Niya didn’t move at first. She just stayed there on the stone floor, bent over herself, breathing these thin, shaky breaths that barely made it out of her throat. After a while she pushed herself up, slow and clumsy, using the wall because her legs weren’t listening. They trembled under her like she hadn’t stood in days.The walk to the washroom felt longer than it was. She dragged her feet more than she stepped.

  She splashed the cold water onto her face without hesitation—once, twice, again—hard enough that droplets hit the wall. She kept rubbing at her skin until it burned. It didn’t help. The feeling under her skin wouldn’t leave. It wasn’t dirt. It was something else, something that clung to the inside.

  She raised her head and looked at the cracked mirror.

  A tired woman stared back. Older than she should’ve been. Eyes that looked washed-out, like the color had drained years ago. Shoulders that seemed to be holding weight no one else could see.

  “Eight years,” she whispered, gripping the basin too tightly. “Eight damn years. Seven of them… like this. And I’m still here. For her. Only her.”

  She wiped her face with the sleeve of her cloak and pulled it over her shoulders. When she stepped out into the hallway, not a single person looked up. Servants pretended to be busy. Guards pretended she didn’t exist at all. That part always stung in a dull, familiar way.

  She reached the storage room with its stacked crates and the old shelf that hid the narrow little door. She squeezed behind it, pushed gently, and slipped inside.

  The room was barely big enough for the bed shoved in the corner. The girl on it stirred, rolling toward the thin light that came through the crack under the door.

  “Aunt Niya?” she mumbled, rubbing sleep from her eyes.

  Niya managed a small smile—fragile, but real enough. “I’m alright, sweet girl.”

  Lia pushed herself up, slow and careful. Eleven years old but she looked lighter, paler, like the life had been leaking out of her over time. Her hair had grown long and curled a little at the ends.

  “Why are we still here?” she asked quietly. “No one’s coming… are they?”

  Niya pulled her into a tight hug, one hand on the back of the girl’s head. “He’ll come. Someone will. I have to believe that. If I don’t…”She didn’t finish the sentence.

  Lia leaned against her chest, eyes falling shut again.

  The room felt less like a cage for a moment. Still cold, still dangerous, but not enough to crush them. They eventually drifted off like that, wrapped around each other, clinging to the one bit of warmth the world wasn’t trying to take.

  The throne room didn’t look like a place for mortals. It looked like something built to make people feel small. Tall black pillars, streaks of gold like veins, and the three obsidian thrones gleaming at the far end under the torchlight.

  King Valerious sat in the center, barely moving. His face was pale, narrow, unreadable. His violet eyes looked like they had forgotten softness existed. Even the crown—twisted black iron—seemed more like a shackle than a symbol of power.

  He didn’t have to speak for the room to listen.

  Lord Silas Blackwood lounged to his left, his crimson eyes half open, his robe settling around him like some lazy shadow. There was perfume on him—sharp, expensive—but something underneath it felt rotten.

  Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

  “So,” Silas said, smooth as always, “what shall we do next, Your Majesty?”

  On the king’s right, Lord Rex Malaichi leaned back, broad chest shining with gold pieces that didn’t match his heavy armor. His grin always looked wrong on his face, like it had been cut into him.

  “Come on,” Rex said, “we already own half the continent. And with the Hero? We’re unstoppable. What’s left but the rest of it?”

  Valerious finally opened his eyes. “I want the witch.”

  Silas raised a brow. “The one in the forest?”

  Valerious nodded once. “No one lives on my land without kneeling.”

  Rex snorted a laugh. “Then drag her here. Kael can deal with her.”

  Valerious tapped the throne arm once. “And the village from eight years ago… the one we took?”

  Silas let out a slow breath. “That place.”

  “Turn it into an ammunition factory,” Valerious said. “Or a district for nobles. Something useful.”His voice thinned. “Purge the filth.”

  “Kill the poor, then,” Rex said, like it was nothing.

  “Efficient,” Silas murmured.

  Valerious raised his hand. “Kael. Come.”

  The giant doors shifted open without a sound.

  Kael stepped out of the shadows—silver and dark blue armor catching the torchlight, pale hair hanging to his shoulders. His eyes were too bright, too sharp, as if they saw things no one else could.

  He bowed. “Your command?”

  “Begin the operation,” Valerious said. “Wipe out the poor in the capital. All of them.”

  Kael straightened. “As you wish.”

  He disappeared almost instantly, the air trembling where he’d been.

  Valerious allowed himself a thin smile. “Loyal hound.”

  Silas breathed out a quiet laugh. “A dangerous one.”

  Rex shrugged. “Hope he remembers who holds the leash.”

  But higher up, on the rooftop, Kael didn’t look like anyone’s dog.

  He stood alone, the wind tugging at his cloak, the city stretching out beneath him. “That king,” he said with a rough little laugh, “actually thinks he commands me.”

  Something cold glinted in his eyes.

  “I serve the Goddess alone. And this kingdom… it’ll break. Because of him.”

  His laugh echoed across the rooftops—strange, empty, wrong.

  The sun was barely up, but the plaza was packed. Word had traveled fast—faster than fear, somehow.

  Soldiers in black armor surrounded the square, their spears planted in the ground like a fence meant to keep hope out.

  Kael stepped onto the platform, helmetless, unreadable. The light caught in his silver hair as he rested one hand on his sword like he didn’t even realize he was doing it.

  “By decree of King Valerious,” he announced, voice carrying too easily, his gaze was tough “every household will pay four thousand gold coins. Today. Refusal results in exile or death.”

  The crowd erupted.

  “We don’t make that in a year!”“They’ll starve us!”“He’s lost his mind!”

  Kael just stared at them.

  “You have one week,” he went on. “Then executions begin. You may leave the capital, but your belongings stay.”

  A merchant stepped forward, puffed up like he wanted to impress someone. “A fair price for peace!” he declared.

  The rich nodded in support. The poor almost choked.

  “This isn’t peace!”“We’re dying already!”“You’re just a tyrant’s mutt!”

  Someone threw a tomato. It hit Kael square in the chest and burst. Then a stone skimmed his shoulder.

  An old man—face lined, hands shaking—shouted, “You’re no hero! You’re nothing but a puppet!”

  Kael turned his head toward him.

  Just turned. Nothing more.

  The man’s strength collapsed. He hit the ground, and the square went silent, all the noise folding in on itself.

  Kael didn’t comment. He simply walked off the platform and through the soldiers, who parted like he was something dangerous they didn’t want to brush against.

  The silence trailed after him.

  A woman whispered, “We can’t pay this… what are we supposed to do?”

  “If we leave, we lose everything,” someone else said.

  Another voice, tired and too honest, murmured, “Then we die here.”

  A girl in a gray hood watched from the back—Sara. She didn’t speak. Didn’t lift a bow. She just watched, jaw tight.

  “This isn’t the time,” she said under her breath. “Not yet. Not while they’re still blind. Not while fear speaks louder than truth.”

  She slipped into the shadows of a side alley and was gone.