“As the Starless One. Give me a place in your books. When night comes, let there be one more candle lit for one more Saint. Can you agree to that, merciful queen?” he drawled.

The Darkling seemed almost disinterested, but the demon in Nikolai sensed it was a pose.

“He means it,” Nikolai said in disbelief. “He’s willing to die.”

“It is not death,” said the monk. “Death would be a kindness.”

Genya tilted her head to the side. She was watching the Darkling closely. “But it’s not death you fear, is it? He’s afraid he’ll disappear.”

Nikolai remembered what Genya had said. All the Darkling ever wanted was to be loved by this country. He knew that feeling well. He’d had to face it when he’d stared down his demon. There were few men Ravka loved. Saints were another matter.

“Zoya?” Nikolai asked. The Darkling wanted them to raise an altar in his name, to write his story and his legacy anew, but it was not Nikolai’s choice to make. “Genya?”

Zoya and Genya stood hand in hand, and as they looked at each other, he knew they were remembering every loss they’d endured at this man’s whims. He had seen Zoya’s torment when she’d witnessed the Starless at their worship, when they’d stood on the Fold that had devoured her aunt and cost countless others their lives, praising his name. The woman she’d been in that moment could not have bent to this request.

“Do we let him play the hero?” Zoya asked.

Genya nodded once. “Let him do it. Let our suffering have meant something.”

Zoya stood framed by red blossoms and thorns, a queen who needed no crown. “It will be done.”

The Darkling turned to the monk. “Where do we begin?”

The monk studied them for a while. Then she gestured to the thorn wood, as the monks descended the walls, surrounding the trunk in a sea of red silk, men and women, old and young, Ravkan, Zemeni, Suli, Shu. Even a few flaxen Fjerdan heads.

The Darkling held up his hands. “Unbind me.”

Nikolai and Zoya exchanged a glance. If this was all a ploy, he would make his move now.

“Fan out,” Nikolai said to the Sun Soldiers. “Be ready.”

“As long as I live, the demon will remain inside you,” said the Darkling as Nikolai used a knife to saw through the ropes at his wrists.

“We’ve made our peace.”

“Some treaties do not last.”

“You do love a dire prophecy, don’t you?”

“Zoya will live a very long life,” the Darkling said. “Despite the demon, you may not do the same.”

“Then I will love her from my grave.”

A smile touched the Darkling’s lips. “Brave words. Time may tell a different tale.”

Nikolai almost laughed. “I’m really not going to miss you.”

He sheathed his knife and stepped away.