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‘I set everything into motion for this,’ the queen continued, her tone sharp as a blade.

‘Do you truly believe your father was the mastermind behind the oath marriage? That it was done in some noble attempt to unify the kingdoms?’ She let out a hollow laugh, bitter and humourless.

‘I couldn’t care less about the other kingdoms or unity!

It was done for one reason and one reason alone—so that girl could come here, and you could drive a dagger through her damned heart. ’

The silence that followed was suffocating.

Alina swore she saw Ash's hand twitch—as if, for the briefest of moments, he had considered striking the woman who had given him life.

His fury was a living, breathing thing, a tempest contained only by sheer force of will.

But though he did not raise a hand, his body shook with such unrestrained rage that Alina half-expected him to lash out and shatter the room around them.

His chest rose and fell in great, heaving breaths, each one rattling against his injured ribs.

And then, without a word, he turned.

To leave. To escape.

But Alina caught his arm, her fingers light against his burning skin.

The storm of fury in his golden eyes shifted then, narrowing towards her, sharpening. For a fleeting second, it seemed as though he might tear his arm away. But then, after a heartbeat’s hesitation, something softened—just barely, a breath of restraint over a raging inferno.

‘Perhaps we should listen,’ Alina whispered, voice cautious but firm. ‘Listening does not imply agreeing to any of it. But she was right about the witches, she warned me about them and I did not believe her.’

‘I am n-not k-killing Mal.’ Ash’s voice was like distant thunder, heavy with barely contained wrath. His words, slow and deliberate, were not spoken to Alina but thrown like a gauntlet at the queen. ‘If it m-means that I d-die, then I s-shall die in honour of my wi-wife.’

The queen exhaled sharply, pressing a hand to her temple as though trying to quell the chaos within her mind. Alina knew that gesture well. Her mother had suffered from headaches for as long as she could remember, sometimes so severe they left her confined to her chambers for days.

Was this one of those times? Or was it something else?

‘Mother,’ Alina said, cautious. ‘How do you even know the curse is real?’

For the first time since they had entered, Queen Cyra faltered.

She sank onto the edge of the bed, her spine curving inward, her gaze distant—lost in something only she could see.

And when she finally spoke, her voice was quiet.

‘The headaches,’ she said. ‘They have been with me since I was a child. But they are not merely headaches. They are something more. I have hidden the truth from the world for years, but I have listened to them—to what they whisper to me. And since the day Ash was born, they have shown me his fate. They have shown me what will happen if the curse is not broken.’

Alina’s blood ran cold.

Her breath came fast and shallow, the realisation sinking into her bones like an anchor pulling her into dark waters.

Her mother wasn’t talking about headaches at all.

Ash understood it too. She saw the moment the fury drained from him, the moment his body stilled, not in calm, but in sheer, startled comprehension.

Alina took a step closer to her brother, fingers aching to reach for his hand. To hold onto something—anything—that would tether her before she was lost to the weight of what she knew was coming next. But she did not touch him. Instead, she clasped her hands together, steeling herself.

‘Mother,’ she asked, voice barely above a whisper, ‘what are they?’

The queen lifted her gaze, her eyes unreadable, her lips parting.

‘They are visions.’

…

Beneath the castle, nestled in the depths of ancient stone, the underground hot springs shimmered like liquid amber, their mist curling lazily in the dim, torch-lit cavern.

The scent of minerals and warmth hung thick in the air, mingling with the distant echoes of dripping water.

Most of the guests had long since fled the pools, scandalised by the unabashed nakedness of the desert princesses, but Hessa and Sahira had been pleasantly surprised to find that one shadow had not been so easily deterred.

‘You can come out of the darkness now, prince of nightmares.’

Hessa’s sultry voice broke the silence as she drifted towards the edge of the pool, her arms resting languidly on the hot, slick stone.

Her fingers tapped against the surface, a slow, rhythmic sound, a lure for the predator she knew was watching.

A pair of dark leather boots materialised in her vision.

Tilting her head back, she allowed her gaze to travel upwards, her lips curling in a smile both knowing and wicked.

Kage Blackburn.

The wyverian prince stood over her, carved from shadow and silence, his expression unreadable, his presence as unmoving as the obsidian cliffs of his kingdom.

‘Are you here to join us?’ Hessa asked, shifting slightly to give him a better view of her bare skin glistening in the firelight.

Kage crouched, dipping his long finger into the steaming hot water. ‘Tsa. Kaama ayash yaa.’ No. I come looking for you .

‘Ni na?’ Why?

‘Because I have some questions for you.’

From the waterfall, Sahira smiled, a slow, patient thing.

Their smiles had always been their most formidable weapons—sharpened edges of a game they had mastered long ago.

They wielded beauty like a blade, disguising purpose beneath seduction.

No one ever saw past the veil of temptation, and by the time they did, it was far too late.

‘I will answer your questions if…’ Hessa trailed her fingers along the water’s surface, watching the ripples dance, ‘you get into the water with us.’

She waited, savouring the moment, delighted when Kage moved with deliberate slowness, tugging off his boots, then his shirt, then his trousers.

