You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

CHAPTER
65
This was some new hell. Some new lev­el of night­mare. I even went so far
as to try to wake myself up.
But there they were—in their night­gowns, the silk and lace dirty, torn.
Elain was qui­et­ly sob­bing, the gag soaked with her tears. Nes­ta, hair
disheveled as if she’d fought like a wild­cat, was pant­i­ng as she took us in.
Took in the Caul­dron.
“You made a very big mis­take,” the king said to Rhysand, my mate’s
arms band­ed around me, “the day you went after the Book. I had no need of
it. I was con­tent to let it lie hid­den. But the moment your forces start­ed
sniff­ing around … I decid­ed who bet­ter than to be my liai­son to the human
realm than my new­ly reborn friend, Juri­an? He’d just fin­ished all those
months of recov­er­ing from the process, and longed to see what his for­mer
home had become, so he was more than hap­py to vis­it the con­ti­nent for an
extend­ed vis­it.”
Indeed the queens smiled at him—bowed their heads. Rhys’s arms
tight­ened in silent warn­ing.
“The brave, cun­ning Juri­an, who suf­fered so bad­ly at the end of the War
—now my ally. Here to help me con­vince these queens to aid in my cause.
For a price of his own, of course, but it has no bear­ing here. And wis­er to
work with me, my men, than to allow you mon­sters in the Night Court to
rule and attack. Juri­an was right to warn their Majesties that you’d try to
take the Book—that you would feed them lies of love and good­ness, when
he had seen what the High Lord of the Night Court was capa­ble of. The
hero of the human forces, reborn as a ges­ture to the human world of my
good faith. I do not wish to invade the continent—but to work with them.
My pow­ers ensconced their court from pry­ing eyes, just to show them the
ben­e­fits.” A smirk at Azriel, who could hard­ly lift his head to snarl back.
“Such impres­sive attempts to infil­trate their sacred palace, Shad­owsinger—
and utter proof to their Majesties, of course, that your court is not as
benev­o­lent as you seem.”
“Liar,” I hissed, and whirled on the queens, dar­ing only a step away from
Rhys. “They are liars, and if you do not let my sis­ters go, I will slaugh­ter
—”
“Do you hear the threats, the lan­guage they use in the Night Court?” the
king said to the mor­tal queens, their guards now around us in a half cir­cle.
“Slaugh­ter, ulti­ma­tums … They wish to end life. I desire to give it.”
The eldest queen said to him, refus­ing to acknowl­edge me, my words,
“Then show us—prove this gift you men­tioned.”
Rhysand tugged me back against him. He said qui­et­ly to the queen,
“You’re a fool.”
The king cut in, “Is she? Why sub­mit to old age and ail­ments when what
I offer is so much bet­ter?” He waved a hand toward me. “Eter­nal youth. Do
you deny the ben­e­fits? A mor­tal queen becomes one who might reign
for­ev­er. Of course, there are risks—the tran­si­tion can be … dif­fi­cult. But a
strong-willed indi­vid­ual could sur­vive.”
The youngest queen, the dark-haired one, smiled slight­ly. Arro­gant youth
—and bit­ter old age. Only the two oth­ers, the ones who wore white and
black, seemed to hes­i­tate, step­ping clos­er to each other—and their tow­er­ing
guards.
The ancient queen lift­ed her chin, “Show us. Demon­strate it can be done,
that it is safe.” She had spo­ken of eter­nal youth that day, had spat in my
face about it. Two-faced bitch.
The king nod­ded. “Why did you think I asked my dear friend Ianthe to
see who Feyre Archeron would appre­ci­ate hav­ing with her for eter­ni­ty?”
Even as hor­ror filled my ears with roar­ing silence, I glanced at the queens,
the ques­tion no doubt writ­ten on my face. The king explained, “Oh, I asked
them first. They deemed it too … uncouth to betray two young, mis­guid­ed
women. Ianthe had no such qualms. Con­sid­er it my wed­ding present for
you both,” he added to Tam­lin.
But Tamlin’s face tight­ened. “What?”
The king cocked his head, savor­ing every word. “I think the High
Priest­ess was wait­ing until your return to tell you, but didn’t you ever ask
why she believed I might be able to break the bar­gain? Why she had so
many mus­ings on the idea? So many mil­len­nia have the High Priest­esses
been forced to their knees for the High Lords. And dur­ing those years she
dwelled in that for­eign court … such an open mind, she has. Once we met,
once I paint­ed for her a por­trait of a Pry­thi­an free of High Lords, where the
High Priest­esses might rule with grace and wis­dom … She didn’t take much
con­vinc­ing.”
