Finally, Roa saw her.
Lirabel.
She’d pulled her Relinquishing mask down, just for a moment, allowing Roa to identify her.
Lirabel was fighting to get to her. Roa could have dug in her heels. Could have made it difficult for them to keep dragging her—at least until Lirabel caught up.
But then Rebekah would take Lirabel, too. Roa couldn’t let that happen. She’d promised to keep her friend safe.
Suddenly, the crush of the crowd overwhelmed them, and Roa lost sight of Lirabel. Her handlers dragged her onward, bruising her as their fingers drove into her arms. The moment they entered the public square, Roa saw the chopping block, its surface hacked with the sentences it had carried out. The wood was stained brown with blood.
Her stomach twisted at the sight of it.
Rebekah wouldn’t...
She couldn’t...
Beside it stood the broad-shouldered and brawny executioner. Both his hands gripped the hilt of the biggest, heaviest sword Roa had ever seen.
Her blood ran cold.
Rebekah’s men formed a ring around the chopping block, keeping the crowd at bay. One of her men grabbed Roa’s shoulders, forcing her to her knees so hard, the pain made her gasp.
The rope tying her wrists bit into her skin. Her gag cut into the corners of her mouth. Roa cast her gaze over the sea of masked faces, looking for one face more than any other...
Where are you, Essie? I need you.
“Tonight we put a traitor on trial!” Rebekah called to the crowd, her face glowing in the firelight.
Roa—who was losing feeling in her bound hands—looked up over the buildings and the city walls. A pale waxing moon hung over the Rift mountains beyond the temple walls, and the sky was lightening in the east.
“For sabotaging the safety of our city...”
Roa looked away from the sky, to the torches burning in the hands of the perplexed crowd. Like beacons of light.
“For plotting the death of the king...”
A movement in the square caught her eye. One person shoved forward, fighting their way through a crowd that didn’t know who to side with—their outlander queen, or the king’s councillors.
“We find Roa of the House of Song—”
“Let her go, Rebekah.”
Roa straightened, trying to see.
Just beyond the ring of men, the king himself pulled off his mask and dropped it at his feet. A storm of murmurs rose up from the crowd.
Dax,she thought, her heart twisting.You’ve played right into her hands.
The murmurs were getting louder and angrier now. At first it seemed to Roa that Dax had lost them completely by coming to his traitorous queen’s defense. Except... no.
More and more people stepped up to the king, in order to standwithhim. The fury of Firgaard was turned not on Dax or even Roa, but on the woman who’d dragged their queen through the square and declared her a traitor, when the king was clearly safe.
The people of Firgaard were on Dax and Roa’s side.
The king was here. The tide was turning. Rebekah had lost. And yet, she didn’t seem concerned.
“As you wish.” Rebekah bowed her head slightly to Dax, then made her way to where Roa knelt. Roa felt the cold steel of a blade slide between her wrists as Rebekah sawed through the ropes.
