He pulls out a chair and sits, though his nervousness is apparent. I don’t blame him—I’m not known for being overly forgiving.
“Seren, Rowan—what of the next relic?” I gesture to Seren to sit down.
Seren clears her throat delicately, placing the old piece of parchment on the table and sliding it forward. “We’re looking at this section here,” she says, pointing to the lines that read:
Where ruins burn and the Flame-heart sleeps,
The dragon stirs in the soul it keeps.
And in the skies where wild winds sing,
Beast and bond form a timeless ring.
“And what have you discovered?” Lady Sylvaine asks.
Seren’s face shifts from innocent and pure to scholarly and wise in a heartbeat. Her brows furrow in concentration, and she begins, “My mother used to tell me a bedtime story about thesleeping flame.She said it lived beneath the ashen ruins of a city that vanished. A city so old, even the maps forgot it.” She looks around at the room,and we’ve all leaned in, elbows resting on the table, eagerly awaiting her discoveries. “She used to say,‘The flame remembers. Even if the world does not.’I thought it was just a tale.”
Rowan interjects smoothly, “Seren told me about this tale, wondering if the sleeping flame was connected to the Flame-heart from the prophecy, so I Memory Walked thousands of records looking for threads and archives relating to it,” he pauses for a heartbeat, looking straight at me. “I found something... unexpected. Something big.”
I incline my head, trying to mask my eagerness. “And?”
“There’s an ancient myth that speaks of the Flame-heart as a dormant soul of a dragon,” he lets the words hang in the air. No one speaks, all of us holding our breath in collective curiosity. “The Flame-heart is not a literal beating heart, but the preserved soul of an ancient dragon that carries the will and memory of the most powerful dragon.”
“I can add to this myth,” Lady Sylvaine announces, her voice firm and confident—a reminder of her decades advising kings—and I can’t help but raise my eyebrows in surprise. “Don’t give me that look, boy—I advised the last three kings. There are things I was never meant to forget,” she says, giving me a wry smile. “The ancient dragons were soul-bound to the Dravari royal line—not just as their allies, but their protectors,” Lady Sylvaine says with such conviction that I’m inclined to accept it as the truth.
“Are you telling me that the dragons aren’t really extinct?” Ronyn asks quizzically from behind Seren.
“I’m telling you that their extinction is largely fabricated, yes. Many were killed, but others went into hiding when the Dravari throne fell,” Lady Sylvaine confirms. “Now, they’re sleeping, dormant. I don’t know where. They’re wiped from Dravara’s memory along with everything else of importance, no doubt—they’d pose a great threat to Thalmyr.”
Ronyn drags his hands through his shaggy brown hair, eyes blown wide in surprise. “Well,” he drawls, “fuck.”
Fuck, indeed.
“How do you know how the Dravari monarchy fell?” I ask,genuinely curious to know how this unassuming courtier knows so fucking much.
She looks at me sardonically and says, “How doyouknow how the Dravari monarchy fell?”
The sneaky old woman.
I smirk.Now I know why my father liked her and kept her on his council despite many opposing her position.
I pause for a moment, weighing the merits of sharing this. “Since Elyssara informed me that she is the lost Dravari heir according to the Obsidian Crown,” I reveal, feeling the weight of the admission settle heavily in my chest.
The room stills. The council is silent, processing the information.
“You couldn’t just pick a regular woman with no royal lineage, bound magic, or fucking soul-bonded dragon, brother?” Daelen whistles, dragging his hand down his face.
“Yeah, what he said—except she’s my best friend, so pretend I didn’t,” Ronyn quips.
I smile at Ronyn and Daelen—they’re trouble when they’re together.
I quickly drag my gaze back to Rowan and Seren, “We’ll get to Elyssara in a moment, but first, how do we find these ashen ruins of a city?”
Rowan sits up a little straighter, “The only information I can pull from my archives is that there is a lost kingdom that can be accessed through an enchanted waterfall somewhere in Zerynthia where the Flame-heart sleeps. The only detail I could decipher during the Memory Walk was an ancient rune carved into a rock beside the falls—one I’ve never seen in any other record.” Rowan shrugs as if what he’s said isn’t fucking world-changing.
I don’t miss the way Lady Sylvaine huffs out a shaky breath—apprehensive, maybe. Perhaps what’s hidden doesn’t want to be found?
Rhyven raises his hand, “I believe I can actually help with that, my prince.” He swallows thickly, his unsettledness still obvious, “I’vetracked elk to the ends of Zerynthia and have seen a waterfall with a rune.”
