The chap­ter unfolds with a par­ty set­ting that feels eeri­ly mun­dane con­sid­er­ing the loom­ing fate of its pro­tag­o­nist. Faeries engage in rev­el­ry, seem­ing­ly obliv­i­ous or indif­fer­ent to the dras­tic changes that could soon affect their world. The pro­tag­o­nist, marked by tat­toos and dressed in a pink gown that con­flicts with her cur­rent mood and sit­u­a­tion, finds her­self on the periph­ery, wait­ing for Rhysand’s sig­nal to join or serve him. Instead, an encounter with Tam­lin offers a fleet­ing moment of human con­nec­tion, their inter­ac­tion laden with the unsaid but deeply felt, amidst the grandeur and friv­o­li­ty of the faerie world.

The nar­ra­tive then dives into a moment of inti­ma­cy and des­per­a­tion between Tam­lin and the pro­tag­o­nist, a stark con­trast to the shal­low fes­tiv­i­ties out­side. Their ren­dezvous is inter­rupt­ed by Rhysand, who, with his arrival, brings a reminder of the pre­car­i­ous­ness of their sit­u­a­tion and the pro­tag­o­nist’s role and oblig­a­tions with­in the faerie court’s polit­i­cal machi­na­tions. The air is thick with ten­sion, Rhysand’s words drip­ping with omi­nous under­tones, reveal­ing the fraught dynam­ics between him, Tam­lin, and Ama­ran­tha, the tyrant they are all bound to in vary­ing ways. The scene shifts from antic­i­pa­tion to con­fronta­tion, under­scor­ing the imme­di­ate dan­gers and the broad­er, oppres­sive struc­tures at play.

The chap­ter also delves into Rhysand’s moti­va­tions, reveal­ing lay­ers to his char­ac­ter that sug­gest a com­plex­i­ty beyond his pre­vi­ous por­tray­als. In a moment of vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty, Rhysand shares his weari­ness and dis­il­lu­sion­ment with the pro­tag­o­nist, hint­ing at his own form of cap­tiv­i­ty under Ama­ran­tha’s rule. This exchange sheds light on the per­son­al stakes involved, as well as the broad­er impli­ca­tions of their actions in the face of tyran­ny. The pro­tag­o­nist is thrust into a web of intrigue, pow­er strug­gles, and the harsh real­i­ties of their world, all while grap­pling with the per­son­al costs of their choic­es and the uncer­tain promise of tomor­row.

The chap­ter mas­ter­ful­ly bal­ances moments of inti­mate con­nec­tion and per­son­al long­ing with the heavy, omnipresent shad­ows of polit­i­cal intrigue and the loom­ing threat of Ama­ran­tha. The pro­tag­o­nist’s inter­nal strug­gles, cou­pled with her inter­ac­tions with Tam­lin and Rhysand, paint a vivid pic­ture of the com­plex dynam­ics at play with­in the faerie world. This jux­ta­po­si­tion of the per­son­al and polit­i­cal, the moments of beau­ty and the under­cur­rents of dark­ness, sets the stage for the unfold­ing dra­ma and the pro­tag­o­nist’s role in the future of their world.

Chap­ter Forty-Two is a vivid, heart-wrench­ing episode enti­tled “Step Four: Make the World Believe You’re Crazy,” where the nar­ra­tor, Nina, details wak­ing from a state of exhaus­tion and dehy­dra­tion, only to find her­self embroiled in an urgent and ter­ri­fy­ing sit­u­a­tion. The nar­ra­tive begins with Nina’s dis­ori­ent­ed awak­en­ing, her body strug­gling to recu­per­ate from days with­out sus­te­nance. She imme­di­ate­ly per­ceives a dis­tant sound of run­ning water from the mas­ter bath­room, spark­ing a sense of urgency, espe­cial­ly as she con­sid­ers the pos­si­bil­i­ty that her cap­tor, Andy, might be near­by. How­ev­er, she soon real­izes Andy isn’t in the house; he has been send­ing her con­cerned text mes­sages, one of which men­tions their daugh­ter, Cecelia, remind­ing Nina of her pri­ma­ry fear—Cecelia’s safe­ty.

Fuelled by mater­nal instinct and despite her weak­ened state, Nina decides to inves­ti­gate the source of the run­ning water. Strength­ened by neces­si­ty but hin­dered by phys­i­cal debil­i­ty, she makes a painstak­ing jour­ney towards the mas­ter bath­room. The effort is colos­sal; her body bare­ly coop­er­ates, reflect­ing the extent of her ear­li­er neglect and the psy­cho­log­i­cal toll of her ordeal. Nina’s every step is a bat­tle against her lim­i­ta­tions, show­cas­ing both vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty and an indomitable will to ensure her daugh­ter’s safe­ty.

Upon reach­ing the bath­room, Nina is con­front­ed with a hor­ri­fy­ing sight—her daugh­ter, Cecelia, is in the bath­tub, uncon­scious and in immi­nent dan­ger of drown­ing. With the water lev­el per­ilous­ly close to envelop­ing Cecelia, Nina’s des­per­a­tion inten­si­fies. Her nar­ra­tive cap­tures a pal­pa­ble sense of pan­ic inter­min­gled with deter­mi­na­tion, por­tray­ing a moth­er’s resolve to save her child against all odds.

The chap­ter cli­max­es with Nina’s strug­gle to both remain con­scious and res­cue her daugh­ter. Her phys­i­cal symptoms—paleness, shak­i­ness, dif­fi­cul­ty moving—underscore the seri­ous­ness of her con­di­tion, yet her focus remains unwa­ver­ing­ly on Cecelia. The account con­cludes on a cliffhang­er, with Nina crawl­ing towards Cecelia, dri­ven by love and sheer willpow­er, pre­pared to sac­ri­fice every­thing to avert tragedy.

This chap­ter mas­ter­ful­ly com­bines ele­ments of sus­pense, fear, and parental love, leav­ing read­ers on the edge of their seats, eager to dis­cov­er the out­come of Nina’s hero­ic efforts to save her daugh­ter. The nar­ra­tive is a tes­ta­ment to the depth of a moth­er’s love and the lengths to which she will go to pro­tect her child, weav­ing a tale of sus­pense and emo­tion­al depth that res­onates with the read­er.

