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“They’re moving against you.”
“What? Who?!”
“Teo, Dumfries, Gore . . . we have to hide.”
The only name I recognize is Teo’s. “Hide? I will not hide.”
“The deve will not forgive any of us if something happens to you, Rina.” His hand slashes through the air between us, startling me. Bron is not as big as some of the warriors, but he’s certainly bigger than I am.
“Child,” Niri says softly, coming up behind me. “You should listen to him. Teo is not to be trifled with.”
“But what does he want?”
“Most likely your head,” Bron says.
My head jerks back. “Surely not. Like you say, Luka will not forgive.”
Bron checks the hall, his movements jumpy and frantic. “We have no time to argue.”
“Teo would not risk his own life to take mine,” I insist. “So what does he want?”
“At a minimum, he wants a pound of flesh, Rina.”
Niri gasps, but my mind turns.A pound of flesh?“He wants to see me punished?” Maybe this is what’s needed to earn a place for myself here. “And that would appease him?”
Bron’s horror almost has me doubting myself. “No,” he says fiercely as he grabs my arm again and pulls me out into the hall. “Don’t even think it.”
“Bron! Stop. Please. Listen to me.”
“No! You listen to me.” He tugs us to a halt and turns on me. “It won’t work.”
“But if I don’t face them, they will never accept me,” I say, the idea taking root. “Not ever. Even if Luka goes through with the marriage, I’ll forever be waiting for the blade that lands in my back.”
The hesitation bleeding into his countenance is enough to convince me I’m right. “I’ve suffered much in my life, Bron. Almost none of it on my own terms.” Loud male voices sound from downstairs as I go on, “But now I have the chance to choose my fate.”
Boots echoing on the stairs have him losing his nerve. “No, Rina. You are the a’deve. You –”
“But that’s just it, Bron. I’m not. Not yet. This may give me a real chance at it, though. What’s the worst they can do to me?”
“You don’t want the answer to that.” He re-takes my arm, this time hauling me in the other direction, toward the back stairs.
“Bron,” I plead, twisting and turning against his hold, but he’s too strong for me.
“No, you were left in my care.”
He pulls up short as two warriors cut us off at the top of the back stairs. They don’t even hesitate; one of them punches Bron full in the face, laying him out flat, and the other clamps an iron grip around my wrist and yanks the dagger Luka gave me from its sheath at my waist.
“Wait,” I screech as the man starts pulling me down the stairs. “Let me make sure he’s okay.”
“He’s fine,” says the one who hit him. I realize it’s Crion, Bron’s own brother.
“How could y–”
“Shut up,” growls the one dragging me along.
“I’m coming willingly,” I grit out as we arrive at the Great Hall, which is unusually empty. “There’s no need to be harsh.”
“Isn’t there?” Crion sneers. “It’s not like you showed any mercy to my brothers.”
