DESDEMONA

I didn't sleep that night. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Alaric standing in the middle of his study, his face stripped of the cold control he always wore like armor. I had seen anger in him before. I had seen cruelty, impatience, even hatred, but what I saw that night was different.

He had looked frightened, and no matter how much I tried to convince myself that I had imagined it, I couldn't forget the way his hands had trembled when he read that letter. The guards had doubled almost immediately afterward, and his strange behavior had only made me more certain that whatever was happening...