Chapter Thirty-Five #2
Calira knows Revryn loved her. Loves her.
He tells her every week in the letters he sends.
The ones she has learned to discard. Reading them changes nothing.
Affection does not alter reality. Because Thalmyr taught her how to endure the system that consumed most others.
He took her softness and refined it until it calcified into something impenetrable.
Unbreakable. Unbeatable. That’s exactly how she became the Crown’s Blade.
“I have Thalmyr,” she counters simply.
It has always been enough.
She trusts him in the way soldiers trust the blade that keeps them alive.
Ronyn’s mouth falls open in shock.
“You have Thalmyr?” he echoes incredulously.
“The fucking dictator that killed my family for stealing apples for my baby brother? The same man who hoards resources and magic behind his precious Barrier? The one who snatches Starborn children from the arms of their mothers for his Guard? The one who watches Earthbounds die of hunger and thirst and disease every fucking day?” He spits the words, then adds, “Are we talking about the same man?”
Calira sets her jaw. They don’t know him.
She knows he is not perfect. But he is still the man who taught her how to excel inside the system he built to protect Dravara. Revryn left. Became weak from grief. Thalmyr adjusted. She respects that.
Weakness destroyed her mother. But the Guard did not break Calira. It hardened her until breaking was no longer possible. Thalmyr taught Calira that survival belongs to the people willing to continue functioning.
“Call it collateral,” she finally answers.
Ronyn’s expression shifts in a way Calira recognizes immediately. Not fear. The discomfort people feel when confronted with what survival actually costs.
A growl tears from Jax’s throat. “Loss of life is not collateral, Commander,” she spits the title, “it is atrocity. Murder. Genocide of a people.”
Calira does not react. “It stops a much larger tragedy.”
Jax and Ronyn exchange a look that says they don’t buy it. Calira doesn’t care. Doesn’t care what they believe, what they think, what they assume to know. She cares about results. Outcomes.
And perhaps, she can use them to further Dravara’s agenda.
Finally, she looks at Vren. “You tell them.”
The Melder steps forward, huffing an exhausted exhale. “Well that was entertaining,” he grouses sarcastically.
“The Melders are soulbound to the Dravari royals. Our role is to protect Virellin Castle and the royals who occupy it at any cost. It’s in our blood.
Our bones. It’s who we are. An instinct we can’t deny,” Vren explains, his words precise, certain.
“And when the realms started to fail, and the dragons no longer took to the skies, Thalmyr decided to take matters into his own hands—to protect the kingdom.”
Ronyn nods slowly, taking it in, trying to sift through truth and lies.
Jax shakes her head. “Thalmyr’s family are the ones who had the witches trap your kind in mortal skin. This is bullshit.”
Calira stays silent.
Vren holds up a hand to stop Jax, his thick, dark brows knitted in frustration already. “If you’ll let me explain…”
Reluctantly, she nods.
“The Lurians did trap the Melders. And Thalmyr wants to change that.”
Ronyn stares ahead, desperately trying to grasp the evolving truth.
“But the witches will not remove the spell. So, Thalmyr developed a contingency,” Vren explains, every word slow, carefully chosen.
Ronyn nods, realization landing, like puzzle pieces finally coming together to form a complete picture.
“The Barrier,” Ronyn breathes in recognition.
Vren nods. “Exactly. He created The Lightborne Barrier. But he couldn’t hold it—not for long. So he needed something that would hold it in place. Something strong that could freeze magic in place,” Vren says.
Jax does not take her eyes off Vren. Ronyn’s eyes dart around the space like he’s trawling through memories that might explain this.
Vren sucks in a steadying breath.
“Our blood,” he says, and the words drop like a guillotine.
Jax throws her hands in the air, pacing across the space, breath rising and falling in undisciplined rhythm. Too emotional.
“He takes their blood? He bleeds them dry to protect his own home?” she hisses the words like an accusation.
And Calira has had enough. Enough of the moral righteousness of people who do not understand the truth.
“They agreed to the sacrifice to protect the truth of Dravara!” she snaps.
Vren takes another step forward—a step in front of Calira.
“We willingly sacrifice a Melder every month to hold The Barrier. If we refuse, Virellin falls. If we comply, we slowly disappear. We’re doing it for the Rightful Queen,” he says, patriotism lacing every word.
