He burned a man alive for it. Slowly. Deliberately. While every dragon in Pyraeth watched.
My instincts whisper to map exits and count guards—but I’m standing at a door I could open, wondering what would happen if I did.
He comesto check on me at midmorning.
The knock is perfunctory—a single rap of knuckles against wood before the door swings open, as if he’s already decided my answer won’t matter. Izan fills the frame the way he fills every space he enters, all coiled power and careful restraint. He’s dressed for the war room, dark fabric stretched across shoulders that could shift into obsidian scales at a moment’s notice.
“Your arm.” Not a question. Not a greeting. His gaze drops to the bandage.
“Healing.”
“The healer’s report said there was no magical contamination.” He steps into the room uninvited, and I feel the temperature rise with his entry. Not uncomfortable. Never uncomfortable. But present in ways I can’t dismiss. “The blade was clean.”
“How fortunate.” I turn to face him fully, letting him see the flat assessment in my gaze.
I’m alone again with the heat he’s left lingering in my chambers.
The servants treatme with careful deference.
Not fear—they reserve that for Izan, for the other dragons, for the creatures who could end their lives without consequence. What they show me is subtler. Respect, perhaps. Or wariness.The acknowledgment that I occupy an undefined space in the stronghold’s hierarchy, and undefined spaces are dangerous.
The woman who brings my midday meal is older, gray-haired, with hands that have clearly known hard work. She sets the tray on the small table near the window without meeting my eyes, arranging dishes with practiced efficiency.
“Thank you.” I keep my voice neutral. Friendly would be suspicious; cold would be cruel. “What’s your name?”
She hesitates. Glances toward the door as if expecting Izan to materialize in judgment.
“Mira, my lady.”
My lady. As if I’m nobility instead of a captive with better accommodations.
“I’m not a lady, Mira.” I take a piece of bread from the tray, forcing myself to eat calmly despite the questions burning in my throat. “How long have you worked in the Enforcer’s stronghold?”
“Twelve years.” Her voice steadies slightly, finding safer ground in simple facts. “Since my husband died in the forge-fires. The Enforcer needed staff. I needed work.”
“And in twelve years, how many guests has he kept in these particular chambers?”
The question lands like a stone in still water. Mira’s hands pause on the tray. Her eyes flick to mine—brief, startled, quickly lowered.
“None, my—” She catches herself. “None. These rooms have been empty since before I came. Some of the older staff say the Enforcer had them built decades ago, but no one knows why. He never...” She trails off, apparently realizing she’s said too much.
“Never brought anyone here.” I finish for her.
“No.” The word is barely audible. “Never.”
She leaves quickly after that, and I sit with my bread and my questions and the gravity of information I didn’t ask to receive.
These rooms. Built decades ago. Never occupied.
Until me.
He comes again at dusk.
This time, the excuse is strategy. Intelligence reports that require my expertise, analysis of blood-magic patterns that his scholars can’t parse. He spreads documents across the small table where I’ve been eating my meals, and we stand side by side reviewing cascade structures and binding compositions while the light shifts from orange to deep red outside the window.
It’s a fiction. We both know it. The analysis could wait until tomorrow, could be done in the war room with proper equipment, could be delegated to any of a dozen subordinates with adequate clearance.
He’s here because he can’t stay away. And I’m not sending him out because?—
