His eyes flew wide, the blood draining from his face as he lunged forward, fists bunching in her ragged gown.

"How dare you," he roared, his voice cracking with a mix of horror and humiliated fury, shaking her like a rag doll. The denial burned in his throat, but her words struck true, unearthing the buried shame he had long suppressed. He can’t help but wonder how she had even known this in the first place.

"Lies! You Vile celestial poison!" he yelled trying everything in him to protect his shame from coming out, after all for now he could still use the privileges of his royalty to play his games. His mother who always protected him is no longer alive and wouldn’t want to let the reason she had started all these die.

She didn’t flinch this time, her laughter dying into a gasp of pain, but her gaze held his coldness, gleaming with the knowledge of a blade unsheathed.

"I know everything, Adam," she hissed, her voice dropping to a venomous whisper, each word dripping with triumphant scorn.

"You know nothing and make this be the first and the last time you speak of this out or I will make sure you have no tongue to speak again."

Rhynera scoffed once, and he couldn’t help but wonder if Rhynera would cower in fear when he spoke to him.

She had always respected his decision and loved him but the Rhynera who stared at him right now is so different.

"The king dotes on you as his heir, but your blood is never his? If you don’t want him learning the truth that you carry no dragon blood, no right to the throne then save me from this pit. Free me, and I will shield your secret."

"Shut your hell-cursed mouth!" he bellowed, releasing her with a shove that sent her sprawling again, his face a storm cloud of rage and dawning dread.

The cell spun around him, the weight of her revelation crushing his chest like a falling boulder.

Rhynera groaned, easing herself upright against the wall, her hands cradling her stomach with a tenderness that twisted the knife deeper.

A fresh wave of pain creased her features, but she forced a sly smile through it, her voice softening to a manipulative coo edged with desperation.

"This child is yours, Adam! Thread carefully so you don’t kill him before he gets to know who his father is?"

"Never! I have to be sure that this child is mine! I am not accepting any beast child to be mine!" he roared.

Rhynera broke into another peal of laughter, "Adam don’t forget this, you are no longer the crown prince, reduce your little expectation or even proud self and talk to me in a cool manner."

"Never! I will rule this realm just like my mother wants me to. I will do without any of your help."

Rhynera shrugged her shoulders as she stared back at him. "Then do... but don’t forget about your powers, too. Or have you forgotten? Your mother wove the spells that let you play with fire all these years. Why not try it now? Summon your flames without her crutch. See for yourself."

Adam’s hands shook as he stepped back, clenching them into fists until his nails drew blood.

He focused, willing the fire to his palms, the simple cantrip he’d mastered as a youth, a burst of heat to warm a hall or sear an enemy’s flesh. But nothing came.

Only a hollow ache, echoing her words. His knees buckled; he sank against the bars, the fight leaching from him like blood from a wound. Speechless, he stared at his empty hands, the prince’s mask cracking to reveal the terrified boy beneath.

Betrayal layered upon betrayal as his mother’s deception, and Rhynera’s web of lies.

Weakness flooded him, hot tears pricking his eyes, but he blinked them back, channeling the hurt into fresh venom.

"You... you are twisted, so you killed my mother because of this you devil, you knew my weakness and decided to kill my mother you evil creature!" he muttered, his voice hoarse, laced with a raw edge of despair. But Rhynera pressed her advantage, crawling closer on bruised knees, her eyes alight with calculated fervor.

She broke into a painful laughter this time around, "Have you ever treated me like a wife ever since I set foot into this place?"

He snorted at once, "What? I gave you power... You want me to treat you like my brother spoils his little brat." She snickered at this.

"Yes! You heard me right! Yes, for gracious sake I want to be treated that way!" she yelled out in tears.

"But you and your mother are just monsters!" she schooled his head and and Rhymera just swallowed her pains

"You see? Despite everything I am still the only one on your side now, I am the only one still willing to be your woman... not even Serena would do so. Adam. Save me so we can flee this crumbling realm together. I have allies in the Shadowver realm who will embrace you and give you a power of your own. Then we can come back and conquer it all."

