Catherine, however, did not find the idea that her life could be in danger far-fetched. If anything, it felt expected. She had seen enough, lived enough, in both this life and the one before, to understand how the world responded to power, to breakthroughs, to anything that threatened to shift the balance.
People had been killed for far less, and that truth had never felt distant to her. It had always lingered somewhere at the edge of her awareness, quiet but undeniable.
