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His grip loosened on Stellan’s chain. “Good.”

I let my shoulders drop. My shaking hands gave Adrian the frightened, obedient woman he expected for the next few seconds.

Stellan watched me cross the dais. His face had gone pale from the pressure on his throat, but his gaze moved from me to the Crown and back again. He didn’t struggle when I stopped below it.

He understood.

Adrian mistook his stillness for defeat. “Place it on your head.”

“Release his throat first.”

“When the Crown accepts you.”

“You want me conscious for this, don’t you? Ease the chain.”

Adrian studied me and must have decided the demand was proof I’d surrendered, because he let one red link loosen.

Stellan dragged in a breath.

Lenora reached the second step.

I raised my hand towards the Crown.

The black metal turned until its open centre faced me. Fine lines covered every point, packed together like scratches from desperate fingers.

Edith had hidden me from this. Stellan had spent a century chained to it, and Adrian had torn Harrowmere apart to possess it.

I didn’t want it, and wanting had stopped mattering when the dagger entered Stellan’s chest.

Cold rolled over my skin before I touched it.

Harrowmere went still as the broken doors stopped shaking. White ward light faded from the walls, and every open passage around the throne room fell dark. Even Adrian’s red commands weakened as the house waited for my hand.

My fingers closed around the Crown.

Pain bit into my palm. The metal felt too heavy for its size, and a hard pulse moved through it against my skin.

A smile returned to Adrian’s face. “Put it on.”

I lifted it above my head.

Stellan’s control broke for a second. Fear hit me through the bond, raw enough to steal my breath. I looked at him until he saw that I was still myself.

Then I lowered the Crown.

I expected it to resist. Instead, the black points opened around my hands and the Crown accepted me.

It began to descend towards my head.

41

STELLAN

The first black point touched Bryony’s hair. Every throne-room light died.

Adrian’s red chains kept me pinned beside the dais. I could hear Bryony breathing above me, fast and shallow, while the Crown lowered another inch.

“Bryony.”