Chapter 32
Chapter
Thirty-Two
Eliza returned to her chambers with her mind heavy, turning again and again to Rakhal. To the way he had fought, the way he had stood against his own, the way he had defended her people. Watching from the walls, she had believed in him utterly.
And at the same time… he had been terrifying. A single orc, taking on a horde—his people.
He’d fought with such ferocity against a band led by his very own brother.
How had it come to this?
What had made him turn so viciously, so ruthlessly?
The soldiers escorted her through the torchlit corridors.
She would have bid them leave her—she was queen, she needed no guardians to walk her own halls—but it would be strange, even foolish, for her to wander the castle alone at night.
Especially now, dressed as she was in velvet that was not of Maidan cut, her hair braided in the style of an orc bride.
The servants would gossip.
No… they will gossip, she corrected herself grimly. Word would spread faster than fire through straw. Through the town, through the garrisons, through the mages in their tower and the lords in their seats of power.
That she had been returned by a band of orcs.
That an orc prince now lay bound in the dungeons beneath their feet.
Already she could feel it: her power fraying at the edges. She could almost hear her cousins whispering behind the council doors, waiting for their chance to strike at her crown.
She drew a steadying breath. She must keep it together. She could not falter. Not now.
She dismissed the guards with a single sharp command, her tone brooking no argument. They hesitated, but she fixed them with the kind of look that had sent grown men stammering since her coronation. Reluctantly, they bowed and withdrew.
Inside, her chambers were silent. The maidservants had long since retired, their lamps extinguished, the air faint with lavender from the earlier linens.
Her gaze fell to the window. It was still slightly ajar, swaying gently in the night wind. The same window through which Rakhal had come for her—through which he had stolen her away.
Now, he lay below. Her captive.
She should have felt relief. Triumph. Instead, her chest tightened with something else. Something unsettled.
Something has changed, she thought, fingers curling in her skirts. Shifted. Why did she feel uneasy?
It was good, wasn’t it? A relief that someone—something—as dangerous as him was in chains, tethered, no longer a threat.
And yet… war was coming. She could feel it pressing closer, like the air before a storm. It would be bloody. And there would be no peace.
With a sigh, she dropped onto the edge of her bed, the velvet pooling around her legs. Her body sagged under the weight of exhaustion, but her mind would not still.
She would wait. She had to. Until the castle quieted, until the commotion died down, until the soldiers had returned to their posts and the mages drifted back to their tower.
Then—then she would go to him.
Just as her eyes drifted closed, as stillness at last began to wrap around her—for the first time since she had left that sun-drenched courtyard in Rakhal’s chambers—there came a sharp rap on the door.
Her eyes snapped open. She sat upright, every muscle tensed, alarm prickling at her spine.
Who would dare?
Who would approach her private chambers in the middle of the night?
And how had they passed the guards?
Eliza rose swiftly, indignation burning away her fatigue. She crossed the chamber in long strides, every step gathering fury. When she tore open the door, she was already shaping the words on her tongue, sharp and cutting—demanding to know who dared disturb her in the deep of night.
But the words died there.
On the threshold stood the High Mage of the Tower.
Lady Veyra Thalorin—ancient, regal, her back straight as a blade despite the weight of her years.
Her silver hair was coiled into a severe knot, her long robes trailing dark blue with embroidered wards that shimmered faintly in the torchlight.
Her eyes, pale as frosted glass, fixed on Eliza with the quiet authority of one who had counseled three generations of queens and kings.
“Your Majesty,” Veyra said, her voice low, sonorous, carrying the kind of gravity that bent lesser wills without effort.
“Lady Thalorin,” Eliza said coldly, cautiously. She kept her chin high, though every instinct told her to beware. The woman radiated power in a way few others did—like a storm held in flesh.
Thalorin had been High Mage for as long as Eliza could remember.
Nobody crossed her. Not even her father had dared.
And it was Thalorin’s voice, her blessing, that had ultimately approved Eliza’s ascension to the throne.
The crown could not exist without the mages, and the mages could not stand without the crown.
The people of Maidan would never trust the Tower alone; the common folk feared what they didn’t understand.
“This is… unexpected,” Eliza said, her voice level. “What brings you to my chambers at this time of night?”
