Clara's pov

Seven days.

I had seven days left to make Elara Callum call me her friend, or I would die.

Not just me. Everyone I'd ever cared about—my younger sister still working in the eastern territories, my aunt who'd taught me to read in secret, even the cook who'd slipped me extra bread when I was starving. The king's threat had been clear: “your bloodline will rot in the dirt because of you.”

I sat in my small room, staring at the leather-bound journal in my lap. Pages ...