Page 102 of Given

“I won’t keep her in the dungeon for long,” he said. He lifted his gaze. “Just until you’ve searched her room.”

“And then what?” I rasped.

“Then she does what I brought her here to do. What she was born to do.”

I didn’t want to ask. Didn’t want to know. But the truth had arrived at last. I felt its approach like a dark horse bearing down on me.

“Tell me,” I told the male I’d loved since I was sixteen. Nothing he had to say could change how I felt.

“One year before Given of Sithistra was born, the Brotherhood prophesied her birth. The prediction proved accurate, and she was confirmed as a Child of Prophecy. But on the night she entered the world, the Brotherhood issued a second prophecy. The brothers wrote it on the bottom of the scroll used to record her name and parentage. It said that the savior of the realm would be bound in blood and reborn from the Rift.” Laurent held himself rigid, his silver eyes full of an emotion I couldn’t place. “Shortly after Given was born, the prophecy was ripped from the scroll and spirited away from the Towers of the Mir. It was lost for many years. But a certain group found it. They’ve studied it extensively, calling up magic to decipher its meaning. Petru and the other priests of the Sanctum have looked it over, too.”

My voice seemed to come from far away as I asked, “What group?”

“The mages of Wesyfedd.”

The dark horse of truth galloped faster. “And what does the prophecy mean?” I forced myself to ask.

“Given of Sithistra, the last elven-born of Nor Doru, will conceive a child with another elven-born. Bound in the blood of old Eldenvalla, that child must perish in the Rift and then reemerge to save the Deepnight from destruction.”

Blood rushed in my ears. Whose child must perish in the fucking Rift?

“Who is the other elven-born?” I asked. But I already knew.

“You.”

Chapter Thirty-Two

GIVEN

I was too numb to cry. Unfortunately, I wasn’t too numb to feel the cold. It burrowed under my skin and leeched into my bones. Not only did Laurent have a dungeon, but it was also darker and more uncomfortable than the one in Beldurn Castle. The men-at-arms had pushed me into a small cell carved from the rock that supported the palace above. The door was solid iron, its only opening a tiny slit that revealed I was completely alone in the dank underground cavern. A lamp burned somewhere outside my cell, its light barely bright enough to let me see my hand in front of my face.

At least Laurent hadn’t thrown me into the Rift.

As soon as the thought came, tears burned my eyes. I hugged my arms over my stomach. A sob escaped my throat, my breath a small, white cloud in the frozen air.

My body ached from the things Laurent, Varick, and I had done in bed. Even now, I felt both of them inside me. Felt their hands and mouths on my body. Their sweat on my skin. In the moment, the passion that had arced between us had felt exactly right. When the three of us moved together, all my doubts had fallen away. My fears had melted along with my body, which had flowed between the two of them so seamlessly it felt like we’d always been connected.

But that vanished the moment Laurent found the solstone. My breath puffed out again—a tiny ghost hovering in the cell. Who could have moved the dagger? And why? Rowena was the only person in the Midnight Palace who knew of the weapon.

Or was she? I squeezed my arms more tightly around my midsection and paced, my thin slippers offering little protection from the rough stone floor. Rowena was with her husband at their estate. She couldn’t have put the dagger in Laurent’s bed. But maybe she didn’t work alone. Maybe she wasn’t the only Sithistran spy in Nor Doru. But I had almost no hope of finding out who might be working against Laurent, especially now that my husband no longer trusted me.

“I don’t have to trust you to ensure you serve this realm. The prophecy is bigger than all of us.”

What had he meant by that? How was I supposed to serve the realm if he believed I was a spy? But when he’d spoken of prophecy, he’d sounded…resigned. “Rolund knows, then,” he’d said. What did my brother know? It had something to do with Crasor’s words about the “savior of the realm.”

Bound in blood.

Reborn from the Rift.

Not born. Reborn. What did that mean?

A faint scuffling sound brought my head up, my gaze instantly locked on the door. My heart pounded painfully. A key scraped in the lock, and the door swung open.

Varick ducked through the doorway, his golden eyes piercing the gloom.

Terror gripped me so tightly I couldn’t move. He’s here to kill me. Or take me to the Rift. Rolund would get his way, after all.

But Varick didn’t rush in and seize me. His features were tense, almost frightened. “Come on,” he mouthed. “Quickly.”

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