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T eryn’s first day as king consort had thoroughly gone to shit. Thankfully, Cora’s gamble with the collar had paid off. The dragons had disappeared hours ago, but only after leaving a dozen shattered windows, a crumbling keep roof, a charred battlement, and a few casualties in their wake. Teryn hadn’t seen what had sparked the fight between the archers and the black dragon, but Captain Alden’s report stated the dragon had grown hostile as soon as it had spotted the armed soldiers. Their arrows had done nothing to the creature, and they’d had no defense against its flames, hence the casualties.

Now those lives hung heavy on Teryn’s shoulders, if only because they weighed on Cora’s. She’d given the order for the archers to take their posts. He wouldn’t let her bear that alone.

He eyed her across the council table; she was seated at the head while he occupied the foot. She didn’t bother maintaining a regal posture as she sank deep in her chair. It was evening now, and their formal council meeting had ended. They’d come up with very few solutions regarding the dragons, only addressed reports of burned farmland, missing livestock, and the overall terror of the people who’d spotted the dragons in person. The wedding guests had been desperate to leave Ridine at once, and Cora and Teryn had decided to let them. There wasn’t much they could do to protect them, whether they were at Ridine, on the road, or in their homes, so if it made them feel safer to flee the castle, so be it. Only those who’d come from north of Khero were cautioned to stay until a scouting party could be sent ahead. Which, thankfully, was just one retinue.

Lex and Lily entered the room with hesitant expressions. A hazy figure swept in along with them, one only Teryn could see. The ghost was female, and from the look of her simple yet dated attire, she must have been a servant who’d died at Ridine decades ago. She swept down the length of the table, hardly noticing its occupants. But as soon as she approached Teryn’s end, her eyes locked on him.

She launched a floating step away, muttering to herself. “No, not you. No, no, no, no. Not that one.” Then she left almost as quickly as she’d come, disappearing into the nearest wall. That was the fourth spirit Teryn had spotted since entering the council room, but the first that had come so close. Not to mention her strange reaction. It reminded him of Emylia’s startled responses when she’d first learned he could see her as a ghost.

Thoughts of Emylia made him wonder if she’d made it to Zaras. If so, had she managed to gather any intel on Syrus? He wasn’t sure how fast a spirit could traverse great distances, but now that Emylia was no longer tethered to the crystal, he supposed many things were possible.

Cora brightened somewhat when she saw Lex and Lily, though the look held a fatigued edge. “Come,” she said, extending a hand to the empty chairs.

Now that the formal council meeting had ended, only two figures aside from Teryn and Cora occupied places at the table: Captain Alden and Lord Hardingham. The latter was a middle-aged man with neatly trimmed auburn hair, a short beard, and kind brown eyes. He was previously Larylis’ councilman—and his father’s before that—and was now Cora’s Head of Council. After Cora had lost her brother’s councilmen to Duke Morkai’s slaughter last summer, she’d been left with no one to fill the roles. So Larylis and Mareleau had strategically staffed her council with the most trustworthy men and women they could spare. Hardingham had been at the top of that list.

“Thank you for agreeing to meet with us,” Cora said as Lex and Lily claimed seats at Cora’s end of the table.

Lex blushed. “Thank you for including us in…whatever this is about. I hope we’re talking about those bloody dragons.”

“Yes,” Teryn said, giving him a halfhearted grin, “we are talking about those bloody dragons.”

The council room door opened again, and in walked Larylis and Mareleau. Larylis looked as exhausted as Teryn felt, dark circles shadowing his eyes. Mareleau, on the other hand, walked with her head held high despite the collar piercing both sides of her neck. Her skin was red and inflamed around the punctures, but she wore the object as if it were a necklace. Teryn had been too distracted, too detached from his body, to recall how it had felt to wear the collar. And he hadn’t been burdened by it for long. Whereas Cora had been forced to wear it for hours.

Cora paled as soon as her eyes landed on her friend. She rose from her chair and rushed to her. As she reached Mareleau, she fluttered her hands as if she couldn’t decide whether to give her a consoling touch or not touch her at all lest she cause pain. “Are you all right? Does it hurt?”

