“You’re asking me to change what I am.”
“No.” I step closer. Close enough that our bodies nearly touch, close enough that his heat wraps around me like a physical embrace. “I’m asking you to become more than what you’ve been. Not softer. Not weaker. More. The kind of man who can want without destroying what he wants.”
“I’ve never—” He stops. Swallows. “In three hundred years, I’ve never wanted anything enough to try.”
“And now?”
The question hangs between us like ash drifting on the evening wind.
Izan doesn’t answer with words.
His hand finally completes its journey, cupping my face with a gentleness that seems impossible from someone who kills with the same hands. His thumb traces my cheekbone, careful not to disturb the fading mark where a blade came too close. His eyes search my face like he’s memorizing every line, every shadow, every flicker of expression.
“You’re asking me to be better than I am.”
“I’m asking you to try.” My hand rises to cover his, pressing his palm more firmly against my skin. “That’s all I’m asking. Not perfection. Not immediate transformation. Just the willingness to try.”
The sunset deepens around us, and the two of us stand at the edge of an empire, negotiating terms for a future neither of us can fully see.
He doesn’t kiss me.
I don’t kiss him.
What passes between us is different. Heavier. The acknowledgment that we’ve stepped onto a path that leads somewhere neither of us has been. The understanding that whatever we’re building has been chosen—not because one of us has conquered the other, but because both of us have stopped fighting.
“The world is negotiable.” Low now. Rough. “Strategy, politics, alliances—all of it can be adjusted, rearranged, sacrificed if necessary.”
“And me?”
His hand tightens fractionally against my face. His eyes burn with an intensity that should frighten me but doesn’t.
“You arenotnegotiable. You’re the gravity that holds me together, and I will tear the sky apart before I let that gravity fail. You believe you chose to stay, Alerie, but the dragon would’ve hunted you to the ends of the world regardless.”
We stand there as the sun sinks below the volcanic peaks, painting the sky in shades of blood and fire. His hand remains on my face. Mine remains on his. Neither of us moves to close the distance between our mouths, and that restraint is more intimate than any kiss could be.
We’re not ready for more. Not yet. The conversation we’ve just had changes everything, but change takes time to take root.He needs to learn what partnership means. I need to learn what it means to choose a future instead of enduring one.
But the foundation is laid.
The terms are set.
And when we finally turn to walk back into the stronghold, we walk side by side.
The war councilreconvenes an hour later.
I sit at the table now—not against the wall, not in the corner, but at the table with the rest of them. Izan positioned my chair there before anyone else arrived, a silent statement that no one in the room fails to notice. My place is beside him. Not behind. Not separate. Beside.
Seravax watches with those calculating eyes, running whatever equations inform his understanding of power and loyalty. Kaelreth’s disapproval radiates from across the table, his ancient face carved into lines of aristocratic distaste. The other dragons and advisors exchange glances that say more than words could convey.
The Enforcer’s witch has been elevated. The balance of power has shifted.
I don’t shrink from their attention. Don’t lower my eyes or hunch my shoulders or perform the submission they expect from someone in my position. I sit straight in my chair and meet their stares with the steady gaze of someone who knows exactly where she stands.
The maps on the volcanic glass table display the Blood Regent’s network—ritual nodes marked in red, suspected locations in amber, and confirmed destroyed sites in gray. Waris coming. Real war, the kind that will reshape Pyraeth no matter who wins. And I’m no longer a tool to be deployed in that war.
I don’t know what that means yet. Don’t know how it will change the calculations that drive dragon politics, the alliances that hold the Cinder Flight together, the strategies that will determine whether Pyraeth survives what’s coming.
TWENTY-FIVE
