Chapter Fifty-Two
The greatest wars are rarely won
By those who fear what must be done
Elyssara does not take the seat at the head of the table in Virellin Castle’s war chamber.
She stands instead, hands braced against the worn timber, the map of Dravara spread beneath her palms, every line and mark already committed to memory. The room hums with restrained energy, voices low, tension coiled tight between bodies that have learned the cost of what comes next.
This is not The Perils. There is no laughter here. No brask. No illusion of friendship. Only the final moments before the world bends or breaks.
“They’ll come from the shore,” Ronyn says, nodding toward the coastline etched into the map. “Fastest access. Cleanest strike.”
Teddy doesn’t look up.
“No,” he says calmly. “They won’t.”
His confidence is clear, indisputable. That stills the room more effectively than any raised voice could.
Elyssara lifts her gaze to him. “Why?”
“Because it’s obvious,” Teddy replies, straightening.
“They wouldn’t risk a naval attack with the possibility of being stuck on the water.
They wouldn’t risk it if there’s any chance we free the Melders.
” His finger drags across the map, bypassing the coast entirely, his mind working cleanly, efficiently.
Like the General of War. “And because they know we know it.”
He taps the Frael Forest—the place where this all began.
“Caeloria didn’t build an empire by being predictable.
They’ll avoid Tarrakai—they know we have him.
Avoid open ground. Avoid a possible air strike with all of them concentrated in a single area.
They’ll come through here—dense cover, multiple entry points, close enough to the slums that by the time we realize what they’re doing, they’re already inside the city. ”
A quiet settles over the table.
“It’s what I would do,” Teddy murmurs.
“Fuck. That puts them right inside the heart of Virellin,” Jax mutters. “No room for error.”
“Exactly,” Teddy agrees. “Which is precisely why they’ll do it.”
Elyssara nods once.
Seren leans in. “So we leave the coast unprotected and the castle completely exposed? The risk is enormous.”
She’s not wrong.
Elyssara’s stomach tightens.
But Teddy shakes his head definitively. “War is risk. The real risk is in dividing our already-outnumbered force and splitting our focus. They’ll cut through us in a heartbeat.”
Thalmyr steps forward for the first time, his expression stricken with grief and solemnity and defeat.
A muscle in his jaw feathers, his tension palpable.
“Maireth will not settle for conquest of the castle. She’ll want every Starborn soldier in a grave before dawn breaks, every Earthbound bending a knee to her reign.
No chance of an uprising. No threat left unchecked. ”
No threat left unchecked.
Elyssara’s mind whirls, running through every possible outcome—all of which lead to the same devastating end: defeat.
She shakes her head, trying to dislodge the thoughts from her mind.
“We leave the coast unprotected. We stick with Teddy’s plan,” she announces, her voice imbued with a strength she doesn’t feel.
“We can’t let them close to the castle—not with The Barrier fading. They won’t come from the coast with The Barrier still up, anyway. We need to meet them at the edge of the city. How long until The Barrier falls completely?” she asks, eyes flicking between Thalmyr and Vren.
The men exchange a glance. Not kind—necessary. The kind of shared gaze held between two men doing whatever it takes to keep a kingdom from being toppled.
Thalmyr sighs, and it sounds dangerously like surrender. “Hours. When the moon rises to its peak, The Barrier will be no more.”
The only defense. The only thing standing between conquest and the castle—The Barrier. The Lightborne Barrier she has resented her entire life. The symbol of oppression, starvation, loss, superiority. And now? She wishes it would hold for just one more day.
She nods. “Then we need to take them out before they get there. Every single one of them.”
Elyssara is no stranger to violence. No stranger to claiming lives that threaten her own or her loved ones—doesn’t think twice about it.
But destruction on this scale? This is new.
Faceless strangers invading her kingdom for no better reason than because they were told to.
Boys and girls sent to die because powerful people mistook conquest for purpose.
It feels senseless, unnecessary. But these are her people.
And she’ll end anyone who seeks to take the only place they’ve ever called home.
“We need to stop them before they cross The Black Stream bridge. It’ll cause a bottleneck—there’s one bridge—but if they cross it…” she trails off, shaking her head at the weight of it all. “It’s over. They can access The Underbelly, the castle, every person of Virellin.”
The words settle across the room like a premonition. Breaths become shaky. Hands drag down faces. Curses are muttered under breaths.
But Teddy leans in, like this is exactly where he thrives. Like his senses have been called to arms.
