The voice arrives when I'm alone.

It never shouts. Never screams. It murmurs, coiling around my mind like a serpent clutching its prey.

"Why do you fight me?"

I don't answer. I never do.

Standing outside the city gates, I tighten the straps of my armor and roll my shoulders. The castle stands tall on the horizon, its white stone towers illuminated by the sun's final rays. Inside those walls, past layers of noble hubris and regal custom, the princess waits.

My best friend. My only real friend.

Tonight is the royal banquet. I'd been summoned to attend — not as a guest, but as a knight. Another soldier in shining armor, just another sword in the hand of the Holy Dominion. But I know better than to imagine this is a mere convening of fools in golden robes.

The king wants something. And when the king desires, pain follows in its wake.

"You should let me in."

The voice slithers back through my skull. The Demon Spirit. That thing inside of me, captured at birth.

I let out a slow breath, sending it back. It's not real. Not in the way people think. Nobody else can hear it, nobody else can feel it curling inside my veins when I draw too close to losing control. But it's always there. Watching. Waiting.

Pulling my hood up, I step onto the stone bridge that leads to the castle. The guards step aside without a word, recognizing me. I'm not nobility, but I have my name.

Raiden of House Kaelith. Knight of the Dominion. The warrior's bloodline, the so-called chosen ones.

I don't believe in fate. But fate most certainly believes in me.

"You hesitate. You doubt. You're afraid of what you can become."

As I stepped into the eyes of the castle's entrance my sword hummed by my side. Chandeliers of enchanted crystal dangle from the ceiling, their gentle light cast the ballroom in gold. Lords and ladies dance in silk and velvet, their voices lost in bottomless tide pools of politics and greed.

And then, before I can take even one more step, something hits me from the side.

I barely have time to react before an arm slides around my shoulders and I'm abruptly pulled through the crowd, away from the center of the ballroom and into the gloom behind the pillars. My ears are flooded with a peal of light, unrestrained laughter, and I'm already aware of who it belongs to before I even lay eyes on her face.

Lysara.

She releases, twirling away in a grand bow, the floor-length swathes of her gown trailing in the wake of her motion. Her emerald eyes sparkle with mischief, her golden curls tousled from whatever trouble she's already gotten into tonight.

"I'm Raiden," she says, grinning at me too wide. "You look like you're not even here right now."

I look up at the nobles making the arc in the middle of the hall, feigning interest in their own words. Then I look at the throne, where the king observes it all with that very same calculating look.

"As if you're in a position to say something," I say under my breath. "You're the princess. You should be smiling at your suitors, or whatever it is you're supposed to be doing."

She puts her hands together in feigned horror.

"Oh, gods forbid. What a terrible fate."

I huff a laugh against myself.

Lysara is… impossible. She's been trapped within this place her whole life, raised to be a perfect daughter, a perfect future queen. And yet she somehow acts like it doesn't matter. As if she can simply decide to be free.

I envy that.

"So, are you here for overpriced wine and scowling at people, or do you have a reason for dragging me into the shadows?" I ask.

She leans forward, speaking a little less loudly.

"Something's wrong, Raiden."

And just like that, the levity buzz is lifted out of the atmosphere.

"What?"

She looks over her shoulder to make sure nobody is listening. When she speaks next her voice is softer, measured.

"Father is plotting something."

I turn to where she's looking up at the throne. The king is sitting, still, but I can see it now — the tension of his posture, the gleam of his eyes. He's waiting for something.

"What kind of something?" I ask.

Lysara shakes her head.

"I don't know. But I don't like it. And neither should you."

A frown crosses my face as I tighten my fingers on my sword hilt. The king doesn't plot for anything. He's got something up his sleeve, and people are going to bleed for it.

I look back at Lysara, at the way she bounces on her feet, impossibly unfocused. To her, this isn't mere politics. She's scared.

I don't like that.

"I'll see about it," I say to her. "Keep your nose clean, Lysara."

She snorts, shaking her head.

"Please. You know and I know that's impossible."

She's right.

But before either of us has time to say anything else, I feel it again.

A shift in the air. A presence. Watching.

I look down toward the far end of the hall.

And that's when I see her.

Sipping in the dark, standing on the edge of the ballroom, untouched by the light. She isn't speaking to anyone. She isn't moving. She's just… standing there. Staring at me.

She looks into my eyes, and a slow smile spreads across her lips.

A chill runs down my spine.

For some reason, something about her makes my skin crawl.

"Who is that?" I murmur.

Lysara tracks my gaze and frowns.

"Who?"

I turn to look at her.

She's confused.

She can't see the woman at all.

And tonight, the Demon Spirit does not whisper for the first time.

It laughs.

There she is, in the recess of light, a specter at the threshold of the ballroom.

They're darting emeralds that blaze under the flickering chandeliers, the deep green irises almost unnatural against the third white skin of her smooth face. Her dark curls hang in tousled elegance around her face, wrapped in layers of black lace and silk, like a lady of nobility in formalwear for a funeral.

Her lips—tinted the color of vintage wine—twist into a smile. Not polite. Not kind. Something dark, more knowing. The kind of smile that didn't need words to ask:

I see you.

A gloved finger taps a the cigarette between her lips. She is partially lit in the soft glow of an ember flaring for an instant, revealing shadows under her eyes. She releases smoke slowly, deliberately, as though time eases around her.

And she is watching me. Only me.

Not the nobles. Not the king. Not even the princess sitting next to me.

Me.

A cold shiver runs through my spine, impulse screeching at me to shift, to speak, to look away. But I don't. I can't.

"You see me."

I don't hear her voice. I feel it. A murmur a few layers deep in my mind, smooth and quiet, but speaking insistently. Persistent.

The Demon Spirit stirs. This time, it does not whisper. It listens.

And then—

"Raiden?"

Lysara's voice pulls me back.

I blink.

The woman is gone.

As if she were never even there.

I don't move for a second, still trying to process what I just glimpsed.

No one else reacted. The nobility laugh on, drinking their fine wine. Nothing happened in what the musicians play.

Lysara frowns at me, head cocked.

"You okay? You appear to be scared out of your wits.

I breathe in. She's not wrong.

"I'm fine..,"

Her eyes narrow a little, but before she can utter another word —

"Raiden Kaelith."

A voice calls my name, and every muscle in my body bristles.

I turn.

Seraphis Valerian stands at the side of the dance floor, wearing immaculate black and silver armor, his noble crest pinned to his chest. His silver hair is swept back, his sharp features unreadable in the flickering light of the chandelier. His sword is strapped to his side, but here the true weapon is his gaze — slicing, never yielding.

I feel the burden of responsibility within them. The certainty.

He is the perfect knight. Everything I should have been.

The crowd nearby quiets slightly, noticing the tension. Even the king watches with passing interest from his throne.

"I have words to share with you," says Seraphis, his tone flat. Controlled.

I glance at Lysara. She goes rigid next to me; the folds of her dress tighten in her grip.

She knows what this is.

And so do I.

"Of course," I say, shrugging off my shoulders. "Let's talk."