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His forehead rested against mine, his hand still between my legs, and his breathing was as unsteady as mine.

After a moment, he slowly withdrew his hand.

Then he fastened my jeans for me.

He pulled the zipper up and closed the button, but his fingers were shaking badly enough that it took him two attempts. When he finished, he stepped back once, then again, leaving a deliberate space between us.

He stood in the aisle with his hands clenched at his sides and his collar still open. The brand at his throat faded from orange to red, then darkened into an angry, blistered line against his skin.

“I am not free,” he said, his voice rough, “to keep all of you. This will have to suffice.”

“What does that mean?”

His fingers went to his collar.

That was the only answer he could give me.

He touched the edge of it and looked at me, and I understood. Whatever explanation I wanted belonged to the same category of truth as everything else the oath had forbidden him to say.

I left because I had no idea what else to do.

I walked the length of the aisle toward the great doors, still unsteady, with my face hot and the memory of his hands lingering on my skin. I had already put my hand on the brass handle when he spoke again.

“Miss Hale.”

I turned.

Ronan was still standing where I had left him beneath the warm Archive lamps, his posture rigid, his collar open, and one hand pressed flat over the brand at his throat.

“Whatever you do, whatever we just did… Don’t trust me,” Ronan Ashgrave said quietly. “That is the truest thing I am allowed to tell you.”

I stared at him.

The brand beneath his hand remained dark.

Tamsin climbed all two hundred and twelve stairs that evening carrying a packet of chocolate chip cookies and complaining about every stair step. When she reached my room, she found me sitting on the iron bed with my knees drawn up.

Whatever she saw on my face stopped her in the doorway.

“Right,” she said. “What happened, and who do I have to bite?”

I didn’t tell her about what I found out.

I didn’t tell her about the stamp, the painted woman in the bestiary who had my hair, or the word Ronan had nearly choked trying to say. I also kept Oda’s warning to myself: Be careful who you show your hands to.

I still didn’t understand what any of it meant, and until I did, telling Tamsin felt too much like placing something dangerous in her hands without knowing what it could do.

I told her everything else.

I held up one finger.

“Silas.”

“Obviously.” Tamsin sat on the end of my bed and opened the cookies. “The whole island knows about Silas. You smell like a pine forest every morning, babe. It’s not subtle.”

I raised a second finger.

“Jax.”