I pause, letting the silence stretch, letting them feel the weight of what comes next pressing down on all of us.
“After that, we notify the other islands about what happened—make sure everyone knows we followed proper procedure, gave them every chance to explain themselves, extended courtesy they didn’t deserve.”
Another pause. The fire crackles. Someone shifts their weight, leather creaking.
“And then we can do what needs to be done with no interference.”
I look at my family gathered around this war table—ancient dragons whose names are spoken in whispers and curses across the known world, fierce mates who would die for me without hesitation, survivors, and warriors and killers united by blood and bond and the desperate need to protect what’s ours.
The weight my parents carried all those years settles onto my shoulders now. I feel it pressing down, crushing, relentless, threatening to drive me to my knees. The weight of command. The weight of consequences. The weight of knowing that my decisions will determine whether hatchlings live or die, whether our nests thrive or burn, whether the next generation inherits a kingdom or a graveyard.
But I don’t buckle. My spine stays straight. My wings stay furled but ready, leather warm against my back.
I was built for this. Bred for this. Broken and remade for this.
I am my mother’s daughter, and my mother taught me well.
“Let’s plan for the worst and hope for the best.” Corvus’s voice cuts through the heavy silence, warm and steady as always, a beam of light in the darkness we’re all drowning in. I turn to him, my mate, my anchor, my reminder that there are still things worth protecting, worth fighting for, worth burning the world to save.
I offer him a soft smile, and he returns it with one of his own—gentle, unwavering, full of a faith in me I’m not sure I deserve but desperately want to be worthy of.
He’s so positive all the time. Even now, even standing in a room thick with the promise of war and the stench of old hatred, even knowing what we’re planning, what we’re capable of, what we might have to become—he finds something to hope for.
I’m lucky to have him.
I’m lucky to have all of them.
And I will burn this world to cinders before I let anyone take them from me.
