Mirrors and opposites. Forged by different fires.
They were not allies. Not rivals. But something more volatile. Two forces with nothing binding them except necessity and history.
Callum smirked, fingers tightening on the chairs back. “I hear they call you the Wraith now. Perhaps we make sure the scribes get the legends right this time.”
“Do they?” Ronan’s mouth drew into a half smile. “Then at last, they’ve finally learned to see me clearly.”
Behind him, Elysian leaned patiently in the doorway, winter wrapped in skin. He said nothing, but the silence was its own blade:Choose your next words carefully, guardian.
Callum’s stare shot toward him anyway. “They also say the pale hound walks beside him,” he murmured. “But no one ever hears his paws, only feels the breath of frost right before they die.”
Ronan’s smirk deepened, the kind not born of humor but warning. “Careful. You’ll start sounding like one of our admirers.”
A twitch ghosted across Elysian’s mouth. Approval, or something close to it.
“Ah.” Callum stepped closer. “No admiration lives here. After all—” he stood tall, his stare sliding over Ronan, “I see you’re still without a crown. Heavy thing, I imagine, for Ryuu not to trust its own prince. Or is it the prince who doesn’t trust himself?”
The air thinned.
Elysian moved then, silent as snowfall, slipping from Ronan’s shadow. Callum’s hand twitched toward his sword, glare snapping between them.
Ronan’s arms spread out in a slow, careless sweep, as though brushing aside Callum’s jab, halting Elysian beside him.
“Charming place you’ve hidden.” His eyes skimmed over the worn timbers; the table scarred with age. Then snagged on a child’s sketch nailed crooked to the wall—a family, simple but smiling. The falsity of normalcy. Of a life he never had. “It’s an impressive little life you’ve built here. It’s almost convincing.”
Callum’s jaw twitched, barely, tension amplifying between them, leaking warmth throughout the room as he gestured to the chair before Ronan.
Elysian returned to the dim of the doorway as Ronan’s palm dragged along the chair’s spine, the wood cracking beneath his touch.
Too small for him, too fragile. He didn’t plan to sit anyway.
The table between them lay empty, save for the map sprawled across its center. Its edges were charred, corners curling like old scars. Across the top a name was sprawled in neat ink:
CSOLENIA.
Callum nodded his chin to Elysian, a request to join them.
Elysian didn’t move, only leaned into the doorframe, a blade dancing idly between his fingers as he feigned boredom.
Callum’s lip curled. “Your pet lacks manners. Do you feed him better with scraps or fear?”
The air warmed, just enough to warn as Ronan’s voice dropped. “Careful. He’s no pet, but a free man. And I don’t keep mine leashed.”
Elysian didn’t dignify the insult, only folded his arms, eyes fixed on Callum, a mastered, predatory stillness named after terror.
For a heartbeat, the room stood suspended.
Callum broke first, dismissing away the tension with one flick of his wrist. He lowered into his seat; the chair sighing soundlessly beneath him.
Ronan remained standing where smoke had begun drifting near his boots. Not threatening, not yet, but not restrained, either. Simply watching.
“If you’ve come seeking dragons, our fire is rather exclusive,” he drawled. “Consider us unavailable. There is no alliance to be made between Ryuu and the rot festering under Luamis’ gilded wards.”
Callum laced his fingers together. “We need your help.”
A humorless breath escaped Ronan. “You’d have better luck begging the Gods.”
Shifting, Callum looked briefly to Elysian before returning to Ronan. “Notweas in the king.” He paused. “We as in—”
