Chapter 14 Kingdom’s Blade
Chapter fourteen
Kingdom’s Blade
-Kael-
The war room of Calyrix Castle was carved from obsidian.
It had no windows. No warmth. Only the pulse of candlelight and the cold, methodical tension of men and women who’d lived long enough to know that empires fell faster than they rose.
Kael stood at the head of the table, arms crossed, shadows stirring faintly at his back like wings held in check. Valea and her mate knelt first.
Astrielle’s parents, Lord Draeven and his bondsworn General Valea, both proud, both forged in blood and grief bent the knee with no theatrics. Just shame and silence.
“We offer our sincerest apologizes for Astrielle's conduct — it was both inappropirate and unbecoming, the rashness of one acting on wounded pride.” Draeven said, voice hard as gravel. “We failed to predict her delusion. It won’t happen again.”
“No,” Kael said coldly. “It won’t.”
Valea didn’t speak. Her hawk eyes flicked to her King’s unreadable expression, then away and Kael noted the faint tension in her throat.
She was furious. Not at him. At herself.
A shame she passed her pride down so easily, Kael thought.
He didn’t offer forgiveness. Instead, he lifted a hand, summoning a servant who swept open the side door.
Aldwyn, the blind lorekeeper, stepped into the room draped in heavy layers of ink-black wool.
His long, bone-carved staff tapped against the stone as he approached the table, eyes hidden beneath his familiar Veil of cloth.
“You summoned me, my King,” Aldwyn said, voice like wind in a catacomb.
Kael gestured sharply. “I did, based on Maris’ show of power. We need to have a firm grasp as to what she is.”
The old man inclined his head, moving slowly until his fingers found the carved edge of the obsidian table. “I’ve reviewed every scrap of lore we still possess —and some that were forbidden even before the gods turned their faces.”
He lifted a small parchment scroll from his robes and placed it on the table.
“Based on what you described — the surge of raw magic without rite or spell, the color, the sound it made, she is no simple witch.”
“No one said she was,” Valea muttered.
Aldwyn ignored her.
“Nightbound blood, yes. Faint. Buried, likely from generations past. It would explain her eyes, starbursts around the pupils. A trait once common in the northwestern lines of the borderlands before they were culled.”
He tapped the scroll.
“But something more is at play. The Seer’s prophecy… it cannot be ignored.”
Kael’s jaw flexed. “You’ve read it?”
Aldwyn’s voice dropped.
“I have theories… Nothing certain.”
“Speak them anyway,” Kael snapped.
Aldwyn sighed. “The ‘dreamer’ may be Eiren herself, the lost goddess. Or the girl, if her power is… inherited. The line about chains and sky suggests a bond beyond this realm. Magic that existed before the gods’ curses.”
Kael didn’t blink.
The table fell into stunned silence. A breath later, heavy bootsteps echoed from the hall. The war room door burst open. Captain Nyreth, head of the city guard, bowed low.
“My King,” he said, breathless. “We intercepted word from the south road. A rider broke through the city wall at dawn, headed southwest.”
“Toward Calanthe?” Kael asked.
“Aye, sire. Sent by that of a disguised female. Alone. They were spotted in an empty area by the wall. Likely three to four hours ahead of our scouts.”
A pulse of pure, lethal calm spread through Kael’s chest.
He didn’t need to guess who it had been.
Valea swore a curse under her breathe and bowed her head.
“Do not let him arrive,” he said softly, the edges of his voice gleaming like a knife.
Captain Nyreth bowed again and vanished.
Kael stared down at the Seer’s riddle, the parchment seeming to glow faintly in the firelight.
What are you becoming? He silently questioned.
He didn’t know.