The question hung in the air between them, sharp as a blade.
Who did this?
Everything else faded. The warmth of the fire meant nothing. Rain tapped at the window, moonlight slipped across the stone. None of it mattered. Only that question, the answer that didn’t come, and the silence growing heavier by the second.
Nyra looked away first. She clung to the blanket in her lap—barely a movement, barely even a sign. But Kael caught it. He caught everything she did now, especially when it came to her.
His golden eyes never left her face. He studied her. He waited. He searched. He’d asked all kinds of questions before: in wartime, during betrayals, before executions, questions that changed the fate of kingdoms. He learned over the years that silence sometimes screams the loudest. Right now, N