Mareleau waved her off, but there was no malice in the gesture. “Don’t baby me, Cora, I’m fine.”

Cora bit her lip before forcing a smile. “I’m glad you’re all right.” She returned to her seat, and Mareleau and Larylis claimed chairs near Teryn’s end of the table. Larylis and Lord Hardingham exchanged warm greetings.

“Where’s Noah?” Teryn asked.

“He’s sleeping,” Larylis said. “Helena is with him.”

“She won’t be attending?”

Mareleau answered with a decisive, “No.”

Teryn figured that meant Helena was still in the dark about most things. He and Cora had organized this less formal meeting to discuss the topics they couldn’t—or weren’t ready to—share with the council.

A dark shape dove from the rafters, eliciting a squeal from Lily. But it was only Berol, so no one else was startled. She hadn’t wanted to let Teryn out of her sight after the appearance of the dragons and had followed him inside the castle afterward. Now she alternated between haunting the rafters and crowding his personal space. He’d had the presence of mind to don his shoulder pad, upon which she landed now. Absently, he extracted a strip of duck from his waistcoat pocket and fed it to his falcon.

“If that’s all of us,” Cora said, “I’ll begin. Lex and Lily, I’ll address what concerns you first so you needn’t feel obligated to remain if you’d rather not linger on the dark topics we’re about to discuss.”

Lex and Lily exchanged a worried glance, then returned their attention to Cora.

Cora took a deep breath. Teryn wished he was sitting beside her so he could hold her hand. Remind her he was here. She wasn’t alone. Her eyes flicked to his as if she’d been of the same mind. With the warmest smile he could muster, he gave her an encouraging nod.

She nodded back and angled herself toward Lex and Lily. “If you’re wondering why we’ve requested that you follow a scouting party home to Tomas, instead of departing at once, it’s because the border north of Khero may be unsafe. Now, humor me while I explain the next part, for I know it will come across as fiction. Something called the Veil surrounds the kingdoms of Khero and Vera, the land once known as Lela. The Veil is like a curtain between our world and…well, the fae realm.”

She paused, waiting for their reaction.

Lex frowned, his mouth curling halfway toward a grin. But as he met Teryn’s gaze and found there was no mirth on his face, he paled. Facing Cora again, he said, “Fae realm. Right. I’ve seen unicorns, a man-and-unicorn-eating monster, and now dragons. A magic curtain to the fae realm shouldn’t be impossible to accept.”

Lily gave an awkward laugh but it was tinged with hysteria. “Right,” she said in her small voice.

Cora continued. “Until recently, only unicorns had been able to cross the Veil, and only to leave the fae realm—El’Ara—which is why they only recently appeared in our world. The appearance of dragons tells us the Veil has been torn. In other words, there’s an opening somewhere in that curtain that separates our worlds. We don’t know where the tear is or what would happen if people accidentally crossed it. Nor do we know what other creatures may emerge from it.”

“It could be anywhere,” Teryn said. “Or everywhere. We don’t yet know if the tear is a single location in the Veil, or if it merely means the entire Veil is weakened.”

Cora stood from her chair and pointed at a map that had been laid out upon the table from the previous meeting. She tapped the stretch of land between northern Khero and southern Vinias—the kingdom that lay between Khero and Tomas. “Since the Veil surrounds Lela, it exists here too. You can’t reach Tomas without crossing it.”

“Even if you go by sea,” Teryn added, “you’d still have to cross the Veil. You are, of course, welcome to do whatever you choose, but as you are our friends and allies, we suggest you let our scouting party test it first.”

“Oh, I very much agree,” Lex said. “I’ll trust your scouts to assess the border. No questions asked.”

Cora turned her attention to Captain Alden. “When will the scouting party be ready to depart?”

“Majesty,” the captain said, “Lieutenant Carlson will be ready to depart for the Khero-Vinias border at first light.”

“Thank you, Captain Alden,” Cora said with a gracious nod. “Any other updates?”

Alden cast a hesitant glance at Lex and Lily before answering. “Yes, Majesty. I have one pressing update that I didn’t bring up during the formal meeting, for it is a private matter of state regarding a subject not all council members are apprised of. Do I have your permission to speak on this subject now, Majesty?”