I was going to vom­it. Tam­lin, to his cred­it, looked like he might, too.
Lucien’s face had slack­ened. “She sold out—she sold out Feyre’s fam­i­ly.
To you.”
I had told Ianthe every­thing about my sis­ters. She had asked. Asked who
they were, where they lived. And I had been so stu­pid, so bro­ken … I had
fed her every detail.
“Sold out?” The king snort­ed. “Or saved from the shack­les of mor­tal
death? Ianthe sug­gest­ed they were both strong-willed women, like their
sis­ter. No doubt they’ll sur­vive. And prove to our queens it can be done. If
one has the strength.”
My heart stopped. “Don’t you—
The king cut me off, “I would sug­gest brac­ing your­selves.”
And then hell explod­ed in the hall.
Pow­er, white and unend­ing and hideous, bar­reled into us.
All I knew was Rhysand’s body cov­er­ing mine as we were all thrown to
the floor, the shout of pain as he took the brunt of the king’s pow­er.
Cass­ian twist­ed, wings flar­ing wide as he shield­ed Azriel.
His wings—his wings—
Cassian’s scream as his wings shred­ded under talons of pure mag­ic was
the most hor­rif­ic sound I’d ever heard. Mor surged for him, but too late.
Rhys was mov­ing in an instant, as if he’d lunge for the king, but pow­er
hit us again, and again. Rhys slammed to his knees.
My sis­ters were shriek­ing over their gags. But Elain’s cry—a warn­ing. A
warn­ing to—
To my right, now exposed, Tam­lin ran for me. To grab me at last.
I hurled a knife at him—as hard as I could.
He had to dive to miss it. And he backed away at the sec­ond one I had
ready, gap­ing at me, at Rhys, as if he could indeed see the mat­ing bond
between us.
But I whirled as sol­diers pressed in, cut­ting us off. Whirled, and saw
Cass­ian and Azriel on the ground, Juri­an laugh­ing soft­ly at the blood
gush­ing from Cassian’s rav­aged wings—
Shreds of them remained.
I scram­bled for him. My blood. It might be enough, be—
Mor, on her knees beside Cass­ian, hur­tled for the king with a cry of pure
wrath.
He sent a punch of pow­er to her. She dodged, a knife angled in her hand,
and—
Azriel cried out in pain.
She froze. Stopped a foot from the throne. Her knife clat­tered to the floor.
The king rose. “What a mighty queen you are,” he breathed.
And Mor backed away. Step by step.
“What a prize,” the king said, that black gaze devour­ing her.
Azriel’s head lift­ed from where he was sprawled in his own blood, eyes
full of rage and pain as he snarled at the king, “Don’t you touch her.”
Mor looked at Azriel—and there was real fear there. Fear—and
some­thing else. She didn’t stop mov­ing until she again kneeled beside him
and pressed a hand to his wound. Azriel hissed—but cov­ered her bloody
fin­gers with his own.
Rhys posi­tioned him­self between me and the king as I dropped to my
knees before Cass­ian. I ripped at the leather cov­er­ing my fore­arm—
“Put the pret­ti­er one in first,” the king said, Mor already for­got­ten.
I twisted—only to have the king’s guards grab me from behind. Rhys was
instant­ly there, but Azriel shout­ed, back arch­ing as the king’s poi­son
worked its way in.
“Please refrain,” the king said, “from get­ting any stu­pid ideas, Rhysand.”
He smiled at me. “If any of you inter­fere, the shad­owsinger dies. Pity about
the oth­er brute’s wings.” He gave my sis­ters a mock­ery of a bow. “Ladies,
eter­ni­ty awaits. Prove to their Majesties the Caul­dron is safe for … strong-
willed indi­vid­u­als.”
I shook my head, unable to breathe, to think a way out of it—
Elain was shak­ing, sob­bing, as she was hauled for­ward. Toward the
Caul­dron.
Nes­ta began thrash­ing against the men that held her.
Tam­lin said, “Stop.”
The king did no such thing.
Lucien, beside Tam­lin, again put a hand on his sword. “Stop this.”
