Metal struck stone.
Metheea woke with her arm raised.
Her hand closed around nothing.
For one breath, the canopy above her became the Regent's ruined chamber. The curtains were torn. Men climbed through the windows. A blade hovered over Azrayel's chest.
Then the sound came again.
A sword scraped against the floor outside her room.
"Lift it," a guard said beyond the doors. "Do not drag it through the blood."
Metheea remained upright in bed.
Her heart struck hard against her ribs.
She was in her own chamber.
The familiar blue curtains had been tied back from the bed. The carved screen near the dressing table remained undamaged. Her gowns hung inside the open wardrobe, and the silver basin beside the window held water darkened by used cloths.
The room smelled of healing herbs.
Beneath them, blood still lingered in the air.
Metheea swallowed.
Her stomach turned.
She bent over the side of the bed and vomited into the basin set beneath it.
