Chapter 22
Chapter
Twenty-Two
The palanquin slowed. Then stopped.
They had arrived. Outside the gates of Istrial.
After days of travel across the plains, they had crossed the mountain ridge before nightfall, and now the walls of Istrial loomed before them, torches flickering along the battlements.
"Halt!" a voice thundered from high above, echoing off the stone. "Halt, or you shall be fired upon!"
The words cracked through the night air, sharp as a whip.
Eliza shifted, leaning toward the narrow window.
Beyond the veil of wood and velvet, she saw him.
Rakhal. He stood at the fore, his gaze fixed on the tower above the gates.
Firelight from the braziers licked over his frame, gilding the sharp lines of his jaw, glancing off the dark piercings in his ears.
His eyes—gods—his eyes glowed faintly blue, like embers smoldering in the dark.
The shadows were gone to her sight; it was night now, and only the torchlight gave form to the world. But she felt them. She felt him. The oppressive weight of his presence began to seep into the air, rolling outward like a tide she could not see but could not mistake.
And the orcs felt it too. She knew it. For some of them, fierce warriors with tusks and armor, flinched at the sudden heaviness, their shoulders twitching, jaws tightening.
Power. Bare and unrestrained. And he was only beginning to let it spill forth.
Then, slowly, imperiously, he raised one massive, gloved hand.
"Wait," he said, his voice cutting clean through the stillness, deep and resonant, carrying with it a command no one dared disobey.
It was different to how she had seen him before. Not the quiet menace, not the sardonic taunts, not the unexpected gentleness. This was authority, sharpened to a blade's edge.
And she thought darkly to herself: he will be no mild-mannered consort, this one. He will be a terror. He already is.
He turned, and his expression was hard, unreadable, a mask of power. His eyes glowed faintly, unnervingly, as though something otherworldly had been lit behind them.
He uttered a command in orcish to the palanquin bearers. They bowed their heads in assent, shifting their weight, waiting.
Then he came to her. He reached the door, pulling the curtain aside with a measured hand, and bent, extending his arm toward her.
"Come, Eliza," he said. "It is time."
She met his gaze, unafraid, her defiance rising again like steel in her chest.
"And what do you expect me to do here?" she asked quietly.
His mask softened. The blue glow in his eyes dimmed, fading back into shadow. A wry quirk tugged at the corner of his lips.
"They're your people, aren't they? And you are queen. You know our agreement." His head tilted slightly, dark hair shifting with the motion. "You decide."
She took his hand. Stepped out of the palanquin. Her bare feet sank into the Maidan soil—precious soil, soil that had drunk rivers of blood. Hers. His. Their peoples'.
At once, the guards lowered the palanquin, bowing under its weight.
And before she could react, Rakhal's arm swept around her waist. In one effortless motion, he lifted her, setting her on the roof of the palanquin. The sudden height stole her breath.
"My queen!" a guard in the watchtower cried, his voice cracking with astonishment. "Our queen is alive!"
A roar went up along the walls. Her men, her knights, her people—they shouted her name, a storm of relief, fury, and confusion all at once.
"Harm a hair on her head and you are all dead men!" the same guard bellowed, and a volley of shouts echoed behind him, steel flashing in the torchlight as weapons were raised.
"Enough!" Eliza's voice cracked through the night, ringing off the stone walls. Cold air bit at her throat, but her words carried strong, resonant, and undeniable. "As you can all see, I am alive and well."
"Why are you with the orcs?" a soldier shouted back. "Give the word and we'll put bolts of iron through their skulls and incinerate them with mage fire!"
Her heart hammered. She raised a hand, steady, commanding, willing her body to look as imperious as her title demanded. Staring up at the soldiers—the first she had to win over—she steeled herself.
"You will not shoot any of these orcs," she declared, her gaze flicking briefly to Rakhal at her side. "For now."
A ripple of confusion stirred along the walls.
"As you can see," she pressed on, her voice clear, strong, "for the past day and night, there has been no fighting. No war. No bloodshed. The plains are peaceful. The city is quiet. Like you and I, these orcs want the fighting to end."
She lifted her chin, daring them. "You see me standing before you, atop the vessel of our enemy, because I have negotiated with the Varak—and we have reached an agreement."
Gasps and cries of disbelief rose from the ramparts. "What is the meaning of this?" men shouted, outrage spilling like fire.
"Silence!" she bellowed, her voice turning harsh, cold, a whip of command cracking through the night. "Do you question my judgment? Do you dissent against your queen?"
The uproar faltered. The walls grew still.
"Beside me stands Prince Rakhal Karthan of Clan Varak. Second son of King Draak Karthan." She let the titles hang, heavy with consequence. "He has shown me his intentions with sincerity and with honour. Together, we have forged an agreement. The war will end."
Disbelief rippled again, low and uneasy. She caught it with a glare sharp enough to cut. The murmurs died.
"No doubt you are looking for proof. For certainty." Her voice softened only slightly, a blade sheathed but no less deadly. "The first certainty is this: the attacks have ceased."
A pause, to let the truth sink in.
"The second is this: these orcs stand before you without raising a weapon. You know what they are capable of—yet now, they show restraint."
She let her gaze sweep over the walls, over the tense silhouettes of her soldiers, the faint glow of magefire shimmering in their hands. They had fought the orcs viciously on the battlefield. They had seen firsthand what orc strength and savagery could do—and they feared it still.
And Rakhal's group? They were no common warriors.
Two dozen of the most dangerous-looking orcs she had ever seen.
Each one armed, disciplined, silent as carved stone.
Each one could scale the walls and tear through the gates with nothing but brute strength and raw will.
They wouldn't make it far against the full might of Istrial—but they would leave ruin in their wake.
No. She wouldn't let that happen.
Neither would he.
No more.
"But they won't attack," she continued, her voice firm, cutting through the tense silence. "Like us, they want peace. And Prince Rakhal and I have found a solution—one that will end the war for good."
Her words hung in the cold night air, heavy, defiant, impossible to ignore.
The soldiers were quiet, hanging on her words. Their faces, lit by the firelight along the walls, shifted between disbelief and suspicion, their eyes narrowing as they tried to decide whether she spoke truth—or whether she was under duress.
Now she had a chance. A narrow crack in the wall of their doubt.
"Rakhal and I want peace," she declared, her voice carrying into the still night. "And to demonstrate to you just how serious he is…" She drew a breath, her heart hammering, "…he will come forth with me. Alone."
The silence that followed was like a blade's edge, drawn taut and gleaming.
Rakhal looked up sharply. For an instant she braced for his fury, for his denial—but his expression betrayed nothing. No surprise. No anger. He simply tipped his head in assent. A single, measured gesture. And perhaps—just perhaps—there was the faintest glimmer of respect in it.
The ease of his acceptance startled her—she had expected at least some resistance to placing himself at her people's mercy.
Because he knew as well as she did: she never would have convinced him to walk into Istrial's gates alone. Not by command, not by plea. But here, with her soldiers' arrows trained on him, magefire ready to rain down, she had leverage.
She could test him.
If he went forward—alone—then either he was sincere in his intentions…
Or he was so assured of his own power that it made no difference…
Or both.