Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death.

Two figures in cloaks meet in a corner of Loot Alley. They exchange a bag of coins and make a promise to each other.

Paedyn Gray stands in Kitt Azer’s courtroom covered in dirt and blood. Kitt is now the king of Ilya, having assumed the throne after Paedyn killed his father, Edric Azer. At the end of the previous book in the trilogy, Paedyn and her lover, Kai Azer (Kitt’s brother), decided to return to Ilya as a couple. This is unusual because Kai is an Elite, gifted with magical powers as a result of the Plague that infected the kingdom years ago, while Paedyn is an Ordinary, one of the people who didn’t gain magical powers in the wake of the Plague. Elites see Ordinaries as inferior to themselves, and before their relationship, Kai was an assassin who tracked and killed Ordinaries.

Now, Kitt asks Paedyn to marry him. He tells the court that he wants to unite the Elites and the Ordinaries despite Edric’s historic hatred of the Ordinaries. Paedyn tries to focus on what’s happening, but she wishes that Kai were there.