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“His wife, your mother—Queen Elore? I was… important to her. King Horace would have hunted me to the ends of the world if he knew I existed, simply so Queen Elore wouldn’t have anything tying her back to the South.” She paused. “I assume you’ve figured out that she was Southern by now?” she asked.

I nodded. “Why would my father have put in so much effort to hunt you?” I asked, wishing she’d just get to the point.

“Because… Queen Elore was my mother, too,” Matea said, softer than she’d spoken before.

The statement felt like a punch to the gut.

That was why I felt like I recognized her that day at the market.

She looked so much like Mother. Her heart shaped face, the firm set of her jaw, her straight nose—even the green of her eyes matches the color of my own.

Both inherited by a female neither of us seemed to know.

“How—” I gasped. “How is this possible?” I finally managed to get out.

Matea sighed, as though she was already tiring of the conversation. “Elore grew up here, in the South. These,” she motioned again to the two figures behind her, “are her parents, Billie and Geoff Ashford.”

My eyes snapped up to the female’s face—my grandmother’s face—and I couldn’t help but notice the tears welling in her eyes. In that moment, I wondered what she saw when she looked at me.

Suddenly, I remembered the records I studied when I first arrived at The Haven.

I looked back to Matea. “You’re… not lying. I’ve seen the noble house records myself—they stop after Mother’s name.”

Matea gave me a smug smirk, then nodded.

“Elore wielded all five Southern zirilium—not unheard of in our noble houses—but she loved helping others more than anything else. She used her abilities to become a trokav for the Southern army when she was young. Back then, the Ocrein Isles hadn’t closed their borders yet, and our two peoples mixed freely.

She met my father, Ethan, on the battlefield, where she found him gravely injured and left for dead.

She ended up nursing him back to health over the course of a few months, and during that time, they fell in love—hard and fast .

“They welcomed me to the world a little over a year after my father was back to full health, having carved out a small life for themselves here in Cairnyl. My father was going to take Elore’s last name and become a member of the noble class, in order to be with her.

Even though he was a loyal soldier, Elore didn’t care about social status—she herself worked hard as a trokav in every battle that came and went.

Until one battle, when… they didn’t come back. ”

She took a deep breath, but didn’t give herself time to think before barreling ahead.

“When I was just a few months old, The Ashfords, my— our —grandparents, were told that they had both been slaughtered in battle. It was an especially bad battle—we had been taken completely by surprise, and it was all hands-on deck. But when the battle ended, their bodies were never recovered. It was like they simply vanished .”

A chill ran down my spine as I listened to what she was saying. There was no way she knew.

Right?

“But then, another eight months after the battle where they supposedly died, Queen Elore came into the picture in the North. When I was old enough to start piecing things together, I didn’t think much of it at first. Just a coincidence, right?” She laughed under her breath.

“Well, after years of trying to figure out what happened to my parents, I decided to take matters into my own hands. I journeyed to the North,” she shot Byn and Teagan a concerned look, likely because crossing into the North was forbidden, “and stayed in Hollis for a couple days, gathering clues. There—”

“How did you make it there and back without being caught?” Byn interrupted.

Matea looked as though she had to hold back an eye roll as she extended her hand.

Then melted into the shadow of her chair within the blink of an eye.

Byn pressed his lips together tightly.

Matea appeared again in the chair, then asked, “Make sense?”

Byn nodded, then motioned for her to carry on. I realized that must be how she disappeared that day at the market, too.

“As I was saying. You know what I found in Hollis?” she asked, looking in my direction.

I shook my head, still slightly skeptical.

“There was a small tavern on the outskirts—Tammy’s Tavern—that had portraits of all the Northern royal couples.

And the most recent one depicted the cold-hearted King Horace with his arm around my mother.

There was no denying it—I had studied her portraits in Ashford House for my entire life. Her face is burned into my mind.

“It was at that point I knew she was alive. Or at least she hadn’t died that day on the battlefield.

I wondered what that meant for my father, but I’m still unsure, seeing as Elore obviously somehow became involved with your father, and I couldn’t imagine she did so willingly,” she said, and I could tell she must feel a certain way about that topic.

“So… if all of this is true, why are you telling me this now? That was years ago,” I asked, unwilling to present my and Laurence’s findings without her confirming her own theories first.

“I think they’re still alive. I heard about that member of your Valwain—Ezra.” She nodded to Byn, who went stiff upon hearing the name. “I believe he’s still alive, too. And if my research is correct, there are more out there somewhere. Alive.”

My heart pounded as I slowly set the book in my lap onto the table before us, opening to the page I had showed to Laurence.

“I believe you. And your theories,” I said after a moment.

Matea’s eyes snapped to meet mine, as if searching for any signs I might be lying or pulling a cruel prank on her. But I simply held her gaze, letting her see how genuine I was being. Slowly, she nodded and looked down to the book between us.

In that moment, I decided to take a leap of faith and trust this female—my half-sister.

“Earlier, I found these records. And if they’re accurate, then over the years, we’ve lost thousands of our soldiers and trokavs—ones who didn’t make it home, dead or alive,” I stated.

Byn scanned the pages, taking in each report and statistic, while Teagan rounded the couch and came to lean over Byn’s shoulder to inspect it as well.

“Why hasn’t this been brought to my attention before now?” Byn asked, and I could feel a new weight settling on his shoulders.

“We didn’t know, Your Majesty. Think about it—if a Northerner freezes a soldier in place, then shatters them, there isn’t a body to recover. It’s all just been brushed under the rug—until now,” Matea answered without missing a beat. It was obvious she had given this a lot of thought.

I looked up to Billie and Geoff—my grandparents. “What do you two think about all of this?” I asked them.

The two looked at each other, then Geoff nodded slightly. Billie took a step forward.

“We agree with Matea’s theories, though maybe not how she gathered her evidence.” She sent a scowl towards Matea, who smiled cheekily in response. “Matea might be stubborn, brash, and sneaky, but she’s not a liar. Plus, the records speak for themselves.” She motioned towards the book on the table.

I nodded, and I found myself agreeing with them. I didn’t know if Mother and Ethan were alive still, but I did know Quinn believed Ezra was, and the records go back years, all showing the same results.

“So the North is taking our people. Not just our soldiers and trokavs, but even members of nobility and the Valwain now,” Teagan stated, and I looked to Byn to gauge his thoughts.

I could tell by the light in his eyes that this revelation, while adding a burden to his already heavy shoulders, had also brought him a sliver of hope.

Our friend, his brother, might still be out there somewhere.

Matea nodded. “That’s the theory here, Princess.”

There was a moment of silence, where everybody simply processed the heavy revelation that had just been laid out before us.

Not only did my father hurt everybody he came in contact with, try to conquer the world as we knew it, forced me to hide who I truly was, and more—he also kidnapped Southerners for what I could only assume were his own selfish purposes.

A small portion of me began to feel less guilty about taking his life.

After all, sometimes you had to sacrifice those you love for the greater good.

A heartbeat later, I locked eyes with Matea—my sister—before finally responding.

“Let’s go get our people back.”