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Chapters (64)
  1. Front Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Contents
  6. Pronunciation Guide
  7. Prologue
  8. Part One
  9. One
  10. Two
  11. Three
  12. Four
  13. Five
  14. Six
  15. Seven
  16. Eight
  17. Nine
  18. Ten
  19. Eleven
  20. Twelve
  21. Thirteen
  22. Part Two
  23. Fourteen
  24. Fifteen
  25. Sixteen
  26. Seventeen
  27. Eighteen
  28. Nineteen
  29. Twenty
  30. Twenty-One
  31. Twenty-Two
  32. Twenty-Three
  33. Part Three
  34. Twenty-Four
  35. Twenty-Five
  36. Twenty-Six
  37. Twenty-Seven
  38. Twenty-Eight
  39. Twenty-Nine
  40. Thirty
  41. Thirty-One
  42. Thirty-Two
  43. Thirty-Three
  44. Thirty-Four
  45. Thirty-Five
  46. Part Four
  47. Thirty-Six
  48. Thirty-Seven
  49. Thirty-Eight
  50. Thirty-Nine
  51. Forty
  52. Forty-One
  53. Forty-Two
  54. Forty-Three
  55. Forty-Four
  56. Forty-Five
  57. Forty-Six
  58. Forty-Seven
  59. Epilogue
  60. Excerpt from The Sun and Its Shade
  61. The Night and Its Moon Playlist
  62. Acknowledgments
  63. About the Author
  64. Back Cover

A large, mahogany desk rested at the study’s center. There were ordinary things on it like neat stacks of papers, rows of books, and bottles of ink. Then there were more peculiar oddities: a crystal sphere on what appeared to be the body of a golden snail, a pen with a long, black embellished feather quill, and an ornamental carving of a stag. Some furnishings were enclosed in glass with delicate possessions hidden behind their frosted doors. Shelves were filled with books of various sizes and in various states of decay, a mix of old, leather, dusty things and small, new, bright bindings with jewel-covered backs and scarcely a sign of use.

“Look at this,” Nox said from across the room.

Amaris looked up from where she had been tracing her pale finger along a map of the kingdom, finding Farleigh pinned with a star. The dry, scratchy parchment created a dragging noise beneath her finger as Amaris allowed her nail to trace their place in the world. Farleigh was just up and to the right of the center of the map, sitting before a sprawl of forest that was intercepted by an endless stretch of darkly shaded mountains. The dotted line that separated them from the northern kingdom loomed terribly close. It wouldn’t do them much good to dwell on matters of geography, though.

Amaris stepped away from the map and joined Nox in front of the frosted cabinet doors. Inside, the black velvet head of a mannequin sat with a black-gem-studded silver tiara resting atop.

“Can you imagine Matron Agnes in such a thing?” Amaris asked, voice tinged with amusement.

“I like to think she puts it on after we’ve gone to bed.” Nox giggled.

“Put it on,” Amaris goaded.

“Are you trying to get me in trouble? You’re the little princess—you put it on.”

“Where do you think she got the money for all of these things?” Amaris asked, and Nox felt a small stab that the girl hadn’t yet pieced together the answer. Maybe it was a blessing to still hold on to the scraps of innocence that allowed her to be spared from the harsh realities of their mill. She didn’t want to be the one to shatter Amaris’s world.

Nox shook her head, as she did whenever she couldn’t find the right words for what needed to be said. She angled her body to signal that their time playing with forbidden treasures had come to an end.

Amaris sighed. “Where does she want me to go this time?”