Chapter 114: A Split Kingdom
Melissa’s POV
My eyes popped wide and I gasped. My surroundings came into sharper focus than ever before. It was all too much, too obvious-every movement, every sound, every smell.
I forced myself to stand, a strange energy buzzing through my body. Something deeper, something flowing within the soil, was warming the ground under me, not the light.
“Melissa!”
The sound of my name made me turn.
A few feet away, Kane stood with wide eyes and something I couldn’t quite read. Solace? Concern? Fear?
My throat felt raw as I struggled to speak. “Kane…”
He hesitated and took a step closer, staring at me.
Then he stopped. His hands balled into fists and his muscles stiffened.
“What happened to you?” He spoke in a quiet, cautious tone.
I scowled. “What do you mean?”
He didn’t respond. Rather, as though testing something invisible, he extended his hand slowly. He flinched as if he had been scorched the instant his fingers touched my skin.
The odd surge of energy between us was something I also sensed.
Kane tightened his jaw. “You’re different.”
I was unsure of how to react. He was correct. Something had changed within me.
However, I was unsure of what.
In front of me, the battlefield was covered in corpses and the ground was smeared with blood. Silence, the sort that follows a victory, was what I had anticipated.
Instead, there was a hum of restlessness in the air.
The soldiers continued to collide, their blades echoing against one another. Unwilling to give up, the packs fought. Darius was no longer there, but his impact persisted like a curse.
“They won’t stop,” Kane said next to me.
I forced myself to look away from the mayhem. “Why?”
Lydia came over, her face white. “Because they have lost their sense of reality. Darius had too much magic. The warriors are battling ghosts, and his generals are refusing to give up.”
My eyes squinted at the battlefield. Ghosts. Not ghosts, please. Sound waves.
Deep within this realm, Darius had buried his might. He would not let go, not even in death.
“We end it,” I murmured, sounding more composed than I had anticipated. “Now.”
Kane nodded despite an unreadable flicker in his eyes. “Then tell me how, Melissa.”
I didn’t respond. Because the answer was whispered by something dark deep inside me.
“Lydia!” As Zephyr ran toward us with a battered scroll in his hands, his voice reverberated throughout the camp. Urgency tightened his face.
He shoved the parchment at Lydia and said, “You need to see this.”
She swiftly unfolded it, looking over the old manuscript. The colour left her face.
She took a deep breath. “This can’t be right.”
Kane took a step forward. “What does it say?”
Lydia gestured to a paragraph with trembling fingers. It describes a queen who will emerge from the ashes of conflict. Someone with unparalleled power.”
Zephyr spoke in a sombre tone. “But she will not save the kingdom… She will demolish it.”
Silence stretched between us.
Then, slowly, all eyes turned to me.
My chest tightened. “You think it’s talking about me?”
Nobody said anything.
They didn’t have to, though.
I could see the unspoken fear and mistrust in their eyes.
I balled my fists up.
No. I wouldn’t turn into what they were afraid of.
I declined.
Before me waited in silence in the throne room.
I had the right to claim it.
I moved forward, the sound of my footsteps resonating off the marble floor. Zephyr, Kane, Lydia, and the others trailed behind, observing and anticipating.
The gold, polished, and powerful throne shone in the flickering torchlight.
My ears rang with the thunder of my heartbeat.
It was this.
It was for this that I had struggled.
This was-
A falsehood.
Once more, the murmurs from the emptiness coiled themselves around my mind. You are still bound by fate, which is like a chain.
No.
I had suffered too much and battled too hard to let this kingdom’s expectations hold me back.
I turned abruptly to face my friends, my allies, my people.
I then uttered the words that would determine my destiny.
“Burn it all.”
The room was filled with gasps.
Kane’s eyes became wide with shock. “Melissa-”
I held up my hand.
Power crackled through the air as it erupted from my fingertips. Around the throne, flames twisted and curled as they screamed to life.
The golden seat of authority, which represented all the events leading up to this point, started to melt.
Chaos broke out in the room.
People yelled. A few begged. A few of them fled.
Kane took hold of my wrist. “What are you doing?”
My bright eyes reflected the fire surrounding us as I looked him in the eye.
The words “I am not a queen,” I muttered.
The fire became larger.
The throne fell apart.
And the kingdom was on fire.