She did not step aside. Did not invite her in. Not yet.
Thalorin’s pale eyes glimmered faintly in the torchlight.
“I am here,” she said, her voice quiet yet heavy, “because of an unheard-of situation. The queen of Maidan disappears without explanation, and then returns at nightfall—escorted by orcs. And now a powerful shadow mage lies bound in the dungeons beneath us.” Her words rolled like distant thunder.
Eliza kept her posture rigid, careful not to betray the unease curling in her stomach. “There was a situation,” she answered coolly. “And as you can very well see, it has been handled.”
Thalorin’s brow arched, her expression unreadable. “Handled? I do not know whether it has been handled or not. Too much remains unanswered.” She stepped forward, the air around her seeming to tighten. For the first time, the old woman’s presence felt openly threatening.
Her voice dropped lower, soft but edged like a knife. “Aren’t you going to invite me in?”
The air rippled with power. Subtle at first, like heat rising from stone, then sharper, pressing against Eliza’s skin. An intimidation, a threat cloaked in formality. The wards embroidered in Thalorin’s robes shimmered faintly, alive with restrained energy.
Eliza’s pulse quickened, but she held her ground, her face schooled into icy composure. She would not flinch. Not here. Not before her.
“It is late,” Eliza snapped, her voice ringing sharp as steel. “Whatever it is you want to discuss, it can wait until tomorrow morning. We will discuss this formally.”
“No.”
Lady Thalorin took a step forward.
Eliza stiffened. “What is the meaning of this—”
But the words caught in her throat. Power surged, invisible and suffocating. The air slammed against her like a wall, driving her back. She stumbled across the threshold of her chambers and fell hard to her knees on the stone floor. Her jaw clenched as she struggled, her body refusing her command.
Thalorin stood over her, eyes glowing gold, light searing and terrible.
So like Rakhal’s eyes had glowed—yet not the same. His had been wild shadow-fire, threaded with danger. Hers were cold, controlled, absolute.
“The situation has gotten out of hand,” Thalorin said softly, almost kindly, though her magic pressed like chains around Eliza’s chest. “You are no longer fit to rule.”
Eliza’s throat burned as she fought the compulsion. Her voice scraped out between clenched teeth, ragged but defiant. “The High Council… will never approve.”
Thalorin’s golden gaze did not waver. “The High Council has already met with the Tower,” she said, her voice calm, merciless. “With myself.”
Eliza’s blood ran cold.
“Plans have been discussed.”
Thalorin’s lips curved faintly, though it was no smile. “Your cousin, Lord Maeron, will be installed as king. A man the lords trust, a man the soldiers will follow. And one who knows better than to make dangerous bargains with orc princes.”
The invisible weight pressed harder, pinning Eliza’s shoulders.
She said nothing. The words burned behind her teeth, but the compulsion held her silence like iron. Instead, a promise folded itself into the hollow of her chest—cold, precise, inevitable.
I will destroy Thalorin for this.
Only one way presented itself, simple and brutal in its clarity.
Thalorin’s grip—legal, magical, political—rested on two pillars: the Tower’s sway over the council, and the hostage lesson she’d made of the shadow prince.
Break the first and the second crumbles; free the second and the first’s leverage fractures.
Rakhal lay in the dungeon. Bound, wounded, warded—and for all his danger, he was the key.
Eliza let the thought settle, tasting the impossibility and the promise in it.
The castle hummed around them, every corridor a thread of power Thalorin had already begun to braid.
Outside, the drums of war beat closer each hour.
Inside, a chessboard had been set and pieces moved without her consent.
She forced herself to breathe. The compulsion pressed on her like a tide, but the vow in her bones did not yield. When the Tower loosened its hold, when the guards tired and the mages turned their backs, she would act.
For now, she was constrained—silenced, watched, indisposed—but she would have time enough to plan. Rakhal in the dark below was both danger and instrument. To reach him would be to reach Thalorin’s heart.
She closed her eyes, not in surrender, but to keep the shape of the plan safe.
“You will be kept here under guard,” Thalorin informed her, voice smooth as polished steel.
“You will be afforded the comforts you need—your father was my friend, after all—but you will not leave the tower. Not until the war is over. You may have one maidservant to attend to you. She will come once in the morning and once in the evening. Food will be delivered from the kitchens. Business will carry on as usual.”