Nes­ta was bel­low­ing at the guards, at the king, as Elain yield­ed step after
step toward that Caul­dron. As the king waved his hand, and liq­uid filled it
to the brim. No, no—
The queens only watched, stone-faced. And Rhys and Mor, sep­a­rat­ed
from me by those guards, did not dare to even shift a mus­cle.
Tam­lin spat at the king, “This is not part of our deal. Stop this now.”
“I don’t care,” the king said sim­ply.
Tam­lin launched him­self at the throne, as if he’d rip him to shreds.
That white-hot mag­ic slammed into him, shov­ing him to the ground.
Leash­ing him.
Tam­lin strained against the col­lar of light on his neck, around his wrists.
His gold­en pow­er flared—to no avail. I tore at the fist still grip­ping my
own, sliced at it, over and over—
Lucien stag­gered a step for­ward as Elain was gripped between two
guards and hoist­ed up. She began kick­ing then, weep­ing while her feet
slammed into the sides of the Caul­dron as if she’d push off it, as if she’d
knock it down—
“That is enough.” Lucien surged for Elain, for the Caul­dron.
And the king’s pow­er leashed him, too. On the ground beside Tam­lin, his
sin­gle eye wide, Lucien had the good sense to look hor­ri­fied as he glanced
between Elain and the High Lord.
“Please,” I begged the king, who motioned Elain to be shoved into the
water. “Please, I will do any­thing, I will give you any­thing.” I shot to my
feet, step­ping away from where Cass­ian lay pros­trate, and looked to the
queens. “Please—you do not need proof, I am proof that it works. Juri­an is
proof it is safe.”
The ancient queen said, “You are a thief, and a liar. You con­spired with
our sis­ter. Your pun­ish­ment should be the same as hers. Con­sid­er this a gift
instead.”
Elain’s foot hit the water, and she screamed—screamed in ter­ror that hit
me so deep I began sob­bing. “Please,” I said to none of them.
Nes­ta was still fight­ing, still roar­ing through her gag.
Elain, who Nes­ta would have killed and whored and stolen for. Elain,
who had been gen­tle and sweet. Elain, who was to mar­ry a lord’s son who
hat­ed faeries …
The guards shoved my sis­ter into the Caul­dron in a sin­gle move­ment.
My cry hadn’t fin­ished sound­ing before Elain’s head went under.
She did not come up.
Nesta’s scream­ing was the only sound. Cass­ian blind­ly lurched toward it
—toward her, moan­ing in pain.
The King of Hybern bowed slight­ly to the queens. “Behold.”
Rhys, a wall of guards still cleav­ing us, curled his fin­gers into a fist. But
he did not move, as Mor and I did not dare move, not with Azriel’s life
dan­gling in the king’s grasp.
And as if it had been tipped by invis­i­ble hands, the Caul­dron turned on its
side.
More water than seemed pos­si­ble dumped out in a cas­cade. Black,
smoke-coat­ed water.
And Elain, as if she’d been thrown by a wave, washed onto the stones
face­down.
Her legs were so pale—so del­i­cate. I couldn’t remem­ber the last time I’d
seen them bare.
The queens pushed for­ward. Alive, she had to be alive, had to have
want­ed to live—
Elain sucked in a breath, her fine-boned back ris­ing, her wet night­gown
near­ly sheer.
And as she rose from the ground onto her elbows, the gag in place, as she
twist­ed to look at me—
Nes­ta began roar­ing again.
Pale skin start­ed to glow. Her face had some­how become more beau­ti­ful
—infi­nite­ly beau­ti­ful, and her ears … Elain’s ears were now point­ed
beneath her sod­den hair.
The queens gasped. And for a moment, all I could think of was my father.
What he would do, what he would say, when his most beloved daugh­ter
looked at him with a Fae face.
“So we can sur­vive,” the dark-haired youngest breathed, eyes bright.
I fell to my knees, the guards not both­er­ing to grab me as I sobbed. What
he’d done, what he’d done—
“The hell­cat now, if you’ll be so kind,” the King of Hybern said.
I whipped my head to Nes­ta as she went silent. The Caul­dron right­ed
itself.
Cass­ian again stirred, slump­ing on the floor—but his hand twitched.
Toward Nes­ta.
