Deep lines furrowed around Graysen's features as a shudder of agony rolled through his battered body. Sage nudged his wet nose into Graysen's chest, huffing and loosening a whine. Though he wagged his tail, it hung low with worry.

Straw crunched beneath my bare feet as I padded around Graysen's kneeling figure, the willwips shooting away in bright, scattering clouds and the Birds of Prey casting curious glances as they prowled about, guarding the entrance to the rookery.

The deep bruise on Graysen's cheek was beginning to fade. Fat droplets of sweat speckled his skin, trickling over the curves and dips of his powerful torso. My fingers trembled as I tentatively touched his blood-splattered shoulder. The muscles twitched at the barest touch.

Oh gods, his back, his beautiful back. It was a gelatinous mess of ruined flesh, charred in crisp lines from the fiery heat of the whip. There would be more scars on scars. But this time there was no way that I'd allow his cruel aunt to make him keep them. No fucking way.

He glanced up, his hands still buried in my wraith-wolf's misty fur. "They'll heal," he told me, his voice raw and hoarse.

Leaning in with my senses, I heard a soft sticky noise as the raw wounds began to knit back together. I offered him a hand and he slipped his into mine. I helped him rise to his feet and guided him to a shallow seat set into the wall, more a stone bed, I realized, than actual seating. He winced as he sat down, spreading his legs wide so I could stand between his thighs to face him. He tilted his head, his expression softening as I brushed my fingers through the hanks of hair hanging over his forehead, sweeping them back. "You shouldn't have done it," I breathed, still trying to wrap my mind around the brutality of what he'd endured.

Graysen scowled, anger hardening his supple mouth. "And allow you to take the punishment? Never." A heartbeat later, the anger faded from his expression, replaced by a notch of confusion between his eyebrows. He sounded lost when he murmured, "I haven't seen her like this, not in a long, long time."

The onset of more tears tickled my nose and my bottom lip wobbled. "It was me. I pushed her too far. I destroyed your mother's portrait, the one hanging in the gallery with her holding the basket of white roses."

Graysen craned his neck back to stare up at the high innards of the rookery, blowing out a deep breath that vibrated on a groan. He straightened his head, the damp locks of hair swayed he shook his head, trying to work out a way to explain it all. He lifted a helpless hand. "My aunt... She's an artist, and she was the one who painted the portrait. She finished it the day my mother was stolen. It was the reason why she didn't join my mother on her visit to the city, she wanted to finish the piece before my mother's return." He dropped his gaze to his thighs as he rubbed his hands up and down the fish-scaled adamere. "We'd planned a family dinner to celebrate the grand unveiling." His voice was rough and uneven when he added quietly, "It's the last painting we have of my mother. My aunt couldn't bring herself to even pick up a paintbrush after that. The portrait means, meant, a lot to her... To us all."

Deep shame, like cold, heavy chains spiked with ruthless barbs, coiled around my spiteful heart, tightening hard. Hot tears scorched a path down my cheeks as I collapsed to my knees on a wail.

"Nelle." Alarm tainted Graysen's voice, and he reached for me, his fingers curling around my waist. He pulled me onto his lap, cradling me tenderly, his body heat warming me as I curled into his chest, my teardrops splashing between us. His hand, the knuckles scuffed and bloody, ran a soothing touch up along my side to cup my cheek, angling my face to meet his. "Don't... Not for her, not for what she's done," he urged, brushing the tears from beneath my eyes as I shuddered, sobbing loud and ugly. "It doesn't excuse what she did, Nelle. Doesn't justify it. I just...I get why she reacted the way she did."

I understood. But the shame I felt wasn't for Valarie, it was for what I'd done to the portrait, to Tabitha, my unjust fury at seeing the image of her hanging on the wall in the Crowthers' ancestral gallery. It was petty to have placed the blame on Tabitha and taken my rage out on her portrait. Tabitha had done nothing wrong. She'd tried to save me, and instead, she'd been stolen by the Horned Gods in my place. It was the last image Graysen's family—his father and siblings—had of their mother, and I'd destroyed it.

Buried amongst the shame was remorse too.

I'd purposely not told Graysen everything that had happened at the Emporium. I'd only shared the first half of the evening so that he wouldn't be able to detect an untruth. I'd intentionally twisted him into attacking his brothers because I wanted retribution.

He'd fought and beaten the Warband, men and women he'd battled alongside for years, and were long-life friends.

Throat punched Kenton.

Shattered Caidan's arm and knocked him unconscious.

He'd gutted Jett and broken his spine.

