Byron alone seems unsurprised by our location, though his strange amber-threaded eyes have taken on a new intensity.
I turn back to the view, suddenly overwhelmed by the implications of where we stand. From this vantage point, the emperor's domain seems simultaneously vast and small: a patchwork of light and shadow, power and poverty, all stitched together by the will of a single man.
A man who, for all his might, might never have even stood where we stand now.
“Tell me,” Selen says, her voice dropping to barely above the wind's whisper, “what do you see when you look down there?”
Silence hangs for a moment, heavy with uncertainty.
“I see the empire,” Ellis offers cautiously.
“I see a prison,” Lira counters, her voice hard.
“I see everything I'll never have,” Vex murmurs.
Selen turns to me, her teal eyes expectant. “And you, Veyra?”
I gaze at her, realizing it’s the first time she’s used my name. The question settles in me like a stone dropped into still water, ripples spreading outward. I look again at the sprawling city, the palace below, the distant mountains… and something shifts in my perception.
“I see... a construct,” I say slowly, the words forming as the thought crystallizes. “Something built by… mortal hands.”
Selen's eyes flash with approval. “Precisely. You’re smarter than I gave you credit for.”
She turns to address us all, her silver hair catching the light like a crown. “Everything you see—every tower, every wall, every division between those who rule and those who serve—was built by mortals. Mortal fae with hands and hearts and fears.”
She pauses, letting the words sink in.
“Even the emperor bleeds,” she continues. “Even he must sleep… Even he fears death.”
Something stirs in my chest at her words. Not hope exactly, but something adjacent to it. A realization that has, perhaps, been forming since I first connected with the ashblood in the training pit. The empire, with all its might and cruelty, is not an immutable force of nature. It's a mortal creation, sustained by mortal belief.
And I could decide to not believe in it.
I notice Byron, finding his eyes already on me, watching with such closeness that it almost makes me think he's following my thoughts. He gives me the barest nod, as if confirming something only he can see.
“The empire tells you that you are small,” Selen continues. “That your only worth lies in your service to power. That the magic in your blood is a defect to be feared and controlled.”
The word “magic” sends a ripple through our group. Ellis's eyes widen, while Lira's skirt uncomfortably. Nyx shifts her weight, suddenly tense.
“They lie,” Selen says simply. “And the greatest power they hold over you is not their walls or their weapons, but your belief in your own smallness.”
She walks the perimeter of our small platform, meeting each fae’s eyes in turn.
“Why did you bring us here?” Talyra asks, speaking for the first time, her voice carrying a note of challenge.
Selen smiles, but doesn't answer immediately. She turns to face the sun, her profile sharp against the late afternoon sky.
“I brought you here to ask a simple question,” she says. “Standing at the highest point in the empire, looking down at allthat has been built to contain you, what will you choose to believe about yourself?”
The question hangs in the air between us, profound in its simplicity. I feel something shift inside me. A subtle realignment, like a dislocated joint slipping back into place.
For all my life, I've been told I am small. Insignificant. A ward girl from the slums, destined for the arena or the brothels or an early grave. Someone whose only worth lay in what could be extracted from her.
But standing here, above the emperor himself, with the wind in my hair and the memory of flight still tingling in my veins, I feel the lie of it all.
Chapter 25
Imeet Selen's gaze and see in her eyes that she knows exactly what I'm thinking. This is why she brought us here. Not to show us the empire's vastness, but to reveal its vulnerability. To help us see ourselves not merely as subjects, but as equals.
