Her fingers skipped over the laces, tangling them into knots. She could barely piece together a coherent thought. Was she going to be killed? These three men—they were her peers in the Kings Guard. They hadn’t particularly liked her (the feeling was rather mutual) but there certainly wasn’t enough hatred to garner a midnight murder. And they were all sergeants; she outranked them.

“Where are you taking me?”

“You don’t get to ask questions.”

She needed to stall. Her sword and dagger were sheathed across the room. Maybe, if she scrambled over, she could—

“Time’s up.” Hester, the largest of the bunch, revealed a length of rope and bound her arms. Her bootlaces trailed like tripwires under her toes as he yanked her upward, her shoulders jamming into the back of her neck.

“Ow,” she said.

“Sorry,” he murmured. “King’s orders.”

“King’s . . .”

Her mind went panicky-white. The moisture left her mouth so quickly her teeth ached.

“Why does the king—”

“I said no questions!”

She diligently clamped her mouth as her captors dragged her out of the barracks and into the night, holding her just-too-high to walk for herself. Her toes scrambled for purchase on the packed earth of the palace grounds. They reached the hall, where the remnants of dinner lay like untouched murder evidence, then through to dank palace corridors. And farther, to where bare stone shifted to rugs, blank walls to tapestry. Then, an oak door, oiled so recently it reeked of linseed and pine tar. It opened.

Her knees slammed against the floor before her mind had a chance to catch up. Oh, I’ve been shoved.

“You look well,” a familiar voice slurred beside her.

She bit back a gasp. James’s lips puffed like a seedpod ready to burst, a pinkish sap of drool and blood seeping from the corner of his mouth. One of his vibrant green eyes was swollen shut.

“And you,” she whispered, attempting to breathe. He looked at her like he knew what she meant: You’re my best friend. I love you.

She glanced around her new prison. Three thrones sat at the edge of the room—the throne room, apparently, though she had never seen it before. Thick pennants hung from bronze flagpoles jutting from stone walls striped with arched stained glass depicting the major gods. The Mother, god of hearth and home. The Sister, god of poetry and piety. The Brother, god of war and music. The Twice-Buried, god of sex and death. And, behind the thrones, the largest window of them all: The Father, the etheric god that built all on the first day and would destroy all on the last.

It seemed unlikely that any of those gods would come to her aid. The last time she had prayed, it was to The Cheesemonger, god of cheese, and it was on a dare.