Evander emerges from his hands, and when he looks at me, it’s with a grief I haven’t witnessed since Jerad’s death.

Jerad’s death that he takes responsibility for.

Just like he takes responsibility for this.

“It was a long time ago,” I say, and though it’s not a lie, it feels interchangeable with one on my tongue.

Evander shakes his head in disbelief. “You always seemed so…so happy. I was so worried about you after your father passed, but then you showed up in the palace foyer with that bright grin on your face, and I just thought…”

I squirm on the bed.

“I thought I’d never seen someone grieve and come out the other side looking like that.”

I don’t have the heart to tell him that the smile was for him, so he wouldn’t have to bear my pain.

I don’t think I have to tell him. The way he looks at me, I know it dawns on him.

He tries to hide it, but there’s no concealing the flicker of realization in his sea-green eyes. No hiding the dots beginning to connect.

I’ve known Evander for too long not to know what he’s thinking.

This man, the father of my child, was the one who messed me up. Who put it into my head that a relationship that should have been innocent, platonic, could naturally become something more.

I watch him realize that the day I returned to the palace, the way I’d thought of Evander had changed, been altered irrevocably.

He says none of this, of course, because he’s too kind to, but it feels like a shard of bone being thrust through my heart anyway.

I feel naked. Like Evander’s sea-green eyes are focusing on the messed up parts of me for the very first time.

He might as well be crammed in that pantry with me and Derek for how exposed I feel.

“I want to help,” he says, “in any way I can. I know that probably doesn’t seem like much.”

I fight back tears and shake my head, touched even as shame and mortification wash over me. “The fact that you want to is enough,” I say, though as the words come out, I consider them. Evander possesses power in Dwellen. I don’t know whether he’d be able to help me get Nox back, but it certainly doesn’t seem out of the realm of possibilities. The words are on the tip of my tongue, my plea for Evander to help me save the male I love, when Evander shakes his head and says, “I should have asked more questions that day in Ellie’s workshop. I should have known something else was going on.”

The comment is innocuous on its own, in line with everything else Evander has said, but there’s something about it that punctures the hope ballooning in my chest.

“You did what you had to do. You treated me like an adult. Like I’m responsible for my own actions, which I am,” I remind him.

Evander shakes his head. “I know. But I didn’t know—”

“That there was a predator informing my every action?” I snap. “That my poor little brain got stunted by what he did to me, by what Clarissa did to me, and now there’s only so much that can be expected of me?” I don’t know why the words come out so jagged, so harsh, because I know even as I’m saying them that they aren’t fair. Evander is trying to be kind, and I’m rearing up like a snake backed into a corner.

Evander’s eyes go wide, and he clamps his mouth shut, though more in discernment than anger.

“I’m sorry,” he says, though he shouldn’t.

“Me too,” I say, my throat aching. “I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”

Evander shrugs it off and smiles. “I’ve known you long enough to recognize when you need some sleep.”

I let out a wisp of a laugh, and the smile that nudges Evander’s lips is strained. “Blaise, if there’s anything else—anything at all—you don’t have to talk to me about it, but Ellie’s your friend too, you know. You can talk to either of us.”

“I know,” I say, my throat tight, but it’s not the truth. Because as much as I want to tell Evander about Nox, I can’t help the unease that knocks on the back of my mind.

It’s the dread lingering in the corners of my consciousness; now that Evander knows about Derek, all he’ll hear when I tell him about Nox is that I’ve fallen for my captor, for the male who tortured me.

That once again, I’ve fallen for a male, simply because he paid me a sliver of attention.

And I can’t bear for Evander to see me that way.

So I let Evander leave without a single mention of Nox.

When he shuts the door behind him, I figure it’s for the best.

For the rest of the day, I pretend to sleep.

But really, I just simmer.

CHAPTER 54

BLAISE

It is a good thing that Ellie and Evander both are deep sleepers, even on the pallet they’ve made at the foot of the bed, because it allows me to sneak out of Evander’s quarters once night falls.

I know my way through the palace well enough, so that isn’t an issue.

I’ve snuck out of this place so many times, the occasions couldn’t be counted by the flecks of sand I could hold in my palm.

So I do, and with my hood I swiped from the servants’ closet drawn, I slip into the night.

With a lie on my tongue and murder in my heart, I make my way back to Mystral under the cover of night.

When I reach the border of Dwellen and Mystral, marked by a stone slab engraved with the names of the kingdoms on each’s respective side, I don’t hesitate to pass over.

For a moment, I wonder if my bargain with Abra will set in, if it will seal up my throat and leave me wallowing for air.

But nothing happens.

Because I’m not breaking my vow.

I’m not returning for Nox.

I’m returning for Farin.

CHAPTER 55

BLAISE