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When he remembers that moment Damon feels like he will break apart. He hit Lyr. He hit him. It’s too much to bear.

Exhausted, he is the one who kneels, falling to the floor at Lyr’s feet. Breath coming fast. He takes Lyr’s hand and presses it to his own heart.

“Forgive me,” he says. “Forgive me.” He looks down at the floor. His whole body aches. He wants to stay here. Just here, at Lyr’s feet. Maybe he should forget the keys. Just stay here. He’s not thinking rationally. He can’t.

And he’s still there, on his knees, with Lyr’s chained wrist in his hand, Lyr’s hand on his heart. When someone behind him speaks. “On your knees for your whore, I see.” It’s a drawl. A familiar voice. “Please, don’t let me interrupt whatever you’re planning to do, Bastard.”

Damon looks over his shoulder to see Atticul in the cell doorway.

27

LYR

Lyr looks over Damon's big shoulder, still bleeding from the impact of the door. Atticul stands there behind him. He holds Razelii, the Amber Blade at her throat, the familiar gold gleam of it, unmistakable.

“Don’t try anything. I have my men just outside.”

“What do you want from me now, Atticul?” Damon says from his knees. He sounds weary, almost careless.

Atticul doesn’t seem to notice. He says, “An exiled man, in Azuria, in Attar, in the Rose Palace, I have every legal right to kill you like a dog.”

“If you must. You’ve always wanted a reason to kill me.” He looks at Atticul with dark eyes. “Let them go. Let Lyr and Razelii go. You only ever wanted me.”

Atticul raises an eyebrow. “You think I’m a fool? Put down your blade, and stay on your knees.”

“This?” Damon pulls a sword from his belt and throws it across the cell floor.

“And don’t think your big bitch is coming to save you. I have her. My men have her under guard. And my faithless concubine who was cavorting half-naked with the dungeon guards. Those guards will all get flogged for this. But they are luckier than you and your pathetic team of spies and assassins. The glory I will get for having foiled this attempt on the Rose Palace by a deadly faction of Juran and Plumian scum.”

“A deadly faction?” Damon sneers. “Two whores and two soldiers against you and all your bodymen?”

Atticul ignores this. “I can’t believe you’d be this stupid to come back here after him.”

“You didn’t expect me to?” says Damon blankly.

“Yes, perhaps. Perhaps I should have realised that you are a fool. And a slut for that whore. But what matters is, you’re here now. You are an exiled man in the Rose Palace, it is my duty and honour to kill you, Bastard.”

Lyr’s mind races. Damon will fight him. Of course. Damon will fight him. He looks at Razelii in Atticul’s arms. She looks pale and scared, but she blurts out, “Run. Just run. Leave me.”

Before Atticul can react to this, he slumps. He seems to fold up like crumpled parchment. Razelii stumbles forward, confused as he drops his grip on her.

A man is behind Atticul. Holding, not a knife, but a small dart that he has stuck into Atticul’s neck. A tall man in grey robes. The man who rescued Lyr from the dungeons last time.

Damon says, “Doroth Zain.”

“He’s not dead,” says Doroth Zain. “Although the realm of Azuria, the whole world would be better off if he was.”

Damon says, “Don’t kill him. It’s what Vindar wants.”

“It is,” says Doroth Zain. He walks over to Lyr and wordlessly unlocks his manacles with a key. Lyr drops to the floor into Damon’s arms. He lets Damon hold him, kissing his hair as Doroth Zain drags Atticul across the cell and locks up one of his wrists. Lyr can feel Damon shaking.

Doroth Zain turns to Razelii who stands stunned in the doorway. “Your friends are locked in the guards’ room. I have taken care of Atticul’s men. Release them and take them back to the banks of the Gleam. You can wait there for Damon and Lyr.”

“I’m not sure if she—,” Damon begins.

“She won’t betray you again,” says Doroth Zain, passing a key to Razelii.

As he takes her over to the cell door to explain where she needs to go, Lyr whispers to Damon. “That’s Doroth Zain. The priest?”