The door clicked shut.
I didn't move. The journal was still open in my lap. The pendant sat untouched on the desk beside me, glinting faintly.
Sythriss said nothing at first. Just... stood there, her gaze raking across the room like a queen inspecting a broken battleground. Her steps were soft, deliberate, as she glided further in, robes trailing like smoke behind her.
She didn't ask permission to enter.
Of course she didn't.
Her eyes landed on the book in my lap.
A faint smile touched her lips. Amused.
"A gift," she murmured. "Of sorts. From Lirian."
She moved with casual authority, drawing out a chair from the corner and dragging it closer with one hand. As if this were a casual visit.
A conversation between family is it?
She sat.
I didn't move.
The stone floor was cold beneath me, and I welcomed it—something grounding, something real. The journal still lay open across my thighs, the pages curled faintly at the edges. The pendant glinted nearby, untouched, reflecting a thin sliver of light from the high window above.
Sythriss's gaze settled on both, one after the other. Her lips curved—not quite a smile. More like something amused, private, calculated.
"I see you've been reading," she said.
My fingers curled slightly against the paper. "It was on my desk."
She hummed once. "It was with your... belongings. I thought it best returned to you."
I blinked. Once. "So you read it."
"Of course." She didn't even try to deny it. "It would've been negligent not to."
I bit back a sharper response and set the journal aside, spine up, leaving the pages open. "Negligent?"
Sythriss didn't flinch. "You are my daughter. My blood. What you carry—what remains—it matters. I need to know what direction you're drifting before I decide which way to push."
I scoffed, low and bitter. "So that's what this is. Assessment."
Her gaze sharpened. "Everything is assessment. Do not mistake comfort for complacency. You were reborn, Elyssia, but you are not complete. Not yet. And not safely."
I lifted the journal in one hand and let it fall gently back into my lap. "You think this makes me unsafe?"
"I think it makes you... uncertain." She leaned forward slightly, elbows resting on her knees, fingers steepled. "And uncertainty in a creature like you? That breeds danger."
"To you?" I asked, voice quieter, sharper.
Her eyes met mine, cool and unwavering. "To yourself."
I scoffed again, less bitter this time. "You don't care about that."
"You should'nt assume what you dont know," she said, smooth as ever. "However, I do prefer our assets intact."
I stiffened, heat crawling up the back of my neck.
My mouth opened, the words already forming—sharp and fast and too much. "You talk about me like I'm some tool to shape, some—"
She raised a single hand.
Not abrupt. Not angry.
Just final.
The words caught in my throat.
Sythriss's eyes narrowed, not cruel, but heavy with command. "Is this what you truly wanted to say to me, daughter? All that venom… and this is what you choose to converse about?"
I blinked. Once. Twice.
The room tilted just slightly—power shifting, conversation rerouted before I could stop it.
She went on, voice low and steady. "I have expectations. They will be met. You will train. You will grow. You will stand when others falter—not because I demand it, but because you are capable. That is your inheritance."
I said nothing. The silence crept in again, thicker this time.
Sythriss studied me. "But I am not without generosity. My time is not given freely, yet here I am—mother to daughter. You are blood. Mine."
Her hands rested lightly on the arms of her chair but her golden eyes burned with an intensity that made me hesitate.
So this is the queen of this domain.
"So ask," she said. "You've had time. Years. Surely, your thoughts have sharpened."
I swallowed, the breath catching against my ribs.
This wasn't what I'd expected. She wasn't here to comfort me. Not truly. But she was here. And she was listening.
My breath caught in my throat.
So ask.
There were a dozen questions clawing at the back of my skull. A hundred more I hadn't let myself say aloud. Some were too raw. Some too tangled in fear. But now, with her in front of me—waiting, not with patience, but certainty—I couldn't hold them back.
"Why me?" I asked. "Out of everyone… why was it me you chose?"
Sythriss didn't even blink. "You were present," she said. "And willing."
My lips parted. That was it? That was the answer?
She tilted her head slightly. "I needed a vessel. One strong enough to hold what I gave. You survived. You endured. That is not something most can claim."
"That doesn't make it right," I snapped. "I didn't understand what was happening to me—I didn't ask for this."
Her expression didn't falter. "You chose to live."
The words struck like cold steel.
"I warned you," she continued, voice as smooth and sharp as a knife's edge. "The consequences would be steep. And the rewards—greater still."
I stared at her, chest tightening.
"Then why not just… let me die?" I muttered.
