The sensation of falling stopped.

Fiona gasped, her body jerking violently upward. Her lungs heaved, desperate for air that wasn't filled with saltwater.

"Haa... haa..."

She was sitting up. Her hands flew to her throat, then her chest, then her legs.

No pain. No broken bones. No freezing water.

She was sweating, her silk nightgown clinging to her skin. The air was warm and smelled of lavender and expensive linen.

She looked around wildly.

Pale gold wallpaper. The antique vanity table cluttered with crystal perfume bottles. The heavy velvet curtains drawn against the night.

Her bedroom. Her old bedroom in the Crown Prince's Palace.

She turned her head to the digital clock on the bedside table.

October 14th.

The year... it was three years ago.

The door creaked open.

"Your Highness?"

Fiona flinched, her heart skipping a beat.

Yana stood in the doorway, holding a silver tray with a glass of water and a pill bottle. Her face was round and worried, her dark hair pulled back in a neat bun.

Yana. Who had died shielding Fiona from the press when the scandal broke in her past life.

"Yana," Fiona choked out.

Tears welled up in her eyes, hot and fast. She scrambled out of bed and ran to her, nearly knocking the tray from her hands.

"Oh, Your Highness!" Yana set the tray down on a side table just in time to catch Fiona. "It's okay. I know the doctor's news was hard. But there are other ways... you can still be a mother."

She thought Fiona was crying about the infertility diagnosis. The fake diagnosis Bradley's doctors had given her yesterday to break her spirit.

Fiona hugged her tight, feeling the solid warmth of her body. Yana was alive. Fiona was alive.

"I'm not crying about that," Fiona whispered into her shoulder.

She pulled back. She wiped her face with the back of her hand. The tears stopped as quickly as they had come. Her breathing steadied.

The grief was still there, a heavy stone in her gut, but she pushed it down. She didn't have time for grief.

"Yana," Fiona said, her voice changing. It was lower now. Harder. "Where is Bradley?"

Yana blinked, surprised by the sudden shift in Fiona's demeanor. "He... he is at the Charity Gala, Your Highness. He won't be back until late."

"And the news?" Fiona asked. "What is happening with the Regent?"

"Prince Demian?" Yana looked confused. "The news says he is in critical condition. They say... they say he might not survive the night."

Fiona's blood ran cold.

Tonight. It was tonight.

In her past life, Demian Ballard, the Regent, the most feared man in the kingdom, had suffered a catastrophic reaction to the Pyro-Toxin in his blood tonight. He survived, but the agony cost him the use of his legs for years and drove him into isolation. His weakness allowed Bradley to seize total control of the military. After Bradley discarded Fiona, she spent two years locked away in a remote villa. Her only companions were books. She devoured the Orozco family's private library, filled with ancient texts on medicine and poisons. It was there she found it-a detailed treatise on Pyro-Toxin and its unique, organic antidote. She had studied it, memorized it, dreaming of a revenge she never got to enact. Until now.

If she wanted to win, she needed a weapon. She needed a monster who could eat Bradley alive.

She needed Demian.

"Get me my black running gear," Fiona ordered, moving toward the hidden safe behind a painting of a lily. "And the medical kit. The surgical one."

"Your Highness?" Yana stammered. "You're grounded. Prince Bradley said-"

Fiona spun around. She grabbed Yana by the shoulders.

"Look at me."

Yana stared into Fiona's eyes, trembling.

"The Fiona who listened to Bradley is dead," Fiona said. "Do exactly as I say, or we both die. Do you understand?"

Yana swallowed hard. She saw something in Fiona's face that terrified her. But she nodded. "Yes, Your Highness."

Ten minutes later, Fiona was dressed in black, a hood pulled low over her face. She had a scalpel and a set of silver acupuncture needles strapped to her thigh.

She slipped out through the balcony. She knew the blind spots of the cameras-she had spent three years memorizing them, trying to avoid Bradley's spies.

She dropped into the garden, landing softly in the wet grass. The rain was starting to fall, just like the night she died. But this time, she wasn't running away. She was hunting.

She scaled the outer wall and flagged down a taxi three blocks away.

"Regent's Estate," she told the driver.

The radio was playing. A reporter's voice filled the cab. "...Crown Prince Bradley was seen comforting the Duchess Icy Duffy today, whose husband, Duke Asher, is currently deployed with the Third Fleet, praising her tireless work for the orphans..."

Fiona stared out the window at the blurring city lights. A cold smile touched her lips.

Enjoy your applause, Bradley. It will be your last.

The Regent's Estate was a fortress. High walls, electrified fences, guards with assault rifles.

Fiona had the taxi drop her off a mile away. She walked the rest, keeping to the shadows.

A delivery truck was idling at the rear gate. Arctic Ice Supply.

