Page 158 of A Tongue so Sweet and Deadly

She dropped his hand as if she’d burned herself. “You wanted to make sure I didn’t know. That I wasn’t working with him.”

“Lessia…”

She backed away from the cell—away from Loche. “Stay away from me.”

Frayson cleared his throat. “Thank you, Loche. I wasn’t sure you’d follow my orders, but I’m glad to see your feelings haven’t clouded your dedication to Ellow.”

Loche’s eyes pleaded with her, but she averted hers, hissing a breath through her teeth.

She couldn’t look at him.

He hadn’t even warned her what she would walk into.

“You bastards!” Amalise snarled in the back of the room.

As Lessia took a step toward her, Frayson ordered, “Silence!”

Frayson waved his hand toward Lessia. “Now that we’ve cleared you from suspicion of being an accomplice, you will go through your final trial before the election.”

Lessia stared at him.

Perhaps they’d beat her again.

Hopefully they’d do it until she passed out.

Oblivion seemed like a blessing right now when the pain from Ardow’s admission and Loche’s betrayal felt as if it would tear her apart.

Frayson eyed her. “The final hardship is loss. So many lost their family, friends, their loved ones during the war. Becoming regent means that you will need to go through the same loss to ensure you won’t put your people through that again.”

He fidgeted with his gray cloak before he continued. “We had difficulty figuring out what choice we’d offer you, but your friend’s betrayal of Ellow made it clear. Your task is simple: you need to decide whether to execute Ardow today or banish Amalise from Ellow forever.”

Chapter

Sixty-Four

Each beat of her heart slammed in her ears, mocking her with its vigor.

Lessia backed into the wall, agony ripping at her chest as she stared from Amalise’s stricken face to Ardow’s white one.

She couldn’t do this.

As she started to shake her head, opening her mouth to tell them she was leaving the election, the tattoo on her arm pulsed, and she had to brace herself against the wall not to bend over.

Panting, she tried to come up with a way around the oath she’d been forced to take.

But there wasn’t one.

“Lessia, it’s all right.” Ardow’s voice was gentle. “I knew this was the risk.”

“No!” Amalise cried behind him. “I’ll go! I’ll go!”

Her eyes sliced frantically between her closest people.

Her friends.

The first people who’d accepted her for Lessia.

Who loved every broken piece of her.

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