CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
The Choosing
The King's final decline began on a morning in late spring, when the flowers in the Queen's Garden were at their most beautiful.
He woke struggling to breathe, his heart stuttering in his chest like a bird trying to escape a cage. The physicians came running, did what they could, but everyone who saw him knew: the borrowed time was running out.
"Gather my children," the King whispered when the crisis had passed and he could speak again. "All of them. There's something I need to do while I still can."
The summons went out. Within the hour, all five of his children stood at his bedside—Marcus rigid with barely concealed fear, Helena's mask finally cracking, Darius standing at attention as if awaiting orders, Elara with tears already streaming down her face, and Orion holding Nera's hand like it was the only thing keeping him upright.
"I'm dying," the King said. His voice was weak but clear. "Today, tomorrow, perhaps a week if the gods are generous. But soon."
"Father—" Marcus started.
"Don't. I've made my peace with it." The old man's eyes moved across his children, taking them in one last time. "I've put this off too long. The succession. I need to name my heir before I go."
The tension in the room sharpened. Helena straightened almost imperceptibly. Marcus's jaw tightened. Even Darius shifted his weight, suddenly alert.
"I know what you're all expecting," the King continued. "Marcus, you've spent your life preparing for this. Helena, you've built alliances that could rule a continent. Darius, you've defended our borders with honor." His gaze settled on Elara, then moved to Orion. "And you two... the overlooked and the runaway. The ones nobody considered."
He took a labored breath.
"Orion. Come closer."
* * *
Orion approached the bed, his heart pounding.
"I'm going to ask you one more time," the King said. "One last time. And then I'll never ask again."
"Father, I've already—"
"I know what you've said. But I need to hear it now, at the end, so I know I gave you every chance." The King's hand found his, grip weak but determined. "Orion, son of Aldric, will you take the crown of Valdris?"
The room held its breath.
Orion looked at his father—this man who had shaped him, driven him away, and welcomed him back. This man who had spent a year showing him that love and duty could coexist, even when they pulled in different directions.
"No," he said gently. "I won't."
"Even now? Even knowing what your refusal might mean?"
"Even now." Orion squeezed his father's hand. "The crown isn't mine to wear. It never was. I found my path, Father, and it doesn't lead to a throne. It leads to a frozen city in the north, to a life I built with my own hands, to a woman who saw me when no one else did."
"You're certain?"
"Completely."
The King held his gaze for a long moment. Then, slowly, he smiled.
"Good," he said. "That's the answer I needed to hear."
"What?"
"I had to know you hadn't changed. That you were still the man who chose freedom over power, love over duty." The King's smile widened slightly. "Because that conviction, that certainty—that's what I'm looking for."
He turned his head toward the others.
"Elara. Come here."
* * *
The room went still.
Elara approached the bed as if in a dream, her face pale, her steps uncertain. She had stopped crying, but her eyes were wide with something beyond grief—something that looked almost like terror.
"Father?"
"Kneel, daughter."
"Father, I don't understand—"
"Kneel."
She knelt.
Behind her, Marcus made a sound—not quite a protest, not quite a gasp. Helena's face had gone completely blank, her calculating mind visibly racing. Darius simply stared, his soldier's composure finally cracking.
"I've watched all of you," the King said, his voice gaining strength from somewhere deep within. "For years, I've watched. Marcus, you're strong and capable, but you're too rigid. You see duty as a cage, the same way Orion did, and that resentment would poison your reign."
Marcus flinched but said nothing.
"Helena, you're brilliant—perhaps the smartest of all my children. But you've spent so long playing the game that you've forgotten there are real people on the board. You'd rule well, but you wouldn't be loved."
Helena's mask flickered, but she inclined her head in acknowledgment.
"Darius, you never wanted this, and I won't force it on you. Your heart is on the border, with your soldiers. That's where you belong."
"Thank you, Father," Darius said quietly.
"And Orion..." The King looked at his fourth child with something like pride. "Orion found the courage to choose himself. He's the best of you in many ways, but he's not meant for this life. He knows it. I know it. And I respect him for refusing to pretend otherwise."
His gaze returned to Elara, still kneeling, still trembling.
"But you, Elara. You're the one I've been watching most closely."
* * *
"Me?" Elara's voice was barely a whisper. "Father, I have no experience. No allies. No—"
"No corruption," the King interrupted. "No faction pulling at you. No debts to repay, no promises to keep, no games already in motion." He reached out, touching her face with a trembling hand. "You're the only one who came to me this year without wanting something. The only one who visited because you loved me, not because you were positioning yourself."
