LeFay gritted her teeth as pain pulsed through her arm. She held it against her chest, glaring at the girl standing across the ruined room.
The chamber barely resembled a guest suite anymore.
Furniture lay shattered and splintered, their frames charred black from bursts of uncontrolled flame. Shards of ice clung to the walls and floor like frozen teeth, glittering in the dim light filtering through the heavy curtains. Deep cracks spider-webbed across the stone, a silent testament to a brief, vicious battle that had turned the chamber inside out.
In the center of the wreckage knelt LeFay, breath ragged, her body trembling. The arm she held to her chest was broken. She tried to rise but her feet were encased in ice , anchoring her in place. Blood trickled from a gash on her forehead, mingling with the sweat that streaked her face.
Before her stood Jamie Thorne. The bloodied spear in one hand and the silver wand she had picked from the cemetery was in the other. The dark energy that had manifested when Jamie summoned the wand had not disappeared.
It moved.
Slowly.
Almost lazily.
At times it seemed to form the vague equine outline before dissolving back into swirling shadows.
'How?'
LeFay stared at it her mind racing with a mix of fury and bitter disbelief.
'How did I lose to this small girl? I had the upper hand.'
Indeed, she too was a votary.
She had been faster.
Stronger.
More experienced.
When the girl first appeared, LeFay had immediately decided to end the confrontation with a single strike. She remembered the moment clearly thinking the girl was stupid for bringing a long weapon to a restricted space.
With one clean movement the weapon was knocked aside. Then she had moved for the girl's shoulder, deliberately avoiding anything fatal.
A disabling injury.
That was all.
That was the first underestimation.
The girl had moved faster than expected. She had amplified LeFay's inertia while diminishing her speed—a combination that threw off her balance completely. The spear had spun, and the butt had connected with LeFay's skull with brutal precision.
That initial underestimation had sealed her fate. The girl had turned out to be far more skilled and versatile than her youthful appearance suggested. Worse still, a crushing, suffocating presence had radiated from Jamie—a heavy, primordial dread that had seeped into LeFay's bones, making her hesitate at the worst possible microsecond.
And then, when LeFay had finally shaken off the psychological weight of Jamie's intent and seemed overpowered her in close quarters, the girl had summoned a silver wand. A concussive blast of dark energy had erupted from it, catching LeFay mid-stride and knocking her flat onto her back. As she had tried to stagger up, the energy manifested around Jamie and surged, coalescing into a terrifying, dark energy swirling with the vague, menacing shape of a rearing equine beast—a phantom of pure pressure that had slammed back down onto LeFay's chest like a physical weight, breaking her arm and rendering her completely helpless.
"Surrender."
One word.
Simple.
Absolute.
LeFay had wanted to refuse.
She couldn't.
Her body had betrayed her.
"I yield."
Now, pinned and broken, LeFay stared daggers at her captor.
'Damn it!' she cursed inwardly, a wave of bitter humiliation washing over her.
Jamie stood tall, her expression cold, unforgiving, and entirely deadpan. With a sharp, deliberate motion, she raised her spear and leveled the razor-sharp tip straight at LeFay's throat.
"You're going to tell me everything," Jamie said, her voice dropping into a flat, commanding register that brooked no argument. LeFay wanted to say no but pain immediately erupted behind her eyes. She doubled slightly as a headache tore through her skull.
She opened her mouth, and the words came out against her will.
"Yes," LeFay whispered.
Her voice shook.
"I will."
Jamie gestured with the spear. "Then start. Who are you?"
LeFay's jaw clenched, the muscles in her neck straining as she fought against the compulsion. A bead of sweat rolled down her temple.
Her gaze darted sideways toward the heavy oak door of the chamber, and a fresh wave of self-loathing hit her.
'Damn my own paranoia,' she thought bitterly.
Before entering, she had personally installed a Silencer Amulet—a grade four artifact designed specifically to completely insolate the room from the outside world, preventing any eavesdropping, spying, or resonance tracking from the external elements. She had wanted absolute privacy to conduct her work. Now, that same airtight privacy meant her guards outside had no idea she was under attack, and even if they tried to barge in, they would instantly fall victim to the psychological effects of the artifact. She was entirely alone, entirely exposed, and entirely at the mercy of the girl before her.
"I am... LeFay," she gasped, her voice trembling under the immense strain of the compulsion.
"Scribe of the Obsidian Archives and Special Envoy of the Third Circle... answering directly to the Matriarchal Council of Nordhelm."
Jamie's raised an eyebrow.
"Scribe?"
"Yes."
"What does that mean?"
"It means I am entrusted with information concerning the interests of the Nordhelm Crown."
"Information?"
LeFay hesitated.
The headache returned.
"To a degree."
Jamie nodded.
"Why are you here?"
LeFay exhaled slowly.