Eliza’s mind raced. Of all the maidservants, only one came to her at once—one who might be convinced to help her, discreet and loyal where others would whisper.
“Give me Brenna,” she said.
Thalorin’s head inclined, the motion deliberate, her dark braids sliding over one shoulder. Something close to pity flickered in her eyes, brief as candlelight.
“You can have Brenna,” she said at last, the words edged with dismissal, as though Eliza’s choice of servant was beneath notice. “A trivial matter.”
The air shifted.
The invisible weight pressing down on Eliza—sharp as a claw at her throat, cold as iron in her veins—vanished all at once.
She gasped, breath spilling free in a rush she hadn’t meant to give. Muscles trembled in the aftermath of restraint, her body remembering the suffocating grip of Thalorin’s power. She forced her spine straight, her chin high, masking the sting of humiliation with regal calm.
She would not show weakness. Not before this woman.
And yet, the relief flooded through her all the same, treacherous and undeniable.
Her gaze flicked to the high windows, where sunlight filtered pale against the stone, and for one reckless heartbeat she wished Rakhal stood there instead.
His shadows had been no less terrifying, no less invasive—but they had been his.
His power had coiled around her like a shield as much as a weapon, dark and possessive, never mocking, never belittling.
Against Thalorin’s cold sorcery, she longed—gods help her—for that ruthless shroud of shadow, for his formidable presence to counter this woman’s disdain.
The thought burned shamefully in her chest.
She crushed it.
She pushed the thought of Rakhal away as if it were a dangerous thing—because it was. I can’t yearn for him now. First I have to reach him. The prayer was private and sharp.
Thalorin’s mouth twitched with a thin amusement. She straightened, cloak whispering against the stone, and made as if to leave. Before her foot touched the corridor, she looked back with a smile that held no warmth.
“I thank you for delivering the orc,” she said, voice low and tightly polite, a mockery dressed as courtesy.
“He will be studied, and then discarded. We have no need for him as a hostage.” Her eyes narrowed, calculating.
“The Varak made their choice. They tried to infiltrate Maidan with deception—now they will pay for their miscalculation.”
Eliza felt each syllable like the crack of a whip.
Her fists curled beneath the tablecloth so hard her nails bit her palms. Heat flared in her face—not from fear, she told herself, but from a rising cold she could not name.
If they break him, she thought, if they break him while I watch…
The image was a living thing that shoved air from her lungs.
Thalorin dipped her head once, then added, with a cruel precision, “The one useful thing you did, while you were queen, was to convince the king of the Ketheri to ride to our aid. They will arrive soon. The Varak will be annihilated.” Her gaze sharpened, and for the first time, there was no pretense of civility—only the certainty of a sentence already written. “Now, you will simply watch.”
The door loomed at her back like a promise. Thalorin turned, cloak swishing, and the corridor swallowed her like dark water. The bolts of the chamber door thudded as she left; her footsteps faded. Silence flooded the room afterward, thick and ridiculous.
Eliza let herself breathe then—just enough to keep her from fainting.
Relief and dread braided through her, indistinguishable.
They’ll study him. The words echoed. They’ll cut him open for knowledge they don’t comprehend.
They’ll feed the shadows to scholars who wear crowns and call it science.
Rage, sudden and cold, licked at the edges of that thought.
She pushed herself up from the bench. The stone felt steadier under her feet than any promise Thalorin offered.
Brenna—Brenna would be her line, her sliver of agency inside these walls.
Find him. Keep him alive. Tell him I’m coming.
The list fitted itself into a single hard point at the centre of her will.
Outside, beyond the tower and the city and the wards, the plains would soon run black with riders.
In the middle of that storm lay Rakhal—wounded, stubborn, human in ways he would never admit.
She swallowed the ache and squared her shoulders.
If Thalorin wanted a spectacle, she would give one: not of a queen helpless and watching, but of one who moved the board while others cried checkmate.
Eliza crossed to the narrow window, pressed her forehead to the cool glass, and watched the eastern sky bristle with a thin, frightened light. I will reach him, she told the dawn. I will reach him, or I will burn what stands between us.