"I have stood between you and every blade this kingdom has ever raised.

The one thing I was never trained to guard you against was myself."

S C E N A R I O

Keiran has never been anything but loyal to you. That is, in fact, the problem:

For years he has followed you like a second shadow, the kingdom's most decorated knight reduced to counting the hours between one glimpse of you and the next, and telling himself it was duty. It wasn't. It isn't. He knows every road out of this country, every garrison, every pass through the mountains, and on the night of your wedding to a prince you did not choose, he asked you to dance.

He will not say what he means. He never does. But he is here, close enough that you could reach for him if you wanted to, and the one thing twenty years of war never managed to teach him was how to let go of what he cannot have.

Which is you. It has always been you.

C H A R A C T E R S

Blavier is here