The muscles beneath his skin shifted like a work of art coming to life.

He was leaner than his brother Kai, less beast and more blade—but in that body was pure coiled power.

As he sank into the steaming waters, Hessa glided towards him, pressing close, her hands settling lightly on his shoulders.

‘You are so tense, prince.’Her voice was a silken caress against his ear, her fingers kneading his flesh with practiced ease.

‘What is it you wish to ask me?’ With her hands on him, she could shape the conversation as she pleased.

‘Why were you in a drakonian maid’s room?’

Hessa’s fingers hesitated. It was slight, but Kage noticed. Those unreadable eyes darkened, a hunter’s keen focus sharpening upon its prey.

And so she did what she did best.

Her arms wound around his neck, her bare skin brushing against his own, every touch an invitation, every breath a promise. Most men lost their minds at the mere suggestion of pleasure. The body had a way of unraveling the mind’s defenses, of making questions slip away like sand in the wind.

‘Curiosity,’ she said lightly, running her lips along the curve of his jaw. ‘We wanted to see what the quarters of a drakonian maid looked like.’

‘You can stop pretending.’ Kage’s voice was a blade pressed to the throat, cold and sharp. ‘I know how your sister and you operate. I know you could probably cut my throat in less than a few seconds if you wanted to.’

‘A second.’

‘I know you use seduction to get what you want.’

Hessa remained close, never breaking the game. Men always thought they were above it—until they weren’t.

‘It won’t work with me,’ Kage warned.

Ah. A challenge.

She pressed herself against him, letting her fingers trail lower, lower, her legs wrapping around his waist like a serpent coiling around its prey.

‘Are you sure?’ she whispered, her breath hot against his throat.

Her fingers teased down his chest, down his stomach—pausing just at the place where all men eventually surrendered.

She wrapped her hand around his length beneath the water, watching for the telltale response, the loss of control. ‘Would you prefer my sister?’

Kage’s lips twitched in the faintest smirk. ‘Neither.’

Hessa glanced downward, taking note of his reaction—or lack thereof. Her eyes gleamed with something dark and dangerous. ‘So you prefer something a bit more familiar to what you have?’

Kage leaned in, voice like a growl of distant thunder. ‘Precisely, princess.’

The spell shattered.

Hessa ripped herself away from him as though burnt, a snarl curling her lips. She treaded backward, fury dancing in the embers of her gaze.

‘What is it that you want, prince? We were observing the beauty of the castle and happened to fall upon a maid’s room,’ she bit out. ‘We wanted to have a look. Is that a crime?’

‘That depends.’ Kage leaned back against the edge of the pool, unfazed, utterly indifferent. ‘Did you take anything?’

Hessa’s pale eyes sparked with something unreadable before she masked it with a smirk. ‘Why are you truly here, amir?’

Kage’s thin lips curled faintly at the Sandhii word for prince. He did not answer immediately, and that alone set Hessa’s nerves alight. Something was off. Something was wrong. She glanced towards Sahira, reading the same quiet unease in her sister’s gaze.

They had come to the Kingdom of Fire with one purpose—to watch, to listen, to uncover the whispers of the curse. They had always been mercenaries, their loyalty as fleeting as shifting sands, but there were stories—stories buried deep in the desert, tales of debts unpaid, of spirits unavenged.

The desert folk had always been a people of quiet reverence, their lives woven with the whispers of sand and the secrets of the wind.

Once, long ago, they had stood beside the witches, their alliances bound not by ink and parchment, but by sacred oaths and ancient rites.

They had danced beneath the silver glow of twin moons, their prayers rising like smoke to gods who listened.

But faith alone did not fill an empty belly, nor did loyalty to the forsaken promise survival.

When the Great War cast its long shadow over the kingdoms, the desert folk were faced with a choice—not one of honour or kinship, but of necessity.

Gold flowed from the coffers of the Kingdom of Fire and the Kingdom of Light, and so they became blades for hire, warriors whose allegiance was measured in coin rather than conviction.

Yet war is an unfaithful mistress, and when the last sword had clashed, when the kingdoms had shuttered their borders and drawn their lines in the dust, the desert folk were left adrift. The wealth that had once sustained them turned to nothing, and the hands that had once paid them turned away.

Famine and ruin swept through the dunes like a vengeful storm.

The once-proud mercenaries became beggars beneath a sun that had once worshipped them.

And so the stories began—the whispers of old debts unpaid, of gods who had turned their faces away in wrath.

Many believed their suffering to be divine punishment, a curse shaped into the very sands they had once called sacred.

For they had forsaken their kin, chosen greed over faith, and now, the gods had forsaken them in turn.

‘I believe we have the same goals.’ Kage exhaled, dark and slow, watching her. ‘We are looking for the same thing.’

Hessa frowned, her nails tracing the surface of the water. ‘Looking for what, amir?’

His smirk deepened, dark amusement curling in his voice as he switched to her native tongue.

‘Dagaa, amiraa.’

The dagger, princess.

He tilted his head, letting the words sink in, his next sentence a blade pressed to her throat.

‘Hataa amir nar.’

To kill the Fire Prince with.