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“How long ago?” My voice is deadly calm—the kind of calm that precedes a massacre.

The Spectral Guard inclines his head. “Within the hour.”

An hour.

An hour she has been with him.

I close my eyes, inhaling deeply, forcing down the scream clawing at my throat.

Morrin’s voice cuts through my rage like a dagger.

“What did you truly expect, Your Majesty. She’s the sea witch. Thequeenof siren whores. She fooled you,” he says.

I hear the disappointment in his tone.

The blame.

“You let her in,” he continues, his voice sharp, cutting. “You let her get close. Close enough to see our weakness. To learn of our defenses, and now she’s given him exactly what he wanted.”

I whip around, snarling, my magic surging outward. A vase across the room explodes against the stone wall, shards flying.

“Enough.”

Morrin doesn’t even flinch. “She’s played you for a fool, Nyxara, and now the whole realm will suffer for it.”

Fool.

The word lashes through me like a blade, a precise cut meant to wound.

The torches lining the chamber walls flicker wildly, their flames twisting unnaturally, feeding off the slow, smolderingfire coiling in my chest. The castle itself seems to tighten, as if holding its breath, as if the very stone and air knows what is about to come.

I inhale sharply through my nose, swallowing down the rage, forcing it into something cold, something sharp.

Morrin watches me carefully, his dark eyes unreadable, his wings twitching with unspoken wariness. He shifts slightly, but he does not move away. He knows better.

And yet, he asks, “What are you going to do?”

I meet his gaze, my expression carved from ice and fury. The answer is simple.

“The war is far from over. He will come.”

Morrin’s feathers ruffle, his talons scraping against the stone, but he does not speak.

The air tightens, thick with power, the weight of it pressing against my lungs, my skin. The torches burn hotter, their golden light flickering violently, casting jagged shadows along the walls.

I take a step forward, my voice dropping into something dark, something final.

“He may have the sea witch,” I murmur, low and lethal. A slow exhale, steady, controlled. “But I will end them both.”

A finality settles over the room.

The weight of my words crushes the silence, a declaration sealed in fire and war.

Then, without another glance, I turn.

I storm from the war chamber, my boots slamming against the black stone floors, my gown billowing behind me like smoke, like the remnants of something already set ablaze.

The Sentinels do not move.