"I was sent..." LeFay wheezed, her voice cracking as another wave of pain hammered her brain, blood to trickle from her nose.
"...I was sent to Aerthos to observe the festival, to gauge how much the kingdom suspects Nordhelm for the attack on Blackhaven, and to assess their stance moving toward the Continental Congress."
Jamie's expression hardened.
"So you came here to spy on us."
"I came here to observe."
"That's spying."
LeFay sighed.
"Yes."
Her grip on the spear tightened. Then came the question LeFay had been dreading.
"What does Nordhelm have to do with the attack Blackhaven?"
LeFay looked away. The command pressed harder and her fingers trembled.
"I can't—"
Pain exploded behind her eyes and she gasped as her eyes turned more bloodshot and blood began dripping from her nose again. Jamie didn't understand the reaction but watched silently as LeFay's teeth clenched.
"We were hunting... the Grand Maker... Sigmund Kilgowe." LeFay choked out, her breath coming in ragged gasps.
"I heard you when you were mumbling about that. Why were you hunting him?"
"Because... because he is the only one who can use the fragment the way the queen desires."
"The fragment?"
"An artifact... a forbidden relic passed down and hidden in Nordhelm for generations... a fragment of the Oblivion!" she cried out, her voice breaking with frustration and pain.
The moment those words left LeFay's mouth, a sharp, searing jolt of electricity rippled across Jamie's body. The hidden mark etched into her shoulder—the silent, dormant brand of her lineage—erupted with sudden, burning agony. Jamie winced, gasping sharply, and instinctively dropped her left hand to clutch her shoulder over her clothing, her breathing turning shallow as the brand pulsed against her skin.
"The Queen wanted it."
"Why?"
"I don't know."
The command pressed again.
"I don't know!" LeFay's voice cracked.
"The Queen has been working with shadows... with people from Xylos! I am just an instrument of the state, I don't understand the full scope of their mad ambitions!"
Jamie didn't understand either. she just stared at her captive quietly. Whether it was because she couldn't grasp the weight of this conspiracy or because pieces were still missing she felt she was getting the fill picture she wanted in order to understand why one nation robbed her of her parents and wanted her next. It felt like standing at the edge of an abyss, listening to a language she had never learned.
Seeing the genuine confusion and mounting distress on the young girl's face, LeFay let out a harsh, broken laugh that turned into a cough.
"Look at you," LeFay spat bitterly, her eyes wide with a manic mix of fear and exhaustion as the magical compulsion kept her chained.
"You're just a child. You don't understand anything about what you're standing in the middle of."
"Then make me understand. Why were my parents killed? What does any of this have to do with me?"
Jamie commanded, her voice dropping an octave, carrying the terrifying weight of the equine shadow behind her. LeFay tried to hold back, but the compulsion wrung the words straight from her throat, turning her confession into a frantic, disjointed stream of historical trauma.
"Raizelle Lukas was never meant to be a traitor—she was meant to be queen. The eldest daughter, the rightful heir to the Obsidian Throne. But her younger sister, the woman who now rules Nordhelm, had always coveted power. Unfortunately she could not counter your mothers power as the then Prima Donna."
Jamie's brow furrowed as LeFay wheezed and continued.
"She saw the fragment as her path to glory, her weapon to crush any who opposed her ascension. She planned to use it to cement her claim, to silence the whispers of those who still believed Raizelle should rule. Raizelle knew what would happen if her sister succeeded—a civil war backed by both her authority and that of the fragment clashing that would drown Nordhelm in blood and leave millions dead possibly plunging the continent plunged into chaos. So she made a choice. She took the fragment. We know that she used her trait to absorb it into herself to bypass the arrays protecting the locations it was being kept in. Along the line she was intercepted and wounded but she still managed to flee south, across the border, into Aerthos, hoping to disappear, hoping to keep the fragment hidden forever. She gave up everything—her crown, her homeland, her name—to save a kingdom that would forever brand her a traitor."
LeFay's breath came in ragged gasps, her nose bleeding freely now, her will crumbling beneath the weight of Jamie's presence.
"That's who your mother was. Not a thief. A sacrifice."
For a moment the vague equine shape became clearer. Then vanished.
"So that's why." Jamie whispered.
"Nordhelm spent years searching for the fragment."
"But my mother didn't have the fragment, why did she have to die? Why did my father have to die? Why..." Jamie yelled pushing the spear tip into Lefay's forehead and drawing a few drops of blood.
"Why?'' She whispered again withdrawing the spear and moving to sit on the bed, burying her face in her hands.
"The operation on Blackhaven was to capture the Grand Maker. but due to the recklessness of someone, it went off the rails," she admitted, her voice strained. "Your father was never supposed to be killed. He was just... in the way. A soldier who got too close. An accident."
"So they will come after me?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because you are the Prima Donna."