Nira and Marisol waited near the braziers, steady and alert. Two guards flanked the door with spears crossed, the tension in their stance unmistakable.
Then the King rose, and the room obeyed.
“Be seated,” he said, and the command rippled outward.
Lord Verron Verelith did not sit. Caelen’s father wore mourning black as though it were armor, his ruby ring, large as a knuckle, throwing firelight as he leaned forward, his gaze honing on Jakobav like a blade finding its mark.
“Majesty,” he said, his voice smooth and poisonous, “must we conduct this council with that savage standing behind your daughter’s chair? My son lies in the infirmary because of him.”
The flames hissed in their iron bowls, and high above, a chime tolled, hollow as bone.
Eryndor’s mouth thinned. “Your son is grievously wounded,” he said evenly, “but he will live.”
“Live to be humiliated in his own hall?” Verron snapped. “To watch a foreign warlord plant himself like a pillar behind Orchid’s queen?”
Jakobav didn’t move, his stillness carrying more weight than any gesture, silence radiating from him like a threat.
“Lord Verron,” her father said, iron beneath the calm, “this chamber will not be a battlefield.”
Lady Isola of the Estuary, with her silver-and-coral braided hair and her tide-bright eyes, tapped one fingertip against the table. “With respect,” she said coolly, “this is theater. The breaches are not. Boats have gone dark on calm waters, farmers have vanished, and fish wash ashore with their eyes turned wrong. What is Orchid doing, beyond rehearsing speeches and pinning gowns?”
Murmurs frothed along the table’s length.
“The Veil thins by the day,” said a scholar, his voice papery with sleeplessness. “We require decisive doctrine.”
“We require a queen who can command more than a room and a smile,” another voice added. “One who hasn’t been absent for so many years.”
The words landed between Ella’s ribs. She set her palms on the table, its coolness seeping into her skin, and she lifted herchin. “I went where I was pulled,” she said steadily. “I learned what Orchid would need. I returned because the kingdom called me home.”
“Pretty,” Lord Verron sneered, his lip curling. “But pretty doesn’t close a breach.”
Voices rose in overlapping waves until the chamber felt smaller than its walls, recommendations tangling into recriminations, fear curdling into anger. Ella opened her mouth to speak, but three men cut across her, their words colliding until the torches guttered and flared, unsure which way to go.
Jakobav slowly walked to the front of the room.
He didn’t raise his voice though the chamber re-aligned around him as if pulled by a tide.
“Dravaryn stands with Orchid,” he said, each word steady. “You will have our alliance, our steel, our armies, and the full support of a nation that does not break or falter. Ever.”
Her father’s brows lifted a fraction.
The scholars didn’t blink.
For the first time, Lord Verron seemed exquisitely at a loss.
Ella knew Dravaryn would not take this pledge lightly. Jakobav had just rewritten diplomacy, and possibly the fate of the realm, with barely more than a sentence.
Shock and gratitude sank into her chest.
He’d just offered up a kingdom as though it were nothing, as though she were everything. The danger was not in his armies or his steel, but in the certainty with which he chose her.
She rose and moved to stand beside him. Her hand slid into his, steady, unshaken. The torchlight flickered once and then steadied.
“Tomorrow,” she said, and her voice did not waver, “I will be crowned your queen. We will restore Orchid. Together we will heal the Veil.”
For the first time all night, no one dared to interrupt her. Even the candles seemed to listen. The marble floor seemed to vibrate as though something deep in the castle had shifted, like a beast before it runs.
Her father looked at her and didn’t hide the pride in his face.
