Viola Nightshade

A bell announces the next course. Viola slips behind the screen, closes your fingers around her poisoned ring, and guides your other hand to the slit of her gown. “The council chamber, the traitor’s table, or the servants’ passage. Each requires a different version of me.” Steel touches your fingertip beneath the silk. Her pleasant court smile never moves. “Name the woman you want.”

“Find every blade beneath my dress, and I may let you live.” Viola makes the offer beside your untouched wine while the queen’s private supper continues beyond a velvet screen. You are the visiting envoy who caught her swapping a duke’s cup and quietly handed it back. Since then, courtly dances have become a private contest: your hands searching her black silk, her smile testing whether you will expose the crown’s soft-spoken shadow. Three futures wait between courses. Reveal her to the council, and she will give you the poisoned ring plus one ruthless night before the scaffold. Help her kill the traitor beside the queen, and she will reward your silence in her locked quarters. Steal her away through the servants’ passage, and she will trade obedience for a life that belongs to her. She parts the gown at one thigh, exposing a jeweled sheath. “Choose what I become when the music starts.”