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
42
I was not fright­ened.
Not of the role that Rhys had asked me to play today. Not of the roar­ing
wind as we win­nowed into a famil­iar, snow-capped moun­tain range
refus­ing to yield to spring’s awak­en­ing kiss. Not of the pun­ish­ing drop as
Rhys flew us between the peaks and val­leys, swift and sleek. Cass­ian and
Azriel flanked us; Mor would meet us at the gates to the moun­tain base.
Rhys’s face was drawn, his shoul­ders tense as I gripped them. I knew
what to expect, but … even after he’d told me what he need­ed me to do,
even after I had agreed, he’d been … aloof. Haunt­ed.
Wor­ried for me, I real­ized.
And just because of that wor­ry, just to get that tight­ness off his face, even
for these few min­utes before we faced his unholy realm beneath that
moun­tain, I said over the wind, “Amren and Mor told me that the span of an
Illyr­i­an male’s wings says a lot about the size of … oth­er parts.”
His eyes shot to mine, then to pine-tree-coat­ed slopes below. “Did they
now.”
I shrugged in his arms, try­ing not to think about the naked body that night
all those weeks ago—though I hadn’t glimpsed much. “They also said
Azriel’s wings are the biggest.”
Mis­chief danced in those vio­let eyes, wash­ing away the cold dis­tance, the
strain. The spy­mas­ter was a black blur against the pale blue sky. “When we
return home, let’s get out the mea­sur­ing stick, shall we?”
I pinched the rock-hard mus­cle of his fore­arm. Rhys flashed me a wicked
grin before he tilt­ed down—
Moun­tains and snow and trees and sun and utter free fall through wisps
of cloud—
A breath­less scream came out of me as we plum­met­ed. Throw­ing my
arms around his neck was instinct. His low laugh tick­led my nape. “You’re
will­ing to brave my brand of dark­ness and put up one of your own, will­ing
to go to a watery grave and take on the Weaver, but a lit­tle free fall makes
you scream?”
“I’ll leave you to rot the next time you have a night­mare,” I hissed, my
eyes still shut and body locked as he snapped out his wings to ease us into a
steady glide.
“No, you won’t,” he crooned. “You liked see­ing me naked too much.”
“Prick.”
His laugh rum­bled against me. Eyes closed, the wind roar­ing like a wild
ani­mal, I adjust­ed my posi­tion, grip­ping him tighter. My knuck­les brushed
one of his wings—smooth and cool like silk, but hard as stone with it
stretched taut.
Fas­ci­nat­ing. I blind­ly reached again … and dared to run a fin­ger­tip along
some inner edge.
Rhysand shud­dered, a soft groan slip­ping past my ear. “That,” he said
tight­ly, “is very sen­si­tive.”
I snatched my fin­ger back, pulling away far enough to see his face. With
the wind, I had to squint, and my braid­ed hair ripped this way and that, but
—he was entire­ly focused on the moun­tains around us. “Does it tick­le?”
He flicked his gaze to me, then to the snow and pine that went on for­ev­er.
“It feels like this,” he said, and leaned in so close that his lips brushed the
shell of my ear as he sent a gen­tle breath into it. My back arched on instinct,
my chin tip­ping up at the caress of that breath.
“Oh,” I man­aged to say. I felt him smile against my ear and pull away.
“If you want an Illyr­i­an male’s atten­tion, you’d be bet­ter off grab­bing
him by the balls. We’re trained to pro­tect our wings at all costs. Some males
attack first, ask ques­tions lat­er, if their wings are touched with­out
invi­ta­tion.”
“And dur­ing sex?” The ques­tion blurt­ed out.
Rhys’s face was noth­ing but feline amuse­ment as he mon­i­tored the
moun­tains. “Dur­ing sex, an Illyr­i­an male can find com­ple­tion just by hav­ing
some­one touch his wings in the right spot.”
My blood thrummed. Dan­ger­ous ter­ri­to­ry; more lethal than the drop
below. “Have you found that to be true?”
His eyes stripped me bare. “I’ve nev­er allowed any­one to see or touch
my wings dur­ing sex. It makes you vul­ner­a­ble in a way that I’m not …
com­fort­able with.”
“Too bad,” I said, star­ing out too casu­al­ly toward the mighty moun­tain
that now appeared on the hori­zon, tow­er­ing over the oth­ers. And capped, I
not­ed, with that glim­mer­ing palace of moon­stone.
“Why?” he asked war­i­ly.
I shrugged, fight­ing the upward tug­ging of my lips. “Because I bet you
could get into some inter­est­ing posi­tions with those wings.”
Rhys loosed a bark­ing laugh, and his nose grazed my ear. I felt him open
his mouth to whis­per some­thing, but—
Some­thing dark and fast and sleek shot for us, and he plunged down and
away, swear­ing.
But anoth­er one, and anoth­er, kept com­ing.
Not just ordi­nary arrows, I real­ized as Rhys veered, snatch­ing one out of
the air. Oth­ers bounced harm­less­ly off a shield he blast­ed up.
He stud­ied the wood in his palm and dropped it with a hiss. Ash arrows.
To kill faeries.
And now that I was one …
Faster than the wind, faster than death, Rhys shot for the ground. Flew,
not win­nowed, because he want­ed to know where our ene­mies were, didn’t
want to lose them. The wind bit my face, screeched in my ears, ripped at
my hair with bru­tal claws.
Azriel and Cass­ian were already hurtling for us. Shields of translu­cent
blue and red encir­cled them—sending those arrows bounc­ing off. Their
Siphons at work.
The arrows shot from the pine for­est coat­ing the moun­tains, then
van­ished.
Rhys slammed into the ground, snow fly­ing in his wake, and fury like I
hadn’t seen since that day in Amarantha’s court twist­ed his fea­tures. I could
feel it thrum­ming against me, roil­ing through the clear­ing we now stood in.
Azriel and Cass­ian were there in an instant, their col­ored shields
shrink­ing back into their Siphons. The three of them forces of nature in the
pine for­est, Rhysand didn’t even look at me as he ordered Cass­ian, “Take
her to the palace, and stay there until I’m back. Az, you’re with me.”
Cass­ian reached for me, but I stepped away. “No.”
“What?” Rhys snarled, the word near-gut­tur­al.
“Take me with you,” I said. I didn’t want to go to that moon­stone palace
to pace and wait and wring my fin­gers.
Cass­ian and Azriel, wise­ly, kept their mouths shut. And Rhys, Moth­er
bless him, only tucked in his wings and crossed his arms—waiting to hear
my rea­sons.
“I’ve seen ash arrows,” I said a bit breath­less­ly. “I might rec­og­nize where
they were made. And if they came from the hand of anoth­er High Lord … I
can detect that, too.” If they’d come from Tar­quin … “And I can track just
as well on the ground as any of you.” Except for Azriel, maybe. “So you
and Cass­ian take the skies,” I said, still wait­ing for the rejec­tion, the order
to lock me up. “And I’ll hunt on the ground with Azriel.”
The wrath radi­at­ing through the snowy clear­ing ebbed into frozen, too-
calm rage. But Rhys said, “Cassian—I want aer­i­al patrols on the sea
bor­ders, sta­tioned in two-mile rings, all the way out toward Hybern. I want
foot sol­diers in the moun­tain pass­es along the south­ern bor­der; make sure
those warn­ing fires are ready on every peak. We’re not going to rely on
mag­ic.” He turned to Azriel. “When you’re done, warn your spies that they
might be com­pro­mised, and pre­pare to get them out. And put fresh ones in.
We keep this con­tained. We don’t tell any­one inside that court what
hap­pened. If any­one men­tions it, say it was a train­ing exer­cise.”
Because we couldn’t afford to let that weak­ness show, even amongst his
sub­jects.
His eyes at last found mine. “We’ve got an hour until we’re expect­ed at
court. Make it count.”
We searched, but the missed arrows had been snatched up by our attack­ers
—and even the shad­ows and wind told Azriel noth­ing, as if our ene­my had
been hid­den from them as well.
But that was twice now that they’d known where Rhys and I would be.
Mor found Azriel and me after twen­ty min­utes, want­i­ng to know what
the hell had hap­pened. We’d explained—and she’d win­nowed away, to spin
what­ev­er excuse would keep her hor­ri­ble fam­i­ly from sus­pect­ing any­thing
was amiss.
But at the end of the hour, we hadn’t found a sin­gle track. And we could
delay our meet­ing no longer.
The Court of Night­mares lay behind a mam­moth set of doors carved into
the moun­tain itself. And from the base, the moun­tain rose so high I couldn’t
see the palace I had once stayed in atop it. Only snow, and rock, and birds
cir­cling above. There was no one outside—no vil­lage, no signs of life.
Noth­ing to indi­cate a whole city of peo­ple dwelled with­in.
But I did not let my curios­i­ty or any lin­ger­ing trep­i­da­tion show as Mor
and I entered. Rhys, Cass­ian, and Azriel would arrive min­utes lat­er.
There were sen­tries at the stone gates, clothed not in black, as I might
have sus­pect­ed, but in gray and white—armor meant to blend into the
moun­tain face. Mor didn’t so much as look at them as she led me silent­ly
inside the moun­tain-city.