Ronyn spins on Calira, teeth bared. “And what’s your role? Kill the dragons? You are the Crown’s Blade, after all,” he snarls the words.
Calira has been raised to tolerate far more than petty insults and hurt feelings. She steps forward, closing the gap between them. “I collect the blood tithe.”
A strangled sound breaks from Ronyn’s mouth. “A blood tithe? Oh look, it even has a pretty name!” he barks sarcastically. “It’s fucking murder, Calira. You are culling the dragons!”
Jax thrusts her palm into the smooth volcanic walls in an explosion of anger. “So he just kills whoever’s in the way of his plans and calls it politics?”
Yes.
These people speak about peace like it is the natural state of the world instead of something carved from violence and held together by sacrifice.
They want safety, but recoil from the brutality required to preserve it.
Want order, but condemn the people forced to enforce it.
Thalmyr understands what most rulers never do: kingdoms are not maintained through goodness.
They are maintained through endurance. Everyone wants the protection of systems. Few are willing to stomach what it takes to preserve them.
“He’ll choose the kingdom over the people every single time. Over the dragons, too.”
Ronyn drops his head back, closing his eyes like he’s about to beg the Stars for guidance.
Futile.
“Gods,” he murmurs. “So this is why you come to Vyrhal. Distract them with weapons orders, and slip away with a Melder to hold The Barrier in place instead?”
Finally. He’s getting it.
Calira nods. “We’ve got a lot of enemies on every continent, Ronyn. The Melders have the power to change everything. If anyone knows where the dragons are, they’d have the power to topple kingdoms.”
He huffs an exhausted breath.
“I’m suddenly realizing I know absolutely nothing about basically everything,” Ronyn groans, pinching the bridge of his nose.
Jax reaches for him, but thinks better of it, withdrawing her hand at the last moment.
“You know what they say, Ronyn,” Vren begins, “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
Ronyn narrows his eyes. “I’ve heard it. So what does that make us?” he ventures, expertly gleaning information.
“It makes us friends. Maireth is coming for Dravara, Zerynthia. She’s the enemy here. That makes us allies.” Vren quirks an eyebrow, like he’s trying to cut a deal at The Black Stream Markets. The Melders have always been expert negotiators, if not a little underhanded.
Calira doesn’t like it—allying with people she does not know. Though the man who sired her did, and somewhere, deep beneath her training, her conditioning, everything she’s learned to bury… that means something.
“So what now?” Jax snaps impatiently.
Vren leans in. He chances a glance back at Calira, and she gives an almost imperceptible nod.
“You find a way to get the witches to free us, and we no longer have to pay the blood tithe. You don’t, and The Barrier falls, dragons die out, and the kingdom burns to ash.”
Ronyn draws back, analyzing Vren like he’s a problem to solve.
“So just a few things on the line then,” Ronyn mutters under his breath.
Vren snorts a laugh. “Just a few.”
Ronyn sucks his teeth, a plan forming—Calira can see it in his eyes.
“Right. Well. That’s all deeply concerning.”
He rubs a hand over his face.
“I think we need a little sit-down with the witches,” he finally says.
Vren scoffs instantly, almost like the sound was involuntary. “I won’t go anywhere near those fucking cunts.” His voice is all gravel.
This is why Calira doesn’t cut deals with Melders—hot-tempered, short-sighted, emotional, grudge-holders.
“They trapped us like this, stole our purpose, forced us to live inside these,” he gestures to his own form with disgust. “Like we’d forget flight,” Vren spits. “Fire in our lungs. Sky beneath our wings. Freedom carved into our bones.”
Freedom.
Calira wonders if she’s capable of such a feeling. Or it’s been refined out of her. Distilled her into something purely procedural.
Ronyn flicks his hair out of his eyes with an easy swish. “Well, lucky for you, I know a new witch who is decidedly not a cunt, and actually, rather lovely. Let me just get in touch,” Ronyn quips, and reaches for the amulet hanging from his neck.
He swallows thickly, his newfound truth slipping between the fissures in his performance.
“Good,” Calira says. “Because war is coming, and without The Barrier or the dragons, Dravara will cease to exist.”