Night had fallen over the battlefield. Shadows swallowed the bloodstained earth, and the moon bled silver light over the corpses of the fallen. The ground still reeked of betrayal—thick and choking, more potent than the stench of war.
Seraphine didn't remember how her knees had hit the ground. Only that her heart had shattered long before her body ever did.
The man she had fought beside, trusted without question, and defended to her people—even when they warned her—had abandoned her with a single glance.
Evander.
His eyes, once so soft when they looked at her, were cold now. Distant. And when the High Lords of her own realm had turned their backs, he hadn't stopped them.
The soldiers who once swore loyalty to her now averted their gazes. They stood like strangers, unmoved as though he
