Page 302 of Burn of the Everflame

“No. He can’t hurt you. But he’ll try.”

Symond’s eyes glinted, curiosity outshining his determination to sulk. He walked forward, and I reluctantly trudged behind. I hated every last part of this.

There was a dark side to Diem’s desire to heal, and this was it.

Unlike the gloomy austerity of the other dungeon cells, this one had been filled with love and light. Hanging lanterns cast a warm glow across plush cushions, thick furs, and rugs that covered the floor. A large bed with piles of pillows had been placed in one corner, and a buffet of pastries and brightly colored sweets had been placed in another.

All of it looked untouched.

Diem was crouched on the floor, the cell’s inhabitant hidden behind her. “Have some water,” she begged. “You have to stay alive if you want to kill us.”

A sound rose that was more dying animal than living human. Symond craned his neck for a better look, and a boy lunged past Diem, swiping a hand at him with a snarl.

“Stuart, no!” Diem cried, catching the boy by the waist and wrestling him back.

I moved to help her, then froze in shock. The boy I’d first met in Sophos, the lanky library clerk whose cheeks once turned pink every time Diem spoke to him, was unrecognizable. His skin was loose and sallow, his hair missing in clumps. His face was covered in bruises and scratches that I suspected came from the guards’ efforts to force food and water down his throat—Diem’s orders. His dead eyes and jerky movements looked like something out of a nightmare, a creature that young children feared might emerge from under their bed.

He looked like a corpse waiting to be buried.

I took Stuart by the collar, pulling him off Diem. He swung his arms at me, clawing at my face, though his mortal nails slid harmlessly across my Descended skin.

“Stuart, calm down,” Diem pleaded. She reached for him, and I gently pushed her away. Stuart would not attack her, but his mindless frenzy could still get her hurt.

“He can’t hear you anymore, my heart.” It killed me to say it, and to feel the pain that rose in her when I did. I looked at Symond. “Ophiucae took his mind. Diem has been trying to find a way to restore it.”

“When I go in his head, everything looks blank,” she said to Symond. “I don’t know how to help him. You’re so experienced—and so powerful. You’re an expert with Umbros magic. Surely you know how to do what I couldn’t.”

Symond’s eyes narrowed. She was trying to flatter him into acquiescing, and he knew it. I just didn’t know if his ego was big enough for it to work.

Diem’s hopeful look made my stomach churn. If he failed, she’d be devastated. If he succeeded, it would mean the thousands of Sophosians she’d killed could have been saved—and that would destroy her in a way I didn’t think she’d ever come back from.

I lifted Stuart up and clamped his arms behind his back, alarmed at how fragile he felt beneath my grip. I’d fantasized once about giving the boy a painful death. I realized, with shame, that I’d gotten my wish.

“He won’t eat or drink unless we force him,” Diem said. “He doesn’t sleep or talk. The only thought left in his head is to kill.”

Symond took Stuart’s face in his hands, palms gripped to his temples, his expression inscrutable. “I see the issue.”

“Can you help him?” Diem asked.

“Yes. He’s trapped in a prison. I can set him free.”

Symond’s gaze rose to me. I felt the scratch of claws inside my mind, and then a vision—a foreign one, placed there by Symond’s magic. A warning . . . and a question.

“Permission, Your Majesty?” he asked.

“Yes,” Diem breathed, a smile beginning to form.

But Symond didn’t act. It wasn’t Diem he was asking.

I should have demurred. It was her call to make, and if she truly understood, she would never agree.

Instead . . . I nodded.

Symond’s hands jerked to the right with a lethal crack, and Stuart went slack.

Diem screamed. She grabbed Stuart from me, sinking to her knees and clutching him against her chest. Tears sprang to her eyes as she stared at his bent neck and unblinking eyes. “What have you done?”

“What you wouldn’t,” Symond snapped. “And if I find the Centenaries that Ophiucae did this to in Umbros, I’ll snap their necks, too, the first chance I get.”