Chapter Thirty-Nine

Violet regains consciousness in a prison cell beneath Basgiath, where she is interrogated and tortured by Major Varrish about stealing Lyra's journal from the king's private library. After five days of brutal questioning, Dain Aetos arrives to extract her memories, but a shocking turn of events occurs when Xaden arrives to rescue her.

Violet wakes restrained in the brig, drugged by Nolon and captured after stealing a book from the royal library. Varrish and Nolon interrogate her about how she breached a royal ward and who assisted her, but Violet uses selective truths to avoid incriminating her allies. When she refuses to answer further questions, Varrish beats and tortures her, breaking her fingers, arm, and ankle. Throughout her ordeal, Violet experiences what appears to be visions of the dead rider Liam, who offers emotional support. Over five days, Nolon visits periodically to attempt persuasion while Varrish continues physical torture, repeatedly blocking her connection to Tairn with a serum. Varrish reveals his signet allows him to see people's weaknesses and plans to use Xaden's love for Violet as leverage. When leadership is summoned to the border due to incidents, Varrish brings Dain Aetos to extract Violet's memories, claiming she is working with a second rebellion to destroy Navarre. During the memory extraction, Violet shows Dain the truth about the marked ones, the venin threat, and the weapons being smuggled out. Dain sees enough to understand they are arming an enemy through a drift. As he threatens to kill her with her own dagger, chaos erupts in the antechamber. Varrish is suddenly stabbed and falls. Dain cuts Violet's restraints and begins helping her escape, but is quickly overtaken by Xaden, who appears in the cell and kills Nora.