She's done being a prisoner. He's done running. The Crimson Queen is done waiting. I wake up screaming in a stranger's bed. For three weeks, I was a prisoner in a mountain. Now I'm hiding in a fortress with a dragon who won't stop pacing outside my door. Rurik is reckless. Annoying. And he looks at me like I'm the only person in the world. I should be making lists. Keeping myself safe the way I always have. Instead, I'm learning to let the fire in my veins loose. He says he'll be my furnace. He says he'll burn down anyone who tries to take me. I'm done being someone's prisoner. I'm ready to stop surviving and start burning. Three hundred fifty years of jokes and chaos. Never stayed in one place. Never wanted to. Then I find her—broken, furious, and holding a scalpel to my throat. Aisling Byrne is iron and ice and the only thing that makes me want to stand still. My dragon doesn't care about her walls. He wants to protect her. Claim her. Make her ours. The claiming fire is howling inside me every time she's near. But she's had enough of being owned. Enough of being trapped. An ancient queen is reaching through the shadows to drag her back. To keep Aisling safe, I have to do the one thing I've never mastered. I have to wait.