Free Web NovelChapter 12: Chapter 12: A Vhaelor’s Justice
The car had barely come to a halt at the palace gates before a shockwave ripped through the air, nearly throwing the vehicle off its wheels. In the distance, trees were being snapped like toothpicks, and the sky was a haze of grey dust and debris. Ari ran out from the heavy oak doors, her face pale but her movements frantic as she grabbed my arm and hauled me inside.
The palace was not the sanctuary I expected. As I stepped through the door, the air felt charged, vibrating with a frequency that made the hair on my arms stand up. In the distance, the horizon was obscured by plumes of grit and dust, a draconic roar that made the heavy stone walls of our home groan in sympathy.
"I’m surprised you aren’t out there," she whispered, her eyes darting to the windows. "I thought for sure you’d be the first to lose control."
"Ari, what is happening?" I demanded, brushing the dust of the road from my dress.
"My parents, I’ve never seen them like this. Not for a simple diplomatic insult."
Ari didn’t answer. Instead, she led me to the side gallery where a small, jagged piece of a shattered recording crystal lay on a wooden display table.
"One of the attendants dropped it when the shaking started," Ari said, her voice barely audible.
"It captured the private conversation at the hall after the kings left for the meeting."
I reached out, my fingers hovering over the shard.
As I touched it, the air cooled, and the voices of the Southern and Eastern Queens filled the space, sharp and mocking.
"...a desperate move by the West," a voice Queen Selene of the South drawled with a cruel laugh.
"To think they’d sell off their own daughters like common whores to that pack of Northern dogs. But then again, what do you expect from a bloodline created by a wild animal? A dragon is still just a beast, after all. I’m sure Ryophlira and Aiyolistra will enjoy being passed around the north like prostitutes." freёwebnovel.com
The crystal shattered into fine dust under the pressure of my grip. A slow, creeping heat began to crawl up my neck. I turned toward the grand staircase, my heels clicking like a death knell on the marble.
"So," a voice dripped from the landing above.
"You heard it too."
Aiyolistra stood there, but she didn’t look like my sister. Her eyes were twin pools of toxic violet, and the air around her was visibly warping. As she descended, the lush ferns in the hallway didn’t just wilt they blackened and turned to ash in seconds.
"What are you doing here?" Aiyolistra hissed, her voice vibrating with a power that made the floorboards beneath her feet begin to splinter and crack.
"Why aren’t you out there burning that hall to the ground?"
"Why do you always think I’m the only one who needs to act?" I snapped back, my own power surging. The temperature rose ten degrees in a heartbeat. I could feel the embers in my lungs, the desire to let the fire consume everything.
She stepped closer, and the tension between us became a physical thing - a wall of heat meeting a wave of rot. The marble floor between us gave way, a long, jagged crack snaking through the stone as our powers collided.
She reached out, her fingers clawing the air as if she could reach through the distance and choke the life out of the women who had spoken those words.
"I will rot the flesh from their bones while they still breathe," she whispered, a dark, jagged smile finally breaking across her face.
"Not if I turn them into a ash first," I countered, my eyes glowing with a brilliance that rivaled the sun.
We stood there, two sisters who usually spent our days at each other’s throats, now unified by a singular, murderous intent. The palace was groaning, the very foundation shaking under the weight of our combined rage.
Then, the front doors didn’t just open they were pushed aside with a silence that was more terrifying than any roar. freёwebnovel.com
My father entered first. He was disheveled, but his face was a mask of absolute, frozen stone. In his arms, he carried our mother. She was wrapped tightly in his heavy, charcoal-colored cloak, her red hair tangled and matted with blood that was far too dark to be her own.
They didn’t smile. They didn’t brag. They walked into the hall with a silence that felt like the aftermath of a massacre. My brother followed, his eyes fixed on the floor, his hands still stained crimson.
Mother looked up as they passed us. Her eyes were dull, the violet fire replaced by a weary, coldness. She didn’t say a word, but as her gaze met mine, I saw the truth of the world we lived in. Respect wasn’t given, it was taken from the ashes of those who dared to forget who we were.
I looked at the blood on my father’s hands, then at the crack in the floor where my sister and I had nearly torn our own home apart.
Yue-Senn was right.
The two-week deadline Yue-Senn had proposed was no longer a strategic suggestion, it was a necessity. The world wouldn’t wait for me to be ready. It would try to break me, insult me, and discard me until I gave them a reason to be afraid.
I turned to Ari, my voice cold and clear as a winter morning.
"Call the Prince of the north," I commanded.
"Tell him he doesn’t have to wait for an answer. Tell him we need to meet tonight."
