SHE SURVIVED 99 ROYAL POISONS—ON THE 100TH, THEY CALLED HER A MURDERER

Though the conspirators were bound, the kingdom was not yet at peace.

Deep within the northern wing of the castle, in the private chambers where Physician Voss had kept his personal research, Maeve and Prince Theo searched through the remaining iron chests.

"We need to be certain," Maeve said, turning over a stack of yellowed parchments. "Voss was a meticulous man. If he created a binary weapon, he kept a record of every antidote and every remaining cache."

"Why do you still search, Maeve?" Theo asked gently. "You are free. The carriage is waiting for you in the courtyard."

"Because I know how poison works, Prince," Maeve replied, stopping at a small wooden lockbox tucked behind a shelf of dried herbs. "It never stays in one cup. If one drop is left behind, it spreads until the whole house is ruined."

She used her silver knife to force the lockbox open.

Inside lay a single leather journal bound in brass, alongside a small glass cylinder filled with a bright silver liquid—a substance Maeve recognized instantly.

Liquid Mercury-Aconite.

Theo leaned over to read the entries written in Voss’s tight hand.

"If the binary catalyst fails at the wedding, the secondary reserve is placed within the main water cistern beneath the High Keep. Once dissolved, the entire castle will fall silent within forty-eight hours."

Theo’s face went dead white. "The main cistern... it feeds the drinking water for the entire city of Valedorn."

Maeve grabbed the journal and the silver cylinder. "Voss didn't just want to take the treasury. If he failed, he meant to turn the entire capital into a graveyard."

"We must alert the guards—" Theo began.

"There is no time," Maeve said, her dark eyes burning with immediate focus. "The secondary reserve is on a timed release mechanism. If the weight in the cistern triggers it, the water will be infected before your guards even reach the lower gates."

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My daughter dumped her wedding cake over my head and called me a burden—...

$I stepped down from a classified military transport and headed directly to the ICU, where my wife was lying with twenty-seven broken bones and a fractured skull. Outside her hospital room, her mother and six sisters stood smiling as though they were waiting for lunch to arrive. The detective assigned to her case leaned in and whispered, "Captain, this family practically controls the entire county." I stared through the glass at my wife's bruised and swollen face before answering, "Good. Because my authority extends far beyond this county."$