KAELITH
The palace felt colder than it should have. Even with the heat burning beneath the mountain, there was tension in the air. Servants whispered, guards avoided eye contact, and the court watched with too much interest. They all felt it. The shift. The danger.
Because of her.
A human girl was in my territory, and it had everyone on edge. I hadn't taken her to the royal wing. She wasn't ready for that and I wasn't ready to let them near her. I kept her in the old wing—where the walls held secrets and the halls were mostly forgotten. It was safer that way.
I stopped outside her room and rested my hand on the door. I could sense her inside. Her breathing. The warmth she carried. It pulled at something in me I didn't want to name.
But I didn't go in.
Instead, I turned and made my way down through a hidden stairwell that led beneath the palace. The torches burned strange colors here—blue and purple flames that never went out. The air smelled like smoke and stone.
At the end of the corridor stood a statue—faceless, old, cracked from time. Beneath it was the Oracle's stone. A relic, older than most of us. It pulsed faintly, waiting.
I placed my hand on it.
A rush of heat traveled up my arm. I didn't hear words exactly, but they formed anyway. Not a voice, but a feeling.
A flame forgotten. A name erased. A throne drowned in ash, unless the darkness is claimed.
I pulled my hand back. My pulse was racing.
No name. No details. Just a warning.
And yet, I knew. The council wasn't afraid for nothing. They knew what this meant. Or at least, they feared what it could mean.
If she was the flame, then maybe I was the darkness.
I leaned against the wall, my thoughts all over the place. I remembered the way she looked at me that night. How she trembled. How she gave in. She had no idea what she was walking into.
And maybe I didn't either.
Let them talk. Let them speculate.
She was mine now.