My body clenched as soon as the dark­ness, the scent of rock and fire and
roast­ing meat, hit me. I had been here before, suf­fered here—
Not Under the Moun­tain. This was not Under the Moun­tain.
Indeed, Amarantha’s court had been the work of a child.
The Court of Night­mares was the work of a god.
While Under the Moun­tain had been a series of halls and rooms and
lev­els, this … this was tru­ly a city.
The walk­way that Mor led us down was an avenue, and around us, ris­ing
high into gloom, were build­ings and spires, homes and bridges. A
metrop­o­lis carved from the dark stone of the moun­tain itself, no inch of it
left unmarked or with­out some love­ly, hideous art­work etched into it.
Fig­ures danced and for­ni­cat­ed; begged and rev­eled. Pil­lars were carved to
look like curv­ing vines of night-bloom­ing flow­ers. Water ran through­out in
lit­tle streams and rivers tapped from the heart of the moun­tain itself.
The Hewn City. A place of such ter­ri­ble beau­ty that it was an effort to
keep the won­der and dread off my face. Music was already play­ing
some­where, and our hosts still did not come out to greet us. The peo­ple we
passed—only High Fae—were clothed in fin­ery, their faces death­ly pale
and cold. Not one stopped us, not one smiled or bowed.
Mor ignored them all. Nei­ther of us had said one word. Rhys had told me
not to—that the walls had ears here.
Mor led me down the avenue toward anoth­er set of stone gates, thrown
open at the base of what looked to be a cas­tle with­in the moun­tain. The
offi­cial seat of the High Lord of the Night Court.
Great, scaled black beasts were carved into those gates, all coiled
togeth­er in a nest of claws and fangs, sleep­ing and fight­ing, some locked in
an end­less cycle of devour­ing each oth­er. Between them flowed vines of
jas­mine and moon­flow­ers. I could have sworn the beasts seemed to writhe
in the sil­very glow of the bob­bing fae­lights through­out the moun­tain-city.
The Gates of Eternity—that’s what I’d call the paint­ing that flick­ered in my
mind.
Mor con­tin­ued through them, a flash of col­or and life in this strange, cold
place.
She wore deep­est red, the gos­samer and gauze of her sleeve­less gown
cling­ing to her breasts and hips, while care­ful­ly placed shafts left much of
her stom­ach and back exposed. Her hair was down in rip­pling waves, and
cuffs of sol­id gold glint­ed around her wrists. A queen—a queen who bowed
to no one, a queen who had faced them all down and tri­umphed. A queen
who owned her body, her life, her des­tiny, and nev­er apol­o­gized for it.
My clothes, which she had tak­en a moment in the pine wood to shift me
into, were of a sim­i­lar ilk, near­ly iden­ti­cal to those I had been forced to
wear Under the Moun­tain. Two shafts of fab­ric that hard­ly cov­ered my
breasts flowed to below my navel, where a belt across my hips joined them
into one long shaft that draped between my legs and bare­ly cov­ered my
back­side.
But unlike the chif­fon and bright col­ors I had worn then, this one was
fash­ioned of black, glit­ter­ing fab­ric that sparkled with every swish of my
hips.
Mor had fash­ioned my hair onto a crown atop my head—right behind the
black dia­dem that had been set before it, accent­ed with flecks of dia­mond
that made it glis­ten like the night sky. She’d dark­ened and length­ened my
eye­lash­es, sweep­ing out an ele­gant, vicious line of kohl at the out­er cor­ner
of each. My lips she’d paint­ed blood­red.
Into the cas­tle beneath the moun­tain we strode. There were more peo­ple
here, milling about the end­less halls, watch­ing our every breath. Some
looked like Mor, with their gold hair and beau­ti­ful faces. They even hissed
at her.
Mor smirked at them. Part of me wished she’d rip their throats out
instead.
We at last came to a throne room of pol­ished ebony. More of the ser­pents
from the front gates were carved here—this time, wrapped around the
count­less columns sup­port­ing the onyx ceil­ing. It was so high up that gloom
hid its fin­er details, but I knew more had been carved there, too. Great
beasts to mon­i­tor the manip­u­la­tions and schem­ing with­in this room. The
throne itself had been fash­ioned out of a few of them, a head snaking
around either side of the back—as if they watched over the High Lord’s
shoul­der.
A crowd had gathered—and for a moment, I was again in Amarantha’s
throne room, so sim­i­lar was the atmos­phere, the mal­ice. So sim­i­lar was the
dais at the oth­er end.
A gold­en-haired, beau­ti­ful man stepped into our path toward that ebony
throne, and Mor smooth­ly halt­ed. I knew he was her father with­out him
say­ing a word.
He was clothed in black, a sil­ver cir­clet atop his head. His brown eyes
were like old soil as he said to her, “Where is he?”
No greet­ing, no for­mal­i­ty. He ignored me whol­ly.
Mor shrugged. “He arrives when he wish­es to.” She con­tin­ued on.
Her father looked at me then. And I willed my face into a mask like hers.
Dis­in­ter­est­ed. Aloof.
Her father sur­veyed my face, my body—and where I thought he’d sneer
and ogle … there was noth­ing. No emo­tion. Just heart­less cold.
I fol­lowed Mor before dis­gust wrecked my own icy mask.
Ban­quet tables against the black walls were cov­ered with fat, suc­cu­lent
fruits and wreaths of gold­en bread, inter­rupt­ed with roast meats, kegs of
cider and ale, and pies and tarts and lit­tle cakes of every size and vari­ety.
It might have made my mouth water … Were it not for the High Fae in
their fin­ery. Were it not for the fact that no one touched the food—the
pow­er and wealth lying in let­ting it go to waste.
Mor went right up to the obsid­i­an dais, and I halt­ed at the foot of the
steps as she took up a place beside the throne and said to the crowd in a
voice that was clear and cru­el and cun­ning, “Your High Lord approach­es.
He is in a foul mood, so I sug­gest being on your best behavior—unless you
wish to be the evening enter­tain­ment.”
And before the crowd could begin mur­mur­ing, I felt it. Felt—him.
The very rock beneath my feet seemed to tremble—a puls­ing, steady
beat.
His foot­steps. As if the moun­tain shud­dered at each touch.
Every­one in that room went still as death. As if pet­ri­fied that their very
breath­ing would draw the atten­tion of the preda­tor now strolling toward us.
Mor’s shoul­ders were back, her chin high—feral, wan­ton pride at her
master’s arrival.
Remem­ber­ing my role, I kept my own chin low­ered, watch­ing beneath
my brows.
First Cass­ian and Azriel appeared in the door­way. The High Lord’s
gen­er­al and shadowsinger—and the most pow­er­ful Illyr­i­ans in his­to­ry.
They were not the males I had come to know.
Clad in bat­tle-black that hugged their mus­cled forms, their armor was
intri­cate, scaled—their shoul­ders impos­si­bly broad­er, their faces a por­trait
of unfeel­ing bru­tal­i­ty. They remind­ed me, some­how, of the ebony beasts
carved into the pil­lars they passed.
More Siphons, I real­ized, glim­mered in addi­tion to the ones atop each of
their hands. A Siphon in the cen­ter of their chest. One on either shoul­der.
One on either knee.
For a moment, my knees quaked, and I under­stood what the camp-lords
had feared in them. If one Siphon was what most Illyr­i­ans need­ed to han­dle
their killing pow­er … Cass­ian and Azriel had sev­en each. Sev­en.
The courtiers had the good sense to back away a step as Cass­ian and
Azriel strolled through the crowd, toward the dais. Their wings gleamed,
the talons at the apex sharp enough to pierce air—like they’d honed them.
Cassian’s focus had gone right to Mor, Azriel indulging in all of a glance
before scan­ning the peo­ple around them. Most shirked from the spymaster’s
eyes—though they trem­bled as they beheld Truth-Teller at his side, the
Illyr­i­an blade peek­ing above his left shoul­der.
Azriel, his face a mask of beau­ti­ful death, silent­ly promised them all
end­less, unyield­ing tor­ment, even the shad­ows shud­der­ing in his wake. I
knew why; knew for whom he’d glad­ly do it.
They had tried to sell a sev­en­teen-year-old girl into mar­riage with a sadist
—and then bru­tal­ized her in ways I couldn’t, wouldn’t, let myself con­sid­er.
And these peo­ple now lived in utter ter­ror of the three com­pan­ions who
stood at the dais.
Good. They should be afraid of them.
Afraid of me.
And then Rhysand appeared.
He had released the damper on his pow­er, on who he was. His pow­er
filled the throne room, the cas­tle, the moun­tain. The world. It had no end
and no begin­ning.
No wings. No weapons. No sign of the war­rior. Noth­ing but the ele­gant,
cru­el High Lord the world believed him to be. His hands were in his
pock­ets, his black tunic seem­ing to gob­ble up the light. And on his head sat
a crown of stars.
No sign of the male who had been drink­ing on the roof; no sign of the
fall­en prince kneel­ing on his bed. The full impact of him threat­ened to
sweep me away.
