We were all dead.

“When did you paint this?” I asked Elora when I found the strength to speak.

She sat in a chair to the side of the room, staring out the window at the snow falling on the pines. Her hands were folded in her lap, the skin gray and wrinkled. She was dying, and this painting had probably nearly pushed her over the edge.

“Last night, while you were gone,” Elora said. “I wasn’t sure if I should tell anyone. I didn’t want to start an unnecessary panic, but Garrett thought that you all should know.”

“It might help change things,” Garrett said, and I glanced back over at him. Worry tightened his expression. That was his daughter dead in the picture too.

“How can you change things?” Laurent asked, her voice shrill. “It is the future!”

“You can’t prevent the future,” Tove said. “But you can alter it.” He turned to me for confirmation. “Can’t you?”

“Yes,” I nodded. “That’s what Elora told me. She said the future is fluid, and just because she paints something, it doesn’t mean it will happen.”

“But it might happen,” Aurora said. “The course we are on now is set up so that this will be our future. That the King of the Vittra will destroy the palace and take over Förening.”

“We don’t know that he’ll take over Förening,” Willa said, futilely attempting to help. “We only see that some of us are dead.”

“That is a great consolation, Marksinna,” Laurent said snidely, and Tove shot her a look.

“Aurora has something,” I said. “All we have to do is change the course.”

“How can we possibly know that we’re changing the course the right way?” Laurent asked. “Maybe whatever action we take to prevent this scene is the action we needed to do to cause it.”

“We can’t do nothing.” I stepped back from the painting. I didn’t want to see everyone I loved dead anymore.

I leaned back against the table and ran my hands through my hair. I had to think of something to stop this. Something to change it. I couldn’t let this happen.

“We have to take out an element,” I said, thinking aloud. “We have to change something in the painting. Make something in it go away. Then we’ll know we’ve changed it.”

“Like what?” Willa asked. “You mean like the staircase?”

“I can go get rid of that right now,” Tove offered.

“We need the staircase,” Aurora said. “It’s the only way to the second floor.”

“What we don’t need is the Princess,” Laurent muttered under her breath.

“Marksinna, I told you that if you said –” Tove started but I stopped him.

“Wait.” I stood up straighter. “She’s right.”

“She’s right?” Willa was confused.

“If we get rid of the Princess, the whole scene changes,” Aurora said as it occurred to her. “The King has been coming for her this whole time, and in the painting, he finally succeeds. If we give her to him, the painting goes away.”

Nobody said anything, and by the confused, worried expressions on both Willa and Tove’s face, I’d say that even they were considering it. It was hard not to. If it was only one of them dead, they probably would still fight to keep me here, but everyone is dead. My life is not more valuable than all of theirs.

“You’re not giving him my daughter,” Elora said firmly. She grabbed onto the back of the chair and pushed herself up. “That is not an option.”

“If I’m going to end up dead anyway, at least I should spare the people,” I said.

“You will find another way,” she insisted. “I am not sacrificing you for this.”

“You’re not sacrificing anything,” I said. “I am willingly doing this.”

“No,” Elora said. “That is a direct order. You will not go to him.”

“Elora, I know the thought of losing your child is unbearable,” Aurora said as gently as she could. “But you need to at least consider what’s best for the kingdom.”

“If you won’t, then we’ll have you overthrown,” Laurent said. “Everyone in the kingdom would stand behind me if you were going to lead us all into certain death.”

“Death isn’t certain!” Elora snapped. “Overthrow me if you want. Until then, I am your Queen, and the Princess isn’t going anywhere.”

“Elora, why don’t you sit back down?” Garrett said gently and walked over to her.

“I will not sit down.” She slapped his hands away when he reached out for her. “I am not some feeble old woman. I am the Queen, and I am her mother, and I have a say in what happens here! In fact, I have the only say!”

“Elora,” I said. “You’re not thinking this through. You always told me that the good of the kingdom came first.”

“Maybe I made a mistake.” Elora’s once dark eyes, looking almost silver now, darted around the room. I’m not sure she could really see anything anymore. “I did everything for this kingdom. Everything. And look what’s become of it.”

She stepped forward, although I don’t know where she intended to go. Her legs gave out from under her, and she fell to the ground. Garrett tried to catch her, but he moved too late. She was unconscious by the time she hit the floor.