The morning light had no warmth.
It poured through the high palace windows in thin, glass-filtered streaks, painting my chambers in golds and greys. I sat unmoving before the mirror, my hair unbraided, cascading around me like a raven veil. My eyes, twin coals in the pale hush of dawn, held no sleep. No fear. Only calculation.
keal.
The name curled like smoke in my chest.
He had stood beside me through blood and blade. His laughter had echoed in the training courts. He had tightened my gauntlets before battle and once stayed awake while I wept in silence.
And he had betrayed me.
Three nights ago, Nira brought me the cipher. She'd dug it from beneath forgotten scrolls and forgotten trust, parchment brittle and lined with a hymn twisted into code.
I deciphered it by moonlight.
A list of names. Strategists. Courtiers. Ghosts.
And Keal.
Not a tool. Not a pawn. A recruiter.
I felt nothing at first. Not rage. Not sadness. Only the echo of something breaking slowly inside me, piece by piece. It was the same sound I'd heard in myself when I stood over the bodies of my slain spies.
"I trusted you," I whispered to the mirror.
Behind me, the White Shadows stood like statues. Nira closest, her wounded shoulder stiff, her eyes locked on mine.
"They know where I sleep," I said. "Which means we change the game."
I rose, the long hem of my cloak trailing behind me like night itself. The girl who once begged for approval was ash now. I stepped into her place, a creature forged in betrayal and bound by will.
"We don't run," I said. "We make them bleed."
The first message was deliberate.
A messenger's body hung from the western battlement at sunrise, blood drained clean. Carved into his chest with a red-hot blade: a white flame.
The palace trembled.
They spoke of curses. Spirits. Shadows awakened.
Good.
Fear was a sharper knife than steel.
I walked the halls with ice in my lungs, still wearing the mask of the dutiful daughter. I listened. I smiled. I mourned with the king's wife in the garden. I praised the palace cooks for their spiced tarts.
But behind every kindness, I counted blades.
The White Shadows moved like whispers. Two guards disappeared by the second night—one drowned, one vanished.
On the third morning, Keal came.
He knocked once and let himself in, eyes hollow.
"Del," he said, low, intimate. "Something's happening. The guards… the whispers—"
I tilted my head, watching him closely. "You seem worried."
He hesitated. "You're not safe here."
"No," I said softly. "I'm not."
He reached out, but his hand hovered in the air, unsure. "If you need anything—"
"I'll come to you."
He nodded and stepped back, lingering too long at the door before leaving.
I watched his shadow fade.
Let him wonder.
Let him squirm.
That night, the Ember Ring gathered.
Nira followed a courier to the crypt entrance. We shadowed them in silence.
The crypt stank of dust and time. I crouched behind a stone pillar as seven figures stepped into candlelight. No hoods this time. No caution.
Fools.
The steward spoke first.
"She grows bolder," he said. "Three dead in two nights. The White Flame is hers."
"She knows?" asked a merchant prince.
"She suspects. And that makes her dangerous."
"She's already dangerous," the priest with the colorless eyes muttered. "A child sharpened by war. We should've finished her in Sevila."
"And now?"
The steward's voice was calm. "We kill her. Quietly. Keal will bring her to the outer gardens by the week's end. She trusts him."
"She shouldn't," the general said.
They laughed.
I did not.
When I returned to my chambers, I found no solace. Only fire.
I stared into the mirror again, searching for the girl who once feared shadows. She wasn't there.
In her place stood something else.
Something colder.
"I hope you're afraid, Keal," I whispered. "You should be."
I gathered the scrolls, the cipher, the names. I burned no bridges. I planned a war.
The next morning, I entered the war chamber uninvited.
Gasps followed me like perfume. I dropped the scroll on the table before the king.
His eyes skimmed it. Then again. His knuckles went white.
"You should read the names aloud," I told him.
The steward stood too quickly.
"Commander, these—these are lies—"
"You think me a fool?" I said, voice sharp as a blade. "You think I wouldn't find your secrets buried in the dust beneath this cursed palace?"
Whispers erupted. The king didn't speak. Not yet.
"You drink with traitors," I told him. "They wear your seal. Sleep in your court."
The steward lunged for the scroll. Nira struck him down before he touched it.
Blood spread across the marble.
I turned to the king. "You once told me Delyra was yours. If that's true, then act like it. Or I will."
And I walked out.
I stood at the balcony that night, wind in my hair, watching the city flicker below.
Behind me, Nira said nothing.
"I won't survive this, will I?" I asked.
"No," she said.
I turned to face her.
"But you'll win," she added.
And that was enough.
Back before the mirror, I pressed my palm to the glass.
"I was never meant to survive this story," I whispered.
"But I will write the ending."
Even if it kills me.