Chapter 19
Sabine
Imust be dreaming.
The past and present crash together in my head like a terrible orchestra with no sense of start or finish. This…this can’t possibly be real. My breath jerks short. For a long, blinding moment, I don’t know where I am. The bedroom, the flickering fire, the shape of our three figures—all of it blurs.
It’s…him.
Rian.
Basten manages to shake off his surprise while I’m still gaping and speechless. Even though Basten is bare-ass naked, he towers over Rian and plants his bare foot heavily on Rian’s chest, pinning him down.
“First of all,” Basten growls, hunching forward to eclipse Rian. “It’s Basten. King Basten. No one has dared to call me Wolf in months. And second of all, fuck you.”
He raises the wine bottle in his hand to smash down on Rian’s head, but Rian throws up his elbows to defend himself. His right arm is charred and weeping blood, the flesh oozing out wisps of smoke.
“Wait, dammit!” Rian cries. “Fuck, just let me explain!”
To his credit, Basten has the presence of mind to pause, the bottle held at the ready, but his rapidly rising and falling chest shows that his patience is strained.
“What’s there to explain? You’ve been hiding in our fireplace for gods-knows how long to kill us as soon as the crowns were on our heads. ”
Rian scoffs, trying to push up to his elbows, but then winces at the pain in his arm.
“This was my bedroom long before it was yours.” His face pales as his wounded arm oozes more blood, but he grits his molars and offers us both a scowl.
“And secondly, kill you? With what, a piece of coal? Do I look like I have a crossbow shoved up my ass?”
Basten actually cranes his neck like there might very well be the backside of an arrow sticking out Rian’s pants.
At Basten’s silence, Rian huffs and twists around to face me. Two dice, carved from bone, roll out of his pocket.
“Sabine!” Rian begs, curled on his back like a helpless, wounded animal. “Songbird, tell him to be reasonable. It’s all a misunderstanding. I thought it was best for you to be where you belonged.”
I nearly laugh.
He can’t be serious.
I bend down to pick up the dice.
Once a cheat, always a cheat, I think. I’m sure they’re weighted, just like his Golath dime was.
I set the dice aside and head to the desk, where I snatch up Basten’s hunting knife in its leather sheath.
“Use this.” Now that I’ve found my voice, it’s ruthless. I toss the knife to Basten over the bed. “It’ll hurt more than that bottle.”
Basten catches it easily and flicks his thumb to pop open the snap to unsheathe it.
Rian’s face pales another shade.
“Wait!” he cries, hands out defensively as he scrambles to slide away from Basten, but he can’t roll onto his side with his damaged arm. “Fuck, Wolf— Basten, I mean— Are you really going to kill a man with your dick out?”
“Sure.” Basten, unbothered, stalks toward him, but in that same instant, Rian’s helpless act vanishes. Of course, it was always an act. There’s never been anything helpless about Rian.
He manages to get his feet underneath him and shoves a knee in the air right into Basten’s exposed groin.
Basten lets an ungodly curse rip as he drops the knife and doubles over, clutching his balls.
Rian rolls onto his left side and pushes to his feet, cradling his right arm to his chest, eyes flashing with that Valvere cunning.
He kicks the knife across the floor, out of Basten’s reach.
While Basten is still doubled over, Rian and I both watch with held breaths to see where the knife stops—next to the map table.
We lock eyes.
I pull in a breath.
“Fuck,” he says.
We both dive for the knife, scrambling across the room, but just as my fingers graze it, he kicks it under the bed. He drops to his knees, cursing at the pain in his burned arm, as he scrambles under the bed.
I reach to grab the knife, too, but Basten is by my side in a second, shaking his head.
“I’ve got this—I owe him a world of hurt.” He grabs Rian’s ankles and jerks him out from under the bed, while Rian twists and kicks like a tantruming toddler. Basten is barefoot but manages to get a solid kick to Rian’s wounded side, and Rian yelps and curls inward.
“You gods-damned rat,” Basten seethes. “We hear that you’ve fought your way nearly to Duren, but you’ve actually been holed up here the whole time? Hiding in your own damn bedroom fireplace?”
“You’re king now…” Rian chokes out, eyes fluttering as he winces. “You’ll see. They give you books of secrets…so many places to hide in the castle…”
Basten snatches him by the back of the collar and drags him to his feet, then throws him against the bed like a knapsack. Rian collides with the edge of the mattress, gagging at the jolt of pain against his wound, but manages to catch himself and stagger to his feet.
I toss my hair back, holding my fists at my side.
“Coward,” I spit, the word flung like a blade.
