A Tongue so Sweet and Deadly

Five years of borrowed freedom expire on a frozen cliff

Lessia has built a careful life in Ellow—taverns, friendships, a hidden shelter for half-Fae orphans smuggled from the Fae island of Vastala.

Five years of borrowed freedom expire on a frozen cliff

Lessia has built a careful life in Ellow—taverns, friendships, a hidden shelter for half-Fae orphans smuggled from the Fae island of Vastala. She's half-Fae, bearing the rare power to control minds through eye contact. Five years ago, she escaped King Rioner's dungeons by swearing a blood oath to serve him, branded with a silver snake tattoo. When his enforcer Merrick, the feared Death Whisperer, appears in her tavern and warns that the king is coming, her tattoo burns for the first time since she arrived in Ellow. On a frozen cliff, Rioner orders Lessia to enter the human election for regent—not to win, but to spy on Loche, the current regent. Ships and Fae have gone missing. If she succeeds, she earns her freedom. Merrick beats her to demonstrate the price of failure.

Lessia's nomination draws objects, slurs, and Loche's cold stare

She climbs the platform in her plain black cloak while the other nominees wear their credentials like armor: Loche the beloved regent, Craven the wealthy noble, Stellia the decorated naval captain, and Venko the shadowy shipping magnate. When Lessia declares her name, the crowd's silence lasts one heartbeat before erupting into fury. Objects strike her chest. Voices demand her arrest. Merrick forces her friend Ardow away and takes his place as her companion—dangerous, since the Death Whisperer can never meet her eyes lest she compel him. Frayson, the elderly Guardian of the Law, rules her nomination legal, but Loche's unnerving scrutiny from across the dais tells her the regent considers her either a threat or a curiosity. Neither comforts her.

A cabin without food or fire reveals both enemies and allies

The nominees are deposited in a decaying cabin deep in the forest for two weeks with no food, no firewood, and boarded windows—a ritual meant to simulate wartime devastation. Lessia, who cannot survive darkness after years in the king's dungeon, saws branches in the freezing woods with Merrick's gifted dagger. Someone mysteriously lights the cabin's fire. As starvation hollows them, Loche shares hidden liquor and questions Lessia about Fae magic and her past imprisonment. Then Craven pins her in the snow with twin daggers at her throat, calling her a disgrace. Loche and Venko intervene. Later, Loche gently cleans the cuts on her neck with melted snow, his fingers tracing her collarbone—the first crack in his hostility. She realizes his coldness is armor too.