LOGINEmberTen months laterClara sits beside the crib reading to her baby brother from a picture book she is mostly inventing. Theo is six months old, round-cheeked and solemn, with Kaine's dark eyes, my auburn hair, and Clara's stubborn chin."And then the brave wolf saved the prince," Clara announces,
EmberKaine finds me outside the healer's door before I can decide whether to turn around."You've been avoiding this," he says, and when I answer yes, he does not ask why because the bond has already told him enough: fear, hope, denial, and the stubborn belief that if I do not name a thing, it cann
EmberThree months after the ceremony, Clara launches herself onto our bed at dawn shouting that the butterflies are back. Kaine groans into the pillow, I sit up too quickly, and the nausea I have been ignoring rolls through me hard enough that I have to breathe before I answer, though Clara notices
EmberThe preparation chamber is quiet except for the roar of the hall beyond the doors. Hundreds of nobles, foreign envoys, priests, guards, and servants have gathered to watch the woman who hid her mark stand in front of the kingdom and bare it by choice.Lila checks my midnight-blue dress, Clara'
EmberI wake up nauseous for the third morning in a row and stop pretending it is travel, stress, or badly brewed tea. The arithmetic is too clean: the symptoms, the timing, the way Nara has gone quiet and watchful instead of sarcastic.Nara, I say, one hand flat against my stomach."I know," she an
EmberThe first warning comes before lunch, when a runner pulls me out of training with news that Alexander has collapsed in council. By the time I reach his chambers, the healers have already cleared the room. He is sitting upright, irritated by his own body, and far more tired than he would ever a







