“I didn’t conspire to kill anyone!” Cyrene cried for what felt like the hundredth time.

Dean had said the same thing over and over to his men, but ultimately, their orders had come from the Queen. So, there was nothing to be done about it until they got back to the capital.

Faylon and Clym had taken her below deck and chained her to a thick wooden bed. There was no way that she could get away. Not that she was going to try since she hadn’t done anything wrong. She had no idea why she was even being accused, and Faylon and Clym wouldn’t speak about it in front of her. They’d just shoved her into the room, chained her to the bed, and locked the door.

The worst part about the whole thing was that she couldn’t be up there with Dean while he dealt with the deaths of his parents. No, not the deaths. The murder of his parents.

She couldn’t imagine what that must feel like. And to have to go through it alone on top of the death of one of his oldest friends. Even if he had eleven sisters to mourn with…none of them were here now. But she was, and she wished with everything that she could be up on deck with him right now.

Cyrene wasn’t sure how much time had passed while she was stuck below deck when she felt the boat slow and then finally stop.

Faylon came to collect her. “Don’t try anything,” he warned her.

She held her arms out where they were chained in front of her. “These don’t exactly give me the opportunity,” she sneered.

“Just don’t do it.”

“I didn’t do anything. I was with Dean this entire time. I have a solid alibi for this. I’ve been here for months. Why would I conspire to kill the Queen and King?” she asked him.

“I’m just following orders, and you should, too.”

He chained her hands behind her back and then ordered her to go above deck. She was placed into a small boat. She straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin. She had done nothing wrong.

Her resolve broke a bit when Dean got into a different boat. He sadly glanced at her but then was rushed away. Cyrene’s gondola followed behind Dean’s.

The canals were empty, and Cyrene could see the result of the hurricane. Debris was everywhere in the water. Some of the houses were crumbling. Others had completely collapsed. People were somber as they transferred precious belongings to other locations. Still, others helped the people who had lost everything.

A few people noticed Dean as he passed by, and a cheer rose up in the crowd. “Prince Dean!”

He managed a small wave, but Cyrene could see how defeated he looked, even just in the set of his shoulders. To her surprise, she heard her name again. Just like she had yesterday on their way to the Bride of the Sea ceremony. It was hard to believe that had only been yesterday.

Then, she heard it again.

She glanced over to the crowd, and another cheer went up. “Princess Cyrene! Our new Princess!”

Tears welled in her eyes at their cheer. They were…applauding her. Excited to bring her into the royal family. She tried to smile at the crowd, but soon, the boats were whisked away, and the cheers disappeared. None of them had any idea that she had been arrested. She hated to think what they would say if they saw her passing by after they’d found out.

She wouldn’t think about that right now. She would talk to Brigette and figure all of this out. Brigette couldn’t seriously believe that Cyrene had done anything to hurt her parents. She hadn’t always gotten along with Queen Cassia, but Cyrene didn’t want her dead.

Dean would convince them. He knew her. He knew she would never do this. It would all work out. Just a misunderstanding. They had no proof.

The boats meandered onto palace grounds and docked on the lake. A retinue of soldiers was waiting for them on the dock. Once she was off the boat, Faylon and Clym took either of her arms and hauled her toward the palace.

Dean grabbed Faylon. “Unhand her. She can walk on her own. I won’t have my fiancée being treated like a criminal with no proof.”

“Thank you,” she whispered.

“Let’s just go,” he said, moving forward.

She swallowed hard and hurried to catch up with him. It was awkward, walking with her hands bound behind her back. She almost reached out for her magic, but instead, she just sent up a call to Avoca. Cyrene couldn’t sense Avoca nearby, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t. After the amount of magic Cyrene had used, she didn’t know what was normal.

Instead of walking inside, the soldiers hurried them into a packed courtyard. Nobles filled the space, jockeying for the best view of whatever was happening. When they saw that it was the Prince, an alley opened up for Dean to walk through.

