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I stood at my father’s left flank, with Aerynn on his right. To the gathering court of lords and ministers filing into the upper tiers, we looked like balance—a royal trinity of Daytime light and secure succession. We were not. My heart was a frantic bird against my ribs, but I forced my shoulders back, my chin lifting as the court populated the room.

My father stepped forward, his boots resting directly over the etched mountains of the northern borders. The room went entirely silent.

“The ambush in the throne room has been contained,” the King announced, his voice slicing through the chamber like a winter wind off the cliffs. “A failed coup by zealots who chose ash over answers. But their defiance changes nothing. The lineage of Enlathaes Kastali remains unbroken. My daughter, Princess Tauriel, has returned to claim her place.”

A ripple of quiet, uneasy movement passed through the rows of lords.

“To ensure the stability of the crown and to silence the whispers of the outer provinces,” my father continued, his voice devoid of warmth, “Tauriel will undertake the three royal trials of succession. She will prove her right to the Drakhar bloodline before the court.”

My jaw tightened.

“She will begin with the Lunareth Remnikai,” the King stated.

The silver liquid of the Mani Vatn. In the old texts, it was a trial of worthiness, with only two outcomes: power or death. A half-human body entering those sacred, volatile waters was an untested variable. The silver reacted to the purity of the magic within the veins; if rejected, the flesh burned from the inside out until nothing remained but a hollow shell. My father was throwing me into it without a second thought.

“Should she survive the waters,” my father’s voice echoed, “she will face the Drakoryn Trial.”

Beside the doorway, Caspian shifted his weight, his blue eyes locking onto me through the crowd. The Drakoryn Trial—bonding with the ancient dragons of the northern isles. Only seventy-three of the King’s Black Guard had successfully bonded and survived out of two-hundred applicants this decade. The rest were reduced to charred bones on the mountain slopes.

“And finally,” the King concluded, “the Gauntlet of Thorns Ball. A formal declaration of her readiness, where any lord of the high provinces may stand before her on the marble and demand physical, combative proof of her worthiness to hold the line.”

The ball would not be a celebration. It would be a battlefield dressed in fine silk and classical music. A room full of vipers waiting to see where the half-breed stumbled, legally allowed to challenge me to a duel if they believed my performance was lacking.

Before the court could murmur its approval, Lord Dellyn stepped forward from his stone seat, walking out onto the granite map until his boots rested near the western borders. His borders.

He moved with easy grace, his posture relaxed, his hands loosely tucked into his emerald velvet cloak.

“My province has concerns, Your Majesty,” Dellyn said, his voice smooth, carrying a smug undertone that made my teeth grind.

Aerynn leaned his broad shoulder slightly toward me, his golden hair catching the torchlight as he muttered under his breath, “Here we go.”

“Try not to start anything, Aeri,” I whispered, keeping my eyes fixed on Dellyn’s face.

“I never start anything, Taur.”

“You absolutely do.”

“Only when I am catastrophically bored,” he whispered back, his jaw tightening.

Dellyn continued as though no one else existed in the chamber. “I speak of the princess. Of her strength. Her worth. Her actual place among us.” He turned his gaze directly to me, the polite facade dropping to reveal the naked venom beneath. “She was raised entirely among mortals. A half-breed. A mongrel cannot hold the line against the dark, let alone survive the Mani Vatn. To allow her to attempt the trials is an insult to the purity of the throne.”

Mongrel. The exact word the dead prisoner had used before he turned to ash.

I took a deliberate step forward on the map, my green eyes flashing. “I will pass my trials, Lord Dellyn. And I will do it while looking down at you.”

The air turned thin, suffocatingly quiet. Dellyn smiled. “I look forward to seeing that performance, Princess. If you don’t dissolve in the silver first.”

Manem moved so quietly that most of the room didn’t register the movement until it was over. In a blur of midnight armor and feral speed, the High Commander crossed the map. The sharp, cold steel of his vanguard blade was pressed firmly against Dellyn’s neck before the lord could finish his breath.

“Speak ill of the princess again,” Manem said, his voice dropping into a low, terrifyingly even register, “and the next thing you will feel is the warmth of your own blood as it pours down your neck.”

Dellyn didn’t flinch. He kept his eyes locked on my father, completely ignoring the blade at his throat. “Control your pet, Konungr.”

Aerynn stepped forward, his boots hitting the granite map with a heavy thud. “Say that again,” my brother whispered, his baby-blue eyes flashing with a sudden light that silenced the hall. His hand was wrapped completely around the hilt of his sword, the blade clearing the scabbard by an inch.

My father stood slowly from his obsidian throne, his presence towering over the room. “Control your province, Dellyn,” he replied coldly. “The trials are set. The lineage will be tested by the realm, not by your tongue.”

Dellyn offered that same controlled, empty smile. “My province speaks for itself, Your Majesty.”