I don’t smile. I hold her eyes. Then the air shifts.
The heat comes from her direction. Targeted. The stone under my feet warms in seconds, then warms further, then hot enough to reach through my boots. The shimmer aroundher body concentrates and pushes outward, and the heat rolls toward me like a punch she didn’t bother making with her fist.
Every Fae in the hall is watching.
Beside me, Maximus is still, but I feel the tension move through him. The bond between us pulls taut. His hand is six inches from mine. He doesn’t close the distance.
The moment he reaches for me, Syrenne wins.
I hold my ground. I plant my feet and I let the heat come.
My boots are on scorching stone and the air in front of my face is warping and every instinct I have is telling me to step back, and I don’t. I’ve been hit harder than this. I’ve been hit by things that left marks.
A woman who fights with temperature is still a woman who fights, and the first rule of any ring is that the one who flinches loses.
The stone under my feet cracks.
A single line. Thin. Sharp. The gold at the crack’s edges flares, and then the Lithenmere does something I didn’t ask it to do.
The heat pouring off Syrenne hits the cracked stone and stops. The gold veins around my feet rearrange, pulling into a dense pattern, and the temperature drops back to bearable in one breath.
The mountain chose a side.
Syrenne’s shimmer pulls back. The push dies. The stone under her own feet cools to neutral.
She stands there. The smile is gone. Her face doesn’t move. The smile reassembles.
Lanthar’s attention moves from Syrenne to me to the cracked stone and back.
The cracked stone holds his gaze longest.
His right hand settles flat against the stone beneath him. The gold thread behind him steadies into the rhythm beneath everything else.
“The settlement will be discussed in private,” he says. “Court of Stone protocols.”
A ripple moves through the hall.
Veyran’s head turns. Toward Lanthar. Past me. His shoulders draw in. He doesn’t speak.
But his eyes find mine.
He holds the contact. Long enough to register. Then his gaze cuts back to his king.
Syrenne hasn't moved. She holds the position. Then turns slowly and walks back toward her delegation. The shimmer follows her. Her path takes her past the Tides delegation, and as she passes Maeven, her chin dips.
Just enough.
Maeven's expression doesn't change. But the mist around his court's feet shifts. Pools toward Syrenne's path, then pulls back.
I clock it.
Two courts whose votes haven't been spoken. A chin dip. Mist pooling toward her path, then pulling back.I don't need to hear the conversation to know one just happened.
Across the platform, Ithara's lips move. One word. Maybe two. The Fae nearest her go still. One of them takes a step back.
Lanthar's right hand lifts from the throne. The stone behind us parts.
"This way." Veyran's voice carries low.