“We don’t meet them head-on,” he says, his tone sharpening. “That’s what they want. We won’t run into the fray this time.”
He risks a glance at Seren, her eyes already pinned on him. Something passes between them. An understanding. A sadness. A loss. But now is not the time.
A flicker passes around the room at Teddy’s words. His old philosophy turned inside out.
“We let them step into our territory,” he continues. “Starborn positioned here, here, and here—” he marks the narrowest passages between the forest edge and the slums, “—hidden, waiting. They push forward thinking they’ve breached the city, and we close behind them.”
“An ambush,” Seren says quietly.
“A controlled collapse,” Teddy corrects. “We let them believe they’re winning until they’re too far in to retreat.”
Elyssara feels clarity settle in her chest.
“This is where we break them,” she says.
“Or where they break us, depending on the strength of our strategy,” Teddy replies evenly. “So we plan for both. We need every one of our Starborn soldiers to be worth ten of theirs.”
Ten to one.
Ten lives for every one of theirs. That is the mathematics of extinction. That’s how outnumbered they are. The weight of that threatens to cave in Elyssara’s chest. But before she lets it, Saana, who has been silent until now, steps forward slightly, her gaze fixed on the map.
“They have Skyfire.”
The words land like a blade.
Skyfire.
Elyssara looks at her. “Explain.”
Saana steadies herself, though the tension shows in the set of her shoulders. She brushes back her tight, onyx curls, like she’s ready to deliver a truth that will change the fabric of the world they’ve come to know.
“It’s not a weapon in the way we understand them. It does not require proximity, nor a person to wield it. It is not a weapon of honor. It is a coward’s weapon, but Maireth will not hesitate to use it. She’s been testing it on the Outside for a long time. Too long.”
Gods.
Dread pools in her stomach like acid.
Jax bares her teeth like an animal being cornered.
“It’s… concentrated ignition. It doesn’t just burn—it consumes. Detonates. Explodes. Anything within its primary radius is gone. Completely. And the secondary…” Her voice tightens. “There won’t be much left to save there either.”
A silence follows. Heavier this time. The kind of silence that’s responding to something that sounds a lot like a death sentence.
Teddy drags a hand through his sandy-blond hair, composing himself. “And the radius?”
Saana sucks in a sharp breath. “At last check, Marin said up to one hundred feet,” she says, and the words sound like verdict.
Fuck.
One hundred feet of combustion.
Acid rises in Elyssara’s throat.
But Thalmyr steps forward again, taking charge of the room like a man experienced at shoving down emotion and performing as king.
“Maireth will not arrive quietly,” he announces.
His voice cuts through the room, calm and certain in a way that makes the words settle deeper than the fear Saana has just introduced.
“She has never been one for restraint. She will not be avoiding casualties.” His gaze lifts, finding Elyssara with quiet, unflinching clarity. “If she has brought Skyfire, she intends to annihilate.”
The room stills.
Panic being tamped down and forced into understanding.
Ronyn exhales slowly. “So we’re not dealing with strategy. We’re dealing with a godsdamned purge.”
“Which means we don’t give her a target,” Teddy says immediately, already recalculating. “No clustering. No obvious formations. We move in smaller units and force her to choose between wasting it or risking her own units.”
The strategy is sound. Logical. But risky. Risky for the small units with nothing but their weapons and gifts from the Stars above.
“We really need the fucking Melders freed,” Elyssara snaps, her palms balling into fists.
Seren’s jaw tightens slightly. “Fucking Lara,” she mutters under her breath. Then her eyes snap to Caev, Daphinia. “Why can’t we free the dragons? Surely we can do the spell.”
Caev clicks her tongue. “Bound by Lara’s blood,” she shrugs, as if she’s commenting on the weather.
“There are eleven witches at your disposal. We’ve come to your aid.
Allow us to use our skills. We’ve not done nearly enough killing lately.
” She scrapes dirt out from under her nails with a dagger, expression bored.
She sounds almost insulted at the lack of murder she’s been able to commit.
Ronyn huffs. “Tarrakai is getting impatient—he wants to level the Frael Forest.”
“Tarrakai is the one they’ll aim for first if you take to the skies too early,” Teddy says.
Ronyn’s grin is sharp, unbothered. “Good. Means I get to make it interesting.”
“You’ll set off the Skyfire. What if they have it positioned in the godsdamned city already?” Saana points out.
Fuck.
Choices lessen, and pressure bears down on Elyssara like a vice.