Chapter 1

"KAELEN DRAVEN TO WED ELARA VALE AT MIDNIGHT."

The announcement flashed across every screen backstage three minutes before my graduation runway, bright enough to turn the makeup mirrors blue. I stared at Kaelen's photograph beside Elara's perfect smile, then at the bridal gown hanging in front of me, and laughed once because the alternative was throwing up on silk I had spent six weeks hand-beading.

"Mira?"

My model, Tessa, caught my wrist.

"Tell me that is fake."

"If it were fake, he would have picked a less expensive photographer."

I slid the last pearl pin into the bodice and checked the hem. The gown was ivory, not white. I had called the shade winter ash, because I had still been stupid enough to believe some things could survive a fire.

The screen changed before Tessa could answer.

"ACADEMIC STATUS UPDATE: MIRA VALENTI. YOUR ENROLLMENT HAS BEEN TERMINATED. YOUR GRADUATION COLLECTION HAS BEEN REMOVED FROM TONIGHT'S PROGRAM."

For a second, no one backstage breathed. Then a production assistant hurried toward me with a clipboard pressed to her chest and panic written all over her human face.

"I am so sorry."

Her voice stayed level.

"The dean said there was a security concern. They have orders from the Valenti Council."

"Do they?"

I took the clipboard before she could pull it back. The signature at the bottom belonged to Orsino Valenti, who had known me since I was a child and still sent me birthday wine I was technically too young to drink.

"How touching. I always wanted my family to attend graduation. I did not realize they meant with a firing squad."

Tessa went pale. The assistant looked as if she might cry.

I did not. I had been crying for Kaelen Draven since he left New York three months ago with one promise, two bodyguards, and a kiss against my forehead that had felt like a future. I had finished my collection anyway. I had sketched through sleepless nights anyway.

I had believed that a man who looked at me like I was the only dangerous thing in the room would at least have the decency not to marry my stepsister on the night I was meant to become someone on my own.

Apparently, I had given him too much credit.

"Where is my work?"

I waited for an answer.

The assistant swallowed.

"Security is taking it down."

"Then security is about to learn why designers keep scissors."

I pushed through the curtain before anyone could stop me.

My final look was already on the runway, half undressed beneath the white lights while two guards in black pack uniforms removed the silver wolf-crown from her head. The audience whispered. Phones lifted.

In the first row, a fashion editor I had spent two years trying to impress was filming me with the delighted expression of a woman who had just found tomorrow's headline.

I walked straight onto the runway.

"Put it back."

I told the guard.

He glanced at my last name on the badge around my neck and then at the Council order in his hand.

"Miss Valenti, you have been instructed to leave."

"You have been instructed to touch a garment worth more than your annual salary with both hands."

I took the crown from him and fixed it back into Tessa's hair.

"I am correcting the more serious mistake."

The audience laughed. It came out nervous, but it came.

My phone buzzed again.

This time the message had no sender.

"EXECUTION ORDER APPROVED: MIRA VALENTI."

Below it sat a Council seal I recognized from every Valenti document I had ever signed. Beside the seal was a countdown.

"ELEVEN HOURS, FORTY-SEVEN MINUTES."

The guard reached for my elbow. I stepped away before his fingers landed.

"Take the collection."

I said, loud enough for every camera to hear.

"Take the degree. But if anyone here thinks I am leaving quietly, they have confused me with my stepsister."

Tessa lifted her chin. Behind her, the models closed ranks around me in winter ash, black velvet, and metal-thread wolves.

Then the backstage doors opened, and Kaelen Draven walked in wearing the suit I had designed for him.

He looked exactly like the man I loved.

That was the problem.