Page 189 of Season Warriors & Wolves

“The Grand Maiden knew of all this?” Magnus asked.

“All Grand Maiden knew,” the violet witch confirmed. “The knowledge is passed to the new generation without fail.”

He sneered. “So Eldmoor was aware of what Silas was planning all along when he wed a Skygard princess? This could have been prevented at the roots? Is that what you are saying?”

“Not entirely, no,” Macaria added. “When Silas married Serene Skygard, Valas and Urinthia had a meeting with him and his court, as the ones who guarded the balance that Silas was threatening to ruin. The reasonings she’d seen had been greedious, power hungry. An alliance with King Jonah would have granted him a new position in the realm.” She glanced briefly at my wife before saying, “But his intentions were also driven by love.”

Snow’s head snapped to her. “You did not just dare speak lies to cover your own faults.”

Macaria swallowed with fear, but did not falter despite the electric threat ricocheting around the glens being hit by lightning behind us. “That is the truth, Snowlin,” she said to her and turned to Magnus again. “It was tradition that a Delcour would join the Skygard as their hand—a spiritual guide. Urinthia nor Valas never trusted Melanthe enough to send her to the Skygard after their last Delcour Crafter died, to be their guide through the powers even themselves could not understand. So Valas, as the Grand Maiden at the time, sent my son under the guise of banishing him, led him to Alaric Drava, and hid the truth from everyone else after I’d told her of my visions that would soon turn into a message of gods.” Her hands shook when she revealed, “Under Nubil skies and on Krig’s lands, stood three Eldingchildren.”

“The prophecy,” Nia said, eyes wide. “You saw the prophecy before it was written?”

The air grew colder, and Snow breathed out frost. She’d been lied to again. “You knew all of it, all of what was to come yet you led my father inside Olympia?”

Macaria shivered. “Not on purpose. Not to destroy it. But to make sure you three would exist. He needed a Skygard, the plan was to use your cousin. But no god dictated it that way. Cranes and visions and writings on the stone predicted so much worse chaos to come. It had to be you. It was necessary that you three would exist. The balance of the realm was at stake. What would follow would be worse than simple destruction. It would be annihilation. A sickness that would have spread further than our realm—a sickness that has already started in many others.” Her dark eyes glowed violet. “A dark new age has started. It has corrupted our land.”

Snow’s hands curled tightly and the skies above screamed her anger so loud that my hearing buzzed for a while after. She took a shaky inhale, her golden eyes crawling with red veins and unshed tears. “The balance of realms?” Her shoulders shook from the rough laughter that left her throat heavy and pained. “The balance of the realms,” she repeated, more to herself than anyone else. “My kingdom fell. My people were slain. My kin vanished, got used, abused and tortured. For the balance of the realms?”

Macaria lowered her head with guilt. “Everyone gathered here needed to know the true burden of what is to come. The true burden that the realm has borne in order to keep alive. It is important to know.”

Drystan cleared his throat. “I’ve heard all I needed to hear. We’ve built enough of a relationship between us to say for certain that Vrammethen will be by your side in this war.”

“The unblessed will fight?” Macaria asked doubtfully.

The human king drummed his trembling fingers on the chair arm. “Indeed.”

There was doubt in Macaria’s eyes that jumped between his silent Crafter and us. “Eldmoor, too. Urinthia would have wanted it so. We might not have armies and artillery, but we have magic—powerful magic. From now and until he is defeated, Red Coven and our Crafters will be at your service.”

I nodded at both.

“We have stood together before we even knew what we were standing together for,” Moriko said. “Hanai will fight beside you, even if I have to leave my own city to the mercy of none.”

Everyone waited for Magnus to speak, but the man had pinned his attention on my wife who silently writhed in pain beside me, her expression stolid and unforgiving despite the thick tears rimming her eyes. “You believe we can win this way?” he asked her.

She finally looked up. “Yes. I know so.”

“You already have a plan,” Caspian said to Snow. “You always had a plan.”

“I do.”

Magnus stood. “Then we ride with you.” He slightly bowed his head to me. “Both of you. Our troops will sail for Dardanes by tonight at the latest.”

Just like that.

It was set.

All six kingdoms would fight against Silas as one.

Snow’s shoulders rose and fell rapidly. She stared ahead at the violent seas swinging from the angry command she gave the skies. Her whole body relaxed when I slipped behind her, wrapping my arms around her waist and resting my forehead on her shoulder.

One could only bear so much.

To hear your existence was manufactured only for suffering crossed any threshold. Yet she still stood.

“Tell me.”

She sucked in a sharp breath. “Every step I take, I learn something new about myself that I didn’t wish to know. Take it all away, Kil, all I am supposed to be and all that they’ve made me, and then what is left of me? What am I, if I am anything at all?” She turned in my arms to face me. “Purpose is all I hear. That it is my purpose. I am where I'm supposed to be, who I’m supposed to be. So I wasn’t meant for anything else at all besides possessing this blood only to carry it further, controlling the sceptre, keeping peace, being divine?” She was breathing hard—choking with each inhale. “Myrdur was ruined. My family perished. My mother is dead. Two kingdoms almost thrown into war. And all for what? So I could suffer at the hands of my father and ultimately die there, too?”