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feel my hands to make them release the heavy wood. I couldn’t feel…anything.
    A topical anesthetic saturated my skin, making it glisten in the morning light streaming in from the stained-glass windows. The herbal drink Emma had given me upon waking made my mind run in wider, looser circles.
    “How are you holding up?” Emma padded softly into the room wearing a white silk robe tied with a sash around her waist. Her feet were as bare as my body. A bun tamed her riotous curls, pulling her eyes up towards her hairline and lending them an exotic slant.
    “Goomph.” Dry and thick, my tongue rolled the word around, failing to get it out on the first try. “Good, I’m…good.” As well as could be expected, all things considered.
    “Are you ready?” Her words were mumbled around the thumbnail caught between her teeth.
    “It won’t hurt,” I slurred. “Harper promised it wouldn’t hurt.”
    His desperation to make good on that promise had resulted in an extra hour, an extra application of the thick, gelatinous goo used to numb the topmost layers of my skin.
    Through the haze fogging my mind, I looked again at the crisp, white silk robe Emma wore. It should have been slicked to her skin instead of floating just above it. Dread pooled low in my belly. “Why haven’t you been prepared?”
    She wouldn’t look at me. “As a testament of my devotion to you, I’m to go through the ritual without aid.” Her voice hardened. “Father insisted.”
    The bottom dropped out of my queasy stomach. “No, you can’t go through with this.”
    “I have no choice.” Her chin jerked up another notch. “I will prove he cannot break me.”
    “You don’t have to prove anything. You have me, vinda larsh , and I won’t allow you to suffer needlessly.”
    “No, vinda koosh , you are the one who has me. I’ve been in your service since the day you were born.” She laughed bitterly. Then her attention settled where I grasped the mirror’s frame. “What’s that in your hand?”
    I glanced down, having forgotten I still held a missive now pasted to my skin. “This arrived shortly after you left.” I passed over the limp document bearing the royal consort’s black wax seal. “I assume to give me time to come to terms with the contents before facing you. Archer must have known you would try and talk me out of it.”
    Emma scanned the document with a downward sweep of her eyes. “Zaniah be merciful,” she whispered. “You can’t mean to go through with this.”
    “If I don’t, then you and Harper will be taken.” I faked interest in my ink-smudged fingertips. “Archer assured me of that.”
    The paper edges tore where her fingers punched through parchment. “He can’t do this.” She crushed the note in her hand. “He won’t force this on you, you can’t allow it.” She stared at the paper like she would a serpent poised to strike before hurling it across the room.
    “If I don’t agree,” I said, “then he will take Harper to the outlands and leave him there to work the silver mines until he dies. Can you imagine what that would do to him? Being trapped underground and never seeing the sky? Never using his wings?”
    Her jaw twitched. I could almost hear the grinding of her molars, but she let me speak.
    “And you? Sold into service as a courtesan? You are his daughter and he would offer you to the First Court vultures or the highest bidder.” I regained my balance and stared her down. “He will not have either of you. Not if I can stop him.”
    She grabbed my shoulders and shook with enough force to rock me back on my heels. “Did you not see the price? He wants you to claim him. An ascendant has first choice of any male the night of her ascendancy. If you choose him, the queen will have to abide by your decision.” Her hands dropped. “We aren’t worth it. Nothing is worth enduring that.”
    I cupped her face with my hands, smoothing my thumbs over her cheeks and down her neck. Little of her skin was