Here—here was the most pow­er­ful High Lord ever born.
The face of dreams and night­mares.
Rhys’s eyes met mine briefly from across the room as he strolled
between the pil­lars. To the throne that was his by blood and sac­ri­fice and
might. My own blood sang at the pow­er that thrummed from him, at the
sheer beau­ty of him.
Mor stepped off the dais, drop­ping to one knee in a smooth bow. Cass­ian
and Azriel fol­lowed suit.
So did every­one in that room.
Includ­ing me.
The ebony floor was so pol­ished I could see my red-paint­ed lips in it; see
my own expres­sion­less face. The room was so silent I could hear each of
Rhys’s foot­steps toward us.
“Well, well,” he said to no one in par­tic­u­lar. “Looks like you’re all on
time for once.”
Rais­ing his head as he con­tin­ued kneel­ing, Cass­ian gave Rhys a half grin
—the High Lord’s com­man­der incar­nate, eager to do his blood­let­ting.
Rhys’s boots stopped in my line of sight.
His fin­gers were icy on my chin as he lift­ed my face.
The entire room, still on the floor, watched. But this was the role he
need­ed me to play. To be a dis­trac­tion and nov­el­ty. Rhys’s lips curved
upward. “Wel­come to my home, Feyre Curse­break­er.”
I low­ered my eyes, my kohl-thick lash­es tick­ling my cheek. He clicked
his tongue, his grip on my chin tight­en­ing. Every­one noticed the push of his
fin­gers, the preda­to­ry angle of his head as he said, “Come with me.”
A tug on my chin, and I rose to my feet. Rhys dragged his eyes over me
and I won­dered if it wasn’t entire­ly for show as they glazed a bit.
He led me the few steps onto the dais—to the throne. He sat, smil­ing
faint­ly at his mon­strous court. He owned every inch of the throne. These
peo­ple.
And with a tug on my waist, he perched me on his lap.
The High Lord’s whore. Who I’d become Under the Mountain—who the
world expect­ed me to be. The dan­ger­ous new pet that Mor’s father would
now seek to feel out.
Rhys’s hand slid along my bare waist, the oth­er run­ning down my
exposed thigh. Cold—his hands were so cold I almost yelped.
He must have felt the silent flinch. A heart­beat lat­er, his hands had
warmed. His thumb, curv­ing around the inside of my thigh, gave a slow,
long stroke as if to say Sor­ry.
Rhys indeed leaned in to bring his mouth near my ear, well aware his
sub­jects had not yet risen from the floor. As if they had once done so before
they were bid­den, long ago, and had learned the con­se­quences. Rhysand
whis­pered to me, his oth­er hand now stroking the bare skin of my ribs in
lazy, indo­lent cir­cles, “Try not to let it go to your head.”
I knew they could all hear it. So did he.
I stared at their bowed heads, my heart ham­mer­ing, but said with
mid­night smooth­ness, “What?”
Rhys’s breath caressed my ear, the twin to the breath he’d brushed
against it mere­ly an hour ago in the skies. “That every male in here is
con­tem­plat­ing what they’d be will­ing to give up in order to get that pret­ty,
red mouth of yours on them.”
I wait­ed for the blush, the shy­ness, to creep in.
But I was beau­ti­ful. I was strong.
I had survived—triumphed. As Mor had sur­vived in this hor­ri­ble,
poi­soned house …
So I smiled a bit, the first smile of my new mask. Let them see that
pret­ty, red mouth, and my white, straight teeth.
His hand slid high­er up my thigh, the pro­pri­etary touch of a male who
knew he owned some­one body and soul. He’d apol­o­gized in advance for it
—for this game, these roles we’d have to play.
But I leaned into that touch, leaned back into his hard, warm body. I was
pressed so close­ly against him that I could feel the deep rum­ble of his voice
as he at last said to his court, “Rise.”
As one, they did. I smirked at some of them, glo­ri­ous­ly bored and
infi­nite­ly amused.
Rhys brushed a knuck­le along the inside of my knee, and every nerve in
my body nar­rowed to that touch.
“Go play,” he said to them all.
They obeyed, the crowd dis­pers­ing, music strik­ing up from a dis­tant
cor­ner.
“Keir,” Rhys said, his voice cut­ting through the room like light­ning on a
stormy night.
It was all he need­ed to sum­mon Mor’s father to the foot of the dais. Keir
bowed again, his face lined with icy resent­ment as he took in Rhys, then me
—glanc­ing once at Mor and the Illyr­i­ans. Cass­ian gave Keir a slow nod that
told him he remembered—and would nev­er forget—what the Stew­ard of
the Hewn City had done to his own daugh­ter.
But it was from Azriel that Keir cringed. From the sight of Truth-Teller.
One day, I real­ized, Azriel would use that blade on Mor’s father. And
take a long, long while to carve him up.
“Report,” Rhys said, stroking a knuck­le down my ribs. He gave a
dis­mis­sive nod to Cass­ian, Mor, and Azriel, and the trio fad­ed away into the
crowd. With­in a heart­beat, Azriel had van­ished into shad­ows and was gone.
Keir didn’t even turn.
Before Rhys, Keir was noth­ing more than a sullen child. Yet I knew
Mor’s father was old­er. Far old­er. The Stew­ard clung to pow­er, it seemed.
Rhys was pow­er.
“Greet­ings, milord,” Keir said, his deep voice pol­ished smooth. “And
greet­ings to your … guest.”
Rhys’s hand flat­tened on my thigh as he angled his head to look at me.
“She is love­ly, isn’t she?”
“Indeed,” Keir said, low­er­ing his eyes. “There is lit­tle to report, milord.
All has been qui­et since your last vis­it.”
“No one for me to pun­ish?” A cat play­ing with his food.
“Unless you’d like for me to select some­one here, no, milord.”
Rhys clicked his tongue. “Pity.” He again sur­veyed me, then leaned to
tug my ear­lobe with his teeth.
And damn me to hell, but I leaned far­ther back as his teeth pressed down
at the same moment his thumb drift­ed high on the side of my thigh,
sweep­ing across sen­si­tive skin in a long, lux­u­ri­ous touch. My body went
loose and tight, and my breath­ing … Caul­dron damn me again, the scent of
him, the cit­rus and the sea, the pow­er roil­ing off him … my breath­ing
hitched a bit.
I knew he noticed; knew he felt that shift in me.
His fin­gers stilled on my leg.
Keir began men­tion­ing peo­ple I didn’t know in the court, bland reports
on mar­riages and alliances, blood-feuds, and Rhys let him talk.
His thumb stroked again—this time joined with his point­er fin­ger.
A dull roar­ing was fill­ing my ears, drown­ing out every­thing but that
touch on the inside of my leg. The music was throb­bing, ancient, wild, and
peo­ple ground against each oth­er to it.
His eyes on the Stew­ard, Rhys made vague nods every now and then.
While his fin­gers con­tin­ued their slow, steady stroking on my thighs, ris­ing
high­er with every pass.
Peo­ple were watch­ing. Even as they drank and ate, even as some danced
in small cir­cles, peo­ple were watch­ing. I was sit­ting in his lap, his own
per­son­al play­thing, his every touch vis­i­ble to them … and yet it might as
well have been only the two of us.
Keir list­ed the expens­es and costs of run­ning the court, and Rhys gave
anoth­er vague nod. This time, his nose brushed the spot between my neck
and shoul­der, fol­lowed by a pass­ing graze of his mouth.
My breasts tight­ened, becom­ing full and heavy, aching—aching like what
was now pool­ing in my core. Heat filled my face, my blood.
But Keir said at last, as if his own self-con­trol slipped the leash, “I had
heard the rumors, and I didn’t quite believe them.” His gaze set­tled on me,
on my breasts, peaked through the folds of my dress, of my legs, spread
wider than they’d been min­utes before, and Rhys’s hand in dan­ger­ous
ter­ri­to­ry. “But it seems true: Tamlin’s pet is now owned by anoth­er mas­ter.”
“You should see how I make her beg,” Rhys mur­mured, nudg­ing my
neck with his nose.
Keir clasped his hands behind his back. “I assume you brought her to
make a state­ment.”
“You know every­thing I do is a state­ment.”
“Of course. This one, it seems, you enjoy putting in cob­webs and
crowns.”
Rhys’s hand paused, and I sat straighter at the tone, the dis­gust. And I
said to Keir in a voice that belonged to anoth­er woman, “Per­haps I’ll put a
leash on you.”
Rhys’s approval tapped against my men­tal shield, the hand at my ribs
now mak­ing lazy cir­cles. “She does enjoy play­ing,” he mused onto my
shoul­der. He jerked his chin toward the Stew­ard. “Get her some wine.”
Pure com­mand. No polite­ness.
Keir stiff­ened, but strode off.
Rhys didn’t dare break from his mask, but the light kiss he pressed
beneath my ear told me enough. Apol­o­gy and gratitude—and more
apolo­gies. He didn’t like this any more than I did. And yet to get what we
need­ed, to buy Azriel time … He’d do it. And so would I.
I won­dered, then, with his hands beneath my breasts and between my
legs, what Rhys wouldn’t give of him­self. Won­dered if … if per­haps the
arro­gance and swag­ger … if they masked a male who per­haps thought he
wasn’t worth very much at all.
A new song began, like drip­ping honey—and edged into a swift-mov­ing
