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Started reading
August 12, 2025
I couldn’t be the only person who found the whole thing…weird. Alastir’s daughter? And now his great-niece? I doubted there weren’t plenty of other wolven or Atlantians that would’ve also been well suited to marry Casteel, especially since Casteel had given no indication that he’d be interested in such a union.
Panic-fueled agony flooded me, entrenching itself in the area around my pounding heart as I slid my hands to Casteel’s chest, feeling for a heartbeat. “Please. Please,” I whispered, tears gathering in my eyes. “Please. Don’t do this to me. Please.”
aint no way
Alastir met my gaze. “I’m not the threat to Atlantia,” he said. “You are. You have always been the threat.”
heartbroken betrayal
“But it’s not just the bloodline, Penellaphe. We were warned about you long ago. It was written in the bones of your namesake before the gods went to sleep,” Alastir said. My skin pimpled. “‘With the last Chosen blood spilled, the great conspirator birthed from the flesh and fire of the Primals will awaken as the Harbinger and the Bringer of Death and Destruction to the lands gifted by the gods. Beware, for the end will come from the west to destroy the east and lay waste to all which lies between.’”
“You are the Chosen, birthed of the flesh and fire of the gods. And you come from the west, to the lands the gods have gifted,” Alastir conferred. “You are who your namesake warned about.”
“I lied to you,” he said softly. “When I said that I would ask to see if any others had known of them or had potentially tried to help them escape to Atlantia, I never planned to ask anyone. I didn’t need to because it was me.”
NOOOOO
“There were Craven there that night. You carry their scars. They were led right to the doors of the inn.” He didn’t blink. Not once. “He led them there. The Dark One.”
IM PUKING
“If you’re not going to kill me or leave me in here to die, I’m a little confused by what you plan to do,” I bit out. “I will give the Ascended what they were so desperate to keep,” he said. “I will give them you.”
aw crap
Suddenly, something large and white leapt into my line of sight, taking down a masked man. Delano.
THANK GOD
“Poppy.” My head whipped to the right, and I shuddered at the sight of Kieran.
im going to puke im so relieved
“I love you, Penellaphe. You. Your fierce heart, your intelligence and strength. I love your endless capacity for kindness. I love your acceptance of me. Your understanding. I’m in love with you, and I will be in love with you when I take my last breath and then beyond in the Vale.”
i cant stop crying
Oh, gods, he was going to Ascend me.
“I know. You’re hungry. But you can’t eat Kieran. That would make me a little sad.”
“Poppy,” he whispered, those strange, churning eyes glimmering with dampness. “You didn’t Ascend.”
“Gods, I hope you truly understand how strong you are. I’m constantly in awe of you. I’ve been in awe of you since the night in the Red Pearl.”
still crying
Casteel was quiet for a moment and then turned to Kieran and Naill. “Did I ever tell you guys about that time I discovered Poppy perched outside a window, clutching a book to her chest?” My eyes narrowed as Naill said, “No, but I have a lot of questions.”
WHEN DID HE GET SO FUNNNYYYYY
The golden trees of Aios had all become blood trees.
It was almost like a brand—an imprint of Delano, of who he was at his core—unique only to him.
“It’s old Atlantian. The language of the gods,” Casteel said, his voice rough. He cleared his throat as he squeezed my hand again. “Meyaah Liessa. It means: my Queen.”
“I promise you if anyone else was involved in this, they will be found, and they will pay. The same goes for anyone else who seeks to threaten you. No matter who.”
green flag
And I stopped pretending. Because I wasn’t okay.
FINALLY shes honest
I liked cheese and bacon and chocolate-covered everything too much for that.
felt
“I know you don’t like to hear this,” Kieran started, and I stiffened, knowing where he was going with this, “but that’s all assuming that your parents were your birth parents. Or—” he quickly added when I opened my mouth. “Or what you remember, what you were told about who your parents were, simply wasn’t the truth.”
