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I caught a passing mention to the end of the civil war. The author wrote about a program of balance and restraint, about the dangers of excess. My breath hitched. This didn’t sound like Viktor. It sounded like someone else. Someone I’d never met but whose name had come up a lot since I’d arrived in Sangratha: Blake’s father. He’d been called the Peacebringer because he’d united the four great houses, brought back the regency, and basically called on the highbloods to stop fucking murdering blightborn quite so blatantly and show some restraint. I’d heard a lot about him. Supposedly he’d been a highblood who was guided by moral clarity, who wanted greater protections for the blightborn because it was right. I remembered thinking once that Blake was nothing like his father, this idealized Peacebringer.

I glanced at Blake. His eyes were still closed. Now I knew better. Blake was a lot like his father: They both wanted a better Sangratha—a gentler one.

I turned back to the journal. I was surprised that some of the entries didn’t exactly glow with mercy. Instead, the writing was cold and pragmatic. I flipped to another entry, and my stomach did a somersault.

Highblood appetites cannot continue unchecked no matter how great a part of our culture the need to hunt and feed may be, because the blightborn population has plateaued. The research we’ve been conducting shows that in certain regions, it is actively declining. Highblood restraint is not a matter of sentiment. It is arithmetic.

My stomach sank as I read on.

The predator cannot exist without prey. If a few generations must suffer so that our Pure Blood race can go on, it is a small price to pay. We must curb the hunt. Not because it is cruel—for no one may truly expect a lion to restrain from devouring a lamb. But because it is, quite simply, unsustainable.

I swallowed hard.

“Whatcha reading now?” Blake asked sleepily.

My head whipped up. His eyes were still closed. “Um, nothing interesting.” I turned the page.

Blood taken from thralls sustains life, but the nutrient yield is lower—measurably so. Blood taken willingly provides diminished returns. Less potency, less enhancement of highblood ability. Still, it is sufficient to preserve life. Feeding between highbloods—in the case of mates, for instance—is irrelevant. Such feeding is for pleasure and bonding, but does not meaningfully increase power or extend healing or longevity in most cases. By contrast, blood taken in the thrill of a hunt produces heightened effects …

There it was. Did I have to read any more? This was it. The truth about the Peacebringer’s supposed compassion. It was all a great big lie. Alexander Drakharrow hadn’t really been trying to save blightborn. He’d been trying to save highbloods.

I turned another page before I could stop myself.

Viktor is furious. He sees my proposals as capitulation. He calls it weakness. He says a predator who refuses to hunt deserves extinction. He argues dominance is the highblood birthright and fear is the mechanism by which order between superior and inferior species is maintained.

My fingers tightened on the page.

“What is it?” Blake was sitting up. His eyes were open.

I looked up at him. “Nothing.”

He narrowed his eyes. “It’s not nothing. I can tell by your face.” He held out his hand. “Give me the book. Let me see.”

I hesitated.

“Pendragon, it can’t be that bad. I can read, too, you know. Pass it over.”

Mutely, I did as he asked. I watched his face as he read. Watched him read, then frown. “Whose journal is this?”

“I think it might be your father’s.”

His hands froze on the page for a moment. Then he flipped to the next one. He stopped. “These entries … I was a child when this was written.”

I swallowed. “Yes.”

Blake clenched his jaw. Then he closed the book slowly.

“Just … put it down,” I said softly. I stood up and went over to him, then sat down on his lap and leaned my head against his chest. Slowly, his arms moved to clasp me. His head rested on top of mine. We sat like that for a while, our eyes closed. Not sleeping, just thinking.

“I idolized my father,” Blake finally said. “Thought he was a highblood hero.”

“I don’t think you’re alone in believing that,” I said softly. Just when I’d thought I was starting to understand the kind of place Sangratha was, I learned something worse.

“He built an entire moral framework on survival math,” Blake said. “Why not just tell everyone the truth?”

“That there was going to be a blightborn shortage? That their precious blood supply might be threatened?” I shook my head against him. “He must have known he couldn’t do that. There might be a panic. Things might have gotten even worse.”

“For highbloods and blightborn.”