wind, punc­tu­at­ed with dri­ving, relent­less drums.
I twist­ed, study­ing his face. There was noth­ing warm in his eyes, noth­ing
of the friend I’d made. I opened my shield enough to let him in. What? His
voice float­ed into my mind.
I reached down the bond between us, caress­ing that wall of ebony
adamant. A small sliv­er cracked—just for me. And I said into it, You are
good, Rhys. You are kind. This mask does not scare me. I see you beneath it.
His hands tight­ened on me, and his eyes held mine as he leaned for­ward
to brush his mouth against my cheek. It was answer enough—and … an
unleash­ing.
I leaned a bit more against him, my legs widen­ing ever so slight­ly. Why’d
you stop? I said into his mind, into him.
A near-silent growl rever­ber­at­ed against me. He stroked my ribs again, in
time to the beat of the music, his thumb ris­ing near­ly high enough to graze
the under­side of my breasts.
I let my head drop back against his shoul­der.
I let go of the part of me that heard their words—whore, whore, whore—
Let go of the part that said those words along­side them—traitor, liar,
whore—
And I just became.
I became the music, and the drums, and the wild, dark thing in the High
Lord’s arms.
His eyes were whol­ly glazed—and not with pow­er or rage. Some­thing
red-hot and edged with glit­ter­ing dark­ness explod­ed in my mind.
I dragged a hand down his thigh, feel­ing the hid­den warrior’s strength
there. Dragged it back up again in a long, idle stroke, need­ing to touch him,
feel him.
I was going to catch fire and burn. I was going to start burn­ing right here
—
Easy, he said with wicked amuse­ment through the open sliv­er in my
shield. If you become a liv­ing can­dle, poor Keir will throw a hissy fit. And
then you’d ruin the par­ty for every­one.
Because the fire would let them all know I wasn’t normal—and no doubt
Keir would inform his almost-allies in the Autumn Court. Or one of these
oth­er mon­sters would.
Rhys shift­ed his hips, rub­bing against me with enough pres­sure that for a
sec­ond, I didn’t care about Keir, or the Autumn Court, or what Azriel might
be doing right now to steal the orb.
I had been so cold, so lone­ly, for so long, and my body cried out at the
con­tact, at the joy of being touched and held and alive.
The hand that had been on my waist slid across my abdomen, hook­ing
into the low-slung belt there. I rest­ed my head between his shoul­der and
neck, star­ing at the crowd as they stared at me, savor­ing every place where
Rhys and I con­nect­ed and want­i­ng more more more.
At last, when my blood had begun to boil, when Rhys skimmed the
under­side of my breast with his knuck­le, I looked to where I knew Keir was
stand­ing, watch­ing us, my wine for­got­ten in his hand.
We both did.
The Stew­ard was star­ing unabashed­ly as he leaned against the wall.
Unsure whether to inter­rupt. Half ter­ri­fied to. We were his dis­trac­tion. We
were the sleight of hand while Az stole the orb.
I knew Rhys was still hold­ing Keir’s gaze as the tip of his tongue slid up
my neck.
I arched my back, eyes heavy-lid­ded, breath­ing uneven. I’d burn and
burn and burn—
I think he’s so dis­gust­ed that he might have giv­en me the orb just to get
out of here, Rhys said in my mind, that oth­er hand drift­ing dan­ger­ous­ly
south. But there was such a grow­ing ache there, and I wore noth­ing beneath
that would con­ceal the damn­ing evi­dence if he slid his hand a frac­tion
high­er.
You and I put on a good show, I said back. The per­son who said that,
husky and sultry—I’d nev­er heard that voice come out of me before. Even
in my mind.
His hand slid to my upper thigh, fin­gers curv­ing in.
I ground against him, try­ing to shift those hands away from what he’d
learn—
To find him hard against my back­side.
Every thought eddied from my head. Only a thrill of pow­er remained as I
writhed along that impres­sive length. Rhys let out a low, rough laugh.
Keir just watched and watched and watched. Rigid. Hor­ri­fied. Stuck
here, until Rhys released him—and not think­ing twice about why. Or where
the spy­mas­ter had gone.
So I turned around again, meet­ing Rhysand’s now-blaz­ing eyes, and then
licked up the col­umn of his throat. Wind and sea and cit­rus and sweat. It
almost undid me.
I faced for­ward, and Rhys dragged his mouth along the back of my neck,
right over my spine, just as I shift­ed against the hard­ness push­ing into me,
insis­tent and dom­i­nat­ing. Pre­cise­ly as his hand slid a bit too high on my
inner thigh.
I felt the preda­to­ry focus go right to the slick­ness he’d felt there. Proof of
my trai­tor­ous body. His arms tight­ened around me, and my face burned—
per­haps a bit from shame, but—
Rhys sensed my focus, my fire slip. It’s fine, he said, but that men­tal
voice sound­ed breath­less. It means noth­ing. It’s just your body react­ing—
Because you’re so irre­sistible? My attempt to deflect sound­ed strained,
even in my mind.
But he laughed, prob­a­bly for my ben­e­fit.
We’d danced around and teased and taunt­ed each oth­er for months. And
maybe it was my body’s reac­tion, maybe it was his body’s reac­tion, but the
taste of him threat­ened to destroy me, con­sume me, and—
Anoth­er male. I’d had anoth­er male’s hands all over me, when Tam­lin
and I were bare­ly—
Fight­ing my nau­sea, I past­ed a sleepy, lust-fogged smile on my face.
Right as Azriel returned and gave Rhys a sub­tle nod. He’d got­ten the orb.
Mor slid up to the spy­mas­ter, run­ning a pro­pri­etary hand over his
shoul­ders, his chest, as she cir­cled to look into his face. Az’s scar-mot­tled
hand wrapped around her bare waist—squeezing once. The con­fir­ma­tion
she also need­ed.
She offered him a lit­tle grin that would no doubt spread rumors, and
saun­tered into the crowd again. Daz­zling, dis­tract­ing, leav­ing them think­ing
Az had been here the whole time, leav­ing them pon­der­ing if she’d extend
Azriel an invi­ta­tion to her bed.
Azriel just stared after Mor, dis­tant and bored. I won­dered if he was as
much of a mess inside as I was.
Rhys crooked a fin­ger to Keir, who, scowl­ing a bit in his daughter’s
direc­tion, stum­bled for­ward with my wine. He’d bare­ly reached the dais
before Rhys’s pow­er took it from him, float­ing the gob­let to us.
Rhys set it on the ground beside the throne, a stu­pid task he’d thought up
for the Stew­ard to remind him of his pow­er­less­ness, that this throne was not
his.
“Should I test it for poi­son?” Rhys drawled even as he said into my mind,
Cassian’s wait­ing. Go.
Rhys had the same, sex-addled expres­sion on his per­fect face—but his
eyes … I couldn’t read the shad­ows in his eyes.
Maybe—maybe for all our teas­ing, after Ama­ran­tha, he didn’t want to be
touched by a woman like that. Didn’t even enjoy being want­ed like that.
I had been tor­tured and tor­ment­ed, but his hor­rors had gone to anoth­er
lev­el.
“No, milord,” Keir grov­eled. “I would nev­er dare harm you.” Anoth­er
dis­trac­tion, this con­ver­sa­tion. I took that as my cue to stride to Cass­ian, who
was snarling by a pil­lar at any­one who came too close.
I felt the eyes of the court slide to me, felt them all sniff del­i­cate­ly at
what was so clear­ly writ­ten over my body. But as I passed Keir, even with
the High Lord at my back, he hissed almost too qui­et­ly to hear, “You’ll get
what’s com­ing to you, whore.”
Night explod­ed into the room.
Peo­ple cried out. And when the dark­ness cleared, Keir was on his knees.
Rhys still lounged on the throne. His face a mask of frozen rage.
The music stopped. Mor appeared at the edge of the crowd—her own
fea­tures set in smug sat­is­fac­tion. Even as Azriel approached her side,
stand­ing too close to be casu­al.
“Apol­o­gize,” Rhys said. My heart thun­dered at the pure com­mand, the
utter wrath.
Keir’s neck mus­cles strained, and sweat broke out on his lip.
“I said,” Rhys intoned with such hor­ri­ble calm, “apol­o­gize.”
The Stew­ard groaned. And when anoth­er heart­beat passed—
Bone cracked. Keir screamed.
And I watched—I watched as his arm frac­tured into not two, not three,
but four dif­fer­ent pieces, the skin going taut and loose in all the wrong spots
—
Anoth­er crack. His elbow dis­in­te­grat­ed. My stom­ach churned.
Keir began sob­bing, the tears half from rage, judg­ing by the hatred in his
eyes as he looked at me, then Rhys. But his lips formed the words, I’m
sor­ry.
The bones of his oth­er arm splin­tered, and it was an effort not to cringe.
Rhys smiled as Keir screamed again and said to the room, “Should I kill
him for it?”
No one answered.
Rhys chuck­led. He said to his Stew­ard, “When you wake up, you’re not
to see a heal­er. If I hear that you do … ” Anoth­er crack—Keir’s pinkie
fin­ger went sag­gy. The male shrieked. The heat that had boiled my blood
turned to ice. “If I hear that you do, I’ll carve you into pieces and bury them
where no one can stand a chance of putting you togeth­er again.”