I'd been caught up in vile, hateful wrath and wanted payback on them through Graysen. He would have done far worse if he hadn't been contained by cursed weaponry. I had to tell him the truth. I sniffled, meeting his anxious gaze. "I wasn't completely honest when I told you about the Emporium."

Fear crossed his expression and his complexion grew sallow. The cords in his throat tightened with worry. "Did someone force themselves on you?"

"No," I quickly reassured him, the ends of my loose hair sweeping around my neck as I shook my head.

Unease remained in the tense posture of his body, but he tipped his head to the side, patiently waiting for me to elaborate. I chewed on my lip, hesitating, but I needed to forge on. "I only told you part of the story, not all of it, not the truth. The threat of selling me to the Emporium was a ploy. Your brothers never intended to auction me off. They were never going to go through with it and had set up the bidding so that one of your men, your gardener, Oswin, would win."

Graysen frowned. "Oswin?"

I scrunched my nose as I hitched a shoulder. "He kind of gave himself away. Every time I saw him in the crowd at the Emporium, he looked green, like he was on the verge of throwing up. I think being part of the scheme, actually made him sick."

"Gods," Graysen muttered, dragging a hand through his hair, the locks ruffling as they sprung free. He scowled. "It was a fucking vile deception." But there was relief beneath his bitter tone that relaxed the tightly bunched muscles in his shoulders.

"Like you said about your aunt, I understand why. It was necessary to scare my father into giving your family Brangwene's Hjarte."

"I'm guessing he did?"

"Actually, it was my mother who gave it up." I held up my wrist with the adamere beaded bracelet, the long loops sliding down my forearm. At the inquiring arch of his eyebrow, I answered, "I got to see my parents briefly afterward. My father had a new bracelet fashioned for me and carried it with him in the hopes he'd see me one day."

Graysen thumbed a few of the beads and they chinked gently up against one another. When he glanced at me, his expression was somber and worry shone in his black eyes. "I felt you... It felt as if you were slipping away from me in death."

I pulled an I'm-sorry grimace. "I might have gone a little bit insane in anger. I might have wanted Jett to see what he was going to do to me with the Witches Ball. I might have tried to end myself for spite." Indeed, part of me had wanted it to work.

Shock cracked across Graysen's features. His mouth parted, but I quickly rushed onward. "I wanted to break Jett and I did. I did break him, Caidan, and Kenton too."

A cacophony of noise erupted within the rookery and captured our attention. All the fine hair on my arms rose at the eerie sound of banshee shrieks and hisses as the Birds of Prey gnashed their piranha-like teeth in warning at the dark figures collecting outside the rookery.

I turned back to Graysen who was staring through the sliver of a gap between the birds hovering at the open doorway. "I shouldn't have done it," I whispered, an aching lump forming in my throat. He'd been hurt and trapped because of me. And I'd been caught up in wrath and selfishness. "I shouldn't have leaned against the sway and turned you against your brothers."

Graysen's swiveled his gaze back to mine and I saw understanding at what I'd done flare in his eyes. "They fucking deserved it. And more."

"No," I gasped, shaking my head.

"It wasn't just you." His eyes turned darker and his voice grew sharper. "For a moment there, I wanted it too."

I spread a hand over the curve of his shoulder and squeezed gently. "You wouldn't have been able to live with yourself if I'd pushed you further."

He placed his hand over mine and gave a reassuring smile. "But I didn't. They'll be okay, Nelle. Jett will heal."

He was right. His brothers would be okay. I blew out a breath of relief, but it was brief and gone in a heartbeat. "Look at the mess we're in now," I whispered, worry spiking my fear even further. What were we going to do? We were trapped in the rookery, while more men and women were arriving outside, awaiting Valarie's arrival I suspected.

Graysen began to adjust my position on his lap and I shifted around so that I straddled his thighs. His fingers scrabbled for the Hangman's Noose tied around my neck and he swiveled the collar around so he could unweave the threads that connected the long length Valarie had attached to the knot. He threw it away angrily and it bounced over the straw floor to lay near the water trough like a dead snake.

"Why didn't you just ask for my help with your mother?" The question had been sitting on the tip of my tongue for a while now. "If you'd told me what happened to her, I would have helped you."

His fingers stilled on the noose and his gaze hardened. "You'd have helped us?" Before I could speak, "Of course," he pressed a finger to my lips, stopping me from replying. "Tell me then. Before all of this—what did you know of my family, of me?"

My truth sank through me and it was shamefully sharp to swallow. It was mortifying. "I didn't like you. I didn't like your family."

The corners of his mouth curved into a small, consoling smile.

