Every style imaginable is painted onto these canvases, but they all have a forlorn quality that breathes into the air, sour and cold and shattering my senses.

Why would someone curate so much despair?

Or is pain the only thing humans can create?

I’m staring at a painting of a child falling from the stars and into the arms of a waiting goblin when I sense someone moving nearby.

I turn suddenly, and he emerges from the shadows like a creature from a twisted fairy tale.

Like a creature of death.

Eyes burning gold and wearing a quilted burgundy vest stitched with a black emblem of a two-headed wyvern, the Prince of War flashes his teeth.

The smile of a predator, with eyes fixed only on me.

20

I MAINTAIN THE KIND OF composure I imagine Naoko to have—indifferent but respectful. At least to those who deserve it.

Prince Ettore’s smile drips with self-satisfaction. “Are you here for the paintings, or are you as bored to tears by the crowd as I am?”

I try to keep my voice even. “I seem to have wandered in here by mistake.” I dip into a curtsy, lowering my gaze to the floor as I’ve rehearsed so many times. When I rise, I find his eyes flicking back and forth like they’re searching for secrets in mine.

“Don’t feel like you have to lie on my account. The party is dull,” he counters, a slender finger brushing against his dark brow. “And that’s being generous.”

I want to ask why he isn’t in his own court, hosting the Dawn Festival in War, but every inch of my skin has gone cold.

Ettore stares at one of the pieces nearby—an intricate oil painting of a feathered creature perched at the roof of a farmhouse, watching a group of children play in a field of yellow hay. There’s tension in his brow as he wrestles with his thoughts.

The music echoes through the corridor, the lively orchestra tempting a roomful of Residents into a synchronized dance.

I should return to the crowd. It was silly to wander so far from the main hall.

Alone, I’m a target.

“Humans are such fragile things,” Ettore muses, eyes pinned to the cascades of brushstrokes. “They have the ability to be strong—to resist—and yet so few do. Most would rather fixate on their own despair. It makes you wonder, doesn’t it, why we bother trying to be so much like them?”

I stare at the painting in silence. One wrong glance could give me away.

“We took their consciousness, gave them peace, and yet…” Ettore waves a hand at the painting. “Their weakness pours out of them, even in their art. It’s almost like somewhere, deep down, they’re still aware.”

“Aware?” I repeat too quickly. Annika never mentioned the possibility that humans who’ve taken the pill could still be partially conscious.