For one terrible moment, no one breathed.

Queen Elara rose as far as her chains allowed.

“My son,” she whispered, tears filling her eyes. “You remember?”

The prince looked at her, his small face crumpling.

“I remember you breaking the window,” he said. “I remember you carrying me through the fire.”

Darius suddenly turned toward the guards.

“Take the boy away. He is ill with grief.”

But the captain of the guard did not move.

The prince stepped closer to the center of the hall.

“My mother did not try to kill me,” he said. “She came to save me after Uncle Darius locked me inside.”

Darius gave a thin smile.

“A child’s word against the regent of the crown?”

“No,” Queen Elara said.

Her voice was weak, but it stopped him.

From inside the torn sleeve of her gown, she pulled a folded strip of parchment and let it fall onto the stone floor.

The captain picked it up.

As he read, the color left his face.

Darius’s voice sharpened. “Give that to me.”

The captain stepped back.

“It is an order bearing your seal,” he said slowly. “Commanding the prince’s guards to leave his corridor before the fire began.”

The nobles erupted in whispers.

Darius looked toward the throne, then toward the doors.

The prince’s lips trembled.

“Why?” he asked. “I trusted you.”

For the first time, Darius’s calm expression cracked.

“Because your father gave the crown to a child,” he snapped. “A frightened little boy who would have ruined this kingdom.”

Queen Elara let out a broken sob.

“You murdered the king too.”

Darius froze.

The prince turned to his mother.

“What did she say?”

Elara pressed a shaking hand to her mouth.

“Your father did not die from fever,” she whispered. “He discovered Darius was stealing from the crown. Before he could expose him, he became ill.”

Darius reached for the sword at a guard’s waist.

Before he could touch it, the captain seized his arm.

The hall filled with steel and shouting.

The prince ran to his mother as the guards unlocked her chains.

She dropped to her knees and pulled him into her arms, kissing his hair again and again.

“I thought I had lost you,” she cried.

He clung to her tightly.

“I knew you came back for me.”

Behind them, Darius was dragged from the throne he had nearly stolen.

The prince looked over his mother’s shoulder at the dark seat waiting above the hall.

“I don’t want to be king,” he whispered.

Elara held his face gently in her hands.

“Then you will be the first good one,” she said, “because you know a crown is not worth more than a life.”

Still trembling, the boy took his mother’s hand.

Together, they walked past the empty throne, while the entire kingdom bowed to the queen they had almost condemned and the child who had saved her.