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~Evira~
Home sweet home.
Although, I had to admit, it felt more intimidating than usual as I passed through the portal, a wave of powerful magics washing over me.
Usually it evoked peace and awe in me.
But the whole summoning thing really put a fucking damper on that.
The magical gateway into the Dracoryn Realm used to open up in the Fire Dragon Quadrant where Titanus Castle of the former ruling house, House Titanus, had stood. Searing heat and sulfur had filled the air all around the moment anyone had stepped through, along with the sight of a towering castle built into a dark stone mountain that had spires shaped like dragon horns pointed toward the sky, a lava river encircling the thing with a massive bridge that enabled passage.
But for the last twenty-one years, after House Vortimer had taken power, the entrance to the Realm was here in the Ice Dragon Quadrant. And it was a true beauty to behold.
The fresh, almost minty-scented air infused me as my gaze swept over the blue-white sky above streaked with drifting snow clouds that glowed faintly with glacial magic.
I made my way along the wide path of white granite stretching ahead toward Vortimer Palace. I could have just teleported directly inside or used my speed, but I’d wanted just a little bit of time to acclimate and get my head on straight for what I was about to face.
Snowy white mountains and the luminescent ice cliffs framed the horizon. Snow-tipped pines clustered along the ridges. Mystical springs were interspersed throughout, cool mist coming off them and whispering into the air.
As I drew closer, my heart starting to race, I took in the palace rising from the mountainside.
Layers of pale-blue stone and ice intertwined and formed sweeping arches and high towers that were capped with frost feathers. Strands of frozen light ran like veins through the stunning structure.
I reached the massive double doors carved with the Vortimer crest and surrounded by spiraling frost wings, and they responded to my presence, the ice shifting, then the doors opening and beckoning me inside.
Here goes nothing.
I made my way through the entrance hall carved with pale sapphire marble and glacial magic running through it, the floor a faint blue marble. Frost-etched murals lined the wall, depicting the unification of the Quadrants, my grandmother forging the Accord for a new non-totalitarian era, my dad being presented as High Regent, even of the parties that had occurred all over the Realm before my birth when House Vortimer had ended the harmful and torturous reign of Zepharion and Serapha Titanus.
My boots clacked on the floor as I looked up at the vaulted ceiling held by white-stone columns, some carved into the shape of dragon forms.
Guards and House Vortimer aides nodded respectfully as I passed on by—we didn’t bow here. I returned them with a smile and a lift of my chin, although feeling my smile fading the closer I drew to the High Regent Chamber, where my dad had told me to meet him.
The aides wore pale-gray and blue luxurious sweeping robes. The Guards were decked out in form-fitting armor following the same color theme, but with sharp geometric patterns, a mixture of draconic metal and fur-lined collars and coats.
A wide bridge led me over the palace’s natural ravine filled with drifting ice fog that swirled in waves. Frozen waterfalls cascaded into it, giving off an air of tranquility, one I couldn’t enjoy the full effects of in my current anxious state.
When I made it to the end of the bridge, I turned left down a long hall that led to the private wing of the High Regent and the First Regent.
And then I reached the doors to the High Regent Chamber.
I sucked in a breath as I stared at the doors. They weren’t throne room doors and didn’t possess all the intimidation that would come along with such a thing, no insistence on supplication. That wasn’t how my dad ruled, how House Vortimer ruled. It was leadership through wisdom, care, diplomacy and collaboration.
I frowned when three familiar scents wafted toward me, not just my dad’s as I’d been expecting.
My grandmother and Torvek were also inside.
“Enter, Evira.”
I jolted as my dad’s voice rang out.
I winced, then shoved both my hands into the doors and pushed them open, the chamber coming into view, all serene elegance.
A council dais encircled by curved seats of ice-glass was the main feature of the space. At the center was an elevated platform of silver marble for anyone who ventured inside with concerns directly for the High Regent to hear to stand and speak and be heard.
Tall windows interspersed around three sides of the space flooded the room with light and the stunning view of the Ice Dragon Quadrant mountains.
