of her Chosen bundling her closer.
"I think there are concerns that if Camellia is able to use her Hunger, she might convince a guard to release her," I said carefully, watching my mother.
I ached for her in a strangely resentful way. My mother didn't like making decisions, and she didn't like making people unhappy. Choosing me over Camellia for the crown had to have been difficult enough, but for what came next…I didn't think she'd have the strength. And yet I wanted some acknowledgment of care from my mother. Just like Lily's attempted assassination, my mother hadn't come to see me while I recovered yesterday. She hadn't asked how I was today. She took her comfort from her Chosen, and that seemed to be where she expected me to receive mine.
"She is contained," Aric said, moving up to the arm of my chair. "Her Hunger is…festering is the word for it, I think. Princess Camellia's appetites have exceeded beyond a body's natural ability to consume."
"Her crimes against her Chosen went unchecked too long," one man on the council spoke up. "It is one thing for our queen's line to do what they like with Kimmerian commoners, but with lords’ sons? With foreign princes? The risk of conflict is too high. And now that there is treason in the mix, she will have to be—"
His voice stopped abruptly at my mother's broken moan.
The castle physician stepped forward, hands clasped in front of him. "Gentlemen, Your Majesty, Your Highness, I had wished to speak to you yesterday, but events prevented this until now. I attended Princess Camellia yesterday morning over the matter of pregnancy, which quite frankly was an impossibility in her state. Having seen her now after just one night in a cell away from access to Chosen to feed her Hunger, I'm afraid…Your Majesty, Princess Camellia is dying."
"What?" I gasped, sitting forward.
My mother sat up too, one hand clapped over her mouth, staring wide-eyed at the doctor.
"She's malnourished, dehydrated, sleep-deprived, her body is failing. If there was something sustaining her this long, it was the magic of her Hunger," the doctor said.
You're not surprised though, are you? a dark voice whispered in my head.
"Dying?" my mother repeated.
"Naturally?" Sir Weston asked, frowning and rubbing his jaw.
"As naturally as one can under the circumstance," the doctor said with a soft shrug.
I thought of the early days of my Hunger coming in, giving into hours and hours with Cosmo and Owen until we were all too tired to continue. And even then, the Hunger had craved for more.
And Camellia was such an impulsive, selfish personality. She'd thought the Hunger made her powerful, and after visiting the Winter Palace, after I'd threatened her, she'd probably foolishly believed that feeding hers would make her stronger than me.
A sliver of guilt wormed its way into my heart, but rather than fight it or sink into the feeling, I simply let it find its place there, amongst the tangle of anger, relief, and sorrow that had already taken up residence.
"Is she in pain?" I asked.
"Acutely, yes," the doctor answered.
"Can anything be done for her relief?"
"A sedative, perhaps."
"Your Highness are you considering…measures to heal your sister?" Jack McCallum asked. "I don't mean to be insensitive, but is that wise?"
"Can she be healed?" my mother asked, eyes widening.
"Physically…it's unlikely," the doctor said. "Her state is deteriorating too quickly."
"In my personal opinion, the Hunger is eating away at the princess now that it's not being fed," Aric said.
"I'm not sure why it should matter, considering her actions yesterday are grounds for execution," another council member muttered with his head down.
I expected my mother to start weeping again or to cry out and object. To insist Camellia was saved, as if we might somehow find our way to peace after everything that had happened. She did neither, although there was a soft catch of breath from her throat before she stood at the end of the table.
"I would like to go and see her in her cell. Bryony?"
"Not a—" Cresswell growled from the back, but one of the others hushed him.
I stood slowly, and my mother reached out a hand for me. "Yes, I'll come."
Camellia's cell was similar to Lily's, a decent room in a sunny corner of the north wing. Not quite the dungeons, but just above them. The windows were high and barred, a small fire in a secured grate keeping the small space warm.
"It's…there's less in here," I whispered to Head Guard Amos.
"She was volatile yesterday when we