None of the cheers from the outer wall were heard in here. Most people glared at her, and a few people even threw things at her. She kept pace with Dean and felt utterly humiliated by the walk of shame for something she hadn’t even done.

When they finally reached the front of the courtyard, the crowd had gone deathly quiet. Cyrene’s eyes found Brigette seated on a dais, overlooking the crowd. She seemed to have aged fifteen years overnight. Dark bags were under her eyes, and she appeared worn and hardened.

“Prince Dean,” she said when she finally saw them.

He bowed deeply, and Cyrene dipped into the best curtsy she could manage with her hands tied behind her back.

“Queen Brigette,” he said. Cyrene could tell the words hurt him. “Is it true?”

“Queen Cassia and King Tomas were murdered last night in their sleep by an assassin who was apprehended after the incident.”

Brigette gestured off to her right, and Cyrene looked around Dean to see whom she was pointing at. When she saw who was on her knees in chains before the throne, Cyrene gasped aloud.

“Maelia!” she cried.

Cyrene jerked forward, as if to run to her friend, but Faylon grabbed her shoulders and held her in place. Her knees gave out beneath her at the sight of her friend shackled to the ground. Bile rose up in her throat, and her breathing was ragged. Her entire body trembled with the view before her.

It made no sense.

“Cyrene! Cyrene, please!” Maelia cried. Tears streamed down her cheeks, and she coughed in between sobs. “I didn’t. I didn’t. Please help me.”

Cyrene just stared at her friend as she tried to stay upright. “She couldn’t have done it. She didn’t,” she whispered.

Dean questioningly looked from Maelia to Cyrene.

Her eyes found his. “She couldn’t have.”

“If that is how you plead,” Brigette said coldly, “then bring forth the witness.”

The reason that Darmian hadn’t gone out to look for Dean materialized before her. He walked out before his Queen and bowed formally in his royal-blue military uniform. He also seemed to have aged overnight.

“I apprehended the murderer, Your Majesty,” Darmian said. His voice lacked all emotion. He was strong and stoic and refused to even look at Maelia.

Cyrene could see how much that broke Maelia. Her head dropped, and all Cyrene could hear was the sound of Maelia crying.

“Please recount what you saw,” Brigette said.

“I was intimately involved with the suspect and had planned to surprise her in her rooms that night.” He delivered that news without a trace of embarrassment or remorse. “When she wasn’t in her quarters after the ball, I went in search of her. I found her leaving the royal wing of the palace. She was crying and shaking and rubbing her hands together, as if she were trying to get the blood off of them.”

Cyrene cringed.

“And then the alarm went up. The Queen and King had been found dead in their bedchambers. There was an assassin loose. Even though I did not want to do it, I searched Maelia because of her suspicious behavior. What I found was this.” Darmian retrieved two sharp blades and laid them before the Queen as evidence. “She sliced their throats open. She is guilty.”

“I didn’t,” Maelia repeated over and over again. “Your Highness, please. I never wanted to hurt anyone. I never wanted to. I was forced to. I resisted for as long as I could. I tried to stay away, but it called for me. It made me.”

Cyrene’s mouth fell open. Maelia was admitting to it. She had actually committed this heinous crime. How is that possible? Poor, sweet Maelia. She was good with a sword, but two Captains of the Guard had raised her. She wasn’t an assassin. She couldn’t be. Could she?

Then, Cyrene really thought about it…all those times she had known just when to go in and out of the palace, unnoticed, how everyone seemed to pass right over her in a crowd, the utter stillness of her feet…

“Creator,” Cyrene whispered. “You did…”

Dean sharply looked at her, but her eyes were focused on Maelia. She couldn’t get in enough air.

Maelia was her friend. She had been her friend from the first day when she was made an Affiliate. Not once had she suspected that her friend could do something like this.

Is this why she had been so sick? She was trying to resist assassinating the crown?

Cyrene felt like an idiot, and she was also utterly terrified. What was to become of Maelia for her actions? Despite everything, Maelia was one of her closest friends.

