Back at the Grunfall war camp, Meryn takes the lead in interrogating the captured Siphon prisoner, who has been chained to a bolted chair in a secure stone building. She demands to know where the abducted children have been taken, but the Siphon denies any knowledge of children, mocking her and the northerners. Meryn escalates the interrogation methodically—first breaking his fingers with pliers, then using a poisoned dagger that prevents his supernatural healing. Despite the increasingly brutal torture, the Siphon maintains he knows nothing about the children, taunting Meryn even as she cuts him. Stark watches from the back of the room without intervening.

When the Siphon declares he wouldn't tell her anything even if he knew, something inside Meryn snaps. Consumed by darkness and shadow-fueled rage, she abandons interrogation entirely and decapitates the prisoner with a bone saw in a drawn-out, horrific act of violence. Anassa, her wolf, approves of the brutality, but Meryn feels only hollowness. She staggers to her tent and collapses into blood-soaked sleep.

Hours later, Meryn wakes to find Stark preparing to tattoo her with Siphon kill marks on her upper arms. As he works, the quiet intimacy of the moment draws Meryn into confiding in him fully—she reveals her true reason for joining the army: to find her sister Saela, who has been missing for three months and turned eleven in captivity. Meryn expresses her anguish over the failed mission and her guilt at having tortured the Siphon to no purpose, fearing she behaved like a monster. Stark offers measured reassurance, telling her not to let it consume her and to remember why she did it.

When Stark leans down to lick the fresh tattoo wounds—a healing practice—the moment becomes intensely charged with physical and emotional tension. Meryn grabs his hair, torn between shoving him away and pulling him closer. Stark responds by deliberately licking again and biting her skin, provoking an unmistakably erotic reaction from Meryn. She recognizes her desperate craving for connection and comfort, even as she reminds herself that she loves Killian and that Stark is dangerous. Before anything further happens, Strategos Egith enters the tent, breaking the moment. Meryn resolves not to revisit whatever just passed between her and Stark.