Chapter 272
The morning air was colder than usual.
It clung to my skin like a warning, sharp and insistent. Even Kyral, usually warm and playful, trembled on my shoulder. Her golden wings folded tightly, her breath misting in the wind.
I stood at the edge of the balcony, eyes on the city below, sensing the shift. The castle no longer felt like home. It felt like a target.
Behind me, the door opened.
“I thought I’d find you here,” the Alpha said quietly, stepping beside me.
He always moved like a shadow—graceful, measured—but this morning, even his presence felt heavier.
I glanced at him. “They’re planning something.”
He nodded once. “Mirella found more traces near the outer barracks. Communication spells. Hidden charms. Someone’s leaking movements to the Bone Court.”
My heart sank.
“Someone in the inner circle,” I said.
“Worse,” he replied. “Someone close to you.”
I stared straight ahead, fists tightening.
“Let them come,” I said. “We’ll burn them out.”
But even as I said it, something inside me wavered. It was one thing to be hunted by strangers—another to be betrayed by your own.
Later that day, I met with Mirella in the western tower, where the sun hit the scrying pool just right.
She looked pale. Tired.
“The Bone King is preparing something,” she said, eyes fixed on the water’s surface. “We caught a glimpse of him this morning. He sits on a throne carved from the remains of the First Brood—your ancestors’ dragons.”
I flinched. “He’s desecrating them.”
“He’s feeding on them,” she corrected grimly. “Their magic. Their history. Their memories.”
I turned away. “Then we end him. We find the source and sever it.”
She hesitated. “There’s something else. Kyral—she’s changing.”
My eyes snapped back to her.
“What do you mean?”
“She’s… absorbing things she shouldn’t. Words. Magic. Her body’s growing faster than Zaerion did. She spoke in the old language this morning. Clearly.”
“She’s a hatchling.”
Mirella gave me a look that said we both knew that meant nothing anymore.
“She’s not just a dragon, Aria. She’s a key.”
“To what?”
“That,” she said, “is what scares me.”
That night, I visited the garden alone.
The air was cool, and the moon glowed in full above the trees. I sat beneath the ancient flamevine tree, Kyral curled beside me, her tail gently wrapped around my wrist.
She twitched in her sleep, murmuring softly in a tongue I half-recognized. I pressed my palm to her scales, and instantly images surged through me—
A great war. Wings spread over a bloodred sky. Screams in the night. A black gate cracking open. A woman’s voice, begging in the old tongue.
“Protect the child. Hide the flame.”
I pulled back, breath hitching.
She was remembering something. Not her own life.
Mine?
Or… something deeper?
“She’s dreaming again,” the Alpha said softly, kneeling beside me.
I didn’t flinch. I was too used to him appearing out of the dark now.
“She’s not just dreaming,” I whispered. “She’s remembering.”
He looked at Kyral, then back at me. “You think it’s ancestral?”
“I think,” I said slowly, “that Kyral may be a vessel for something older. Someone.”
He tilted his head. “Then we guard her even more closely.”
I nodded.
Then, almost without thinking, I leaned into him.
And for once, he didn’t just stand beside me—he wrapped both arms around me and held me. Really held me.
Not like a warrior. Not like a protector.
But like a man who feared what he might lose.
The attack came just before dawn.
The first explosion shattered the eastern watchtower. Screams followed. Kyral shot up from her sleep, snarling. Zaerion’s roar boomed from above the clouds.
I bolted upright, the Alpha already gripping his sword. “It’s started,” he growled.
I grabbed my cloak. “Get Mirella. Get the dragons to the upper court. I’ll take the throne chamber.”
But he caught my wrist.
“There’s something you need to know.”
I froze.
His expression was twisted with something between rage and regret. “I didn’t want to say anything until I was sure.”
“What is it?”
He swallowed hard. “One of the spells traced near the barracks—it had a blood seal. The kind that only works with royal ancestry.”
My chest tightened. “So someone in the bloodline?”
He didn’t answer.
And that was answer enough.
“No,” I whispered. “You think it was her.”
He nodded. “Lilah.”
I found her in the northern corridor, pacing like a caged fox, her robes half undone, eyes red.
When she saw me, she dropped to her knees.
“I didn’t mean to,” she whispered. “I swear, Aria. I didn’t know what I was doing. They told me they could bring back my brother. That they just needed—”
“Your blood,” I said coldly.
She nodded, tears spilling. “I didn’t know what it was for. I thought… I thought it was just scrying magic. I didn’t know they’d use it to—”
“To track Kyral,” I finished for her.
She looked up at me, horrified.
I backed away.
“I trusted you.”
“I’m sorry!” she sobbed. “I swear—I told them to stop. When I realized what they wanted, I refused. I haven’t helped them since. Please, Aria, you have to believe me.”
The Alpha appeared at the doorway, face unreadable.
I didn’t know what to do.
I could hear the battle rising in the distance. The dragons were out. The court was under siege. I didn’t have time for this.
But I also knew what betrayal felt like.
“You’ll be confined,” I said finally. “Until this is over.”
She bowed her head.
And I left her behind.
The throne room was already in chaos.
Shadowflame users had breached the outer circle. One had managed to enter the Great Hall itself, a woman cloaked in black robes, casting a stream of dark fire toward the sky.
I raised my hands, let my fire answer.
The flames collided in a crackling storm of gold and purple.
She sneered. “Your dragons will die screaming.”
“Then they’ll die for something,” I spat, stepping forward. “What do you stand for?”
“Power,” she hissed. “And freedom from your rule.”
I unleashed a pulse of white-hot flame that knocked her backward into a pillar, cracking it in two. Her scream echoed once before she vanished in a swirl of smoke.
Kyral landed beside me, scales burning bright. Zaerion swooped past the shattered windows, scattering attackers.
And in that moment, standing in a hall lit by fire and ash, I understood something:
This war wasn’t just about dragons.
It was about who gets to define power.
When the battle was over, when the smoke had cleared and the enemies had retreated, I stood among the rubble, blood on my hands, magic humming in my bones.
The Alpha approached me, bruised but standing tall.
“She survived,” he said.
“Lilah?”
He nodded. “She’s still under guard. But she refused to run. She protected one of the younger girls during the attack.”
I nodded, slow. “We’ll deal with her later.”
Then I looked down at Kyral, who had fallen asleep in the crook of my arms again. Exhausted.
“She's growing too fast,” I whispered.
“She’s preparing,” he said. “For something big.”
I closed my eyes.
“I don’t know if I’m ready for that.”
He placed a hand over mine.
“You don’t need to be ready,” he said. “You just need to keep standing.”
Far away, in the dark lands of the Bone Court, the king opened his palm and stared at a fragment of a dragon’s scale glowing black-red.
He crushed it.
And whispered to the shadows:
“Tell her the real war is just beginning.”
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