I lifted my chin but the words whispered brokenly from me. "I'm a Wychthorn." And for the first time, I was embarrassed by my position, the entitlement with which I'd grown up. If Graysen had asked for my help, if he'd told me what had happened with his mother and of his family's hope to save her, I would have simply shared it with my father. I'd deemed the Crowthers to be a miserable Lower House and unworthy of my curiosity. They hadn't warranted any of my time or my thoughts growing up. Hells, back then, if given a choice to marry Graysen. I'd have said no. My sights were loftier. I'd always known, in the deep recesses of my mind, that my parents would never allow me to marry. It would be impossible to keep my secret from my husband and his family. No. I knew in a distant, accepting kind of way, that I was going to be a spinster and live at my family's estate forever. Yet I'd still dreamed of marrying into a family that had prestige and would bring honor to my own.

Graysen read it all on my collapsing expression and gave me a pitying look. "Exactly."

"You could have told me about all of this, about your mother, after we—"

He interrupted. "Could I have?"

This time I put myself fully in his shoes. The Horned Gods weren't aware the Crowthers knew Tabitha was alive. No one knew, none of the Houses. And the family was working against the Horned Gods to find and free Tabitha.

If I were them, could I have trusted the family who'd betrayed my own?

Hells no.

It was the only leverage the Crowthers had—that no one knew what they were up to. If anyone else discovered it, from me, my father, another House, they'd have betrayed the Crowthers in an instant to gain themselves an advantage with those we served.

I sniffed, wiping away another tear before it fell, and said pathetically, "But I could have helped."

He tucked a wayward tendril behind my ear. "You are helping in your way."

I placed my hands on his shoulders, the tips of my fingers pressing against his hard muscle. "Let's be free of everyone and run away...please."

Anguish tightened his jaw. The sweat-damp locks of wavy hair shivered across his forehead when he shook his head. "It's not as easy as that."

He withdrew his touch from me and I froze as it filtered in slowly that he wasn't undoing the rope collaring my neck. I blinked. "Set me free."

He reached for me once again, not to undo the collar's knot but to slide his fingers along the side of my face gently. "There's no reason why you should trust me. Hells, I know I've not earned it with everything I've done to you. But please, Nelle, trust in this." He took my hand and placed it over my heart where it beat wildly beneath my palm. "You're going to find your way free of us before the Witches Ball takes place."

"How can you know that?"

"Because I know you. You're cunning. You've already found the escape tunnel."'

"There's a wall."

He drew his other hand up to my temple and swiped his thumb slowly over my forehead. "Trust in this brilliant mind too." He grinned, beaming with pride. "What's a wall to someone as clever as you?"

My nose wrinkled and my chin quivered as I gave him a bright, watery smile. Indeed. All I needed was a key to get past it.

"I just need time, Nelle," he said earnestly. "Trust in me enough to give me that. Help me get an invite to the Witches Ball and then leave."

"You'll come with me?"

His smile fell away. "My mother..."

I knew, of course, I knew. This wasn't just about me. This was about his mother too, and he'd been torn right down the center, half his heart with each of us.

"Graysen..."

He sucked in a loud breath. His mouth slackened and his black eyes were focused intently on my lips, the gold glittering like the stars. I had no idea what could have inspired such a reaction until he curled his fingers through my hair to curve around the back of my head, and breathed, "Say it again."

I leaned forward, pressing my forehead against his. I spoke his name aloud, again, for the first time since I'd entered the Keep. "Graysen."

His eyes fell shut and a shudder rippled through his body. He expelled a breath that washed across my lips and seemed to have been dragged up from the deep well of his soul. "Again."

I couldn't give him what he wanted, an exchange of devotion, of honesty. So I gave him the only thing I could—his name. I whispered his name again and again. And as the willwips danced overhead, chittering sweetly and brightening the gloom with a garden of hues, ivy and bluebell, daffodil and poppy, Graysen and I stared into one another's eyes, breathing the other in.

"You love me?" I just needed to hear it once more.

His embrace tightened around my body, pulling me closer. "Everything I am is yours. My blood. My bones. And all the scars that paint my flesh. My heart beats with yours because you own it too." Pulling away, his tender touch brushed warmth along my temple as he tucked a wayward curl behind my ear. Smiling in reverence, he huffed a laugh. "How the fuck could I not love you? You're my queen, little bird." His smile faded away as he heaved a soft sigh and tipped his forehead back against mine. The sonorous words vibrated against my lips and I closed my eyes and let the vibrance of his intense feelings shiver across my skin as he whispered, "You were the moonlight that kept my empty heart beating with every cruel cut of the whip. And throughout all those long, lonely nights it was your promise of sunshine that saved my cold, black soul."