Rian turns toward me—fluid, practiced, almost theatrical. His eyes drag down the length of me, slow and deliberate, and for a breath I think it’s just more of the same: that same insatiable look he always wore like a second skin. Cunning dressed up as lust.
But no.
This is different.
He isn’t just looking. He’s studying.
Why?” he demands. “Because I stayed? Instead of turning tail and running?”
“The city is burning because of you!” Fury seizes me, and I ball my fists, barely able to hold myself back from snatching up the nearest lantern and smashing it in his face.
Rian’s head tilts, curiosity flickering in his eyes. His gaze darts—quick, precise—to my ears, then my brow. So fast, most wouldn’t notice. But I do.
A spike of panic bolts through me. On impulse, I grab hold of the shell of my ear. Rounded. Human The glamour still holds.
And yet.
“Something’s different about you, songbird.” His voice is light, teasing—but his gaze pins me like an arrow. “Maybe being queen suits you.”
It’s the kind of line meant to disarm. But underneath the jest, there’s calculation. I see the wheels turning behind his eyes.
Gods, he hasn’t dulled an inch. He might even be sharper now. I’m speechless, struck by the powers of his perception. If I didn’t know otherwise, I’d think he was godkissed. That he could see straight to my hidden self.
“Don’t fucking look at her.”
Basten’s voice cracks like thunder, and before I can react, his fist is already halfway to Rian’s face.
Rian ducks with a soldier’s instinct, and then he charges at Basten, ramming his good shoulder into Basten’s bare stomach.
It knocks the breath out of Basten, who staggers back a step before recovering and swiping for Rian, but he slips right by, as wily as ever.
Rian darts toward a heavy brass candlestick, but I track his intention and launch myself onto his back, wrapping my arms around his neck. I slide my arm flush to his throat, pulling as hard as I can to choke him from behind.
“Fuck, songbird.” His strained voice wheezes as he tugs at my hands, trying to pry them off me. “There are better ways to say you missed me.”
Something twists sharp and deep inside me—because damn him, I did. Miss him, I mean. Gods, is that crazy to think? Of course, I didn’t miss the lies or the smirk or the thousand little manipulations. But I longed for some better version of him that might have existed, once.
Because there was a world where we could have been friends. Basten, Rian, and I. Gods, we were so close—right on the edge of something real.
And instead, he chose to play us both like a song.
I hate him for that.
So, I squeeze harder.
He wheels around and slams my back against the wall. Pain rockets through me. Dazed and aching, my limbs go slack. Rian slips out of my grasp, dancing backward to keep some space between us.
He massages his throat, rubbed red from my handprint, and spits out in a rasping voice, “If there’s anyone you should hate, it’s Basten. I gave you to him to protect. I trusted him. He fucking let us both down.”
His words echo hard against the room’s cold edges.
I can feel the energy in the room shift. Basten straightens, going deathly silent. The hair on my arms rise.
Rian, you idiot, I think.
With a cry, Basten hurtles into Rian, driving him backward into the map table. The sharp corner cracks against Rian’s skull with a sickening thud. He shouts, dazed—but still fast. His knee shoots up toward Basten’s groin. Basten twists just in time, catching the blow on his thigh.
Rian’s hand flies to the table. He grabs a pewter tankard and slams it into the side of Basten’s head. It hits with a wet, hollow crack.
Basten collapses face-first to the floor, groaning as blood pours from the gash at his temple.
Rian stands over him, chest heaving, the tankard still clenched in his fist. His hair rises at sharp angles, eyes wide and glassy. His mouth twitches like he’s about to laugh or scream—maybe both.
He looks feral. Half-starved. Completely unhinged.
Well, I understand why. He’s been living in the walls, spying in silence for weeks—it's clearly scrambled something in him.
“I didn’t want to do this, old friend,” he mutters to Basten. “You’re going to end up with a massive headache, but we both know you won’t fucking stay down.”
He starts to bring down the tankard again on Basten’s head.
And my world stops.
Another part of me takes over.
The fey lines on my limbs blister open, spilling silver light across the dark bedroom.
An otherworldly howl climbs out of my throat with enough force to make the chandelier quake.
I feel my human glamour fall away like I’ve clawed through my skin, shed the lining.
My sharpened incisors cut against my tongue.
That’s what we gods are—predators.
Blinding light reflects in the mirrors, forcing Rian to shade his eyes. He’s turned away, ragged breath shaking out of him, but manages to peek between his fingers.
“Oh. Oh. Well—this changes things,” he murmurs in a daze.
I aim my palms toward his boots and blast out a bolt of fey.