INICIAR SESIÓNRavena's POV
The morning after the banquet, I woke feeling lighter than I had in weeks.
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Ravena's POV Marianne counted out the rest of the money with a face the colour of ash.Her hands were not quite steady as she did it, and she wouldn't look at me, and every note she laid down she laid down as though it were a piece of her own skin. I stood and watched her do it and I didn't feel one drop of pity. I had passed the point of pity with this woman a long time ago.
Ravena's POVMarianne's jaw tightened. The needle hadn't gone in. So she reached for a crueler one."Family?" she sneered, and her lip curled. "Is that what you are? Do you know, Luna, my daughter here once had a great deal to say about you, before you were quite so grand. About the kind of woman my nephew was bringing into the royal house." Her eyes glittered. "A woman married once already and cast off. A woman with a used name and a second wedding. Cressida had her doubts about whether such a one belonged among us at all, and she was not wrong to have them, wha
Ravena's POV In the end, Marianne chose to pay.She gave the order through her teeth, and her steward went to the room and came back with a thick fold of bank notes, and she had them set down on the table in front of me rather than placed in my hand, as though passing them to me directly would cost her something more than the coin.I didn't take offense. I just drew them towards me and started to count.
Ravena's POV I had my hand on the door and Vivienne behind me and the whole stack of books held tight against my body when Marianne broke."Wait."I stopped, but I didn't turn around, not yet. I let her say it again."Wait." Her voice was tight, forced out through her
Ravena's POVThe Ministry of Justice. I had said it plainly, and I had said it on purpose, because I knew something that these two women knew even better than I did. The Ministry of Justice, the kingdom's own house of questioners and judges, did not answer to some distant lord. It answered to my husband. Evander held it. The prince who commanded the armies also commanded the men who put hard questions to criminals against the crown, and every soul in the capital knew it.
Ravena's POVDuchess Marianne's house was different at night.By day it had been all light and polish, grand rooms made to make a visitor feel small. But at this dark hour it was hushed and shadowed, and the servant who let us in did so with the stiff, uneasy manner of a household that had not expected callers and didn't know what to make of two women arriving with a stack of books and four silent guards at their backs.
Evander's POVI stood in that empty courtyard long after Ravena disappeared, my chest hollow and aching. The evening air had turned cold, but I barely felt it. All I could feel was the pain radiating from somewhere deep inside me.I forced myself to move, to walk, to f
Ravena's POVQueen Seraphine leaned forward slightly, her expression gentle but serious. "Marriage, Ravena. It is time to think about marriage."My heart immediately sank and everything inside me went cold."Marriage?""Yes, you are at the perfect age. Yo
Evander's POVAlaric stared at me, his jaw clenched so tightly I thought it might crack.I approached him slowly, reached out and took the broken glass from his bleeding hand. He let me, though his body remained tense.After setting the shattered pieces aside, I
"Because... because what you are suggesting is wrong," I said, my voice shaking. "She deserves... you are going too far."Alaric leaned back in his chair, a mocking smile playing at his lips. "Am I? Or am I just speaking a truth you did not want to hear?""This isn't a







