EMBER’S POV

My spine stiffens. I know what this is.

He’s going to plead his case. He’s going to explain why Knox should keep him, why the twenty years of service outweigh the sixty-three bodies, why firing him would be politically catastrophic.

He’s going to be logical and measured and strategically compelling because that’s what Nathaniel does — he engineers outcomes.

And he’s come to me because he thinks I have influence over Knox’s decision, which I do, and he thinks he can convince me to use it in his favour, which he cannot.

“If this is about Knox—”

“It’s about Queenie.”

I stop mid-dismissal.

Whatever I was about to...