Page 39 of She Who Holds My Wrath

“Oh, uh, sorry. Where’s Lyvia?” I murmur, clearing my throat.

“She’s in the Spires, Your Highness,” Melisana says gently, holding out a cup of water.

I snap my head toward her so fast my neck twinges and my visions swims. “What?” The word comes out on a gasp.

“She started assisting there after the attack three days ago, Your Highness. They needed more help after some of their counsellors were killed.”

“Please,” I croak. “Call me Daisy—” I pause, her words suddenly settling in. “Counsellors were killed? Why were counsellors killed?”

“The spires were attacked too,” she says quietly.

My mind reels. Three days. The attack was three days ago. The spires were attacked too. Two attacks. One day. Three days ago. The numbers spin uselessly in my head, refusing to settle into something that makes sense. That means I’ve been… out. Comatose. Three entire days lost. No. That can’t be right. It feels like I’ve only been asleep for hours.

My gaze drifts towards the tall windows across the room. Pale light spills through the glass, cutting across the floor in long, golden beams. Dust motes drift lazily through the light, fluttering and turning like tiny pieces of ash suspended in the air. The world outside looks calm. Too calm.

My chest tightens as images flash through my head of the nightmare I felt myself trapped in. Marta. Korithax. Talia. Theodus, so tiny, holding his wooden sword. My stomach twists so suddenly it makes me nauseous, grief rushing up my throat like bile. My eyes sting instantly, heat building behind them as memories claw their way forward. I blink rapidly, forcing the tears back before Melisana can notice. I refuse to break again so soon.

Instead, I reach for the cup in her hand, my fingers lightly brushing against hers as I take it. The glass feels cool and solid in my shaking grip. Without thinking, I tip it back and drain it in one long, desperate swallow, the water sliding down my throat feeling like relief itself. Gods. I hadn’t realised just how thirsty I was until now. The scratch there eases slightly, the simple act of just taking a drink grounding me in my body again.

For a moment, neither of us speaks. I stare down at my hands resting in my lap, wrapped around the cup. They’re trembling. The sight of it feels slightly detached, like I’m watching someone else’s hands rather than my own. What the hell happened? My thoughts circle uselessly, trying to stitch the pieces together. One moment I was on the tour. Then the attack. The screams. The fire. The bodies. I came back here and… nothing. Just darkness. That endless, hollow place where time didn’t exist. Where I wasn’t alive, but somehow… I wasn’t dead either. My fingers tighten slowly around the now empty cup as the memory of it creeps back over me like a haunted shadow.

“Do you…” I chew my lip. “Do you know what happened to me?”

Melisana smiles softly, her warm aura making me feel slightly more at ease. She takes my glass to refill it, then passes it back. “You were quite upset after the return from the attack. I was told you had burned through your magic reserves, and had fallen into a replenishing coma⁠—”

“A replenishing coma?” I cut in.

She nods once, gesturing for me to drink. I sip this time, watching her as she continues. “Yes. It happens when a person uses their magic too quickly, and all at once. The body can’t handle it. It needs to basically, uh… how do I put this in a way you’ll understand?” She chews her lower lip for a moment, her brow furrowing in concentration. “Your body had to do a reset, so to speak.” She makes air quotation marks with her fingers, and I have to try my best to hide my smirk. It’s cute how she’s trying to ‘human-fy’ it for me.

“Oh.” I lean back against the pillows, idly tapping my nails against the glass. “Can you get Aran for me, please?”

She nods again with that gentle smile, then slips out. Once the door clicks behind her, I let out a hard exhale, throwing my head back to stare at the ceiling’s intricate carvings. I can’t keep doing this. I can’t keep walking through loss and destruction like it’s normal. I knew facing a war would be hard, but this? This is a slow, grinding obliteration of every piece of me. Nothing prepares you for continuously losing people to the battle of war. Especially lives that are so innocent. Children never, ever deserve to be a part of any kind of conflict. Especially conflict that results in their death.

Lyvia’s name floats back to me. The Spires. She’s in the Spires now, probably rummaging through ash and rubble in the village trying to document everything. She’d told me she dreamed of doing more. Of working in Sovarith. Of not being “just a maid.” And here she is, thrust into the Spires after a massacre, probably elbow-deep in things she never should have to see. I asked her what she wanted. I promised I’d help. And instead of lifting her into some shining future, I’ve dropped her in the middle of a battlefield of grief and destruction disguised as a council.

