Her tears burned, but they dried faster than they fell.
She pressed her face into her husband's chest, breathing in the familiar scent of steel, leather, and fire that clung to him, and when she pulled back, her blue eyes were no longer soft.
They were cold, sharpened into blades.
"You owe me, Ric" she whispered, her voice trembling with grief yet steady with resolve. "Their heads. Every last one of the cowards who did this. I want them all, Alaric. Every single one."
His gaze darkened at her demand, but she did not flinch.
The knowledge of her past life, once her greatest weapon, felt like ash now. Useless.
The Emperor, who had survived in her first life, now lay poisoned before her.
Lyra, who she trusted had lived long enough to fade into quiet obscurity then, was now butchered in this life.
The world had shifted beneath her feet. The script was broken.
