Kelsea gave a tremendous heave, her body arching off the ground. But she still could not break the contact. Somewhere nearby, she heard the Red Queen choking.
“What do we have here?” Brenna asked, her voice teasing. Her fingers tickled Kelsea’s ribs, making her writhe, but Kelsea still could not look away. She could feel Lily’s memories climbing up from their dark hole in her mind, scrabbling for purchase, gaining traction. Greg Mayhew, Major Langer, the animal called Parker, soon they would all reach her, and then—
“You leave her alone.”
Brenna jumped away. The contact in Kelsea’s head broke, and she moaned at the mercy of that, the relief of Lily’s memories falling back into the darkness of her mind, where they belonged. Her eyes were dry and aching; she had to blink a few times before she could focus on the figure in the doorway. There she found the last person she would ever have expected: Ewen, the Keep jailor.
“Ewen, run!” Kelsea shouted. Ewen had a knife, but his eyes were wide, the eyes of a child afraid of the dark. Kelsea could not have him die here, not Ewen, not when she had already killed so many others . . .
“Yes, get out of here, boy,” Brenna snarled. “This is none of your business.”
“That’s the Queen of the Tearling,” Ewen replied, his voice trembling, “and I am a Queen’s Guard. The Queen is my business. You leave her alone.”
“Queen’s Guard,” Brenna repeated, her voice dripping with mockery. “You’re a plaything to them, a mascot. You don’t even have a sword.”
These words took a visible toll on Ewen; his white face paled even further and he took a great gulp of air. But still, he raised his knife and took another step forward into the room.
“Ewen, don’t look at her!” Kelsea cried. The sound of gagging came from her left, and when she turned, she saw the Red Queen throttling herself. With a tremendous heave, Kelsea rolled onto her stomach and began wriggling toward her.
“Evelyn!”
Staring off into the distance, the Red Queen removed her hands from her throat and reached down, her fingers hooked into claws. Then, in a single swipe, she tore a wide gash open on her right thigh. Kelsea tried to kick her hands away, but could find no leverage.
“Evelyn, wake up!”
“Mother?” the Red Queen whispered, and with dawning horror, Kelsea realized that the Red Queen was reaching out for her. She scooted backward, but the Red Queen began to crawl toward her, continuing to reach out, her hands grasping at nothing.
“Mother,” she croaked, weeping. “I’m sorry I ran.”
Brenna had cornered Ewen, and she advanced on him now, slowly, the knife tucked behind her back, a smile stretching her mouth.
“Let us discuss this, boy. Come here, look at me.”
“No!” Kelsea shouted, but she saw, despairing, that Ewen was already caught, staring at Brenna with wide eyes and open mouth. Kelsea felt a light pressure on her ankle, looked down, and screamed; the Red Queen was stroking her foot, her mouth upturned in a blood-dabbled smile.
“Mother?”
Sobbing, Kelsea scrambled away, crawling toward Ewen, desperate to break him away from Brenna. She pulled herself forward on her good elbow, one sliding foot at a time, shouting Ewen’s name, but miserably aware that she was moving too slowly, that she would not reach them in time . . . and then she looked up, stunned, as Ewen’s voice echoed throughout the stone room.
“I see that you have a knife behind your back.”
Brenna’s smile slipped. She stared at Ewen for a long moment, eyes wide and teeth gritted in concentration.
“You will drop your knife.”
Brenna’s face contorted with rage, so much anger that Kelsea could feel it across the room, like heat. Ewen moved forward, raising his knife, and Brenna’s eyes rounded in shock.
“You can’t,” she whispered. “You can’t be—”
“Drop your knife,” Ewen demanded again, and Kelsea could only stare at him, wondering if she was dreaming. He was nearly twice Brenna’s size—though until a few moments before, Kelsea had been sure that Brenna was the larger of the two—and she retreated before him, backing toward the fire. She stabbed out wildly with her knife, but Ewen remained just out of her range.
“Put it down.”
“No!”
“Put it down,” Ewen repeated. His face was like a wall, both stubborn and patient, and Kelsea suddenly got an inkling of what was going on here: Brenna had picked a bad target. There was nothing inside Ewen for Brenna’s particular brand of suffering to latch on to, because Ewen was different.
Good.