Chapter 2

Elara's POV

The poison tea incident bought me exactly three days of peace.

Then Kael found a workaround.

"Miss Thorne." The head housekeeper planted herself in front of me, dead-eyed, holding a bowl of something that looked like it had been drained directly from a crime scene. "Griffin heart blood. Fresh. His Majesty says you finish every drop."

I was flat on my back on the velvet couch, staring at the ceiling, genuinely reconsidering my life choices.

"Is the griffin still alive?"

"Miss Thorne."

"I'm asking for the griffin. Not for me."

This is not a royal palace. This is a high-end breeding facility with better curtains.

I sat up. Took the bowl. The blood was warm. It moved when I tilted it.

I pinched my nose, closed my eyes, and was about three seconds from getting it over with — when the doors flew open hard enough to bounce off the wall.

Blonde. Silk gown. Enough perfume to strip paint. She walked in like the floor owed her money.

Seraphina. Duchess of Aldenmoor. The woman who'd been groomed since birth to sit on the throne I was currently, accidentally, keeping warm.

"So this is her." She sneered. "The rumors undersold it."

"Lady Seraphina, you can't—" the housekeeper started.

"Leave." Seraphina didn't even look at her. Just pointed at the door.

The housekeeper left. I made a mental note to feel bad about that later.

Seraphina stopped in front of me and looked me up and down. Slowly.

"Common blood. Common face. You probably can't even hold a fork right." She crossed her arms. "And they want you carrying the King's heir."

I looked at her.

Then at the bowl of griffin blood in my hands.

I set it down. Picked up the bowl of garlic soup that came with it — still bubbling, fragrant, honestly the best thing I'd smelled all week.

"You know what, you make a solid point," I said.

She blinked. "Excuse me?"

"You're right. This whole thing has been a disaster since day one." I blew on a spoonful. "My father checked the wrong box on a form. I don't even want to be here. So how about you put in a word with Kael — his Majesty, sorry — get me released, and I'll take whatever I'm owed for the week and disappear. Deal?"

Seraphina stared at me like I'd just started speaking another language.

"You're not scared of me," she said slowly.

"A little. But this soup is really good, and it's hard to feel pure terror while something tastes this good."

Her face did something complicated. She'd rehearsed a whole speech and I'd just eaten it.

"You think this is funny?" Her voice went up half an octave. "You think you're clever?"

"Not especially. Just tired."

"You have no idea who you're dealing with." She leaned in, quiet and ugly. "You will not last in this palace. I promise you that."

"Okay," I said.

She waited for more. I didn't have more. I had garlic soup.

Her jaw tightened. And that's when I noticed her hand drift toward her sleeve — something slim and pale sliding out along her wrist, almost like a trick of the light.

I didn't clock it as a snake. Not right away. I was busy with the soup, which — full disclosure — was a little too hot.

I shifted my feet under the table.

Hit something slick.

Who put butter on a marble floor—

I went backward. Chair tipped. Arms out. The whole bowl of soup left my hands in one long, beautiful, boiling arc.

"SSSSSS—!"

Not me. Something low to the ground. High-pitched and wet and horrible.

I caught myself on the table edge and looked down.

Right by my ankle — inches from my ankle — a snake was flickering into view, going from invisible to very visible, thrashing on the carpet with garlic soup running off its scales. Small. Pale. The kind of pale that means rare, expensive, and extremely fatal. Shadow viper. I knew the name because a guard had mentioned it last month in the tone men use for things they never want to meet.

Three seconds to kill you, they said.

It convulsed twice.

Then it went stiff as a breadstick.

Dead.

The room got so quiet I could hear soup dripping off the table leg.

Seraphina's face had gone gray. She was staring at her own snake — the thing she'd paid God-knows-what for, the thing that was invisible and perfect and foolproof — lying rigid on the carpet because of butter and soup.

I was still holding the spoon.

"Huh," I said.

The doors opened again.

Kael walked in. He took in the room in about a second. Seraphina, white-faced. Me, spoon in hand. The dead snake, still faintly steaming.

"Shadow viper," he said.

"Your Majesty, I can explain—"

"You brought a shadow viper into my bedchamber." He walked toward her. She took a step back for every step he took forward. "Banned in every province. Possession is a capital offense."

"She doesn't belong here, you have to understand—"

"Get her out of my castle." He said it to the air. Two guards appeared in the doorway. "Her estates are locked down until I say otherwise. She doesn't come back to the capital."

"Kael — Your Majesty — please, just listen to me—"

They dragged her out. Her voice got smaller and then it was gone.

The door shut.

Kael turned and crossed to me. I was still on the floor next to my tipped chair, spoon in hand, soup on my sleeve.

He crouched down, which surprised me. Grabbed my face in both hands and turned it side to side, checking — actually checking — for bite marks.

"Did it touch you?"

"No."

"You're sure."

"I'm sure." I pulled back. "It died before it got there."

He let go and stood. Looked at the snake. Then me. Then the soup-stained floor.

"You killed it with soup."

"I slipped on butter. The soup did the rest." I paused. "Technically the butter killed it."

Something moved across his face.

"Listen to me." His voice went flat and clipped, back to business. "Someone in this palace just tried to kill you. That's twice in one week. So until I find out who's behind it, you don't go anywhere alone. You don't eat anything that hasn't been tested. You don't—"

"You don't need to babysit me."

"You almost died."

"I didn't, though." I looked at the snake. "That's the whole point. I really, really didn't."

He stared at me.

"This is what I was trying to tell you," I said. "In the throne room. When you weren't listening." I held up one finger. "F-O-R-T-U-N-A-T-E. You keep dropping me into life-or-death situations, and I keep not dying. That's not coincidence. That's a specialty."

A long pause.

"You're saying your luck killed that snake."

"I'm saying my luck, some butter, and a well-seasoned soup killed that snake. Yes."

He looked at me for a long moment. Whatever he was thinking was locked behind that face like a vault.

He turned and walked to the door.

"Don't leave the suite," he said, without turning around.

"Are you going to start believing me, or—"

The door closed.

I rolled my eyes so hard it almost hurt.

Someday he'll figure out I'm not what he thinks I am.

Ideally before someone tries to kill me a third time.