Page 232 of The Crown’s Temptation

The room went quiet.

Then the doors opened.

Sevrin looked at the room. He looked at Larafyn. He looked at the Baron. He looked at Yvara. His expression did not change.

He looked at the Morrak on the floor, motionless.

Then he looked at Orsin.

"You're in my seat," he said.

Orsin looked at him with the same patience he had given everything else.

Colsar closed his eyes and the window exploded inward.

The Wanderer came through it the way Wanderers came through things. All at once, its wings engulfed in flames that filled the space, its presence enormous and wrong for the size of the room. It hit the floor and one of the council members screamed and several pushed back from the table.

Orsin turned. He raised both hands.

The Wanderer hit the floor and lay still, its wings folding slowly, a sound coming out of it that Colsar had never heard from anything that size.

The room was very quiet.

Colsar felt it rise in him. The shift. The siakar pressing upward the way it did when something threatened what was his and his body decided before his mind did.

Orsin turned to him.

"I do not like dogs," he said quietly.

Colsar stopped.

The power pressing against him from across the room was not something he could push back against and he understood that immediately.

Conserve your energy, he reminded himself.

Firebirds were not the way. The Morraks were not the way. His siakar was not the way.

His eye burned copper and he held it there and did not shift and looked at the King of Yorali across the wreckage, unsure who was expected to make the next move.

“Fiorakis Rathmor,” Orsin murmured. Colsar clenched his fist. “And the boy is a dog like you, is he not?” Orsin smiled. “No need for tantrums, dog. I have no interest in your useless children.”

He sighed. “Asharin seemed displeased with the accommodations I gave her in the North Tower. She did not seem fond of yellow.” His eyes drifted. “Nor did she approve of the way I disciplined her sisters.”

Colsar struggled to remember. Yellow.

His stomach dropped.

Orsin laughed lightly. “She does not need to worry. A new tower has been built. And there is a room with a new color. A special color just for her.”

Fuck. Yellow. Now Colsar remembered. Asharin had told him. While poisoned, she had dreamed of a yellow room where Orsin discarded his daughters after he⁠—

Orsin interrupted his thoughts. “As for your dog-blooded children, do not worry. You may keep them.” He smiled. “We can have heirs of our own, perhaps.”

Before Colsar could answer, Uralish lunged.

The dampeners did not stop him entirely. Only slowed him. He came forward with everything he had left anyway, his voice tearing through the room.

"For Ryaran⁠—"