The door locked from the outside with a sound Serena felt in her teeth.
"This is for your protection," the Guardian had said, right before sliding the bolt into place, as though the words made the tower room anything other than a cell. Stone walls. One narrow window. A bed she hadn't asked for and a silence that pressed in from every direction.
Serena sat on the edge of the mattress and stared at her wrist, where the silver Moonmark had finally faded back to a faint outline against her skin.
*Protection from what?* she thought. *Or protection of what, from me?*
She'd asked the Guardians a dozen questions on the walk here. Where was Kael being held? What the Council intended to do with her. Whether Mira was safe. Every question had been met with the same clipped non-answer: *The Headmis