Brigette looked indifferent. “You admit to your crimes and say someone forced you to do it. Who forced you?”

Maelia was trembling from head to toe. “I wish I could tell you. I wish they would let me.”

Brigette shook her head. “She’s mad. The punishment for the murder of the Queen and King of Eleysia is death. Does anyone here speak otherwise for this girl?”

Maelia looked up into the crowd for someone, anyone, to say something. Cyrene wanted to. She desperately wanted to defend her friend. She stepped forward to do just that, but Dean put his hand on her arm and shook his head. She pushed past him anyway.

“I will! I speak for her,” Cyrene called.

A ripple ran through the watching crowd.

Brigette fixed Cyrene with an icy glare. “You have no voice here, Affiliate. You have been summoned for conspiracy to murder. We already believe that you conspired with your Affiliate friend here to end the lives of our Queen and King. You used Prince Dean to enter the country, seduced him to lull us into a false sense of security, and then sent your assassin to do your dirty work,” she said with venom in her voice. “Your trial awaits you after we deal with this murderer. So, unless you want to follow her onto the block immediately, then I suggest you step back.”

Brigette flicked her hand toward Maelia, and a handful of guards began unchaining her.

Cyrene stepped back in horror. They believed that she had seduced Dean to get close to the royal family. They believed she was responsible for this. But since they hadn’t caught her red-handed, she wasn’t on trial yet, like Maelia was.

Cyrene could barely watch as Maelia was dragged onstage to a block. She was forced to her knees in front of everyone. Her sobs could be heard over the jeering crowd as she slowly lowered her head down onto the wooden block.

Cyrene turned her head away from the display. She couldn’t watch.

But Faylon jerked her head over. “Watch what you’ve done.”

She tried to pull away, but she couldn’t. She was pinned in place, and nothing and no one was going to stand up for Maelia.

Queen Brigette raised her hand. “For the murder of the Queen and King of Eleysia, I hereby sentence you to death.”

Cyrene felt like she was hyperventilating. Her body was going insane, yet…she didn’t feel her magic. Not once. Not an ounce of power came to her body. She trembled with that realization as her mind tried to avoid what was happening in front of her.

A man in a black hood held an ax high overhead, and then when Brigette dropped her hand, he brought it down onto Maelia’s neck. Cyrene screamed as her best friend’s head dropped into a basket, and her body crumpled.

She jerked away from Faylon and tried to rush forward to Maelia.

She was dead.

Her head was disconnected from her body.

Gone.

Cyrene struggled and pushed against the people holding her as tears flooded her eyes. She reached for her magic again and again, trying to make the pain stop. She needed to make the ache in her chest disappear. She needed to fill that hole within her.

Maelia had murdered the Queen and King.

Maelia was her friend.

Maelia was a murderer.

Maelia had had a gentle laugh.

Maelia was an assassin.

Maelia had helped her when no one else came to her defense.

Maelia had slit the rulers’ throats.

Maelia had hugged her after they were reunited.

Maelia had bloody knives.

Maelia was dead.

Cyrene collapsed. Maelia couldn’t be. She just couldn’t be.

She sobbed. Her heart was broken.

“How could you do this?” she shrieked.

“She killed my parents,” Brigette said emotionlessly. “She got less than she deserved.”

“Dean,” Cyrene said, searching for him. He took a step back from her. “Dean, please.”

He looked at her with that same empty look that Brigette had on her face. “You’re to be tried for conspiracy to murder. You were part of the plot to murder my parents. How was I ever stupid enough to think that I loved you?”

Cyrene’s mouth fell open. “You can’t believe this! Dean, I do love you!”

“I can’t hear any more of this. Take her to the dungeons where she will await trial,” Dean said to his men.

Cyrene screamed. She reached for her magic and came up empty.

“Knock her out if necessary. None of you know what she’s capable of,” Dean said, devoid of emotion.

The last thing she saw was Dean’s empty dark eyes. Then, the pommel of a sword hit her temple, and she lost consciousness.

To Be Continued…