Arcadius’s marriage proposal leaves Alex furious and panicked. Sunny, trying to distract and comfort her, reveals a hidden door in the chapel and leads Alex through a secret passage to a concealed chamber built as an escape route for the Empress. In the refuge, Alex explains why the proposal feels unbearable: Duke Michael, Lady Severa, Jakob, and Brother Diaz all see the marriage as politically necessary because it would secure allies, heirs, and food supplies, while Alex feels trapped by a role that gives her fewer choices than the life she had as a thief.

When Sunny tells Alex to act like the future Empress, Alex breaks and confesses that she is not the true Princess Alexia. Alex says her mother was a cheese seller and her father sold her as a child to Gal the Purse in the Holy City. There Alex met the real Alexia, who possessed the clipped coin and the birthmark that marked her as imperial. After the Long Pox killed the real Alexia, Alex stole the coin, burned a matching mark behind her own ear, and took Alexia’s name because she could not bear being “nothing.”

Alex adds that the Oracles never clearly identified her; they only spoke vaguely, and Bock and the man posing as her uncle chose to interpret those signs as proof. Faced with this false identity and the looming marriage, Alex begs Sunny to run away with her. Alex argues that she does not belong in Troy and hopes they can keep fleeing until they find somewhere else to belong.

Sunny realizes that escaping together would help neither Alex nor the empire. Although Sunny wants to comfort Alex and preserve their bond, Sunny hides her own feelings and asks where an elf like her would belong. Sunny tells Alex that Alex now has a chance to do some good and should not throw it away. Sunny also reminds Alex that their relationship was never going to last: once Alex is crowned, the Pope’s binding will send Sunny back to the Holy City. Hurt but composed, Alex accepts Sunny’s judgment, says she cannot afford to be silly anymore, and leaves with the lamp.

Afterward, Sunny finds Jakob alone in the bedchamber, apparently praying despite his lost faith. Sunny tells Jakob that Alex will probably marry Arcadius, and Jakob says that, in the end, it will likely be best. Sunny admits that she wanted something for herself and cannot keep it. Jakob consoles her with a bleak truth learned from age: nothing lasts forever, not love, war, peace, or hatred. He tells Sunny to be grateful she had something at all, and then to let it go.