The sun had long since set, dragging its last rays of light from the high, stained-glass windows of the ancestral hall. The vast room was now a cavern of shadows, the only light a few flickering candles on the main altar. They did little to pierce the gloom, but they cast a pale, ghostly light on the rows and rows of silent, carved ancestral tablets. They felt like silent judges, watching Marissa as she knelt, alone, in the center of the vast, empty room.
Hours had passed. Her back was a column of fire, her shoulders ached, and her knees, even with the small, velvet cushion Beatrice had quietly ordered a maid to give her, were numb and screaming in protest. But she did not move. She knelt, as she had been ordered, her head high, her expression calm. Her mind was a whirlwind of calculations, replaying every move, every word of Ashlyn's complex, venomous trap.