She rose, only slightly, hands still resting on the arms of the chair. Her eyes were steady. Measured. "Because death was unworthy of you."
I clenched my jaw. "That's not your choice to make."
"It wasn't," she said. "But you gave it to me."
I looked away. My nails dug into the cloth of my robe, knuckles white.
"I didn't know I'd lose everything," I whispered.
Sythriss's gaze flicked to my face, then down the line of my arms, my body. "You didn't lose everything."
I flinched. "You think this"—I gestured to myself, to the soft curve of my voice, the narrowness of my frame—"you think this is some kind of gift?"
Her answer came without hesitation.
"I think it is an improvement."
I stared at her.
"You would."
Sythriss didn't respond to the bitterness in my voice. She let the silence sit there, heavy and alive. For a moment, she simply watched me—studying not what I said, but what I didn't.
Then, softly, she said, "Another question."
I didn't answer right away.
My mind circled too many things—truths I'd learned, lies I suspected. I didn't know which wound to press first. But one rose to the surface on its own, raw and stubborn, clinging to a memory I didn't even know if I could trust.
"…Why that day?"
Sythriss arched a brow. "Be specific."
I exhaled through my nose, slow and tight. "Why were you there? That battlefield. That moment. What brought you to that place? To me?"
For the first time since entering, she looked away.
Her expression didn't falter. But something else in her did. Her posture shifted, just slightly. The steel in her spine softened—barely.
"I was hunting," she said.
I blinked.
A long beat passed.
Then she smiled.
Not cruel. Not smug. Not like before.
This one was smaller. Realer. It barely touched her mouth, but it reached her eyes like a flicker of old light behind cold glass.
"I was following the scent of a thief," she said quietly. "One of many."
The words didn't make sense at first.
Then they did.
"…A thief?"
She didn't nod. Didn't elaborate.
Instead, she leaned back, fingers drumming once against the wood of the chair.
"He took something that belonged to someone precious to me," she said. "Long ago. Something I have not forgivem."
There was no fury in her voice. No tremble.
Just weight.
I found myself leaning forward, my voice quieter than before. "Someone special…?"
Sythriss didn't answer. She didn't even look at me. Instead, she went still, gaze fixed somewhere distant—somewhere behind the walls.
When she finally spoke, her voice was softer. Not warm. But real.
"I felt him fall. Across the world, across time. I felt his death in my bones before the word ever reached me. We do not fade easily, but I knew."
My chest tightened. I didn't breathe.
She hadn't said the word mate again. She didn't need to. I could hear it in her voice now—how it caught just slightly, too subtle for anyone else to notice. But I did. I saw the shift behind her eyes.
I opened my mouth. "How did he—"
She moved past it. Cleanly. Coldly.
"They didn't just kill him," she said. "They stole from him. From me. The things he kept… the pieces of memory, of pride, of us. Shattered. Scattered. Sold."
Her lip curled, the mask of control slipping just enough to show teeth.
"So I began to collect what was mine. One item at a time. That day on the battlefield... I happened to find one."
My blood ran cold.
I could still remember that field—mud and ash, steel slick with blood, bodies twisted in death.
Something clicked into place. Not a memory. Not fully.
Just a sick, low feeling that told me: I was there. I saw it. I stood too close to something far bigger than me.
And it saw me back.
She turned her head toward me again, and for a moment—for just a moment—I didn't see the queen. I didn't see the cold, calculated monarch.
I saw the ache of something ancient. Loss buried so deep, it burned colder than ice.
And then, as swiftly as it came, she straightened.
The warmth—if it had ever been warmth—vanished like it had never been.
A soft knock came from the far side of the door.
Sythriss didn't flinch. "Enter."
The door creaked open, and a Ka'tari stepped inside, silent and graceful, a tray held carefully in her hands. The scent of roasted meat and fresh herbs cut through the room's stillness. The Ka'tari didn't speak. She moved to the table, set the tray down, then bowed her head low.
Sythriss acknowledged her with the smallest nod.
The door closed again.
She rose to her full height, smooth as water freezing in motion. She stepped to the table, inspected the dishes with the barest glance, then turned back to me.
"In a few days," she said, "your lessons will begin."
I blinked. "Lessons?"
She arched a brow, as if I'd asked whether the sky would fall tomorrow.
"Of course," she said. "You are my daughter."
She paused. The smile that came next was faint. Sharp.
"And my children produce only the best."
Her gaze lingered a moment longer. Then she turned, robes whispering behind her, already moving toward the door.