Demian's condition made his blood boil. Literally. He needed tons of ice to keep his temperature down during an attack.

Fiona waited for the guard to check the driver's clipboard. As he walked to the front of the cab, she rolled under the chassis.

She clung to the metal bars, the smell of grease and exhaust filling her nose. The truck lurched forward, carrying her inside the belly of the beast.

When it parked at the loading dock, she dropped down and rolled into the shrubbery.

The air here was different. It smelled of ozone and something metallic. Burnt sugar and copper.

The smell of Pyro-Toxin.

She followed the scent. She dodged two patrols, her heart hammering against her ribs, but her hands were steady.

She reached the master wing. The windows were frosted over from the inside.

She found an unlocked service door-sloppy, or maybe the staff was too terrified to go near him.

She slipped inside.

The hallway was freezing. Mist curled along the floorboards.

She heard a sound that made the hair on her arms stand up. A low, guttural growl. Like a wounded animal.

She pushed open the heavy double doors at the end of the hall.

The room was a freezer. Blocks of ice were stacked in the corners.

And there, in the center of the room, chained to a metal bedframe, was Demian Ballard.

He was shirtless. His skin was flushed a violent, unnatural red, steam rising from his shoulders. His muscles strained against the steel cuffs.

He looked up as the door clicked shut.

His eyes were entirely black. No whites. Just pools of endless, violent darkness.

The chains rattled with a deafening clank as Demian lunged against them.

"Get out!"

His voice was a shredded roar, barely human. The force of his shout hit Fiona like a physical blow.

She didn't flinch. She didn't step back.

She raised her hands, palms open. "I can help you."

He laughed, a wet, choking sound. "Help? I'll tear your throat out."

The heat radiating from him was intense, battling with the freezing air of the room. He was burning up from the inside out.

"Your heart rate is over two hundred," Fiona said, walking closer. Her boots crunched on the frost covering the floor. "The ice isn't working. The toxin has reached your marrow."

Demian stilled. His head cocked to the side, a predator assessing prey. "Who are you?"

"Does it matter?" Fiona stopped just out of his reach. "I'm the only one who knows how to stop the boiling."

"You're Bradley's wife," he rasped. The recognition flickered in his eyes, cutting through the madness. "The vase. The ornament."

"The ornament is broken," Fiona said flatly. "I'm here to make a deal."

He pulled against the chains again, the metal groaning. "I don't make deals with corpses."

"If you don't let me treat you, you'll be a cripple by morning. Or dead."

Fiona took a step forward. Into the kill zone.

Demian moved faster than she expected. His hand shot out, grabbing her neck.

His fingers were scorching hot. They clamped around her windpipe, lifting her off her feet.

Fiona choked, clawing at his wrist. Her vision spotted.

"Give me one reason," he hissed, pulling her close to his face. She could feel the heat radiating from his skin. "One reason not to snap your pretty little neck."

"Because..." Fiona wheezed, staring straight into those black voids. "Because I hate him... more than you do."

His grip loosened. Just a fraction.

"And," Fiona gasped, "I have the antidote."

She didn't wait for permission. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a silver needle. Before he could react, she jammed it into a pressure point at the base of his skull.

Demian stiffened. His eyes widened.

The tension in his arm vanished. He dropped her.

Fiona fell to the floor, coughing, massaging her bruised throat.

"That will only hold the pain back for five minutes," Fiona said, her voice raspy. "We need to flush the blood."

"How?" He was slumped back on the bed now, breathing heavily. The redness in his skin was pulsing.

Fiona pulled out the scalpel.

"My blood," she said.

It sounded insane. But her grandmother, a practitioner of old medicine, had insisted Fiona take a daily tonic since childhood. A family secret, derived from the rare Blue Lotus, meant to 'strengthen the Orozco bloodline.' Fiona never understood it. But in her past life, after years of research in the palace's forgotten archives, she found a text describing its true purpose: it was the only known natural neutralizer for Pyro-Toxin. Bradley thought her blood was merely blue; he had no idea it was also the cure.

She didn't explain the science. She just sliced.

She drew the blade across her left wrist. A line of crimson welled up, dark and rich.

"Drink," she ordered.

She shoved her bleeding wrist against his mouth.

The smell of blood hit him. His pupils dilated. The beast took over.

He grabbed her arm, his grip bruising, and pulled it to his lips.

He drank.

It was a violation. A somatic, visceral intimacy that made her stomach flip. She could feel his tongue against the wound, the suction, the desperate hunger.

Her head spun. The room tilted.

"Easy," Fiona whispered, her free hand finding its way into his sweat-drenched hair. "Easy, Demian."

She was feeding a monster. She was saving the devil to kill a demon.

Slowly, the heat in the room began to dissipate. The unnatural flush faded from his skin, leaving it pale and clammy.

