Chapter 14

The bells are wrong. They’re too soft, too slow—three muted strikes in the distance instead of the wild alarm that should mean “rebels at the gate.” In my tower, the air smells of jasmine and lamp oil, not smoke. The silk curtains drift in a breeze that feels staged, like everything else in this palace. “Time,” the captain of the night guard says. He doesn’t look at my face, just at the iron ring that connects my collar to the chain in his hand. The chain is wrapped in velvet...