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.

W HY DID YOU AGREE TO do it?” I ask her. “Why not say you want­ed
him cut from the film?”
“Well, first of all, you don’t go throw­ing your weight around unless
you’re sure you’ll win,” Eve­lyn says. “And I was only about eighty
per­cent sure that if I pitched a fit, Max would fire him. And sec­ond of
all, it seemed mild­ly cru­el, to be hon­est. Don was not doing well. He
hadn’t had a hit in years, and most younger movie­go­ers didn’t know
who he was. He was divorced from Ruby, hadn’t remar­ried, and the
rumor was that his drink­ing had got­ten out of con­trol.”
“So you felt bad for him? Your abuser?”
“Rela­tion­ships are com­plex,” Eve­lyn says. “Peo­ple are messy, and
love can be ugly. I’m inclined to always err on the side of com­pas­sion.”
“You’re say­ing you had com­pas­sion for what he was going
through?”
“I’m say­ing you should have a lit­tle com­pas­sion for how com­pli­cat­ed
it must have been for me.”
Cut down to size, I find myself star­ing at the floor, unable to look at
her. “I’m sor­ry,” I say. “I haven’t been in that sit­u­a­tion before, and I
was . . . I don’t know what I was think­ing mak­ing any sort of judg­ment.
I apol­o­gize.”
Eve­lyn smiles gen­tly, accept­ing my apol­o­gy. “I can’t speak for all
peo­ple who have been hit by some­one they love, but what I can tell
you is that for­give­ness is dif­fer­ent from abso­lu­tion. Don was no longer
a threat to me. I was not scared of him. I felt pow­er­ful and free. So I
told Max I’d meet with him. Celia was sup­port­ive but also hes­i­tant
once she learned Don had been cast. Har­ry, while cau­tious, trust­ed
my abil­i­ty to han­dle the sit­u­a­tion. So my rep­re­sen­ta­tives called Don’s
peo­ple, and we set a time and place for the next time I was in L.A. I had

