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They trust me.

I am their leader.

This academy will change. I will make it into something worthy, something more than Silas ever could have. And when the time comes, we will bring the royals to their knees.

I move forward at last. As I pass Thalos, I rest a hand on his shoulder, grounding myself in the solid reality of him. I look down at him.

“Thank you.” It’s quiet, but it carries.

Then I keep walking, crossing the living quarters without another word and climbing the stairs to my chamber, the wet squelching of my blood-soaked leathers the only thing breaking the silence. I don’t look back as I go to wash away the remnants of death still clinging to my skin.

Chapter twenty-six

S for C

I strip away my blood-soaked clothes, the stink of that rat still clinging to them, and toss them into the basket outside my door. The Academy laundress will curse me for the stains come morning. By the time the last buckle is unfastened, I feel like myself again. Not the weapon that entered that room, but the ruler who walked out of it.

I lower into the chair behind my desk, draw a sheet of stationary toward me, and dip my feathered quill into its inkwell.

R,

I will follow what you said just this once.

Come see me. We have things to discuss.

— N

The ink glistens as I set the quill aside. I’ll send the letter with the three remaining royals when I release them. I have no quarrel with the king’s pets anymore, not unless they choose to bare their teeth first. Elias paid their debt, as far as I’m concerned. Besides, if any of them belong to Roman and the revolution, then keeping them alive serves us both.

We’ll need every willing heart we can gather if we are to tear a crown from a living bloodline.

My talon nails rest against the edge of the desk, tapping once, twice, as the next thought settles into place. If this alliance is to be real, he needs the truth. Not the slayer, Queen of Magda, but me.

Me.

What I am and the destiny I was made to live out. Sirena’s voice rises from my memory as clearly as if she stands behind me now, her hands playing with my hair, her eyes filled with that terrible knowing, tears rimming her eyes.

Gods, I miss her.

She used to say that fate is a story rather than a sentence. I understood her. I accepted it, even then. Because where I was raised, in that place they called a home, death was never what frightened me.

The ink is just about dry when someone knocks on my door.

“Come in.” The door opens, and Thalos steps inside, closing it behind him. A blade of sunlight cuts through the room and flashes across his glasses as he moves toward the desk and takes the seat across from me. He braces his elbows on his knees and leans forward.

“Thank you,” he says with a sincere dip of his chin.

I fold the letter once, precise, and look up at him. “For what?”

“For taking out the trash.” A faint, sideways smile. A real laugh slips from me before I know what’s happening. Trash, indeed.

“He disrespected me in front of my entire academy,” I reply. “He was dead the moment he chose to draw a blade at me and open his mouth.”

“Yes,” Thalos says, unbothered, “but Korrin was Silas’s dog. He followed him everywhere, did whatever he was told, hurt whoever he was directed to.” His gaze holds mine. “You didn’t just kill a man. You cut the last leash Silas had on this place.”

I don’t necessarily need the reassurance, but it’s still nice hearing it. I’ve wanted Korrin dead since I first met him as a girl in these halls. Even then he looked at people like they were dummies to practice on. I lived in constant fear of the day he’d turn that attention on me.

He was always going to be a problem. Now he isn’t.