Her sisters waited until the door latched. Then Akeylah and Zofi hurried over, one on each side of the bed.

“What did you see?” Akeylah whispered. “Was it another vision?”

Ren closed her eyes. Behind her eyelids, the terrible hallucination awaited. Ships aflame, bodies broken across the waves of the bay. “I couldn’t move,” Ren said, avoiding the question. She couldn’t talk about it all. About what she did. About the terrible secret she carried like a tumor inside. Burnt Bay, a rebel attack in which thousands of Kolonyan soldiers died… It was her fault. “My limbs, my whole body, got so heavy I sank to the bottom of the baths. Even once I realized what was happening, I couldn’t move. The force was so real, so strong.…”

“It’s escalating,” Zofi said, fists balled. “First letters, then hallucinations, now this. What next? Will this blackmailer curse us, plant poison in our veins? Or just push us off a tower like Yasmin.”

“You said something to me,” Akeylah murmured. “After the baths, before you lost consciousness again. You said, ‘The true heir is coming.’”

A chill trickled down Ren’s spine. She felt hairs rise along her arms, at the nape of her neck. “That’s what they called themself. As I was drowning, the blackmailer spoke in my mind. ‘It’s time for the true heir to rise.’”

“What does that mean?” Zofi interrupted.

Ren looked from her to Akeylah. “What we already guessed. Whoever’s doing this to us, they want the throne. They believe it belongs to them, and they’ll do whatever it takes to get us out of the way. Even kill us.”

“We need to protect ourselves.” Zofi’s fingertips danced around the knife she wore at her waist.

“We’ll likely have a couple of days.” Akeylah tugged on one of her thin Eastern-style plaits. “The heir must be spent after using the Vulgar Arts twice in a row.”

“Twice?” Ren’s tone sharpened.

Akeylah hesitated. Cleared her throat. “I had a vision, too. Not long before yours, Ren.”

Ren sat forward, then winced at a pinch in her rib cage. She sank back against the pillows. “What did you see?”

Her sister paused again. Ren could sympathize. She didn’t exactly want to share the details of her own experience either. “A figure from my past,” Akeylah finally said. Then, to Ren’s surprise, she added, “My stepfather. He… he’s not a nice person. To put it mildly.” From the way her normally calm sister wound a plait tighter and tighter around one fingertip, Ren guessed that was a vast understatement. “The heir used him to threaten me. They said, ‘Understand what I do to my enemies. You’re one of them now.’” Akeylah swallowed audibly. “And then…” She straightened, seemed to recall something. “They showed me a book.”