My feet found a purpose. I turned from the door, my back straight, and strode to the dining hall. The clatter of silverware and the murmur of voices and the occasional burst of laughter rang outbefore I reached it. All sounds of normalcy, but it was a lie. A temporary reprieve before the Skathes came to tear it all apart.
I pushed open the heavy doors.
A few heads turned in my direction, warriors and trainers scattered across the long tables. Strangely enough, the noise faltered. I swept my gaze across the room, finding Lexie, Derren, and Kerralyn at a table near the center. Lexie’s brows drew together, her fork pausing halfway to her mouth.
She knew. The moment she met my eyes, sheknew.
She stood, and Derren rose with her. Kerralyn closed her book and met my gaze with a sharp, assessing look. They left the table and started toward me, moving through the crowd as I walked toward the raised dais where Trew usually sat with his advisors.
Look at them, sitting at a table and dining as if nothing was wrong in our world while their king gave everything to protect them.
I stomped up the stairs and crossed the dais.
Grayson and a few other lords watched me approach, their expressions shifting from surprise to irritation at the interruption. I didn’t care what they thought. Only the warriors mattered now.
My friends climbed the platform and flanked me, Lexie on my right, Derren on my left with Kerralyn beside him, her journal open, ready to record what might come next. My chosen family, standing with me as I claimed my destiny.
I lifted my voice above the stunned silence. “Silverstream is under attack. Hundreds of Skathes are moving on innocent families while we sit here eating.”
A wave of shock rippled through the hall. One woman in the front dropped her spoon with a clatter that echoed like a scream.
“Our king rides to war, but we are not helpless children who must wait here for rescue. We’re trained fighters. We’re the future of this court.” Power thrummed through my every word, a current I made no effort to hide. I could feel its weight swirling across my skin.
I thought of my mother, who’d been desperate to hide me. The few times I’d swear things moved without her ever touching them.She’d had power. I knew that now. And like me, she’d suppressed it. Kept it hidden. She’d died with the secret still trapped inside her.
I refused to do the same.
Lexie eased closer. “There aren’t any dragons.”
“Actually,” I said, equally softly. “There are enough. Kira lied.”
“Fuck.”
Exactly.
“Who’s as eager as me to wet their blades with Skathe blood?” I cried out. I’d been raised to smile and curtsy while men decided the fate of my people. No more. Today, fate would listen to me. “Who will stand and fight for the people we’ve sworn to protect?”
The roar that erupted shook the castle walls. It was a physical force, a wave of sound and excitement that slammed into me, that filled me, that made me whole.
“My aunt lives in Silverstream,” a man with a scar on his right cheek yelled, shoving his chair back as he stood.
“My best friend’s family as well,” a woman cried, her eyes wide with terror and rage.
I knew how to dance, how to wear pretty gowns, and how to stand stoic while my people died before my eyes. But I would not dance around this any longer. I would not hide, and I would not suppress the gift the fates had given me.
For twenty-six years, I’d been the perfect princess, dutiful and obedient when it mattered. Today, I became the person I was born to be.
This was what it felt like to lead.
“We ride with you,” someone shouted from the back. The voice was echoed with calls for revenge against the Skathes, chairs scraping on stone as warriors surged to their feet, their faces lit with the same fire burning through my veins.
“You cannot command this,” Grayson snapped, rising from the high table, cold fury blazing on his face. His companion hissed from his shoulder.
I turned to him, and for the first time since arriving, I let my royaltraining show. My spine straightened, my chin lifted, and when I spoke, it was with the voice of a crown princess born to rule. “I’m not asking for your permission. I am telling you what we will do. A crown doesn’t make me powerful. My choice does. And today, I choose war.”
“You’re a newly bonded warrior.” He looked me up and down, his disdain clear. “Essentially an untried recruit.”
“I’m the woman your king would die to protect.” The words hung in the air, a bold claim that silenced every voice in the room. I swept my gaze over the faces watching us, letting them see the truth. “Which means these people—ourpeople—matter to me as much as they do to him.”
