Chapter 23 · The Hand in the Bone

"Don't touch her."

Varan's voice cracked across the ruined hall, rough enough to shake dust from the broken arches.

Aileen's fingers tightened around my ankle.

Bone scraped against my boot. Her ring cut through the leather and pressed into my skin.

"You should've listened to your war dog," Aileen whispered from inside the mother-bone breach. "He can't save you from what you are."

I drove my knife down.

The blade stopped a hair from her wrist. The crack beneath me buckled, and a row of white spikes punched through the stone between my knees.

Varan caught the back of my coat and yanked me away. His chest hit my spine. Heat poured off him, but his breath shook against my ear.

"Sula. Move."

"Let go."

"That isn't a request."

"Then get used to being disappointed."

I twisted, kicked at Aileen's hand, and felt the ring tear my boot open. Her grip slipped. For half a second, I saw her face below the jagged split in the floor.

Not the soft, frightened sister the Morton clan had paraded in front of the court.

Her cheeks were streaked with blood.