Her hand snapped up, snatching Calla’s wrist mid-spin. With a twist of her torso, she redirected the momentum and sent the Harbinger skidding across the stone in a sharp burst of breath and silk.
Then Alora spun, glaive deflecting the swing of Hadeon’s hammer with a ringing crack that split the air. The ground trembled beneath his feet. He attempted to wrench it from her grasp. She sped away in a burst of smoke.
Power surged through her arms, white markings blazing along her skin. She drove the butt of her weapon into his ribs and followed with a sweep of her leg, striking his chest.
The giant hit the ground hard enough to fracture stone.
Smoke drifted behind her.
Claws slashed from shadow, precise and silent.
Alora turned before Deimos emerged fully, catching his forearm mid-strike. Shadows coiled around her fingers, answering her will, and sent him crashing into the training posts. Spinning around to halt her blade against Calla’s throat.
The Harbinger held out her arms in surrender, casting her chakram away.
Alora lowered her glaive slowly, breath steady, posture straight.
Then all three circled her, eyes glowing like embers in the dark. And she at last understood the lesson. The old gifts had been meant to seal her fate.
The new ones were here tobreak it open.
But only she could decide the course.
“Ver Nocthra,”Hadeon murmured.
“Vi’ignis,”Calla followed.
“Va’karr,”Deimos finished.
Alora spoke the maxim of the demons in turn, her voice rising to meet her will.“Ver nocthra vi’ignis va’karr.”
By shadow and fire, we claim.
She wore a crown now through blood and by marriage.
Two kingdoms.
Both hers to rule.
And a queen did not wait for permission.
CHAPTER 55
Alora
The great doors of the throne room boomed open with a thundering crack. The sound tore through the vaulted chamber like a herald’s warhorn, but no trumpets followed, no fanfare or royal announcement. The court took one look at Alora and fell utterly silent. Lords, ladies, guards, and servants alike turned to stare.
Alora stepped over the threshold.
The marble floor stretched before her like a black sea, polished to a mirror shine. Pillars lined the path to the throne, gold etchings catching the light like veins of fire. Argyle’s stained-glass windows cast long shadows, cold, colorless, watching like ghosts.
It was once home.
But now, it was a mausoleum.
Her cloak billowed as she descended the center aisle, followed by an armed entourage of Minotaurs and demons.
Her people gawked at them in disbelief. Others watched with narrowed eyes, exchanging suspicious whispers. Her people. And yet, strangers.