Elain was still shiv­er­ing on the wet stones, her night­gown shoved up to
her thighs, her small breasts ful­ly vis­i­ble beneath the soaked fab­ric. Guards
snick­ered.
Lucien snarled at the king over the bite of the mag­ic at his throat, “Don’t
just leave her on the damned floor—”
There was a flare of light, and a scrape, and then Lucien was stalk­ing
toward Elain, freed of his restraints. Tam­lin remained leashed on the
ground, a gag of white, iri­des­cent mag­ic in his mouth now. But his eyes
were on Lucien as—
As Lucien took off his jack­et, kneel­ing before Elain. She cringed away
from the coat, from him—
The guards hauled Nes­ta toward the Caul­dron.
There were dif­fer­ent kinds of tor­ture, I real­ized.
There was the tor­ture that I had endured, that Rhys had endured.
And then there was this.
The tor­ture that Rhys had worked so hard those fifty years to avoid; the
night­mares that haunt­ed him. To be unable to move, to fight … while our
loved ones were bro­ken. My eyes met with those of my mate. Agony
rip­pled in that vio­let stare—rage and guilt and utter agony. The mir­ror to
my own.
Nes­ta fought every step of the way.
She did not make it easy for them. She clawed and kicked and bucked.
And it was not enough.
And we were not enough to save her.
I watched as she was hoist­ed up. Elain remained shud­der­ing on the
ground, Lucien’s coat draped around her. She did not look at the Caul­dron
behind her, not as Nesta’s thrash­ing feet slammed into the water.
Cass­ian stirred again, his shred­ded wings twitch­ing and spray­ing blood,
his mus­cles quiv­er­ing. At Nesta’s shouts, her rag­ing, his eyes flut­tered
open, glazed and unsee­ing, an answer to some call in his blood, a promise
he’d made her. But pain knocked him under again.
Nes­ta was shoved into the water up to her shoul­ders. She bucked even as
the water sprayed. She clawed and screamed her rage, her defi­ance.
“Put her under,” the king hissed.
The guards, strain­ing, shoved her slen­der shoul­ders. Her brown-gold
head.
And as they pushed her head down, she thrashed one last time, free­ing
her long, pale arm.
Teeth bared, Nes­ta point­ed one fin­ger at the King of Hybern.
One fin­ger, a curse and a damn­ing.
A promise.
And as Nesta’s head was forced under the water, as that hand was
vio­lent­ly shoved down, the King of Hybern had the good sense to look
some­what unnerved.
Dark water lapped for a moment. The sur­face went flat.
I vom­it­ed on the floor.
The guards at last let Rhysand kneel beside me in the grow­ing pool of
Cassian’s blood—let him tuck me into him as the Caul­dron again tilt­ed.
Water poured forth, Lucien hoist­ing Elain in his arms and out of the way.
The bonds on Tam­lin van­ished, along with the gag. He was instant­ly on his
feet, snarling at the king. Even the fist on my mind light­ened to a mere
caress. As if he knew he’d won.
I didn’t care. Not as Nes­ta was sprawled upon the stones.
I knew that she was dif­fer­ent.
From how­ev­er Elain had been Made … Nes­ta was dif­fer­ent.
Even before she took her first breath, I felt it.
As if the Caul­dron in mak­ing her … had been forced to give more than it
want­ed. As if Nes­ta had fought even after she went under, and had decid­ed
that if she was to be dragged into hell, she was tak­ing that Caul­dron with
her.
As if that fin­ger she’d point­ed was now a death-promise to the King of
Hybern.

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

H ERE IS THE THING ABOUT fury.
It starts in your chest.
It starts as fear.
Fear quick­ly moves to denial. No, that must be a mis­take. No, that
can’t be.
And then the truth hits. Yes, she is right. Yes, it can be.
Because you real­ize, Yes, it is true.
And then you have a choice. Are you sad, or are you angry?
And ulti­mate­ly, the thin line between the two comes down to the
answer to one ques­tion. Can you assign blame?
The loss of my father, when I was sev­en, was some­thing for which I
only ever had one per­son to blame. My father. My father was dri­ving
drunk. He’d nev­er done any­thing like it before. It was entire­ly out of
char­ac­ter. But it hap­pened. And I could either hate him for it, or I
could try to under­stand it. Your father was dri­ving under the influ­ence
and lost con­trol of the car.
