I fall silent as their expressions all turn solemn. There’s technically nothing false in my story. But my words are edged with emotion that even these three have to sense. I don’t want to reveal my vulnerabilities before them, but I also need them to lower their guards. To trust me somewhat.

Cyan is the next to speak, his tone a little less flippant and with a bit more reverence.

“So what happened when you got to the Mirror?” he asks, picking up the thread of my earlier tale.

“I never got the chance to reach it,” I lie. Again.

I cannot reveal anything that truly happened in that throne room. I’ve never been able to trust anyone beyond the safety of my family, and that has never changed. “Rion was in Aphelion, and he found me. He overpowered me and then captured me. I passed out and woke up somewhere in the forest. I used my magic to blast them all away, and then I ran, ending up here.”

I take a long sip of my wine. Reliving those events feels like losing Nadir all over again, and it’s everything I can do not to choke on the thick knot of my grief. I’m putting on a great show here, and they can’t know how desperate I am. That would ruin everything.

Everyone is quiet for a few seconds, lost in their thoughts.

“That is quite a story,” Cyan says a few moments later.

“Yes,” I say. It sure is.

His eyebrows pinch together as he bites the inside of his cheek. “Well, then you must stay as my guest for a few days. To recover,” he adds. “And perhaps we can get to know one another. A king and a queen of Ouranos’s realms. You’re practically family.”

His gaze slides to Linden, who growls under her breath.

“I’d like that,” I say, hoping it sounds like I mean it. My plan is to get the fuck out of here as soon as I can, but I’ll have to pretend if I want to find out where the ark is.

He raises a glass and waits for the rest to do the same.

“To new beginnings,” he says and takes a drink.

I follow suit, watching his face, wondering if he believed a single word I just said.

CHAPTER 7

NADIR

THE EVANESCENCE—ZERRA’S PALACE

Everything fucking hurts. I inhale a long, deep breath through my nose as a wave of pain crests into every cell, squeezing my ribs until my bones feel on the verge of collapse.

What’s wrong with me? My eyelids are weighed down, and my limbs feel like they’re filled with lead. Why am I lying on the ground, and why does it feel like stone?

More breaths. In and out. In and out.

In through my nose and out through my mouth.