"I didn't think I was an option."
"Neither did anyone else. That's part of why you're the right choice." The King's eyes were bright with tears he was too proud to shed. "You convinced me to send for your brother. You saw what the family needed when no one else did. You have instincts, Elara—instincts that can't be taught."
"But Marcus has been preparing his whole life—"
"Marcus has been preparing to be the king I was. I don't want that." The King's voice hardened. "I made mistakes. Too many to count. I put duty above love, tradition above wisdom, the kingdom above my children. And look what it cost me—a wife dead too young, a son who ran away, a family fractured for a decade."
He gripped Elara's hand.
"I don't want another king like me. I want something better. Someone who leads with heart first, someone who sees people before politics, someone who hasn't learned to be cruel in the name of necessity."
"That's not strength," Marcus said, his voice strained. "That's weakness."
"No." The King looked at his eldest son with something like pity. "It's the strength I never had. The strength to be kind when cruelty would be easier. The strength to listen when commanding would be simpler. The strength to admit when you don't know something, instead of pretending certainty."
He turned back to Elara.
"You have that strength. I've seen it. Your siblings have seen it, even if they didn't recognize it for what it was." He smiled. "You're not the obvious choice. You're the right one."
* * *
Elara was crying again—not from grief this time, but from something more complicated.
"I don't know if I can do this," she whispered.
"You can. And you won't be alone." The King looked at the others. "Marcus, you know administration better than anyone. Helena, your mind for strategy is unmatched. Darius, your military expertise is invaluable. And Orion..." A faint smile. "Orion will be the conscience you need, the voice that reminds you who you are when the crown gets heavy."
"You're asking us to serve her?" Helena's voice was carefully neutral.
"I'm asking you to support your sister. To be a family, not factions." The King's gaze was steady. "Can you do that? Can you put aside your ambitions, your resentments, your plans—and be a family?"
Silence stretched across the room.
Then Marcus stepped forward.
His face was tight with emotions Orion couldn't fully read—disappointment, yes, but also something else. Something that might have been relief.
"Father's right," he said. His voice was rough, as if the words cost him something. "I've been preparing my whole life to be king. But preparing isn't the same as being suited." He looked at Elara. "You see things I miss. You feel things I've trained myself not to feel. Maybe that's what the kingdom needs."
"Marcus..." Elara started.
"Don't thank me yet. I'm going to be impossible to work with." But there was almost a smile on his face. "Someone has to keep you from being too soft."
"And I'll keep you from being too rigid," Helena said. She stepped forward as well, her mask finally cracking into something more human. "I wanted this. I won't pretend otherwise. But I wanted it because I thought I was the best choice." She paused. "Maybe I was wrong."
"That might be the first time you've ever said that," Darius observed.
"Don't get used to it."
Darius moved to stand beside his siblings. "I never wanted the crown. You all know that. But I'll defend whoever wears it." He looked at Elara with something like affection. "Even my baby sister."
"I'm twenty-one," Elara protested weakly.
"You'll always be the baby sister."
Finally, Orion stepped forward.
"I can't stay," he said. "You know that. My life is elsewhere. But..." He knelt beside Elara, taking her hand. "I'll come when you need me. Write when you need advice. And if you ever feel lost, remember: you're not alone. You have a family. And you have me."
"Promise?"
"Promise."
Elara looked at her siblings—all four of them, offering their support in their different ways. Then she looked at her father, who was watching with tears finally streaming down his weathered face.
"I'll try," she said. "I'll try to be what you see in me."
"That's all I ask." The King's voice was fading, exhaustion claiming him. "That's all anyone can ever ask."
* * *
The coronation was held three days later, in the great hall of Kingshold.
It was smaller than tradition demanded—the King's health wouldn't permit a lengthy ceremony—but it was witnessed by all the people who mattered. The noble houses, the guild leaders, the military commanders. They watched as the crown passed from father to daughter, as Elara knelt before the throne and rose as Queen.
The King presided from a chair beside the throne, too weak to stand but determined to see this moment. His hands shook as he placed the crown on Elara's head, but his voice was steady.
"Valdris has had eighteen generations of kings," he said. "Today, we begin a new chapter. May you rule with wisdom, with compassion, and with the strength that comes from knowing you are loved."
"Long live Queen Elara!" the hall cried.
And from her throne—her throne now, though it would take time to feel real—Elara looked out at her people with tears in her eyes and steel in her spine.
She was young. She was untested. She was everything the kingdom didn't expect.
She was exactly what they needed.
* * *
Two days after the coronation, Nera asked to see the King alone.
