Page 29 of Heart’s Rescue

“Oh, for the void’s sake, just drop the Royal Guard thing, Rowan!” Phaedron snaps.

Phaedron’s voice is so hot and angry that I pull my hand away from the shelf as though it had just been burned. There’s a moment of stunned silence; I try not to breathe as my mind spins in wild gyres of panic.

It can’t be. It has to be.

“Aloserin,” Phaedron says, his voice tight with pain and something else. Anger, maybe? Fear? “Could you please give me a very small amount of time to talk sense into my brother?”

There’s silence. Something tightens in my chest. Time. I’m running out of time. I need to be sure. Aloserin clears his throat on the other side of the door.

“Two days?” he asks.

I dig my fingers into my cheeks until it hurts. Then I raise my free hand, careful not to touch the shelf. I haven’t done this since I was a child, afraid of the dark but not yet afraid of setting fire to my bed hangings. If I set a fire in this pantry—

I shove the thought down, pull in a long, slow breath, and light a flame on the end of my fingers. The sudden light inside the pantry is so bright that I cringe. I stare at the shelf as my heart freezes in my chest. The jagged orange light of my flame dances off wrought silver and rubies, emeralds and diamonds, some of them clean, some smeared with dry, dark liquid.

I snuff out the flame.

It is. Of course it is.

Phaedron and Rowan have my beloved’s crown in their pantry.