She did not remember how she reached her chamber but only the echo of his vow burning her ears. *Fate gave me you. And fate will take you away.* The words clung like a curse.

Sleep never came. Even when she closed her eyes, she felt his grip on her wrist, the tether coiling tight. By morning her pulse had steadied, but her resolve had not. She would bury the memory beneath duty, beneath scents and science, until it faded to nothing.

But duty led her straight into the banquet hall the next night, where goblets gleamed like traps waiting to be sprung.

—

The hall glittered as if famine had never touched Eirden. Chandeliers spilled molten gold across banners and silver plates. Jewels blazed on every wrist. Perfumes clashed in the air, the smell of lilac, amber, rose, so thick she could taste their sweetness. Laughter swelled, too loud, too eager, as though nobles might drown hunger and memory of riots beneath another tide of wine.

Myrren sat low at the table, half-hidden among lesser courtiers. She preferred it that way. Here, scents drifted unchecked, less smothered by incense and glamour. She could read them like ink.

Ori slipped into the seat beside her, eyes wide at the spectacle. “Imagine polishing all those goblets,” she whispered. “You’d need saints and vinegar both.” Her voice was bright, but her knuckles were white around her bread roll.

Myrren tried to smile, but her nose caught something else. Beneath the roasted pheasant and candied fruits lingered something bitter. Earthy. Rooted too deep. She frowned, lifting her goblet. Sweetness clung to the rim, too syrupy, almost cloying. Honeyroot, perhaps. But there was more. A darker undertone. Resinous. Acrid.

Her stomach dropped. A breath of soil dragged from the grave.

*Saints… I know this.*

But her mind resisted naming it, as if silence might undo the truth. Her pulse stumbled. Her breath caught.

On the dais, Thane rose with a practiced smile, golden hair catching candlelight. He lifted his goblet high.

And only then it’s too late that her memory yielded the name.

Valerian.

Sleep’s balm in small drops but death when drowned in wine.

—

The hall roared as he raised the goblet. Courtiers rose, their voices braided in hollow cheer: “To the Crown! To the Light of Eirden!”

“No!” Myrren surged to her feet, the word torn raw from her throat. Too late. He had already swallowed. His throat worked with the swallow, his smile still dazzling as he lowered the cup.

For a heartbeat, the hall froze. Then the color drained from his face.

Thane swayed, catching the table’s edge. His golden smile cracked, turned glass-thin. Ori gasped. Holt’s hand went to his sword, but even his soldier’s instinct could not halt the sudden slackness in his prince’s shoulders.

Myrren was already moving. She shoved past startled courtiers, her satchel clinking at her side. She caught his arm just as his knees buckled, the warmth of him nearly toppling her too. His breath came shallow, lips paling, the faintest blue edging into them.

“Valerian,” she hissed, her voice breaking. “Saints damn them..”

She yanked open her satchel with shaking hands, snatched a vial of vinegar tincture, and pressed it beneath his nose. The acrid bite stung her own eyes. His lashes fluttered.

“Breathe,” she begged. “Stay with me.”

Another vial with rosemary crushed into willow bark. She tipped a drop onto his tongue. He gagged, coughed, breath rasping but air scraped back into his lungs.

Relief shook her knees. She clung to him, forehead near his shoulder. His heat seared through silk and linen. He was too heavy, too real, too close.

Thane’s eyes fluttered open but unfocused, fevered. His hand fumbled for hers, gripping so tight she winced. “Myrren,” he whispered, voice rough, almost broken. “I thought.. I’d never see your face again.”

Her throat closed. Saints, why did he have to look at her like that, as if she were the only thing anchoring him to this world?

“You’ll live,” she muttered, harsher than she meant. Her hand trembled against his arm. “Don’t make me prove it twice.”

He tried to laugh, but it came out a shudder. His head bent closer, his breath ghosting her cheek. “Then stay. Just.. stay.”

The scent of him clung like wine-sweet, fever-sharp, threaded with something rawer. For one terrifying instant, her own heartbeat synced with his, racing to keep him tethered.

A shiver rippled through the hall as the prince sagged against her. Myrren could feel every noble gaze fixed like knives, could smell their fear blooming sharp as vinegar.

“He falters, look at him”

“Is it the poison again?”

“If the prince dies, the throne…”

Whispers cascaded, hushed but insistent, already weighing crowns as if Thane were laid in the grave. Fury lanced through her fear. He was alive. Saints, he was alive. And still they whispered of succession.

Captain Holt moved first. He stepped between Myrren and the crowd, his hand on his sword. His dry voice carried like iron: “Another word and I’ll clear this hall myself. Try me.”

The nobles flinched, perfumes souring with sudden sweat. Yet their whispers sank lower, meaner, like rot under velvet.

Lady Seliora rose gracefully from her place, eyes sharp as glass. “How quick you are to crown corpses,” she murmured, silver gown glittering. “Cousin Thane breathes, and already you trade his name for another.”

Her words drew silence sharper than any blade. No noble dared answer.

Ori pressed close, her hand trembling against Myrren’s sleeve. “Saints, Myrren,” she whispered. “I thought we’d lost him.”

Myrren swallowed hard, unable to speak. She still felt Thane’s grip locked around her wrist, his pulse fluttering weak but steady beneath her fingertips.

The silence that followed was brittle, waiting to snap.

Then Lord Aedric’s voice slithered from the far table. “Convenient, isn’t it? Mistress Vale is always nearest when poison strikes. First to name it, first to cure it. Perhaps because she pours it herself.”

A murmur surged, ugly and eager. Perfumes soured with fear, the air thick with sweat and wine.

“She had the antidotes ready, does that not prove she planned it?”

“A witch’s trick, that’s what it is. No woman names death so swiftly unless she courts it.”

Faces turned. Myrren’s stomach clenched. She could smell the lie forming, could feel it coil around her name until it strangled.

“She saved the prince,” Holt barked. “If not for her—”

“If not for her, cousin Thane would not be poisoned at all,” Aedric cut in, smiling sharp as glass.

Thane stirred weakly, his hand still locked on hers, too heavy to lift. His lips parted as if to defend her, but no sound came. His silence was a blade in itself.

Ori’s grip tightened. “Say something,” she urged. “You have to..”

But Myrren’s voice would not come. Every eye was a dagger. Scents pressed in with fear, envy, and  doubt, drowning her words before she could form them.

A goblet tipped, spilling wine like blood across the floor. The hush deepened, suffocating.

Dozens of eyes fixed on her, lowborn, unarmed, the girl with poison on her tongue.

She felt her pulse hammering against Thane’s grip, her breath ragged. Saints, she had dragged him back from the edge, and still they looked at her as if she had pushed him there.

Then a voice cut through. Low. Cold. Measured.

“In this court,” Lord Corven said from the shadows, “poison moves more freely than bread.”

The words fell like a blade, clean and merciless. Whispers broke again, sharper now, carrying on the sour scent of panic.

Corven’s gaze found hers in the dark and held. His storm-gray eyes lingered as if he weighed the tether of her silence against the pulse of the prince still clinging to her hand.

He stepped closer, close enough that only she could hear. His voice brushed her ear like a shadow.

“Tell me, Myrren. How many times will you risk your life for him, before it becomes your grave?”

Her breath caught, caught between the prince’s golden grip and the shadow’s claim curling like smoke around her throat.