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Choose me, the court whispers in my mind. Come to me of your own free will.

“Will you release him?” I gasp out.

Elionn goes rigid. “No. Amalia, don’t⁠—”

Yes.

I stare at my princeling, at everything we could have been to each other, and flatten my bleeding palm over his prison. “Take me instead.”

My blood spreads across the surface, lines of crimson forming a complex sigil that mirrors the blood tattoo.

The crystal fractures, cracks racing outward from my bloody handprint. Blinding light spills from the fissures. I close my eyes, but the glare burns through my eyelids, searing patterns into my vision.

With a final, musical shatter, Elionn’s prison collapses.

He falls forward, crashing into me. I catch him, my arms wrapping around his half-conscious form. His skin burns cold, still glowing with residual magic.

“What have you done?” he whispers, hoarse but himself now.

Before I can answer, the court’s bond surges through my veins, discontent with my blood offering alone. It wants all of me.

Magic floods my system, ancient and wild, seeking every corner of my being. It burns through pathways in my body I never knew existed, mapping and claiming territory with ruthless efficiency.

My own magic rises in defense, healing what it can, but the Court’s power overwhelms it, subsuming rather than destroying.

I clutch Elionn’s half-conscious form as the chamber convulses around us. Walls fold inward, then outward, architecture rearranging itself in impossible ways. The crystal guardians melt back into the floor as the court’s power settles deeper into me..

Kelaros rushes toward us, pale with horror as he echoes Elionn’s words, “What have you done?”

The floor beneath us drops away, and we fall.

I clutch Elionn to me as we plummet through darkness, Kelaros’s startled cry joining our own as all three of us descend into the court’s depths.

The surface we land on gives beneath our bodies, cushioning the impact. Darkness surrounds us for three heartbeats before new walls form, crystal growing in real time, enclosing us in a new chamber.

I help Elionn sit upright, his body weak from his time in the crystal prison. His irises have returned to their natural silver, the court’s influence gone from them.

He stares at me with a mixture of gratitude and grief. His fingers trace the blood tattoo on my palm, now altered into a sigil I don’t recognize. “You shouldn’t have.”

“Too late now.” I try for a smile, but it comes out strained.

Kelaros paces the perimeter of our new prison, testing the walls for weaknesses. “We’re sealed in. The passage we came through is gone.”

Elionn struggles to his feet, swaying.

I rise with him, steadying him with a hand on his arm. His skin still holds a faint opalescent sheen beneath the silver, but his eyes remain clear.

“Not gone, just moved.” He studies our surroundings. “This is the Opalwell.”

The walls continue to shift around us, crystal flowing with slow, liquid grace before hardening into new formations. The chamber expands, contracts, breathes with my breath.

And I realize only too late that when I asked the court to release Elionn, it did just that. But it never promised to let him go.

22

THROUGH STONE AND BLOOD

AMALIA