“Mother?”

I skidded to a halt just shy of a bend in the hedgerows, my skin breaking out in a cold sweat at the sound of that familiar voice. Pressed my arm to my mouth to muffle my ragged breathing, I squatted down making myself as small as possible.

“Roland!” The Queen’s voice was serene and sweet.

“Matilde, no! Matilde!” The Duchesse screamed the warning, but it was too late. A cry of pain cut through my ears, then the rustle of silken skirts and a thud.

Tears streamed down my face, but I knew better than to move. If Roland saw me, I was dead and would be no help to anyone. But if I waited until he was gone, then there was a chance I could save Matilde and Sylvie.

“Cécile?”

I flinched at the Duchesse’s voice.

“There is no chance you stayed where I told you to, so you can come out now. Roland is gone.”

Mustering my courage, I peered around the corner. The Queen lay on her side, silver eyes blank and unseeing, blood pooling on the white stone beneath her. The hilt of a knife stuck out of her chest, the blade embedded in her heart. Without having seen it, I knew she’d reached for her son with open arms, innocent and unsuspecting.

And he’d killed her. Not because of anything she’d done, but to put an end to his father. To take the throne.

My mind was awash with Tristan’s emotion, and I shook my head to clear it as I approached. Sylvie hung limply from her twin’s back, but she was alive. For how long, I could not guess. Touching the knife at my waist, I silently contemplated whether it would be possible to separate the two, and if it was, whether I had the mettle to do it.

“No.”

I jumped at the coldness in her voice.

“Banish the idea from your thoughts,” she said. “Then come and hear me out before I breathe my last.”

I knelt next to her, desperate to find Tristan and get him free of Trollus before Roland found him. We could hide, or find a ship that would take us to the continent. Run and live while everyone else suffers for your mistakes.

“Thibault is dead,” she whispered, and I watched in disbelief as a tear trickled down her cheek.

“You do not know that for sure,” I said, taking her hand. “He’s strong, it’s possible that–”

“No,” she said. “It isn’t.” The air surrounding the hand I held shifted, illusion falling away to reveal blackened bonding marks. “When Thibault and Matilde were bonded, something unexpected happened. We kept it a secret, but the time for that is over.”

“I thought you hated him,” I said. “That you were helping Tristan with his plot to kill his father.”

“I did.” She smiled. “And I was. I’ve hated Thibault since he destroyed our plans over Lessa’s fool of a mother. Fought against his decision to bond my sister and made his life a living hell every day since. But over Tristan, we were united. Allies against enemies who would’ve seen that boy dead a dozen times over and comrades in our efforts to mold him into the man he needed to be.”