But this. The knowl­edge that my father nev­er will­ing­ly got behind
the wheel of a car drunk, that he was left dead on the side of the road
by this woman, framed for his own death, his lega­cy tar­nished. The
fact that I grew up believ­ing he’d been the one to cause the acci­dent.
There is so much blame hang­ing in the air, wait­ing for me to snatch it
and pin it on Evelyn’s chest.
And the way she is sit­ting in front of me, remorse­ful but not exact­ly
sor­ry, makes it clear she’s ready to be pinned.
This blame is like a flint to my years of aching. And it erupts into
fury.
My body goes white-hot. My eyes tear. My hands ball into fists, and
I step away because I am afraid of what I might do.
And then, because step­ping away from her feels too gen­er­ous, I
edge back to where she is, and I push her against the sofa, and I say,
“I’m glad you have no one left. I’m glad there’s no one alive to love
you.”
I let go of her, sur­prised at myself. She sits back up. She watch­es
me.
“You think that giv­ing me your sto­ry makes up for any of it?” I ask
her. “All this time, you’ve been mak­ing me sit here, lis­ten­ing to your
life, so that you could con­fess, and you think that your biog­ra­phy
makes up for it?”
“No,” she says. “I think you know me well enough by now to know
I’m not near­ly naive enough to believe in abso­lu­tion.”
“What, then?”
Eve­lyn reach­es out and shows me the paper in her hand.
“I found this in Harry’s pants pock­et. The night he died. My guess
is that he’d read it and it was the rea­son he’d been drink­ing so much to
begin with. It was from your father.”
“So?”
“So I  .  .  . I found great peace in my daugh­ter know­ing the truth
about me. There was immense com­fort in know­ing the real her. I
want­ed to . . . I think I’m the only per­son alive who can give that to you.
Can give it to your dad. I want you to know who he tru­ly was.”
“I know who he was to me,” I say, while real­iz­ing that that’s not
exact­ly true.
“I thought you would want to know all of him. Take it, Monique.
Read the let­ter. If you don’t want it, you don’t have to keep it. But I
always planned on send­ing it to you. I always thought you deserved to
know.”
I snatch it from her, not want­i­ng even to extend the kind­ness of
tak­ing it gen­tly. I sit down. I open it. There are what can only be
blood­stains on the top of the page. I won­der briefly if it’s my father’s
blood. Or Harry’s. I decide not to think about it.
Before I can read even one line, I look up at her.
“Can you leave?” I say.
Eve­lyn nods and walks out of her own office. She shuts the door
behind her. I look down. There is so much to reframe in my mind.
My father did noth­ing wrong.
My father didn’t cause his own death.
I’ve spent years of my life see­ing him from that angle, mak­ing peace
with him through that lens.
And now, for the first time in near­ly thir­ty years, I have new words,
fresh thoughts, from my father.
Dear Har­ry,
I love you. I love you in a way that I nev­er thought pos­si­ble. I
have spent so much of my life think­ing that this type of love
was a myth. And now here it is, so real I can touch it, and I
final­ly under­stand what the Bea­t­les were singing about all
those years.
I do not want you to move to Europe. But I also know that
what I may not want may very well be the best thing for you.
So despite my desires, I think you should go.
I can­not and will not be able to give you the life you are
dream­ing of here in Los Ange­les.
I can­not mar­ry Celia St. James—although I do agree with
you that she is a stun­ning­ly beau­ti­ful woman, and if I’m being
hon­est, I did nurse a small crush on her in Roy­al Wed­ding.
But the fact remains that though I have nev­er loved my
wife the way I love you, I will nev­er leave her. I love my fam­i­ly
too much to frac­ture us for even a moment of time. My
daugh­ter, whom I des­per­ate­ly hope you can one day meet, is
my rea­son for liv­ing. And I know that she is hap­pi­est with me
and her mom. I know that she will live her best life only if I
stay where I am.
Angela is per­haps not the love of my life. I know that now,
now that I’ve felt real pas­sion. But I think, in many ways, she
means to me what Eve­lyn means to you. She is my best friend,
my con­fi­dante, my com­pan­ion. I admire the forth­right­ness
with which you and Eve­lyn dis­cuss your sex­u­al­i­ty, your desires.
But it is not how Angela and I work, and I’m not sure I’d
want to change that. We do not have a vibrant sex life, but I
love her the way one loves a part­ner. I would nev­er for­give