Page 23 of Revels on an Angel’s Grave

Numbness seeping through her limbs, Emmeline turned from the edge of the podium.

As she made to exit, Rocarri gripped her arm, light enough that no one would think anything of it, but tight enough to halt her. “Might we have a word privately, Emmeline?”

Her gaze flicked down to Rocarri’s grasp, refusing to show an ounce of the fear or annoyance coiled behind her ribs. She certainly had more than a word for the Chancellor, and with how much everyone was already picking her apart, it was best said in private.

“Of course.” She stepped aside, avoiding Alana’s eye. “After you.”

Even when she followed Rocarri to a walkway hidden within the stone arches atop the arena—even with the view of Valyn’s terra-cotta roofs and windings roads now flooded with Starsearchers celebrating beneath open skies—she couldn’t breathe properly. The thread cinched around her chest pulled sharper with every breath.

“You can’t offer me up,” Emmeline said immediately, not willing to exchange pleasantries.

“I’m not giving you away.”

“It sounds like it. I came to Valyn to teach. For a role at the Academy.”

And to find my sister.

“Initially that was the plan. Until the situation in the seeing chamber on Lyra. Now this is the better option—both for your own good and for the Starsearchers’.”

Emmeline bit down on a scoff. “My own good?”

“Someone with your magnitude of power must be protected, Emmeline. That’s all I’m doing.”

Fates, he was so infuriatingly calm when her life—her future and agency—was being given away.

“I fail to see how this is for my protection.”

“These are not simple warriors entering the Races, dear.” That term of endearment—the same one Falliare had so often used toward her—sent her blood pounding in her ears.

Had the Temple Master known? When he sent her here, had Aldryn Falliare known she wasn’t being offered a position at Valyn Temple Academy? That warriors would be fighting to win her hand? One that was already very much given to another, as much as it ever could be to anyone. Fates, even the thought of bonding to someone else shredded through her.

Don’t you understand, you’ve already ruined me? Her own sobs echoed in her ears, her plea for him to kiss her before he was taken.

His lifeless grey eyes haunted her memory. I won’t rest until I get you back.

Roremar’s ring lay against her wrist, cold pressing into her skin. She let that emptiness ebb off the metal and through her own heart.

“I don’t care who they are,” Emmeline argued, stealing confidence from her vow to find Roremar. “You can’t force me to bond to anyone.”

She turned to leave, but Rocarri called after her, “I think you’ll see I can.” Something in his tone made her freeze. A confidence that chilled her bones and had her begging her Fate ties for a way out of this. “If you don’t, Emmeline, I can’t permit you to stay in my capital.”

Emmeline gripped the stone ledge. Crowds sang through the streets, enthusiasm bubbling through the air as they spilled out of taverns and dance halls, all celebrating her imprisonment.

And somewhere out there…

Her sister.

Her nails dug into the stone. If Rocarri didn’t let her stay, would she ever find Addie? Fates, she couldn’t even be certain she was still in Valyn.

Or if she’d even want to be found now that Emmeline’s name had such notoriety to it. Maybe she was living a quiet, peaceful life somewhere. Emmeline finding her would only put her in danger of being used.

But what if Addie wasn’t safe? What if she was in pain, being tortured or used?

After years of searching and waiting to be transferred, Emmeline had to find her, even if it was only to peer through a window and ensure she was all right.

Emmeline inhaled until her lungs were near bursting. If Rocarri needed to believe she agreed to this bonding for now, let him.

Let him think she was helpless. Let him think she needed his protection. She’d decided when she dove into that seeing chamber and gave up everything to save Roremar that she would no longer hide her ferocity.