LOGINIf someone had told Stella just two months ago that she would one day willingly volunteer herself to enter a battlefield - after having just escaped an entire life of forced servitude, ordered to slaughter on command against her will - she'd have laughed.If they'd told her she'd be doing so astride the back of a dragon - a dragon that only heeds the word of Lady Alcina of House Warner, nee Clair, who'd once almost killed Stella in retribution for what she'd done to her husband - Stella would have declared them unsound of mind. Completely mad in the head.But Stella would also have laughed if someone had told her one day she'd grow to fear the useless, Giftless runt princess of House Clair.And look at them now.As Stella walks up to them in the courtyard, night has already fallen, and the warm glow of flickering torchlights surrounds them.Lady Clair - no, Lady Warner - stands in the center of the ring of fire, slipping a series of chains around her waist with practiced ease. Around
It's been six months since then, and Stella would be lying if she said there aren't days that feel oddly bereft now that she doesn't have a particular commander popping his head into the kitchens any time he's feeling up for a snack.And perhaps trying out new recipes has lost some of its luster, when Stella discovers it's not nearly as fun when there isn't Lincoln's loudly exaggerated praises to look forward to.But she hears the rumors - the rumors of Lincoln's forces decimating their way through the enemy lines, seizing new territories and capturing them under the banner of the Western Plains.When Stella closes her eyes, she can swear she can still see it - the vision of that glorious, gleaming armor and rippling cape; the way his form had looked as though he were dancing across the ruins of a battlefield.And at night, if she includes a certain commander's safety in her prayers, then that's between her and the gods.*****In the seventh month, Alcina receives word from Alfred and
Dearest husband:Is it not strange that it has been nearly a year since we were wed, and yet I still cannot seem to tire of using that word? I miss you terribly so, my husband. I know that our separation is necessary because of our situation, but I cannot stop the heavy sighs in my heart or the "lovelorn" look in my eyes, as the chambermaids tease me.I would write you many pages if I could put my feelings into words, but that has always been my brother's talent, not mine. All I can say with my simple words is that I miss you and my heart longs for you every day.Alcina sets the pen down with another longing sigh, hand pressing against the letters she's just penned as though she might be able to feel Brandon's hand, imagining the expression on her husband's face when he opens Alcina's most recent correspondence.Absolutely terrible, Darla—who, much to Alcina's annoyed frown, is allowed at the front lines and so gets to be with Alcina's husband in person—had sent her a letter last mo
“So the mongrels have forgotten their places,” Lord Johnson says with a harsh laugh. “We should have put them down when we had the chance.” He had never quite gotten over the dismay at having been forced to retreat from their siege in the Heartlands.“Don’t be stupid,” his brother snaps. There’s an irritation lining his words that makes his tone more tightly wound than its usual drawl. “It would have been madness to try to defeat a dragon unprepared.”“Better to have crippled them then, than to have let it get to this,” Lord Johnson grits.Before them, on the massive oak table, sits a crumpled, heavy fabric of crimson red.The flag of House Warner, staked inelegantly into the graveyard that had been left behind by a village in the Southern Terraces.The village to which Duke Albrecht had sent his Death Riders to carry out his execution, not an hour after Nyles brought him the news of Stella Lockwood’s insolent betrayal.Albrecht hadn’t been expecting House Warner to move. Not so soon,
Within days, the castle of the Western Plains has shifted into full preparations for the upcoming war.Though the Red Throne has yet to issue an official response to House Warner’s defiance to protect the small village in the Southern Terraces, it is now but a matter of time before the inevitable: war.There is no more room for doubt, or perhaps not. War is the only certain thing, now, in uncertain times, and they would be fools to wait for the official cry of a battle horn to make their move.The unmatched military might of the Western Plains rises, now, to its singular purpose: to fight and to win.Even the refugees - those villagers that Albrecht had sentenced to execution as retribution for Stella’s defection, who had then been granted shelter in the Western Plains following their rescue - have joined the effort.Though some have found employment in civilian roles around the kingdom, there are a substantial number who have instead chosen to aid in the war efforts directly.Blacksm
That afternoon, Alcina takes off for the Heartlands with Perseus to inform her family of House Warners’s decision, while Brandon remains behind to see Percy and Darla off.When Brandon makes his intentions known to the soon-departing lords of the Ranges, there’s hardly a pause before Percy shrugs.“Very well, then.”Brandon raises a brow. “Is that all?”Darla grins, razor-sharp and vicious. “I’ve wanted to gut those pathetic vermin for a while now,” she says as she stretches her neck, languid and incredibly dangerous.Conversational. “Ever since they reared their stupid heads and tried to act like lions instead of the prey that they are.”Ever since they managed to escape unscathed from the massacre of the wedding at the Heartlands, Darla’s been unsettled. Like a shark that smelt blood in the water, only to have lost its prey.Darla has the kind of bloodlust that won’t settle until she’s standing above the carcasses of her chosen prey.Percy merely smiles, as warm as an indulgent love
Alcina follows Brendan into the maze.Brendan cannot tell if it is foolishness or naivete that compels her to do so, given that anyone with half a brain would have notfollowed a man they compare to nightmares incarnate, into a labyrinth of which they know nothing about.
Brendon's point of View, The girl standing in front of him is not what Brendan had expected at all. He had known, from the day negotiations commenced, that his intended must be of the absolute dregs of humanity, for her own family to have been able to throw her to the monstr
Alcina is sent to the Western Plains, the territory of House Warner, by herself. With a royal retinue, of course, and no less than ten carriages in which her attendants, belongings, and dowry are to be carried. Dowry - given that no one in this arrangement, neither the Clair's nor
Alcina has always known that her most significant value is her disposability. Alcina was born into the great House Clair. It is a famed and noble House known for its gifted bloodline. Is peerless in its long tradition robust and hallowed abilities. But delinquent to that fame, Alc







