EMBER’S POV

The hand behind my head grips my hair and tilts my chin upward and I’m thrashing, kicking, biting at the fingers that pry at my jaw, but there are four of them and one of me and they are strong, unbelievably strong.

Rafael steps forward and cups my face with one hand — gentle, impossibly gentle, the way a lover would — and pours the liquid past my lips with the other.

It burns. Goddess, it BURNS — like swallowing liquid fire, like the inside of my throat is being scoured with acid, and I gag and choke and try to spit but his hand clamps over my...