The skies over Blackvale were painted in bruised twilight, clouds swollen with rain that hadn't yet decided to fall. The castle loomed against the darkening horizon like a wounded beast strong, ancient, but bleeding from within.
Cambria stood atop the eastern watchtower, her cloak billowing around her like wings of shadow. Her fingers gripped the stone ledge as if anchoring herself from being swept away by the storm of everything that had happened everything that was still to come.
Lucien's betrayal was no longer just a whisper in the dark. It was a name carved into the bones of her past, bleeding into her present.
Behind her, Evelyn's footsteps echoed softly. "He didn't just betray the crown," Evelyn said, voice low, eyes fixed on the horizon. "He betrayed you. He betrayed her." She meant Seraphine. She meant the queen was buried in fire and truth.
Cambria turned slowly, her face a mask of calm too calm. "Then I will do what no daughter should ever have to do."