He stopped.

He pulled back, his chest heaving. There was blood on his lips. Her blood.

His eyes were clearing. The black receded, revealing irises of piercing, icy gray.

He looked at her. Really looked at her.

Fiona was swaying on her feet. The blood loss, combined with the adrenaline crash, was too much.

"You..." he murmured. His voice was deep, resonant. Dangerous.

She collapsed forward.

He caught her. His arms were no longer burning hot; they were just warm. Strong.

"You owe me," Fiona whispered, her cheek pressed against his bare chest. She could hear his heartbeat slowing down. "A life for a life."

Demian's thumb brushed the corner of her mouth.

"Done," he said.

Darkness took her again. But this time, it wasn't the cold darkness of the ocean. It was warm. And safe.

Fiona woke up to the smell of coffee.

She shot up in bed, panic seizing her chest. The sheets were gray silk, not the gold of her room.

Where am I?

Then she saw her wrist. It was neatly bandaged with professional gauze.

The memories rushed back. The infiltration. The blood. The deal.

The door opened. A tall man with a scar running through his eyebrow walked in. Vane. Demian's head of security.

He didn't look like he wanted to kill her, which was an improvement from last night.

"Good morning, Your Highness," Vane said. He set a tray down on the bedside table. "The Prince sends his regards."

"What time is it?" Fiona asked, swinging her legs out of bed.

"Seven a.m. We have established a cover story. You were at the Royal Library late last night researching ancient prayers for your husband's success. You fainted from exhaustion and were brought to the nearest medical wing-ours."

Fiona let out a breath she didn't know she was holding. It was a solid lie. Bradley would buy it because it stroked his ego.

Vane handed her a small black velvet box.

"From the Prince."

Fiona opened it. Inside sat a heavy silver ring with a black onyx stone, engraved with a hawk. And a tiny, almost invisible earpiece.

"Put the ring on," Vane said. "It's a signal to my men. If they see it, they protect you. The earpiece is a direct line. Encrypted. The microphone is woven into the setting of the ring's stone. Orozco tech. It's undetectable by standard security sweeps. The Prince insists on discretion."

Fiona slid the ring onto her right ring finger. It was a little loose, but it felt heavy. Like armor.

"Thank you," she said.

She dressed quickly in the clothes Yana had packed-her "library" outfit.

As she walked down the long corridor toward the exit, she saw him.

Demian was sitting in a wheelchair by the window, looking out at the rain-washed garden. He was wearing a black turtleneck that hid the needle mark on his neck.

He didn't turn around. But as she passed, he raised a crystal tumbler of whiskey slightly in the air.

Fiona paused. She touched the ring on her finger.

He saw her reflection in the glass. His lips curved into a smirk.

She kept walking.

The car ride back to the Palace was smooth. Too smooth.

When she walked into the grand foyer, the atmosphere was suffocating.

Yana rushed to her, her face pale. "He's in the dining room. He's furious."

Fiona took a deep breath. She pinched her cheeks to bring some color to them, then let her shoulders slump. She transformed from the woman who fed blood to a vampire into the meek, exhausted wife.

She walked into the dining room.

Bradley was eating eggs benedict. He didn't look up.

"Where were you?" he asked. The fork scraped against the china. Scrape. Scrape.

"I... I was at the library, Bradley," Fiona stammered, pulling out the forged medical report Vane had given her. "I wanted to find that prayer for the gala. I guess I forgot to eat."

She placed the paper on the table.

Bradley picked it up. He scanned it, his eyes narrowing. Anemia. Exhaustion. Stress.

He scoffed. "You're so fragile, Fiona. It's embarrassing. The press is asking questions."

"I'm sorry," she whispered, looking at her shoes.

"Daddy!"

Jimmie ran into the room. He was wearing his school uniform. He ran straight past Fiona and jumped onto Bradley's lap.

"Hey, champ," Bradley's face transformed. He smiled, kissing the top of Jimmie's head. "Ready for school?"

"Yeah! Can we take the sports car?"

"Anything for you."

Neither of them looked at Fiona. She was a ghost in her own house.

She watched them leave, Bradley's arm draped protectively around the boy who had bitten her. The boy who would kill her.

She went to her room and locked the door.

She put the earpiece in.

"Testing," she whispered.

Static crackled, then a voice. Low, smooth, and amused.

"Academy Award performance, Princess."

Her heart hammered. "You were listening?"

"I have eyes and ears everywhere," Demian said. "Especially on my investments."

Fiona looked at herself in the mirror. Her eyes were hard.

"I'm not an investment, Demian. I'm a partner."

"We'll see," he replied. "Seven days. I need another dose. Don't be late."

The line went dead.

Fiona touched the bandage on her wrist.

Let the game begin.