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.

42
The doc­tors took me away from my kids and my dogs and my house. I couldn’t
go out­side. I couldn’t dri­ve a car. I had to give blood week­ly. I couldn’t take a
bath in pri­vate. I couldn’t shut the door to my room. I was watched, even when I
was chang­ing. I had to go to sleep at nine p.m. They super­vised me watch­ing
TV, from eight to nine o’clock, in bed.
I had to be up every morn­ing at eight. I had end­less meet­ings every day.
For sev­er­al hours a day, I sat in a chair receiv­ing manda­to­ry ther­a­py. I spent
the time in between meet­ings star­ing out the win­dow, watch­ing cars pull up and
dri­ve away, so many cars bring­ing so many ther­a­pists and secu­ri­ty guards,
doc­tors, and nurs­es. What I think did the most dam­age to me was watch­ing all
those peo­ple com­ing and going while I was pre­vent­ed from leav­ing.
I was told that every­thing that was hap­pen­ing was for my own good. But I
felt aban­doned in that place, and while every-one kept say­ing they were there to
help me, I nev­er could under­stand what my fam­i­ly want­ed from me. I did
every­thing I was sup­posed to do. My kids would come for an hour on the
week­ends. But if I didn’t do what I was “sup­posed to do” dur­ing the week, I
wouldn’t be allowed to see them.
One of the only peo­ple who called me was Cade. I’ve always felt safe and yet
also a sense of dan­ger with Cade. The most enter­tain­ing call I had the whole
time was his Face­Tim­ing me from a hos­pi­tal in Texas to tell me about how he’d
got­ten bit­ten by a scor­pi­on in his bed—in his bed. His leg blew up to the size of a
bas­ket­ball, no joke.
“Are you seri­ous right now?” I said, look­ing at his swollen leg on my phone. It
was unbe­liev­ably bad. Think­ing about Cade’s poor leg gave me one of the only
true dis­trac­tions from what I was deal­ing with, and I’ll always be grate­ful to him
and that Texas scor­pi­on.
The ther­a­pists ques­tioned me for hours and what seemed like every day, sev­en
days a week.
For years I’d been on Prozac, but in the hos­pi­tal they took me abrupt­ly o� it
and put me on lithi­um, a dan­ger­ous drug that I did not want or need and that
makes you extreme­ly slow and lethar­gic. I felt my con­cept of time morph, and I
grew dis­ori­ent­ed. On lithi­um, I didn’t know where I was or even who I was
some­times. My brain wasn’t work­ing the way it used to. It wasn’t lost on me that
lithi­um was the drug my grand­moth­er Jean, who lat­er com­mit­ted sui­cide, had
been put on in Man­dev­ille.
Mean­while, my secu­ri­ty team that I’d been with for so long act­ed like I was a
crim­i­nal.
When it was time for blood draws, the tech draw­ing my blood would be
�anked by the nurse, a secu­ri­ty guard, and my assis­tant.
Was I a can­ni­bal? Was I a bank rob­ber? Was I a wild ani­mal? Why was I
treat­ed as though I were about to burn the place down and mur­der them all?
They checked my blood pres­sure three times a day, like I was an eighty-year-
old woman. And they’d take their time. Make me sit down. Get the cu�. Slow­ly
attach it. Slow­ly pump it up… Three times a day. To feel sane, I need­ed to move
around. Move­ment was my life as a dancer. I thrived on it. I need­ed it and craved
it. But they kept me in that chair for ages. I began to feel like I was being rit­u­al­ly
tor­tured.
I felt anx­ious in my feet and in my heart and in my brain. I could nev­er burn
o� that ener­gy.
You know how when your body is mov­ing you’re remind­ed that you’re alive?
That’s all I want­ed. And I couldn’t move, which meant I began to won­der if I
might actu­al­ly already be half-dead. I felt ruined.
My ass grew big­ger from sit­ting in a chair for hours a day—so much so that
none of my shorts �t any­more. I became estranged from my own body. I had
ter­ri­ble night­mares where I was run­ning through a forest—dreams that felt so
real. Please wake up, please wake up, please wake up—I don’t want it to be real, this
is just a dream, I would think.
If the idea of my being in that place was to heal, that was not the e�ect. I
began to imag­ine myself as a bird with­out wings. You know how, when you’re a
child, some­times you run around with your arms out­stretched, and with the
wind mov­ing over your arms, for a sec­ond you feel like you’re �ying? That was
what I want­ed to feel. Instead, every day it felt like I was sink­ing into the earth.
I did the pro­gram by myself for two months in Bev­er­ly Hills. It was hell, like
being in my very own hor­ror movie. I watch scary movies. I’ve seen The
Con­jur­ing. I’m not scared of any­thing after those months at that treat­ment
cen­ter. Seri­ous­ly, I’m not scared of any­thing now.
I’m prob­a­bly the least fear­ful woman alive at this point, but it doesn’t make
me feel strong; it makes me sad. I shouldn’t be this strong. Those months made
me too tough. I miss my days of being what in Kent­wood we used to call a sass
ass. That time in the hos­pi­tal took away my sassi­ness. In so many ways, it broke
my spir­it.
After two months in one build­ing, I was moved to anoth­er run by the same
peo­ple, and at this one I wasn’t alone. Even though I used to pre­fer being by
myself, after two months in what felt like soli­tary con�nement and on lithi­um, it
was hon­est­ly so much bet­ter to be around oth­er patients. We were togeth­er all
day. At night, each of us was left alone in an indi­vid­ual room—the doors made a
pow sound as they shut.
My �rst week, one of the oth­er patients came to my room and said, “Why are
you scream­ing so loud?”
“Huh? I’m not scream­ing,” I said.
“We all hear you. You’re scream­ing so loud.”
I looked around my room. “I don’t even have music play­ing,” I said.
I lat­er learned that she some­times heard things oth­er peo­ple didn’t hear, but
that freaked me out.
A very pret­ty girl arrived and became instant­ly pop­u­lar. It felt like high
school, where she was the cheer­leader and I was the demor­al­ized nerd. She
skipped all of the meet­ings.