“You do.”

“We’ve gotten more intel from the Norunian spy in our captivity.”

Teryn straightened. Cora had told him about the man being held in the dungeon, as well as the overall influx of spies from Norun. “What did the spy say?”

“He admitted to Norun’s formal alliance with Syrus and confessed King Darius is in southern Norun at this time, near the Norun-Vinias border. While he wouldn’t outright confess that Syrus and Norun seek to wage war on Khero, he admitted that Darius has recently summoned a fleet of warships from Syrus to make landfall in southwestern Vera.”

Larylis cursed under his breath.

Cora and Teryn locked eyes across the table. Even though they’d suspected Norun and Syrus were allying to target Khero, this was the first outright confession they’d gotten that it was so. Not only that, but Khero wasn’t the only target. If the warships were landing in Vera, King Darius sought Larylis’ kingdom too.

If Darius had already launched the warships before the spy had been captured, he’d made the decision long before the appearance of dragons.

Before irrefutable proof that the Veil had been torn.

Before proof that the true Morkara was born.

How would Darius proceed once he learned of today’s developments? It would be impossible to keep word of the dragons from spreading. For all they knew, they could have flown over the entire continent of Risa by now, and beyond. Worse was the fact that Darius had already launched his fleet. It didn’t take more than two weeks to cross the channel between the Southern Islands and southwest Vera. The fleet could already have made landfall.

Teryn’s mind reeled. So badly he wanted to say something comforting. Something hopeful?—

“I know nothing about the naval fleet.” The voice came unexpectedly from his side. Teryn bit back a curse, nearly leaping out of his skin as he found Emylia occupying one of the vacant seats at his left. His sudden jolt had Berol launching off his shoulder in favor of his chair’s backrest.

“Don’t do that,” he said to Emylia under his breath. Luckily, his voice didn’t reach the others at the table, for Lord Hardingham had everyone else’s attention now, reading the report of dragon sightings he’d shared at the council meeting.

“Sorry,” Emylia said. “I thought you would have noticed my arrival. Anyhow, like I said, I can’t confirm anything about the naval fleet, but I’ve managed to gather that Darius has been away from Syrus for at least a month, and half his military force is currently out of the kingdom.”

Teryn assessed her information. It gave weight to the spy’s confession about Darius being physically present in Norun, and potentially accounted for the warships too. If half his military force was gone, they had to be on those ships. He pursed his lips, not daring to share what he’d learned with those at the table. Cora was the only one who knew about his strange new ability to see spirits, and he wasn’t in the mood to explain it to anyone else. He’d tell her after the meeting.

Lord Hardingham set down his report and looked to his queen for further discussion.

Cora’s eyes were distant, her countenance falling with every second. She looked so empty. So defeated. Teryn curled his hands over his armrests. It took all his restraint not to run to her. He wanted to soothe her, touch her, but he kept his seat. His wife wasn’t weak. She was stronger than anyone knew, and he’d never undermine that, even at an informal meeting like this. He’d save comforting caresses and calming words for behind closed doors.

“What do we do?” came Mareleau’s voice. Finally, her cool facade cracked. Her voice trembled, with what sounded like fear at first. But as she spoke again, her tone was colored by rage. “What the seven devils do we do? This collar may keep the dragons from Ridine Castle now, but I can’t wear it forever. And it won’t stop the beasts from burning land and crops and devouring livestock. It won’t stop Darius from knowing…” Her throat bobbed and angry tears glazed her eyes. Larylis reached for his wife’s hand, gathering it in his. Mareleau’s jaw shifted side to side before she finished what she’d been trying to say. “It won’t keep him from knowing my son—his prophesied enemy—has been born. What the hell do we do?”

Cora sank deeper into her chair and rubbed her brow. “I…I don’t know. There’s so little we can do right now. I have one idea. I don’t know if it will help, but I think it will be worth trying.”

Teryn leaned forward, propping his elbows on the table and steepling his fingers. “What’s your idea?”

She blew out a heavy breath. “Mareleau, Noah, and I will go to the Forest People.”