The town council chamber is too small for the weight of what’s about to happen. The walls are paneled in pine, varnish peeling in places, lanterns hanging crooked over benches filled to bursting with townsfolk who couldn’t stand to stay home once word spread.
The air smells of damp wool, woodsmoke carried in from coats, and the faint tang of iron nails hammered into boots. They crowd shoulder to shoulder, murmurs rolling like low thunder, and when I step through the doorway, the noise cuts short.
I feel every eye on me, human and elf and fae alike. They see a man who came to tear down their heart. They see an orc who signed his name to ink that meant destruction. They see a war.
I let them see it. And then I walk straight through it.
At the front, Mayor Thorne adjusts his spectacles, cane resting against the table, his posture straighter than usual as if the whole ridge rests on his back tonight. Clara sits a few rows in, Dee beside her, Pippa perched on the edge of the pew with her wings twitching like sparks.
Clara doesn’t look at me, but her hands are clenched in her lap, white-knuckled, and the sight makes my chest burn.
And then there’s Thomas. He sits at the opposite end of the table with his smirk polished like a blade, papers spread before him in neat little stacks. His cheap suit shines under lantern light, his hair slicked back too smooth for mountain air. He sees me approach and leans back, crossing one leg over the other with practiced ease.
“Dralgor,” he says, his voice pitched to carry. “You’ve come to stand with me, then?”
“No,” I answer, low and steady. “I’ve come to end you.”
The room erupts, voices overlapping, gasps and curses and mutters thick enough to shake the rafters. Mayor Thorne slams his cane down once, twice, the sharp crack pulling silence back into place.
“Order. Let him speak.”
Thomas laughs, leaning forward, hands clasped together like a man about to deliver a sermon. “You all heard it. Threats. That’s what he does. He threatens, he buys, he bulldozes. I have the contract. Signed, sealed, legal. And I have the right, as his former representative, to act upon it until the courts decide otherwise. This lodge, this land—it belongs to the empire, not to one grieving woman clinging to memories.”
I take the paper from my coat. The original contract. The thing that has haunted every step since I first set foot here. I hold it high, every clause and signature there for the room to see.
“This is the rope you tied around my neck, Thomas,” I say, my voice hard enough that the lantern glass trembles. “And I let you do it because I thought power was worth more than people. Because I forgot what I was building for.”
Thomas sneers. “Save your speeches. That paper binds you, not me.”
“No,” I say, and I rip it straight down the middle, the sound sharp and final, echoing through the chamber like thunder rolling off the ridge. The halves dangle in my fists, uselessscraps, and then I tear them again, and again, until nothing is left but shredded pieces fluttering to the floor like snow.
Gasps ripple through the crowd. Clara’s hand flies to her mouth, and her eyes—those fierce, stubborn eyes—finally lock on me. They shine wet in the lamplight, but she doesn’t look away.
“You think ink makes you powerful,” I tell Thomas, stepping closer, the boards groaning under my weight. “You think hiding behind courts and clauses will let you bleed this town dry. But I don’t need ink to break you. I don’t need a contract to own what I build. And I will not build for you.”
“You can’t—” Thomas starts, but I cut him off.
“You have nothing left to stand on,” I growl. “You will not win in court, because I will drag every line of your lies into the open. You will not win in this town, because they know what you are. And you will not win with me, because I am finished letting you hold my name like a weapon.”
The room hums with energy, townsfolk leaning forward, breaths caught, as if waiting for the next blow to fall.
Thomas’s face reddens, his mask slipping. “You’ll regret this. You’ll lose everything.”
“I lost everything once already,” I say, voice like stone. “And I survived. You? You’ll leave this town with nothing but the echo of your own voice, because no one here will hear you again.”
For a long moment, he glares at me, jaw tight, papers crumpling in his grip. And then he slams them down, chair scraping back with a screech. “Fine,” he spits, his composure cracked. “You can rot with them. But don’t think this makes you noble, Dralgor. You’ll never be one of them.”
He storms out, the door slamming hard enough to rattle the walls. No one follows.
Silence reigns, heavy and waiting. And then Mayor Thorne clears his throat, leaning on his cane. “Well,” he says slowly, hisvoice steady as bedrock. “That settles the matter of who holds this town’s trust.”
Murmurs rise again, this time brighter, carrying hope instead of dread. Pippa cheers so loudly she nearly tips into the cider pot, wings scattering frost like confetti. Dee claps her clipboard shut and wipes at her eyes, muttering something about miracles.
Clara stands. She doesn’t move toward me, not yet, but tears streak her cheeks, and her lips tremble as if she’s holding back a thousand words at once.
I face her fully. “I won’t rebuild what he planned,” I say, loud enough for everyone to hear. “If this lodge is to stand, it will stand as it was meant to. rooted in the land, in the town, in the people who keep it alive. An eco-lodge, built with respect, built with her.”
Gasps, cheers, applause ripple through the chamber like a storm breaking, lanterns swaying as the sound swells. Clara covers her face with her hands, shoulders shaking, and when she looks at me again, there’s no mistaking the tears for anything but joy.