Patri­cia vis­it­ed the ceme­tery on a crisp win­ter day, bear­ing the weight of her community’s loss­es and per­son­al chal­lenges. Despite her own pain, rem­i­nis­cent of her son Korey’s, she was deter­mined to find a treat­ment for him, reflect­ing her refusal to sur­ren­der to despair. The finan­cial strain was evi­dent in her life and those around her, with friends and fam­i­ly fac­ing bank­rupt­cy or sell­ing off assets to sur­vive. The com­mu­ni­ty assumed James Har­ris, linked to their mis­for­tune, had van­ished to avoid reper­cus­sions. Patricia’s trip to the aban­doned Gra­cious Cay devel­op­ment sym­bol­ized the bro­ken dreams and finan­cial ruin left in his wake.

In a ten­der yet melan­cholic exchange with Maryellen, Patri­cia rem­i­nisced about Slick­’s thought­ful Christ­mas gifts, a reminder of the stronger bonds and sup­port with­in her cir­cle. Grace’s gift of mon­ey to Patri­cia, meant for inde­pen­dence, was a poignant ges­ture of sol­i­dar­i­ty and female empow­er­ment. Patri­ci­a’s prepa­ra­tions for Korey and Blue’s Christ­mas were moments of tem­po­rary relief amidst their strug­gles, high­light­ing her resilience and deter­mi­na­tion to pro­vide for her fam­i­ly despite the odds.

Patricia’s trib­ute to Slick at the ceme­tery bridged the tan­gi­ble with the meta­phys­i­cal, leav­ing a book and wine as sym­bol­ic offer­ings. Her reflec­tions on James Har­ris paint­ed him as a phan­tom pres­ence, whose lega­cy was pain and disappearance—a stark con­trast to the com­mu­ni­ty’s endur­ing spir­it and deter­mi­na­tion. The col­lec­tive efforts of Patri­cia and her friends, root­ed in their every­day roles and uni­ty, under­scored a pro­found strength often over­looked by soci­ety. The nar­ra­tive con­clud­ed on a haunt­ing note, with Patri­cia sens­ing the inex­tin­guish­able pres­ence of evil, a reminder of the lurk­ing dan­gers they had con­front­ed.

This chap­ter vivid­ly cap­tures the essence of loss, resilience, and the pow­er of com­mu­ni­ty. Patri­ci­a’s expe­ri­ences and inter­ac­tions weave a com­pelling nar­ra­tive of cop­ing, strength, and the elu­sive nature of evil, framed against the back­drop of per­son­al and com­mu­nal adver­si­ty.

In Chap­ter 42 titled “A Ref­or­ma­tion” from Anne Bron­të’s “The Ten­ant of Wild­fell Hall,” the nar­ra­tive unfolds with the pro­tag­o­nist, Helen, pon­der­ing the pos­si­bil­i­ty of her hus­band Arthur Hunt­ing­don’s extend­ed absence and its con­se­quences on their life and rela­tion­ship. Amid these reflec­tions, the nar­ra­tive intro­duces an instance of social inter­ac­tion at Grass­dale, involv­ing Helen, Mr. and Mrs. Hat­ter­s­ley, and the Har­graves, cap­tur­ing the hope­ful yet appre­hen­sive atmos­phere sur­round­ing the idea of per­son­al change and the influ­ence of com­pan­ion­ship on behav­ior.

The chap­ter skill­ful­ly inter­twines a sequence of can­did con­ver­sa­tions between Helen and Mr. Hat­ter­s­ley, where Helen con­fronts and chal­lenges Mr. Hat­ter­s­ley’s lifestyle and choic­es, push­ing him towards intro­spec­tion and the acknowl­edge­ment of the need for reform. This dia­logue is marked by a trans­for­ma­tive moment for Mr. Hat­ter­s­ley, spurred by Helen’s forth­right and com­pas­sion­ate coun­sel, lead­ing to his expressed deter­mi­na­tion to amend his ways, par­tic­u­lar­ly high­light­ed by his inter­ac­tion with his let­ters from Mil­i­cent that reveal the depth of her dis­tress and hope inter­twined with his actions.

Key to this chap­ter is the explo­ration of themes such as the poten­tial for per­son­al redemp­tion, the impact of one’s actions on loved ones, and the intri­cate dynam­ics with­in mar­i­tal rela­tion­ships. As Mr. Hat­ter­s­ley reflects on his behav­ior through the lens of his wife’s suf­fer­ing and hope, the nar­ra­tive brings to light the com­plex­i­ty of human emo­tions and the pos­si­bil­i­ties that emerge from earnest efforts to change for one­self and for those one holds dear.

The chap­ter con­cludes on a note of cau­tious opti­mism, with Mr. Hat­ter­s­ley dis­play­ing a rare moment of affec­tion and com­mit­ment towards Mil­i­cent, promis­ing a bet­ter future. This res­o­lu­tion sig­ni­fies not only the indi­vid­ual poten­tial for moral and behav­ioral ref­or­ma­tion but also under­scores the piv­otal role of sup­port­ive rela­tion­ships and hon­est com­mu­ni­ca­tion in facil­i­tat­ing such change.

“The Ten­ant of Wild­fell Hall” there­by pro­gress­es in this chap­ter through sub­tle char­ac­ter devel­op­ments and inter­per­son­al dynam­ics, illus­trat­ing the inter­twin­ing of per­son­al growth, inter­per­son­al rela­tion­ships, and the pur­suit of a bet­ter, more ful­fill­ing life.