Chapter 56 · The Last of His Mark

"Don't touch that lever!" Ronan caught my fingers before I could pull it.

The tide slammed him into the stone wall. His shoulder hit with a wet crack, and his grip nearly broke.

"Let go!" I shouted. "The gate has to close."

"Close it, and the chamber floods." Blood ran from the corner of his mouth. "You kill the worker."

"Leave it open, and the whole lower district goes under."

Behind me, one of the rescued workers coughed until he gagged. The other dragged himself across the metal platform, clutching his ribs.

Both men stared at us.

Like we were choosing which one got to die.

Ronan hauled himself upright with the chain bolted into the wall. His coat hung in strips. Beneath his collar, the Keeper mark burned white, bright enough to sting my eyes.

"Don't touch the lever," he said again.

I shoved my shoulder against it. "You don't get to order me around after what I saw."

His jaw locked. "Mara."

"No. Say it." I pushed harder. The lever groaned under my hand. "Say what the council made you do. Say why you carved that rejection into me while they held my mother over a blade.