His severed head landed with an unremarkable thump. The circlet slipped off as Tychon’s body disintegrated into dust.
Leaving Theira, flush with power, facing Varius in his golem and an army animated by her own sorcery behind him.
And eight now badly outclassed adept sorceresses around them.
As one, they sank to one knee and bowed before her.
The magenta jewel gleamed in the former Sorcerer Ascendant’s ashes. Theira could feel it calling to her.
Hers to command, now. All the power in the world.
She’d won, and now she could end this war.
And she would.
Varius watched Theira consider the jewel before her, holding his breath as he fought to wait, to wait.
Theira always had a plan. He knew that in his bones, even if even he hadn’t fully appreciated how far it had gone. But he’d known, if Theira was ever to be free, that the Sorcerer Ascendant would have to die, and she would have to kill him.
And he knew what killing the Sorcerer Ascendant meant for her.
Now she would become the Sorceress Ascendant herself. That was how she ended the war on the Korossian side.
“Sorceress Transcendent,” Lysithea said, watching Theira closely, “will you return with us and take up your rightful place?”
Theira smiled widely. Delightedly, wickedly, and Varius practically felt his heart breaking.
Then she said: “No.”
The very earth seemed to arrest in shock.
Varius didn’t quite dare breathe.
Finally Lysithea echoed, faintly, “No?”
“Take the Crown Jewel with you if you wish.” Theira shrugged, though she was taking clear pleasure in the very obvious shock she’d managed to pull from sorceresses trained in the most dangerous court in the world. “I will not take it up.”
All at once Varius began to laugh, and laugh, and laugh.
Theira arched her eyebrows wickedly in his direction, and he allowed himself to breathe again, less hysterically.
Taking pity on the stunned-silent Lysithea, Theira told her, “I have no interest in ruling.”
“But you killed the Sorcerer Ascendant! No one else can bind the jewel—“ Lysithea’s eyes widened.
“Exactly,” Theira said with satisfaction. “I will not bind myself to the jewel, and if anyone else wants to become the Sorcerer Ascendant, they will first have to go through me. And I am not easy pickings.”
She certainly wasn’t. Not before, not with the power thrumming through her now, and not with what everyone finally understood of just how terrifying her skill at planning truly was.
And she’d held her own against ten first-tier adepts at oncewithoutthat, only the spells and power she carried on her person.
One of the sorceresses protested, weakly, “You can’t just do that?”
Theira raised a brow at her. “Oh? Do you intend to try to make me?” Her red lips curved, and she said mildly, “As ever, I am ready.”
The sorceress paled and shook her head rapidly.
Lysithea asked, “So, what then? We just choose our own Ascendant?”