“And if you decide you want to take what is yours, claim the throne, I will set this entire kingdom on fire and watch it burn if that ensures that the crown sits on your head.”
The sympathy that radiated from the Queen nearly choked me. “Malec had to have been your father, Penellaphe.”
“And even not knowing the extent of the blood that she carried in her, there was no way that Alastir or either of us believed it to be a coincidence that a Handmaiden was masquerading as the mother of a child who was the heir to Atlantia.” Masquerading as the mother… “Gods,” Kieran muttered, dragging a hand over his face. Casteel sat back, a muscle flexing in his jaw as he looked at me. “Poppy, I—”
All will be killed.”
oop bad guys
“He claims to be your brother. Ian Balfour.”
“Poppy, listen to me,” he whispered, and my eyes opened. “I know the truth. Wake Nyktos. Only his guards can stop the Blood Crown.”
So,” he said, running his thumbs over my knuckles, “is it your choice to take the Crown?” My heart skipped a beat. “It is,” I whispered. It was only two words, but they were life-altering and terrifying, and it was strange.
Silvery-white embers erupted over my skin, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw Casteel step back, and the wolven retreat. “Get ‘em, girl.”
supportive king
Squeezing Casteel’s hand, I turned back to his parents. “We have come to claim what is mine—the Crown and the kingdom.”
“Rise,” Eloana ordered softly, her eyes glistening with bright tears when I looked up. She smiled. “Rise as the Queen and King of Atlantia.”
“Cutting off the head does not work,” Emil shouted, and I turned to see a…a headless skeleton tracking the dumbfounded Atlantian. “I repeat. It does not work!”
bro whys he funny
“You were born of flesh with the fire of the gods in your blood. You are a Bringer of Life and a Bringer of Death,” Nyktos interrupted. “You are the Queen of Flesh and Fire, due more than one Crown, one kingdom. What you seek, you already have. You always had the power in you.”
“The Queen isn’t what she seems,” Tawny whispered in my ear as her fear coated the back of my throat. “You need—” “Poppy looks so different,” Ian interrupted, having come up behind us. “Doesn’t she?”
“Brother,” the stranger said, and a rolling tide of shivers shot straight down my side at the deep, gritty sound of his voice. “It has been far too long.” Casteel had stiffened beside me. “Malik.”
“Just married to the wrong brother.”
“The first name I was born with is one you’ve probably heard. It was Isbeth.”
I locked eyes with Ian. A knight had stalked up behind him, sword already unsheathed. The knight was fast, sweeping the blade through the air and then slicing it through tissue, muscle, and bone. Ending life.
He pulled me to his chest as he twisted toward her. “Please. I beg you. Stop. Please, godsdamn it. Stop! I’ll do anything. You want Atlantia? It’s yours—” “You are not the true heir,” she cut him off. “You cannot give me what I want.” “She can’t give it to you if you kill her,” he shouted as my teeth bled. “You want to control her? You want me, then. Take me. I won’t fight you. I swear. I won’t. Just stop. Please.” His voice cracked.
IM NOT OK
But I…I wasn’t me. I wasn’t the Queen of Flesh and Fire.
“Now ask me where your son is.”
VILLIAN ORIGIN STORY IS EAATINGGGGG OK GIRLLLL
I felt my lips curve up in a tight, savage smile. “And then I’m going to finish what you started centuries ago. I will return these lands to Atlantia, and I will return with my King at my side.”
“Malec is not your father,” Nektas said. “The blood that courses through you is that of Ires, his twin.” Shock rolled through me as I stared at the draken’s back. Isbeth…she hadn’t confirmed that Malec was my father…and she had spoken of Malec in the past tense, as if she believed that he was gone. Oh my gods, Isbeth didn’t know where Malec was, and…
Casteel…he had been right. Nektas’s hands closed into fists. “Then your enemy is truly an enemy of ours.”
Nektas faced me. “From this moment to the last moment, they are yours, Queen of Flesh and Fire.”
Tell the Blood Queen to prepare for war.”
