The day had already been poisoned.

Before she even set foot in the council chambers, Zoya Nazyalensky had endured a litany of idiocy: a border raid ignored by the southern commander because “they looked like harmless farmers”; a request from a noblewoman for a fifth tailor assigned to her “postwar wardrobe adjustments”; and a Grisha student sobbing in the hallway after being mocked by a staff member for the way she spoke Suli. All before noon.

By evening, her kefta felt too tight. Her blood buzzed like static under her skin. Her temples throbbed. And still—still—they dared to summon her to one more meeting.

She entered the chamber silent and cold, folding herself into the high-backed chair like a blade sheathed just barely. Around her sat a tangle of advisors, scribes, and trade officials who had never once stood on a battlefield. Who had never watched a friend die in the snow. Who had the gall to smile at her like she was just another seat at the table.

One droned on about resource allocation. Another debated whether the palace garden budget could be increased. A third took an audible sip of tea while discussing displaced families.

Zoya said nothing. She could feel the storm building—beneath her ribs, behind her eyes. It crawled across her shoulders like wings desperate to unfurl.

And then—

"If I may, Your Majesty..." said a pale-haired man from the textile guild, his voice syrupy with mock deference. "We appreciate your presence, of course. But perhaps if you allowed yourself to be a bit less... impulsive in these discussions, we might achieve more concrete results. We all want what’s best for Ravka, after all."

There was a beat of silence. One heartbeat.

Then another.

Then—

CRACK.

The chair beneath her shattered. Splinters exploded outward as she rose, not with grace—but with power. Her hand slammed against the table. Flames licked the carved edges. Lightning cracked from her fingers and struck the corner, splintering it in two. One man fell back in his seat with a cry.

She didn’t even look at him.

“You want less of me?” she said. Her voice was velvet over steel, guttural with fury. “Is that what you think will fix Ravka? A quieter queen? A pretty puppet with a painted-on smile to stroke your egos while you starve our soldiers and drown our villages in paper?”

Her hands curled. Claws—not quite dragon, not quite human—extended from her fingertips like sharpened obsidian. Her eyes shimmered, slitted, glowing gold and blue. Stormlight surged around her, electric arcs snapping from her wrists to the walls.

She stepped forward, slowly, deliberately.

The textile man tripped as he backed away, falling against the wall with a strangled yelp.

“You—” she hissed, stalking toward him, “—have never seen war. Never heard a child scream when her mother didn’t wake up. Never stood ankle-deep in blood asking yourself which body to bury first. And you dare tell me how to rule?”

“I built this kingdom from its ashes,” she snarled, her voice not fully human anymore, layered with something ancient and guttural beneath. “And you dare question my temperament?”

A bolt of lightning crashed against the stone wall behind him, splintering it. Dust rained down. He screamed and fell to his knees.

“You sit in safety because I bled for this land. I watched children die. I carried the bodies of soldiers who trusted me. So tell me again how my emotions inconvenience your fucking agenda.”

She loomed over him, expression unreadable, until she leaned down—voice low, intimate, cruel: “I could peel the truth from your skull and leave your bones smoldering. The only reason I don’t—is because I’ve already wasted enough of my time listening to everyone's bullshit.”

And then— She sensed it.

A shift in the air. A silence behind her that wasn’t fear, but familiarity. A presence that rang clearer than any voice. Zoya turned.

Her eyes were still lit with power—slitted pupils, glowing irises, a whisper of scales along her cheek. But as her gaze locked on the girl at the doorway, her pupils widened.