The banners of Thorne flew over Rithmar's palace by sunrise.
Black and gold, stitched with twin phoenixes, they replaced the hawk-crested flags that had once lined the marble towers. The city had not burned. There had been no siege. No final battle. Just silence, and then surrender.
Elara had not marched with fire.
She had marched with inevitability.
Rithmar's army, broken in the valley, had no strength left to defend its capital. Its nobles, once proud and defiant, now bowed in the throne room where Ravean had once ruled. And Ravean himself—stripped of his crown, his voice, and his pride—knelt in chains at the foot of the dais where Elara now stood.
She did not sit on his throne.
She did not need to.
She stood before it, taller than any monarch who had ever claimed it, and addressed the court.
"Rithmar is no longer a threat," she said. "It is a ward of Thorne."
The nobles murmured, some in fear, others in awe.
"You will keep your lands. Your titles. Your people. But you will answer to Thorne. You will pay tribute to Thorne. And you will never again raise arms against your queen."
She looked down at Ravean.
"And you," she said, "will live. Not as a king. But as a reminder."
He looked up at her, eyes hollow. "You think this is mercy?"
"No," she said. "This is justice."
She turned to her guards. "Take him to the Iron Keep. He will live out his days in silence."
—
The transition was swift.
Thorne's governors were installed in Rithmar's ports and courts. Trade resumed—under Thorne's seal. The people, weary of war and hungry for stability, welcomed the change. They had seen what Elara could do. They had seen what she would not tolerate.
And they had chosen peace.
—
Back in Thorne, the capital erupted in celebration.
But Elara did not join them.
She stood in the royal library, surrounded by scrolls and silence, her fingers tracing the edge of a map that now bore no borders between Thorne and Rithmar.
Kael entered quietly. "It's done," he said.
Elara nodded. "No more black feathers. No more whispers."
He stepped beside her. "You've changed the world."
She looked at him. "I didn't want to."
"But you did."
She turned to him, her voice soft. "Now we have to hold it."
The crown was heavy, but the silence was heavier.
Weeks had passed since Rithmar's surrender. The banners of Thorne now flew from every tower, every port, every gate. The world called it peace. The nobles called it victory. But Elara called it unfinished.
She needed to see it for herself. so when her and kael had returned to Rithmar's she made a decision only her knew about.
So one night, under the cover of darkness, she shed her silks and jewels, wrapped herself in a coarse traveler's cloak, and slipped from the palace through the old servant tunnels. No guards. No Kael. No Lucien. Just her and the city she had conquered.
She crossed the river into the lower districts of Rithmar's capital—once opulent, now quiet. The streets were lit by lanterns and murmurs. Markets still bustled, but the laughter was thinner. The people bowed to Thorne's soldiers, but their eyes didn't shine.
Elara moved through the crowd like smoke, listening.
At a tavern near the docks, she sat in the corner, hood drawn low. A group of merchants argued over mugs of bitter ale.
"She's clever, I'll give her that," one said. "But clever doesn't feed mouths."
"She ended the war," another replied. "That should count for something."
"Maybe," the first muttered. "But peace doesn't pay taxes. And Thorne's taxes are steep."
Elara said nothing. She sipped her drink and listened.
Later, in the alley behind the baker's row, she found a group of children playing with carved wooden soldiers—some painted in Thorne's black and gold, others in Rithmar's crimson and gray.
One boy held up a Thorne soldier and made it bow. "I am Queen Lyria," he said in a mock voice. "Kneel or burn."
The others laughed.
Elara's stomach twisted.
She moved on.
In the temple district, she found an old woman lighting candles at a shrine.
"They say she's just like Maereth," the woman whispered to no one. "But Maereth ruled with fire. This one rules with silence."
Elara stepped closer. "And is that better?"
The woman didn't look up. "It's colder."
—
By dawn, Elara returned to the palace.
She stood before her mirror, pulling the cloak from her shoulders, her reflection staring back at her—not as Queen Lyria, not as Elara of Thorne, but as a woman who had built a world too vast to see from a throne.
Kael found her there, still in the plain clothes, her eyes distant.
"You were gone," he said.
"I needed to see," she replied.
"And what did you find?"
She met his gaze. "Gratitude. Fear. Hunger. Resentment. Hope."
He stepped closer. "Do they hate you?"
"Some do," she said. "Some love me. Most… don't know what to feel."
Kael nodded. "Then we give them time."
"No," Elara said. "We give them reason."
She turned to the window, watching the city stir beneath the rising sun.
"I didn't come to rule ashes. I came to build something better."