“Godsdamnit,” Lucien breathes softly. He tilts his head to shade his missing eye with his bangs, cradling his missing hand with his other. “I didn’t want you to see this.”

“I thought they—they just stopped working.” My voice cracks. “But have you been hiding this? The whole time?” I swallow nails. “Were they always gone?”

The prince won’t look at me, his one eye thin and entirely focused on the far wall.

“Lucien, please,” I beg, reaching for his other hand and bringing it to my unheart. “Please talk to me.”

He swallows too, our throats mirror images, mirror-bruised with the ghosts of lingering kisses, of our love, and he nods slowly.

“Yes. I did the magic. Overdid it. And they just…disappeared. But I knew if you saw that, you’d never tolerate me using magic again.”

“You hid it,” I finish for him. He nods again, a flinch to it this time.

“Illusion spells are difficult. But they’re much easier if you’re filling in the natural gaps of appearance, rather than altering it to something completely different.” He pauses. “It doesn’t take much magical effort, is what I’m saying. So don’t worry.”

“I’m not,” I blurt, and his wounded look turns into a sardonic one for a moment. “Okay. So maybe I am worrying. But gracefully, and with a shit ton of poise.”

“Varia did the same thing,” he continues. “Before she went missing all those years ago, she used a spell to kill her guards and make it look like a Heartless attack. But it was beyond her skill at the time. We found only a few parts: her leg, two index fingers. But when I met her again, she was missing far more fingers. No doubt they’d been—”

“Eaten,” I repeat, pressing down the rising panic. Lucien nods, the sunrise coming through the little window painting his profile in rainbow translucence.

“I felt it. When I met the High Witches. They willingly offer their bodies to be consumed by the Glass Tree. To power it. But if any witch attempts to use a spell beyond their control at the time, the Tree will consume them, too.”

“As punishment?” I ask.

“No.” He shakes his head. “The feeling I got when I used the spells was more like…repayment. Like I owed the Glass Tree something for reaching too far. Like my reaching hurt it, and so it took from me to stem the wound. It felt as if it was making some kind of exact equilibrium.”

“But the Tree of Souls gives you your magic, right?” I say. “Not the Glass Tree. The Glass Tree is only for Heartless. So why would the Glass Tree consume you?”