Assassins break into the palace under moonlight.
Silent. Fast. Blessed by one of the five Archbishops of the Order. Their blades drip silver the only metal that wounds divine souls.
They weren't sent to kill me.
They were sent to bind me.
Stupid.
I don't run. I walk right into their trap. Let their ropes burn against my skin. Let their chains tighten.
And when they whisper the incantation to seal me—
I laugh.
Because I remember the spell.
I wrote the spell.
And I rewrote it with a backdoor.
"You bound me like a villain," I whisper, as the ground begins to burn.
"But I'm not a villain."
"I'm the final act."
They die screaming.
One survives long enough to crawl to the altar in the hall and whisper a prayer.
But I'm already there.
"I hear you," I say, placing my hand over his heart.
"It's too late," he cries. "You're, you're wrong. You're not supposed to"
I smile.
"I'm not supposed to exist. Yet here we are."
He doesn't speak again.
By morning, the palace is on lockdown.
And across the ocean, a foreign queen with eyes of rust and snow declares Seraphina Vale the most dangerous living thing since the sky cracked open.
She's right.
And I'm only just getting started.