Chapter 1

When I kicked open the coffin lid, the mausoleum steward tumbled down the steps in terror.

White mourning banners twisted in the wind, and mourning papers scattered across the chamber.

Someone screamed, "The dead woman's moving."

Half my body was still trapped inside the coffin, and an iron shackle around my ankle had been bolted to the bottom.

Northcott Hall had been determined to make certain I died. Even their burial sacrifice came with a lock.

Fresh scratches marked the inside wall of the coffin. Beatrice had carved them.

"Calamities belong underground, rotting forever."

I laughed once. The coffin nails had already torn my palm open.

The mausoleum steward had nearly lost his senses.

"Hold her down. Don't let that filthy thing near His Majesty."

Two young attendants rushed me, but I caught the coffin edge and dragged myself free.

In the central sarcophagus, Emperor Cassian Thornfield's face had turned gray, yet his chest still moved faintly.

An elderly palace steward hurried over and planted his boot on the back of my hand.

"A sacrificial girl sent by Northcott Hall dares touch the Emperor?"

My fingernails bent backward beneath his heel, and pain darkened my vision.

He spat beside me. "With a fate like yours, even your corpse pollutes the royal tomb."

I looked up and smiled coldly.

"If your eyes are useless, have them cut out.

"Delay any longer and blood will start leaking from every opening in his face."

The instant I finished speaking, two trails of black blood appeared beneath Cassian's nose.

A junior attendant dropped to his knees. "Steward Bram, His Majesty's bleeding."

Bram's expression changed. He pointed at me and started shouting.

"Calamity. Her curse has woken up.

"Beat her to death. Now."

The other women chosen for the burial huddled in a corner and sobbed.

"Don't drag us into this. She's Northcott Hall's cursed daughter. Kill her."

Guards forced me to the floor, and my forehead struck the stone tiles.

"Northcott's castoff. Even dead, she'd stain the mausoleum."

I bit through my lip but refused to shed a tear.

All through childhood, tears at Northcott Hall had earned only harder blows.

My mother's ashes were still in that house.

If I died here, even her remains would have nowhere to rest.

I raised my voice and screamed, "The incense burner is poisoned."

I jerked my chin toward the bronze vessel in the center of the chamber.

"Let it burn another few minutes and every living person in this room goes down."

Bram was about to order someone to gag me when a young attendant suddenly clutched his throat and fell, his face turning purple.

Every insult in the room stopped.

Bram stepped backward, and I used the confusion to crawl to the burner and scrape aside the ash.

A layer of Veyran datura powder had been hidden beneath it.

The room had smelled exactly like this when my mother died.

My father had stood outside her door then, unwilling even to touch her forehead because he thought she was unlucky.

I pulled a silver burial pin from my hair and cut Cassian's fingertip.

Blackened blood welled from the wound at once.

"Bring cold water, coarse salt, and clean needles. Hurry."

Everyone stared without moving.

"Or bring nothing. When the Emperor really dies, every one of you can follow him down for real."

That threat worked better than anything else.

A basin arrived quickly, followed by needles.

I drew off more than half a bowl of poisoned blood before a trace of living color returned to Cassian's face.

His eyes opened slowly. "Who sent you?"

Before I could answer, a shrill proclamation sounded beyond Hollowcrest Mausoleum.

"By order of the Dowager Queen, His Majesty has entered final rest. Seal the coffins and begin burial at once. No one may reopen or inspect them."

I drew breath to shout.

Cassian's hand closed suddenly around my wrist from inside the sarcophagus.

"Keep playing dead.

"I want to see who's most desperate to bury me."

I lowered my eyes. Blood still ran from the iron wound around my ankle.

Northcott Hall wanted me dead. The Dowager Queen wanted him dead.

Whether I saved the Emperor or not, no one meant to let me survive the night.