Princess zetulah Viridian POV;
The air's too thick. Like someone's shoved ash down my throat.
Lord Gavrik Viridian.
The name burns through the war logs, black ink screaming what my gut's been twisting over for weeks. My uncle. The man who taught me to wield a dagger before I could spell my own name. Who held my hair back when I retched after my first kill on the battlefield.
And now this.
Fenrik's last supper—shared with the man who sent him to die.
I slam the parchment down. The damn thing crackles like it's laughing at me. "Explain. Now."
General Solric doesn't flinch. Bastard's carved from the same stone as these mountains. "You shouldn't be here, Princess."
"Try stopping me." My voice shakes. I let it.
He sighs—the sound of a man who's buried too many secrets. "Original orders had Fenrik guarding the supply lines. Safe. Then…" A muscle jumps in his jaw. "Someone rerouted his unit into Emberclaw's killing zone. Night before the ambush."
The tent spins. I grip the table's edge, splinters biting my palm. "And you just let it happen?"
"Your uncle's seal authorized the change." Solric's gaze flicks to the tent flap, like the shadows might snitch. "Questioning a Viridian's orders is suicide."
I almost laugh. Suicide? My brother's blood stains the floor, and this fossil is worried about protocol?
"Coward." The word tastes bitter. True.
He doesn't deny it.
The chamber is too warm, stifling beneath candle smoke and the heavy perfume of clove oil. Goblets gleam, their wine dark as dried blood. The lords sit in a perfect, predatory circle—spiders in silk, watching for the first sign of weakness.
At the head of the table, Gavrik lounges on his throne, fingers laced like he's praying. Or plotting.
The war log smacks the table, unfurling like a corpse's accusing finger.
"Explain." I sound feral. Good.
Gavrik doesn't blink. "Lies, niece. You're distraught—"
"Don't." My dagger's in my hand before I remember drawing it. "You signed his death warrant. Why?"
The lords shift. A dozen goblets clink—nervous sips.
My uncle leans back, throne creaking. "You think ruling's soft beds and sweet wine? Fenrik wept over executed traitors. Wept." His lip curls. "Empires aren't built on tears."
The dagger trembles. I'm eight again, showing him my bloody knuckles after a fight. "Never let them see you shake," he'd said.
Now? Let him see.
"He was your blood."
"And you," he says softly, "are my masterpiece.
Midnight oil lamps smear shadows across the maps Gavrik's pinned to every wall. Our territories. Our enemies.
Our future.
"Fenrik was a stepping stone," he says, like discussing a failed crop. "You? You're the blade."
The air reeks of wax and ambition.
I see it now—the way he'd nudged me toward strategy lessons while Fenrik practiced harp. How he'd smiled when I outmaneuvered tutors twice my age.
"All these years… grooming me."
"Molding." He corrects. A teacher to the last. "Viridian needs a queen who'll burn the world to keep it."
My laugh cracks. "And you'll pull the strings?"
"I'll advise." His smile's all teeth. "As always."
Silence. Then—
"Choose, Zetulah." Gavrik spreads his hands. Beneath the window, torches dot the valley like fallen stars. Our stars. My stars, if I bend.
"Mourn a ghost…"
Wind howls through the arrow slits.
"…or become a god."
I turn. Let the cold bite my cheeks.
Oh, uncle.
You shouldn't have taught me to aim for the heart.
—----------------------
The candle's flame danced like a trapped spirit, throwing shadows that clawed at the chamber walls. Cold bit through my armor—the good kind of cold, the kind that keeps your blade hand steady.
Solric stood statue-still across from me, his storm-gray eyes tracking my every twitch. That damned cloak of his didn't even ripple. Bastard could outwait a glacier.
"How many?" My breath fogged between us. "How many would follow me now?"
His pause lasted three heartbeats too long. I counted.
"Enough to draw blood." A muscle flexed in his jaw. "Not enough to drown in it."
I leaned into the candle's heat, let the wax stink fill my nose. Good. Let it sear away the doubt. "Then we don't drown." My thumbnail dug into the table's groove, finding old bloodstains. "We cut their ankles and watch them sink."
The flame guttered. Solric's exhale sounded like a death rattle.
"Emberclaw rules through fear," I whispered.
"And we?"
I blew out the candle.
"We'll teach them terror."
The war map reeked of mead and old violence. I trailed a finger along Emberclaw's southern routes—those fat, smug supply lines feeding their war machine.
Solric grunted. "Starvation's a slow game, Princess."
"Not starvation." My knife thunked into the table, quivering an inch from his hand. "Education."
He didn't flinch. Annoying.
"They'll come for us twice as hard."
"Let them." I yanked the blade free, splinters raining down. "Angry wolves make stupid choices."
The ghost of a smile tugged his lips. Old bastard almost looked proud.
The moon hung like a gutted animal in the sky.
We moved silent as rot through bone—thirty Viridian shadows hugging the cliffs. Below, the Emberclaw caravan creaked along, torches bobbing like fireflies. Idiots. They'd even brought grain carts. Bread for their frontline butchers.
My pulse roared. Not from fear. Never that.
From the itch beneath my skin, the one that always came before blood.
A wolf howled. Ours.
Chaos erupted.
Claws shredding leather armor. Teeth snapping at throats. I drove my sword through a guard's ribs, warm spray hitting my tongue. Iron. Salt. The old song.
Solric's axe sang beside me, cleaving a man from shoulder to spleen. Behind us, flames devoured supply sacks, turning winter wheat to ash.
A soldier lunged—young, eyes wide as a startled doe. My blade found his heart before his war cry did.
Then—silence. Smoke. The weight of my own breath.
My fingers curled, sticky with blood. My pulse still hammered, but somewhere underneath it—under all the fire and steel—something else scraped against my ribs.
Not regret. Not relief.
Just… a question.
How many more before I stop feeling anything at all?
I shoved it down. Deep.
"Next time," I told the burning carts, "send better men."
The messenger died at Ragnis's boots, but not before croaking my name.
Zetulah.
The Emberclaw king didn't move. Didn't blink. Just sat coiled on his obsidian throne like a viper sunning itself.
Then—laughter.
Dark. Wet. The sound a bear makes when it finds your scent.
"War?" Ragnis emberclaw flicked gore from his clawed fingers. "The pup thinks she wants war?"
His war council froze—rabbits sensing thunder.
A soldier swallowed hard. "She burned the southern supply line, my king. The wheat is gone."
Ragnis let out a slow breath. Then—without looking—he reached for the fallen messenger's dagger. Twirled it once between his fingers.
And then, with nothing but the flex of his grip, snapped the blade in two.
The crack of metal rang through the chamber like a death knell.
For a long moment, nothing moved.
Then—
"Summon Moriba and Azzuri." His voice was almost soft. "Tell them Viridian's forests are kindling."
A pause. A smile.
"And bring me the girl's head unscratched."
He wanted to peel my skin himself.
I'd have to disappoint him.
---
Ragnis emberclaw's final order cracked like a whip:
"Burn the forests. Poison the wells. Salt their fucking gardens."
His crimson eyes glowed in the torchlight—a promise, a curse.
"But the princess?"
A wet click of his tongue.
"Mine."
A ripple of unease spread through the room. But then, just as the guards turned to carry out their orders—
Ragnis emberclaw lifted his hand.
"Wait."
A slow, sharp-toothed grin.
"Send my generals
north."
The council stilled.
"My king?"
He leaned forward, pressing his fingertips together. "It's time we remind Azzuri where their loyalties lie."
Now, it wasn't just Viridian's war.
Now, the whole world would burn.