Chapter 9 - The Gates of the Capital
The iron gates of the royal capital were closed tight, their massive timber beams slotted into place. But as the combined army of Drakonsgard and Elara’s loyalists approached the outer walls, there was no sound of trumpets calling for defense.
The city guards on the ramparts stared down in horror at the frozen statues of the Crimson Company that had been brought along in carts, and then at the radiant figure of Princess Elara riding at the head of the procession.
"Open the gates!" General Vane shouted, his voice echoing off the stone bastions. "Open the gates to the True Queen, or watch your walls turn to glass!"
There was a frantic scramble of footsteps on the ramparts. Moments later, the heavy iron chains began to rattle, and the massive southern gates slowly groaned open, swinging inward to reveal the terrified faces of the city magistrates.
Elara did not wait for an escort. She rode straight through the archway, her white stallion’s hooves clicking rhythmically against the cobblestones of the capital’s central plaza. Thousands of citizens had poured out of their homes, lining the streets in absolute silence, staring up at the woman who had brought spring to the mountains and winter to the tyrants.
She rode straight to the steps of the grand palace.
The heavy oak doors of the Hall of Winter swung open on their own as she approached, the hinges groaning under the sudden influx of cold, clean air.
Inside, sitting rigidly upon the golden throne of the realm, was King Valerius. Beside him stood Aurelia, her platinum hair disheveled, her violet eyes wide with frantic, unyielding desperation. She held a dagger in her right hand, the blade trembling slightly as she pointed it toward the empty air.
"You cannot have it!" Aurelia screamed, her voice cracking as Elara walked up the steps of the dais. "I was trained for this! I was born during the sacred blizzard! I am the first daughter! You were nothing! You were always the unnecessary one!"
Elara stopped three paces away from the throne. She looked down at her father, who sat slumped in his golden seat, his crown crooked upon his head, broken by the weight of his own hubris. Then she looked at her sister—a girl consumed entirely by the cage of a title she thought defined her worth.
"You’re right, Aurelia," Elara said softly, her voice carrying no malice, only a profound, liberating pity. "I was the second daughter. I was the one nobody watched, the one nobody taught, the one who was meant to be traded away so the palace could keep playing its games."
She stepped closer, the luminous frost crown upon her head casting a warm, brilliant light that filled the dark, drafty hall.
"And because nobody was watching me," Elara continued, "I learned how to look at the world outside this room. I learned how to survive without a crown telling me who I was."
She raised her hand.
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Aurelia lunged forward with the dagger, a final, desperate act of a dying dynasty. But before the blade could clear the air, a ring of gentle, glowing frost encircled Aurelia’s wrists, stopping her instantly and forcing the dagger to clatter harmlessly against the marble floor.
Elara did not strike her. She simply walked past her sister, climbed the final step of the dais, and turned to face the great hall.
