LOGIN{Ragna’s POV}The guard stopped.Slowly, he turned toward me, his face tightening with something that looked suspiciously like wounded pride.“Do you think I’m afraid of you?”“No.”I met his glare without moving. “I think you’re foolish.”The words landed exactly where I wanted them to.His jaw clenched.“You stand there talking trash because you think you’ve accomplished something,” he spat. “In a few hours they’ll drag you out of this dungeon, slaughter you in front of the Kingdom, and leave your worthless body for everyone to see!”I watched him while he spoke. Not because I particularly cared about his opinion.Because he was closer now.Not close enough though.“You hear me?” he snapped.“I hear you.”“Then perhaps reality is finally settling in.”“I doubt it.”His nostrils flared.“You’re the miserable one here!”“I’d still rather be me.”That seemed to confuse him more than anger him.“What?”“I’d rather die,” I said with a shrug, “than spend my life standing in the same corri
{Ragna’s POV}The dungeon had become considerably louder.Not because anything had changed down here.Because everything had changed somewhere above us.The screams still drifted through the stone ceiling in waves. Some were distant enough to sound almost unreal. Others arrived sharp and sudden before disappearing beneath the barking of orders and the thunder of hurried footsteps racing across the Palace.The attack had reached the Kingdom.That much was obvious.Milena was now pacing the length of the cell, looking upward every few seconds as though staring hard enough might somehow allow her to see through several layers of stone.“So it’s true,” she whispered. “The Blood Mothers are real.”She turned another restless circle before looking at me.“This is the end.”I remained where I was, listening. Not to her. To everything else. The Palace sounded frightened.That was different from sounding attacked. Milena crossed the distance between us in three hurried steps.“They’re here,”
{Liam’s POV}Loud voices guided me toward the western battlements long before I reached them.The Palace had abandoned every trace of its usual composure. Generals crossed courtyards at a run, shouting fresh orders before disappearing into different formations. Stable hands struggled to calm restless warhorses while servants hurried frightened citizens away from the outer walls. Everywhere I looked, discipline fought a losing battle against urgency.Beyond the gates, thousands of warriors were already assembling.Rows upon rows of armored males stretched across the Palace grounds as standards bearing the crest of the Reigns snapped violently in the afternoon wind. Generals rode along the formations issuing final instructions while captains adjusted ranks with clipped, impatient commands. Brutality flashed beneath the sun as countless claws extended and retracted in restless anticipation.The army was enormous.It should have been reassuring.Instead, the mood surrounding it bordered o
{Liam’s POV}My Father needed the truth.Whether he accepted it… That was his business.Mine was making sure Mother remained alive.I left him standing inside the council chamber with enough revelations to dismantle a lifetime of certainty and quietly closed the door behind me. Whatever conclusions he reached from there would belong to him. I had given him every piece required to understand what stood outside these walls, why Sir Hagari had betrayed him, and why the prophecy everyone believed had ended decades ago had, in reality, merely waited.The rest was no longer my responsibility.Unfortunately, I had acquired another.I crossed the Palace at an unhurried pace, though the building itself seemed incapable of remaining still. Messengers hurried through corridors carrying sealed reports beneath their arms, servants disappeared around corners with expressions that suggested they knew very little and feared considerably more, while guards moved in organized formations toward the oute
{Ragna's POV}I was staring at Milena now and I wasn’t sure I had exactly heard well.In fact, I seriously doubted that I had heard well, so I kept staring intensely, waiting for her to expatiate, while dropping another prompt.“What?” I said and then she smiled.“I’m just messing with you.” She said and then laughed. “Look at the seriousness on your face!” Her finger arrowed at me as she continued laughing.I shook my head then at her silliness and hated that I fell for it. But then there was something with how she said it. Still, it was my fault for falling for it. “You’re unserious.” I muttered now.“I know.” She responded and then shifted closer to me like she had been pulled. “But the Prince is really gorgeous, Ragna!”I looked at her.“Nah.”“Come on. I personally think he’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. He looks like freaking god! Did you see his build?”I sighed. “Now you’re just being weird.” I said and Milena stared at me as though she genuinely expected me to re
{Ragna’s POV}The dungeon somehow felt emptier after Liam left.Not quieter. That would have been impossible.Somewhere beyond our cell, a prisoner was loudly insisting that he had been wrongly imprisoned for the fifteenth time since I’d arrived. Iron doors continued opening and slamming shut at uneven intervals while guards barked orders through the corridors, and every now and then another voice joined the endless chorus of complaints echoing beneath the Palace.The noise hadn’t changed.We had.The conversation Liam left behind still sat inside the cell with us, heavy enough that neither Milena nor I seemed particularly eager to disturb it.Your chances of escaping persecution this time are worse than zero…It was an unpleasant sentence.Not because it frightened me. But because I believed him.Liam wasn’t the sort of person who dressed ugly truths in prettier words. If anything, he seemed determined to strip away whatever hope people managed to invent for themselves. It was an irr
{Ragna’s POV}Voices rang before I saw the bodies that owned them.But soon, that suspense was answered as two men barged into the scene, along with three other females of whom the head Iron Warden was among.“Look at her! You can tell just from that dirty expression.” One of them throated, disfigu
{Liam’s POV}“The moss adds flavor. Trust me.”That was the last thing I heard before silence settled in and I stared at the female before me.It took me a moment to fully digest all the things she had said and another moment to understand that she had actually meant them.She was scared, or joking
{Ragna’s POV}My head hurts.And my eyes were swollen without being physically swollen.They felt swollen while being normal. I don’t know if that makes sense.I haven’t cried heavily in a long time, you know. And I also haven’t felt this confused in a long time. Right now, everything around me wa
{Ragna's POV}I was panting. I was panting really heavily but I didn’t seem to know why. But then that wasn’t my focus. Voices pooled all around me and the ground seemed to be trembling, but none of that was my concern. My mother was, so I threw my gaze to her. I hadn’t realized yet…I rushed







