The Warden waved his hand at Bones, who stepped forward and heaved the door open with a grunt of effort. It was made of thick stone and wide enough for a cartload of bodies to be sent directly into the room beyond, just as the hallway they were standing in was large enough to allow for such transport.

A high-pitched buzzing sound started in Kiva’s ears as the Warden stepped into the room and indicated for her to follow. If not for Naari tugging her in, and the three guards that remained in the hallway behind her, Kiva might have considered making a run for it.

I can survive this, Kiva told herself, her inner voice wobbling in the face of what stood before her. And yet she was determined to fight, to live, until the very end. I will survive this.

Tremors racked her frame, but Kiva made herself look around the sizable room she now halted in the center of. Like the door, both the walls and floor were made of thick stone, the exposed surfaces charred by decades of use. Three of the walls were interrupted by sealed metal grates—which Kiva didn’t inspect for long, all too aware of their purpose. The arched stone ceiling tapered high above her head and lifted into the chute that she knew poked out the top of the crematorium as the second chimney. It would soon be smoking, just like the first.

“Ten minutes, Kiva Meridan,” Warden Rooke said, moving back toward the door and jerking his head for Naari to follow. “Let’s see if you can defy fate a second time.”

Kiva wondered if he thought his words were bolstering, but all they did was leave an ashy taste in her mouth, like her body already knew what was coming.

“See you in ten minutes,” Naari said firmly as she unlatched her hand, her amber eyes locked on Kiva’s and alight with forceful emotion, as if she were trying to share all her strength, all her confidence that Kiva would still be alive at the end of those ten minutes.

The moment Naari’s touch was gone, Kiva wanted it back. There was nothing steadying her anymore, nothing keeping her from falling.

“Slow breaths,” Naari whispered too soft for Rooke to hear, with him already waiting by the door. “And stay low.”

Kiva could barely comprehend the guard’s parting instructions, sheer terror rising up and constricting her rib cage.

The amulet, she reminded herself. Trust the amulet.

That was all well and good, but it also meant trusting the princess, when Kiva still despised everything she represented.

The sound of the door sealing shut echoed around the room, and Kiva spun toward it, a surge of panic unleashing within her.

“No! Come back!” she cried in desperation, running to the stone barrier and thumping her hands against it. “Please!”

It didn’t open.