Chapter 3 Threads and Lies

Brian woke to the scrape of boots on stone and a smell that made his stomach tighten-something sweet and sharp like burning rope. He stayed low in the bed, pretending to sleep, letting his eyes harden around what he felt under his skin. The thread hummed there like a wire under tension. Lyra was awake across the room, her small fire guttering in the basin, and when she turned her face toward him the light painted her in weird gold.

"Morning," she mouthed. No sound. The rack of her jaw told him she meant it like a greeting. He answered with a half-smile that tried to be casual and failed.

A guard knocked then, brisk and officious. "My lord, men from the yard ask to speak with you." He looked at Lyra and swallowed, like he feared looking at trouble might make it bite.

"Tell them I'm otherwise occupied." Brian kept his voice flat. He hoped it sounded like a command.

The guard hesitated. "Asher sent word, my lord. He expects you." The name hit him like a stone thrown through thin glass. He could see Asher's grin from miles away.

Brian stood, dressed quickly. Outside, the castle wore dawn like a wound. Smoke curled from chimneys. Men moved with the bluntness of people who had decided the day would not be kind.

Asher was at the training yard with the boys. He had drawn a small crowd-soldiers and servants who loved to watch a show. When Brian stepped into the open, the murmur quieted. Asher sauntered up, the sort of walk that said he owned the pavement.

"You're soft, brother," Asher said, loud enough for half the yard to hear. "Keeping the Mantle's princess warm?" He jerked his chin toward the tower where Lyra waited. People laughed in a brittle way.

Brian kept his face like a wall. "She'll be under my guard," he said. "I'll decide what to do."

Asher's laugh was a blade. "You'll decide? That's brave. Or foolish." He stepped close enough that Brian felt the heat of him. "You forget your place. You forget what loyalty looks like. Lucius won't be pleased."

Lucius watched from the dais, arms folded. For a heartbeat Brian thought he saw trouble cross the older man's face, but Lucius kept his mouth shut and his eyes sharp. He loved order more than anything. Chaos made him itch.

"You'll bring her down here tomorrow," Asher said suddenly, soft like a promise that could be broken. "We'll show everyone what a rejected mate does. Teach them a lesson."

Brian saw the gleam in men's eyes-the hunger for spectacle. He could feel the grain of fear under Asher's words. If he agreed, Lyra would be paraded. If he refused, he would look weak. Either way, someone would profit.

"Not tomorrow," Brian said. His voice came out thin. "She will remain where she is."

Asher's face went still. "You defy me?" His hand brushed the dagger at his hip like a man checking his teeth.

"You forget your manners," Lucius said. His voice was the kind that made men steady their knees. "We will not be led by moods. We will not be led by... soft whims."

Brian heard the word soft like a slap. The yard held its breath, like someone had put a lid over it. Asher's smile returned, slow and dangerous.

"You'll regret this," Asher said. "You'll make enemies, brother."

Brian could feel the thread in his chest tighten when the name hit-enemies. He had been raised on speeches about duty. He had swallowed the taste of loyalty until it coated his tongue. But the syllable from Lyra-Sera-was a pocket of light in all that dark iron. It had nothing to do with politics. It had to do with something older.

When he left the yard, he saw the steward hurrying toward him with a rolled scrap of paper. "A note from Asher," the man said. "He wondered if you were a coward."

Brian took the scrap and watched the handwriting-slick and neat. It said little, as if to say everything: Bring her or lose her. You have a day.

He crushed the paper in his fist and walked up to the tower. Lyra met him at the top, hands washed, hair smoothed, looking like a woman preparing for a battle she had not chosen.

"We'll not bring her," Brian told her, not as a question. He wanted to see how she would react. She only smiled the small, tight smile she kept for herself and nodded.

He wanted to tell her more. He wanted to say that he had been to the yard and seen the way men looked at her; that he had felt Asher setting a net. But words could be traps. He kept it short.

"The men want a show," he said. "They want to humiliate you."

Her face did not change, but her eyes shone. She moved to the cot and pulled a thin strip of cloth from her skirt. With fingers used to war, she wrapped the strip around a dull stone and began to hammer at it like a smith practicing. The noise was small-metal on stone-but it made Brian think of an old clock ticking. She was practicing movement. She was not helpless.

At dusk, Brian went to the kitchens and brought back food he did not finish. He sat by the cot and ate slowly. The thread hummed, and in his mind a picture unrolled like a scrap of woven cloth-images, not words: a ring of stones, a moon like a coin, a woman's hands raised and blood dark at her feet. It lasted a second and then slid away. He frowned and tasted iron.

Lyra watched him watch the memory and tapped his hand. The touch was quick and certain. It meant: I showed you. Remember.

He pushed his chair back. The building creaked. "Do you know what happened that night?" he asked, more to himself than to her.

She traced the scar on her shoulder, slow and deliberate, then pointed at the seam of the tower wall as if she was showing him a place where something had been hidden. Her eyes said more than the motion. She meant the sacrifice. She meant the ritual. For a breath, Brian felt the world tilt.

Someone knocked then-harder. Not a polite tap but a slam. The door shook. Brian stood so fast his chair toppled. He went to the door and opened a crack. Asher's face filled the gap like a sun that had turned black.

"You keep secrets, brother," Asher said. "Keep them long enough and they rot."

Behind him, men with faces like knives watched the doorway. Brian saw Lucius in their shadows, his mouth thin as wire. He should have known Asher would not be satisfied with threats. He should have known the kind of men Asher would bring.

Asher's smile was a crescent moon. "Take her down to the yard now," he said. "Or we take her and make the choice for you."

Brian felt the world narrow like a throat. He thought of the thread at his ribs and the memory flashes that kept surfacing. He thought of the way Lyra had wrapped the strip of cloth around the stone. He thought of the tiny, sharp faith in her face when she had tapped his hand like a promise.

"Not without a fight," Brian said, and the words surprised him, blunted and rough as a new sword. He stepped aside and the room smelled like rain on a hot stone.

Asher laughed then, a sound meant to cut. "You'll be the death of us, brother," he said, and his voice had a gladness that made Brian's guts turn.

The men stepped forward, boots soft on the flagstone. They moved like a tide.

Lyra's eyes met Brian's and for the first time he felt the thread pull so hard it almost hurt. There was a word in the silence between them-an oath, a warning, a thing said without voice. Remember Sera, it said again, and then, as the men closed in, Lyra lifted her chin and smiled like someone who had been practicing courage for a long time.

The first man reached for her chain.

Someone outside the tower roof gave a long, low cry. It sounded like the start of a hunt.