Orion had offered to come with her, but she'd shaken her head. "This is something I need to do myself. A gift, of sorts. Before it's too late."
She found him in his chambers, propped up on pillows, watching the afternoon light filter through the windows. He looked peaceful—a man who had done what he needed to do and was ready for what came next.
"Nera," he said, a faint smile crossing his face. "I wondered if you'd come."
"You knew I would?"
"I hoped." He gestured weakly to the chair beside his bed. "Sit. I don't have much energy left for conversations, but for you, I'll find some."
She sat, studying this man who had raised the person she loved most in the world. This man who had welcomed her without truly knowing what she was, who had trusted his son's judgment even when all the evidence said she was a mystery.
"You've been very patient with me," she said. "Never pushing, never demanding answers. You could have. You're the King."
"I was the King. Elara holds that title now." His eyes glittered with faint amusement. "And I learned long ago that demanding answers rarely gets you the truth. People tell you what they want you to know, when they're ready. The best you can do is create space for that."
"You're wise."
"I'm old. Sometimes they're the same thing." He studied her. "You have something to tell me."
"I have something to show you." Nera took a breath. "You asked once, what I really was. Orion said maybe someday, when the time was right."
"I remember."
"The time is right. And you deserve to know the truth, before..." She didn't finish the sentence. She didn't need to.
The King nodded slowly. "Then show me."
* * *
Nera stood, moving to the center of the room where the light was brightest.
She had worn this human form for nearly two years now—through the journey south, through the palace, through every moment of this complicated homecoming. It had become almost comfortable, almost natural. But it wasn't who she truly was.
She closed her eyes and let go.
The transformation was gentle—a soft glow that built slowly, light gathering around her like dawn breaking. Her human form shimmered, rippled, and began to change. She grew smaller, her features sharpening, her ears lengthening into delicate points. Wings emerged from her back, gossamer-thin and shimmering with colors that had no names in human tongues.
When she opened her eyes, she was herself again. Truly herself. A fairy no larger than a human hand, hovering in a column of soft golden light, her green hair floating around her like sea grass in a current.
The King's breath caught.
"A fairy," he whispered. "A real fairy."
"Not just a fairy." Nera's voice was the same, though it came now from a much smaller form. "I am Nera, Queen of the Fairy Realm. Ruler of the Emerald Court. I have worn a crown for over a thousand years."
The King stared at her, his aged eyes wide with wonder. For a long moment, he didn't speak—couldn't speak, perhaps, overwhelmed by the impossibility hovering before him.
Then, incredibly, he laughed.
"A queen," he said, joy mixing with amazement. "My son married a queen. An actual queen." He laughed again, the sound dissolving into a cough, but his eyes were bright with delight. "All this time, I thought he'd married beneath his station. Instead, he married so far above it that the comparison is absurd."
"I walked away from my throne," Nera said. "Just as Orion walked away from his birthright. We found each other in the running."
"Two runaways." The King shook his head in wonder. "Two crowns, abandoned. And somehow, you found happiness anyway."
"We did."
"Does he know? About..." He gestured at her, at the light, at everything.
"He knows everything. He's known almost from the beginning." Nera drifted closer to the bed, her light casting soft patterns on the King's weathered face. "He saw me, Your Majesty. Not the queen, not the crown, not the power. Just me. And he chose me anyway."
"That sounds like my son." Tears were forming in the old man's eyes. "Always seeing what others miss. Always choosing with his heart."
"That's why I love him."
"And that's why I'm glad he found you." The King reached out, his hand trembling, and Nera landed gently on his palm. He stared at her—this impossible creature, this fairy queen, this woman his son had chosen—and smiled.
"Thank you," he said. "For showing me. For trusting me with this."
"You're his father. You deserve to know who your son truly loves."
"I knew that already. I've seen how he looks at you." His fingers curled gently around her, protective rather than possessive. "But this... this is a gift. A wonder I never expected to see."
"You've seen many wonders, I imagine. Forty years as king."
"Nothing like this." His voice was fading, exhaustion claiming him again. "Nothing like you."
Nera stayed with him as he drifted toward sleep, her light a soft comfort in the dimming room. Before his eyes fully closed, he spoke one more time.
"Take care of him," he murmured. "My wandering son. My runaway prince."
"Always," she promised. "For as long as I live."
"Good." A whisper now. "Good."
He slept. And Nera kept watch, a fairy queen guarding a dying king, honoring the man who had raised the person she loved most in all the worlds.
* * *
She didn't tell the others what had passed between them. Some moments were private, sacred, not meant to be shared.
