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“No, no! I was tidying them away, it’s what I do. I tidy, and I saw… I saw the words.”
“What words?” I clamped my hand around his neck.Choke him,a voice said, a voice so like Razak’s that he could be behind me, leaning over my shoulder.Choke him, he’ll like it. They always do.My fingers crushed tighter, as though through a force of their own.
“The crown,” he wheezed.
“The crown what?”
“Umair…”
This was getting tiresome. “Umair what? Explain!”Choke him harder.
“He took it!” He clawed at my grip, face flushed, eyes weeping. “The king took it! In the letters… says he took it with him.”
Umair had been absent for years, almost a decade. He had vanished not long after he’d forced me to watch him murder my mother. If he’d taken the crown with him, it could be anywhere.
But Razak knew where it was.
He wouldn’t be doing all this now if he didn’t know exactly where Pain’s crown was and how to get his hands on it.
One thing was clear, the crown was not in the vault.
Panic made the nausea swirl, but I still gripped the apprentice’s neck, still crushed him in my fingers, his life mine.
“Took it with himwhere?” I snarled.
“To Justice, to find the key! It says—in the letters— The letters were open,and Ididn’tmeantoreadthem!”
Justice? The threads always returned to Justice.
Razak had said Justice knew about the crowns, the key, and they’d kept the knowledge a secret. And now Umair had taken Pain’s crown there ten years ago.
The King of Pain hadn’t been seen since.
Was Umair dead or imprisoned?
The apprentice thumped at my arm, then gripped it and clung on, like a drowning man. I didn’t want him dead, I didn’t want to hurt him, yet that voice in my head—choke him, make him see death, make him beg for it.
I tore my grip free and backed away.
No, this wasn’t me, I didn’t want this.Razak, it was Razak. In my head, my life.
I was him, but not. And I was losing my fucking mind! I laughed. It didn’t matter. The crown wasn’t here.Our father had taken it. Perhaps Razak had a personal reason to kill Justice Ines? Did Justice have the Court of Pain’s crown? Was that their secret?
I whirled back on the wheezing apprentice. “Why Justice?” I asked. “Why did Umair take the crown there?”
He flinched and clung to the glass case, afraid ofme.“He believed Justice guards a power.”
“A god’s power, Dallin’s power?”
He nodded and rubbed his neck. “But… forgive me, you know all this.”
I did?I did.Razak knew. “Of course.” I straightened my clothes and hair, realigning my lies.
The Crown of Justice wasn’t the only crown in their court. I hadn’t failed, not yet. There was still a chance, but not here… Not in the Court of Pain.
The apprentice dropped to one knee and bowed his head. “Forgive me. I accept whatever punishment you deem appropriate. Hurt me, it’s all I deserve.”
“Hurt you?” I didn’t have time for this. The crown wasn’t here. We had to abort the plan and flee Pain before its bars closed around us. I turned on my heel. “Ten lashes of the whip should suffice.”