He shook his head violently, the notion repulsing him even as it tempted the void in his soul.

"No! This throne is mine by right my plan, my vengeance. I need no shadow’s scraps!" His shout reverberated, but it rang hollow, undercut by the tremor in his voice.

Rhynera’s laugh returned, softer now, laced with mocking pity as she settled back, wincing. "Then leave me to rot. Forget your ’child’ watch how I save myself. My kin will storm these walls, they will crown me martyr and burn your realm to ash. You? You will have nothing, no allies or heirs. Just a bastard prince exposed."

Rage ignited anew, blinding and primal. Adam’s boot lashed out once more, catching her shoulder; she flew back, slamming into the cell wall with a sickening thud, a cry of agony escaping her lips as stars burst behind her eyes.

She slid down, clutching her side, breath coming in shallow, pained hitches, but even then, her eyes burned with unyielding fire.

"You can’t control me forever," she wheezed, blood trickling from her lip, her voice a rebellious rasp. "When this child comes, you will know bastard spawn or dragon’s blood. Pray it’s the latter, for your sake."

He whirled on his heel, storming from the cell, the iron gate clanging shut behind him like the tolling of doom. His footsteps echoed up the stairs, each one a hammer blow against his fracturing world.

The guards outside averted their eyes, sensing the thundercloud of his mood, but as he vanished into the gloom, a new shadow stirred from the corner’s veil.

Just then Lumina emerged from the shadows like mist given form, silent and inevitable.

Her hooded cloak of star-silk clung to her like liquid night. The hood shadowed her face, but it could not dim the quiet storm that radiated from her.

The guard at Rhynera’s cell door snapped alert, hand flying to the hilt of his sword.

Torchlight caught the sudden flare of fear in his eyes he had heard the stories of the blind princess who saw too much. But before steel could clear leather, Lumina’s gaze lifted and locked onto his.

Her eyes were no longer hidden. The blindfold had been discarded somewhere in the dark, and now those silver orbs burned with an otherworldly intensity.

They now glow like the usual filled enchantment, cold and vast as the void between stars.

Threads of compulsion thin, invisible filaments of will reached out and sank into the guard’s mind like roots into fertile soil. His breath caught in a silent gasp.

At once his body stiffened, spine rigid, muscles locked as though iron bands had wrapped around every joint.

Resistance flickered once then a frantic spark in his pupils guttered out. His sword hand fell limp. His mouth parted slightly, slack-jawed, eyes glazing into vacant obedience.

Lumina stepped closer, the star-silk whispering against the flagstones. Her voice, when she spoke, was soft yet held some kind of power.

"Listen once and listen well."

The words carried the weight of command and the quiet fury of someone who had endured betrayal in silence for too long.

She reached into the folds of her cloak and produced a small crystal bottle no larger than her thumb.

Inside, a clear elixir swirled with delicate golden motes that drifted like fireflies caught in amber.

She then pressed the vial into his open palm, closing his fingers around it with deliberate care.

"Give this to her," she murmured. "Discreetly. Slip it into her water before the dawn watch. Let no one see and speak of this to no soul or my gaze will unmake you."

The threat was delivered without heat, without a raised voice, yet it landed like frost on bare skin.

The guard’s head jerked in a single, mechanical nod. His eyes remained unfocused, pupils dilated, the spell rooting deeper with every heartbeat. He was a puppet now, strings invisible but absolute.

Lumina studied him a moment longer, then allowed the smallest curve to touch her lips a smirk, sharp and predatory, the expression of a chessmaster watching the final piece fall exactly where she had placed it years ago.

Her exile had been no defeat; it had been a feint, a long patience that let enemies believe her broken while she gathered threads of power in the dark.

Every ignored warning, every unheeded prophecy, had been a seed planted in blood-soaked soil. Now those seeds have bloomed.

She stepped back. A whisper of displaced air stirred the torch flames; the corridor seemed to fold around her.