No innocent person deserves to be a piece on someone else’s board. Not Lyvia, not Theodus, not anyone. And yet here we stand, surrounded by the shattered remains of people who never asked to be part of this war—proof of what happens when power is worshipped more than life. And for what? Greed? Control? The fragile ego of beings who mistake domination for strength? What kind of monster looks at a living, breathing world, and decides annihilation is the answer? I do not understand this hunger for power—this relentless need to bend others until they break. To slaughter innocence just to sit a little higher on a throne built from bones. Any sane person would call it madness. And perhaps I am no longer sane… because the longer this drags on, the more I feel something inside me hardening. But even now, even as something colder takes root, this still baffles me.

I regret everything. The thought hammers through my head so violently, it steals the air from my lungs. I regret calling for Korithax after Ethan. I regret ever reaching for the power that answered me. I regret the arrogance that made me believe I could shape the world, that I could build gods and destinies and somehow escape the consequences. I regret every choice. Every step. Every breath that led me here to this exact moment. Because look where it ended. Marta is dead. Theodus is gone. Talia. Korithax. Many other lives, lost.

My chest tightens until it feels like iron bands are being pulled tighter and tighter around my ribs. A scream tears out of me before I can stop it. The sound is so raw and broken, ripping straight from the centre of my chest like a wild beast. Power answers the pain instinctively. Fire bursts from my skin in a sudden flare of white heat, licking across my arms and shoulders as though my body cannot contain the storm raging inside me. The cup in my hand shatters, and the room floods with light. Heat ripples through the air as the door to my rooms bursts open.

“Daisy?” Aran stands in the doorway, his eyes wide with alarm. “Daisy. Breathe. You’ll fall into another coma.” His voice is careful and controlled. Like he’s approaching a wounded animal that might bolt or bite if he moves too quickly. He moves forwards slowly. One step. Then another. And I find myself watching him. Tracking every single movement. The shift in his shoulders. The placement of his feet. The subtle tightening of his jaw. Like a predator sizing up prey.

The realisation sends a sickening jolt through my stomach. What the hell is wrong with me? This isn’t me. This isn’t how I behave. This isn’t who I am. But the fire doesn’t care. It roars hotter along my skin, responding to the chaos tearing through my chest, to the rage and grief and guilt twisting together until I can barely tell them apart.

I squeeze my eyes shut. Breathe. Gods, just breathe, Daisy. I drag in a slow inhale, forcing the air deep into my lungs until it burns. My fingers curl against my palms, tiny stings from the shards of glass grounding me as I hold my breath, pausing for a moment before pushing the breath back through my nose. Again. In. Out. In. Out. Slowly, I feel the fire fading. The flames licking across my skin flicker, weaker and weaker, until the heat finally retreats beneath the surface of my flesh. The last sparks die out with a faint hiss in the quiet room. And suddenly, I feel empty. Like whatever had been raging inside me has burned itself out, leaving nothing but a husk behind.

“Good. Well done.” I feel Aran’s hand closing gently over mine.

I crack my eyes open to see him crouched beside the bed, holding my hands between his like he’s doing all he can to anchor me to the world again.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper, my voice already breaking. “I’m just… I can’t. Aran. I can’t do this anymore.”

The words crumble apart as a sob tears free. Hot tears spill down my face faster than I can stop them, blurring everything in front of me. Aran rises immediately and sits beside me on the bed, pulling me against his chest without an ounce of hesitation.

“Shhh. Hey, it’s okay. I know. I know it’s hard, Daisy.” His voice is soft and calming. “I’m so sorry you went through all of that the other day.”

I know I must sound pathetic. Like some whining brat who can’t handle the weight of the crown that has been placed upon her head. The women in the stories I used to read would never behave like this. The fae queens and warrior princesses in those books faced war and death with steady hands, and noble speeches. They didn’t collapse into sobs, or beg to run away. But I am not one of them. I’m not some fearless fae princess raised for battle and crowns and kingdoms. I was never meant for any of this. It doesn’t matter who I was before. None of that changes the truth clawing at my chest right now. I was not built for this shit.