I tried to go after him, but Marc stepped into my path. “Let him go.” He nodded once at Victoria, and she swiftly departed. “She’ll calm him down.”

“How many people will have to die before he realizes he’s making a mistake?” I asked, rubbing a hand across my face. It came away coated in gold glitter – remnants of my costume from a performance that seemed a lifetime ago.

Marc caught hold of my elbow and led me over to the table. “Sit.” To Sabine, he said, “She needs to eat something – can you arrange for that?”

She didn’t answer, but her shoes made soft little thuds as she crossed the room. Marc sat next to me, and though he was silent, his presence was as much a comfort as it had always been.

“It is hard for any of us to imagine Thibault as an ally,” he eventually said. “But for Tristan…”

“I understand that.” I rested both elbows on the table. “I hate him, too. He’s hurt me. Hurt those I care about.”

“Do you understand?”

I lifted my head, surprised.

“I do not wish to marginalize the harm Thibault has caused you,” he said, gloved finger tracing a knot in the wood of the table. “But you’ve been under his thumb for a matter of months, whereas we’ve been there our entire lives, Tristan especially. Almost his entire life has been predicated upon the belief that his father is the enemy – the man he needed to defeat at whatever cost. To set that aside – even if it is the correct choice – is no small thing.”

“Do you think it’s the correct choice?” I asked.

Marc leaned back in his chair, troll-light moving with him so that his face remained in shadows, and from the corner of my eye, I saw Sabine standing at the door, expression intent. “I think it would certainly be the swiftest and surest way to put a stop to Angoulême, Roland, and their followers. That in the short term, it would mean less loss of life. And,” he held up a hand to forestall my interjection, “that is worth something. But it would come at a cost.”

I chewed on my thumbnail. “Because it would put the King back in control?”