A thunderstorm ends Rune, Verity, and Alex’s planning early. Verity refuses to stay because of an exam, so Rune sends her home in a carriage to keep her safe and dry. With the rain worsening, Rune remains at Thornwood Hall.

In the guest room, Rune cannot sleep, newly haunted by what Gideon once endured in the house under Cressida. Unable to tolerate the memories the building evokes, Rune leaves her room and goes to Alex’s bedroom in the dark, asking to lie beside him.

Rune asks Alex what he knows about what happened to Gideon. Alex recounts how, after the funerals for their parents and baby sister Tessa, Gideon seemed hollow and withdrew from Alex, obsessively working for Cressida and cutting off contact. A friend’s warning leads Alex home, where he finds Gideon beaten bloody in a boxing ring and called “the witch’s whore,” then discarded into an alley after collapsing.

Alex explains that Nicolas Creed helped him revive Gideon and get him home, but Gideon tried to drive Alex away out of fear and protection. Alex and Nicolas begin retrieving Gideon from the alley night after night, until Nicolas brings Alex to a secret meeting of revolutionaries plotting treason against the Sister Queens. Alex is frightened by the group’s hatred, but pressures Gideon to attend in order to keep Alex safe.

Over time, Gideon’s self-destruction eases, and he volunteers to join an armed palace resistance with Nicolas, refusing to let Alex come. After they fight, Alex goes to Thornwood Hall with a loaded pistol, intending to confront Cressida. Alex admits Gideon later gave him Thornwood after the Reign of Witches fell, but Gideon avoids it entirely, and Alex is selling it because he believes the brother he loved is gone. Alex breaks down crying; Rune holds him until he sleeps, then—once the storm clears—quietly leaves, borrowing a cloak and horse to ride back to Wintersea before sunrise.