Chapter 19 · The Second Seal

"You don't get to wear that crown and call it my choice."

Nora shoved the black circlet against Lucan's chest. The metal struck his coat with a hard click, then dropped between their boots.

He didn't bend to pick it up.

Behind him, the old archive chamber shook as another prison bell rang below the floor. Evelyn was still locked under the council hall. Every bell meant another seal had closed around her cell.

Lucan looked from the crown to Nora's bloodstained hands. "If I don't claim it, Bram owns the city before sunrise."

"Good. Let him choke on it."

"He'll kill Evelyn first."

That stopped her for half a breath.

Lucan stepped closer. He was still wearing the Black Seal coat he'd stolen from the dead investigator at the east gate. The badge at his throat caught the blue fire burning inside the archive walls. It made him look less like a man hiding from the council and more like the person the city had been waiting to fear.

Nora hated that her body noticed the difference.

"You knew this crown was here," she said. "You knew it would answer to you."

"I suspected."

"You lied.