But when Orion asked how it had gone, she smiled.
"He laughed," she said. "When he saw what I truly was, he laughed with joy."
"That sounds like Father."
"He said you married above your station."
"Did he?" Orion pulled her close. "He's not wrong."
"Flatterer."
"Truth-teller."
They held each other in the fading light, two runaways who had found their way home—not to a place, but to each other.
* * *
King Aldric the Third died three days later.
He went peacefully, in his sleep, with his children around him. The physicians said his heart simply stopped, too tired to beat any longer. But Orion thought it was more than that. He thought his father had been holding on, waiting, refusing to let go until he knew the kingdom was in good hands.
Now it was. And so he could rest.
And perhaps—Orion liked to think—he went with one more wonder than he'd expected. One more miracle to carry into whatever came next.
The funeral was a grand affair—the entire kingdom mourning the man who had ruled them for over forty years. Orion stood with his siblings as the pyre was lit, watching the flames consume what remained of his father's body.
Beside him, Nera held his hand in silence. She was in her human form again—the form she'd wear for the journey home—but Orion knew now that the King had seen her true self. Had accepted her. Had blessed their union in a way that transcended words.
"He was proud of you," she said quietly. "At the end. I could feel it."
"I know."
"And he was at peace."
"I know that too." Orion watched the flames rise higher. "He got what he wanted. All of us together. A successor he believed in. Time to say goodbye."
"And one last wonder," Nera added softly.
"And one last wonder."
The fire burned through the night, and when dawn came, King Aldric was ash and memory.
But his legacy lived on—in the daughter who now wore his crown, in the sons who supported her, in the kingdom that would continue long after all of them were gone.
And in Orion, the son who had run away and come home just in time to say goodbye.
* * *
A week after the funeral, Elara summoned Orion to her private chambers.
She looked tired—the crown was already wearing on her, the weight of responsibility settling onto shoulders that were learning to bear it. But she also looked determined. Stronger than she had been when their father first named her.
"You're leaving," she said. Not a question.
"Soon. There are things I need to handle in Thornhaven. A life I left behind."
"I understand." She moved to the window, looking out over the city that was now hers to protect. "I'm scared, Orion."
"I know."
"Everyone's watching me. Waiting for me to fail. Marcus thinks I'm too soft. Helena thinks I'm too naive. The noble houses think Father lost his mind at the end."
"What do you think?"
She was quiet for a moment. "I think Father saw something in me that I'm only beginning to understand. And I think... I think I can do this. If I don't try to do it alone."
"You won't be alone. Marcus and Helena will be impossible, but they'll also be invaluable. Darius will keep the borders safe. And I..." He crossed to her, pulling her into a hug. "I'll be a letter away. Always."
"Promise?"
"I already did. I don't break promises."
She held onto him for a long moment—the sister who had been ten when he left, who was now a queen facing an uncertain future.
"Thank you," she whispered. "For coming back. For refusing the crown. For believing I could do this when I didn't believe it myself."
"I didn't do anything. Father chose you. You earned it."
"You showed me it was possible to walk away from expectations and find something better." She pulled back, meeting his eyes. "You showed me that being overlooked doesn't mean being worthless. That the ones nobody considers might be the ones who matter most."
"That's a lot to put on one runaway brother."
"It's the truth." She smiled—a real smile, the first one he'd seen from her since the coronation. "Now go. Go back to your frozen city with your fairy queen and your life of adventure. And write to me. Often."
Orion blinked. "You know?"
"Father told me. Before he died." Elara's smile grew. "He said it was the most wonderful thing he'd ever seen. A real fairy, glowing in his chambers. He made me promise to keep her secret."
"And you will?"
"Of course. She's family." Elara's eyes were bright. "Besides, it explains so much. The garden, the way she moves, the fact that she looks at you like you're the most precious thing in all the worlds."
"She does?"
"You don't notice because you look at her the same way."
Orion laughed—a genuine, surprised sound. "Father really told you everything."
"He wanted me to understand what I was protecting. What our family has become." She straightened, and for a moment, she looked every inch a queen. "Now go with my blessing, Prince Orion of Valdris. And know that you will always have a home here, should you ever need one."
He bowed—a formal gesture, acknowledging her authority—and then ruined it by pulling her into one more hug.
"You're going to be a great queen," he said. "Better than Father ever was. Better than any of us could have been."
"I'll try."
"That's all anyone can ask."
He left her there, standing in the light of her window, wearing a crown she'd never expected and facing a future she'd never imagined.
His little sister.
The Queen.
— End of Chapter Thirty-Three —