A hospital room, maybe If it was, it was the strangest hospital I’d ever seen. If anything, it looked like a bedroom. A very large bedroom with a fireplace in the corner and white everything with gold trim, but still a bedroom.

“Ah, I see you’re finally awake.”

My heart pounded, and the frequency of the beeping increased. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Daxton sitting on a white sofa, holding a drink in his hand. I gritted my teeth. Whatever they were giving me through that tube, it clouded my mind and made my vision blurry, but no amount of medication could make me forget what I’d seen driving away from the club.

“You killed Tabs.” It was hard to speak. My voice sounded deeper and hoarse, and I tried to clear my throat without success.

“No, I didn’t,” said Daxton, walking around the bed until I could see him without straining. “My guards did.”

Again I told my body to move, but I was stuck. If something held me down, I couldn’t feel it, and horror spread through me. Was I paralyzed

I swallowed. Panicking wouldn’t help. “Why”

“Because she stuck her nose where it didn’t belong.”

He took a sip from his cup. “Oh, don’t look at me like that. She was nobody.”

“She was my friend.” He was lucky I couldn’t move, else my hands would have been wrapped around his throat, treason or not. “And she was a IV.”

“She was a prostitute,” said Daxton, but that was a load of bull. Prostitutes on the streets, desperate to make their family a little extra money, were sent Elsewhere when they were caught. But in the clubs, especially clubs frequented by government officials and the ministers themselves— “Would you like to see your new mark”

I didn’t answer. This was my fault. Tabs had been killed because she’d seen me with Daxton. There was no other explanation.

Pulling something from his pocket, Daxton held a small screen a foot away from my face, and with his other hand he slid something cold between the pillow and my skin. It must have been a camera, because the back of my neck appeared on the screen, and I could clearly see the new letters.

VII, marked in black ink that stood out against my pale skin. I looked away. It wasn’t worth Tabs’s life.

Daxton sighed. “It is a tragedy, what happened to your friend, and because it hurt you, I am so very sorry that it was necessary. But she knew the dangers that came with her profession, and she