Her room is on the third floor, west wing.
I take the back staircase. Not because I am hiding — I am the Crown Prince, I do not hide in my own palace — but because the back staircase is faster and I am moving with the particular energy of a man who needs to be moving or the thing he is containing will require more effort to contain.
I know what Hazel did tonight.
I have known since I came through the ward door and saw her standing over Ava's bed with the knife in her hand and the particular expression on her face that was not anger and not grief but something past both of those things, something that had run out of softer options. I know the shape of what she almost did and I know what it would have meant and I know that the only reason the ward is not a crime scene is that I came back without thinking about it, without reason, simply because the ward was where Ava was and some part of me that does not require permission had decided I should be there.
