“Pull it together, Laurel,” Nemesia hisses, though not unkindly, breaking through my inner turmoil. Nemesia’s hand doesn’t leave my back as I stand again, knees weak and limbs uncertain. With a deep inhale, I turn to face the closest person I’ve ever had to a sibling, her hazel eyes staring back at me with deep set resolve. She’s barely out of fae adolescence herself, our centuries-long lives extending what humans consider early adulthood well into our fourth decade. At forty years old, she’s what humans consider early twenties, while I’m practically a teenager. Despite her age, Nemesia was the only person I considered appointing General of my armies when the time came to choose her mother’s replacement. “We need a plan. And I will not make it without you,” she repeats, her tall, lithe body—so unlike my own—towering over me. Tendrils of white-blonde hair escape her braid as the wind caresses her sharp and angular features. Dark tawny skin ripples with muscles in a tense stance.

“We need a plan,” I repeat, nodding in acknowledgement of all the things Nemesia isn’t saying aloud. We need my magic. Magic that I’m barely capable of wielding and that no one understands, myself included. Magic that my parents insisted—demanded—I keep secret. They gave their lives trying to protect me, trying to keep the full extent of my powers and my lack of control over them locked away. But I knew this moment would come. No matter how hard my parents fought to keep my magic—to keep me—a secret, I knew it wouldn’t work. Part of me wonders if that’s why Mazus launched this war to begin with. He wanted me to reveal the secrets of the prophecy-blessed heir, now ruler, of Thayaria.

Nemesia gives me an encouraging smile, lips cracked from weeks of sun and wind exposure.

I can’t allow myself to dwell on the prophecy, not now, not when it has completely and utterly destroyed my life. A fated love that will unite realms is what I was apparently destined for, though in much more flowery language than that. My entire life I’ve been lauded and praised for all the good I would eventually do, envied for the fate that awaited me. But the prophecy is nonsense. All I have is magic I can’t control, the blood of my people on my hands, and an impossible choice. I squeeze my eyes shut and deeply inhale, then center myself within the current of the aether flowing around me. I hold my breath for three seconds, then slowly exhale—just like I was taught by the leymaster my parents brought in when I started displaying abnormal magical powers at the age of nine.

Opening my eyes, Nemesia still stares back at me, eyes wide with expectation.