Seduce Me in Flames Read Online Free PDF

they did not know, how oppressive and terrifying she found being locked in a small room to be. It had been that way ever since her first imprisonment. She remembered how confused she had been, how utterly panic-stricken. She’d been ripped away from her governess, the only woman she’d ever known as any other child might truly know a mother. Blay-ana. Blay-ana had taught her everything. From her first letters to her first clumsy steps into womanhood.Although the governess had not been affectionate by any stretch of the imagination, she had been wise and steady and the only friend and confidante the exiled princess ever had. Ambrea was too “common” to be deemed a worthy and worthwhile friend to her peers, yet too royal to be allowed a common companion. So it had been just her and Blay-ana.
    Then her father had gotten it into his head that her burgeoning womanhood went hand in hand with some ephemeral power to command and coax factions to her side. He had severed her from Blay-ana, making sure they never saw each other again. They never even had the chance to say farewell to each other. He had thrown Ambrea into the catacombs, keeping various weak charges hovering over her so he could justify the long term of her imprisonment.
    It was well over a year later before she was released and given back her own household. All the faces had been strange, though, and for the longest time she had not dared to trust anyone.
    “Ah, hello my old friend,” she said wryly to the cell around her. She gave her uncle credit for consistency. She’d been given the same cell as her last time there, as well as the time before that. She could tell by the little waterfall dribbling along the cracked, mildewed stones in the far left corner. The cell was now a little older, the wearing of the water paths a bit deeper, but it had little charms that made her certain it was the same cell. There were no windows, since the entire catacombs were just as the name suggested, completely underground. The cot against the wall made her bed at home look luxurious. As poor as her household had become over the years, she had never thought to complain. She had always known it could be worse. And even these accommodations were probably considered highbrow. She knew well that there were deeper levels to the catacombs.Darker levels. Though torture was outlawed in the IM’s charter, the emperor, her father, had made a poorly kept secret of his dealings with those he considered enemies of his throne. He had imagined himself above the laws of the IM, merely by privilege of his exalted birth.
    Feeling eyes on her back, knowing that the guard was peering at her through the small window in the door, she lowered herself to her knees, closed her eyes, and said a hasty prayer for her delivered safety. Futile or not, the Scriptures taught that she should never give up hope, because that was tantamount to losing faith. Even if her uncle did manage to find a way to justify her future death, even if she were to be murdered by his hand for all to see and revel in, she could never lose hope. Not even in those last moments could she forsake her belief in the Great Being’s power.
    She glanced up at the cameras that were trained on her from either corner of her cell. Holding her book of devotionals close, she opened to a worn, familiar spot. But instead of the prayers that filled the book on every other page, this one held a sheet of paper-thin Vid. The Vid was a rotating picture, three images only, of the woman who had given birth to her.
    Ambrea knew little of Junessa Vas Allay that had not been told to her with vicious condescension from her peers or those who had raised her after the concubine’s downfall. However, while Blay-ana had been one of those strident, rote voices who spoke of Junessa’s ill qualities and the pridefulness that had led to her downfall, she had also been the one to slip this Vid to Ambrea on a seemingly innocuous night when they had been alone in the