Chapter 226: Fire Without Flame

It’s a terrible thing, learning the limits of hope. I always thought deep down, secretly, recklessly that I was special. Not for the crown, or the blood, or the system whispering impossible things in my head, but because every story I’d ever read about girls like me lost, reborn, chosen ended with a miracle. A clever trick, a twist of fate, a timely rescue. A bit of magic, and everything righted itself.

Tonight, there was only the cold. Only silence where the system used to hum behind my thoughts. Only the echo of my siblings’ names, Aeris and Arion, in the gutted corridors of a castle suddenly too large for anyone to save.

Velka stood beside me, knuckles white on her dagger hilt. Mara and Elira blocked the door, faces set with the grim purpose of women who had already decided which bones they were willing to break, and which they would die protecting. The world outside raged shouts, magic, alarms. Within, I felt small as a shadow beneath the moon.

“They took them,” I said, again, as if saying it enough might rewrite the last hour. “They really took them. And I—”

“And you did everything you could,” Velka cut in. Her voice had iron edges tonight, all the velvet and wicked laughter burned away. “This isn’t over, Elyzara. You know that. You’ve outplayed worse than these idiots.”

“I had the system,” I whispered. “I had…something. Now it’s just me.”

Elira, ever practical, knelt by the shattered map on the war table. “We need facts. The rebels planned this. They wanted the twins. They used dampening fields and null spells old magic, expensive, not easy to deploy. This is no street riot.”

Mara’s eyes glimmered rage and guilt and something almost like hope. “We have the best trackers in the city, half the staff’s got nothing left to lose, and Velka’s got teeth sharper than any revolution. We’ll find them. But we need a lead.”

Outside, a crash distant, but too close for comfort. Riven rushed in, out of breath, clutching a battered ledger.

“Found this dropped by one of the rebels fleeing the kitchens,” he gasped. “I think it’s a codebook. Or possibly their dinner menu. It’s mostly cheese drawings and lists of names.” He tried a shaky smile.

I took the ledger, hands trembling. The world blurred, pages smeared with hope and fear. There halfway down a page, written in a childish scrawl, the names “Aeris” and “Arion.” Next to them, a symbol a broken phoenix, circled twice.

Velka leaned in. “That’s the sigil of the old Guildhall. It’s abandoned, but the tunnels below it link up with half the city’s catacombs.”

“Then that’s where we start,” Mara said, drawing her sword. “We go now.”

“No.” I shook my head, throat tight. “We go smart. If we charge in, they’ll hurt the twins or worse, vanish into the tunnels again. We need a distraction. Something only the real princess can provide.”

Elira grinned, teeth sharp. “A decoy? Or a spectacle?”

“Both,” Velka said, catching on. “Elyzara, you can’t use magic, but you still have a crowd’s worth of nerves. Let the rebels see you make them think you’re negotiating. Mara and Elira can slip beneath, through the old kitchens. Riven can run interference with the staff and city guard.”

I swallowed. “If they see me, they might hurt the twins faster.”

Velka met my gaze, serious as I’d ever seen her. “Or they’ll get careless, thinking they’ve already won.”

My heart pounded—fear, shame, the memory of my siblings’ small hands in mine. All the stories I’d ever told them about bravery and dragons, about queens who saved their families folded into a knot in my chest.

I nodded. “All right. I’ll play the villain. Or the hero. Or whatever this war needs. But if this goes wrong ”

Mara clapped my shoulder, rough and warm. “We’re not letting it go wrong. Not this time.”

We moved quickly through secret halls, across hidden stairways, avoiding shattered windows and the angry voices of rebels who had not yet realized the tide could turn. I walked out into the ruined central courtyard, flanked by a handful of battered loyalists, shoulders square.

The crowd saw me, and a hush fell a hundred faces, most in masks, some in tears, all waiting for a sign. Somewhere in the crowd, the leader of the rebellion a woman in crimson, with eyes hard as winter stepped forward.

“So,” she called, voice echoing across stone and broken banners, “the princess finally faces the people she betrayed.”

I felt every eye on me, the ache of my lost magic, the absence of the system a silence more profound than anything the rebels could muster. But I stood, chin high.

“I’ve betrayed a lot of things,” I said, letting my voice carry. “My own expectations, for one. My tutors’ hopes, my parents’ trust, my own faith in fairy-tale endings. But I never once stopped loving this kingdom. Even now.”

The crowd shifted, uncertain. The rebel leader spat at my feet. “Love isn’t enough to heal a wound.”

“No,” I said, softer. “But it’s enough to stop you from making it worse.”

That got them. Murmurs rippled doubt, maybe, or confusion. Behind me, Velka melted into shadow, and I knew Mara and Elira were already gone, racing through the catacombs. Riven’s voice, loud and clumsy as always, rang out from the kitchens something about a fire in the bakery, a riot among the flour sacks, a truly heroic act of sabotage involving jam.

The rebels’ attention shifted, fracturing. I pressed on. “You want a monster? Fine. I can be one. I can be the last tyrant of the Phoenix Crown. Or I can be the first to admit this world needs more than crowns. It needs bridges. It needs peace.”

The rebel leader hesitated. “And the twins?”

My throat closed. “Let them go. They’re children. If you want a hostage, take me.”

A pause then chaos. A messenger ran to the leader, whispering. The woman’s eyes narrowed, then flicked to her followers. “Bring the twins. If the princess wants to trade she’ll pay the price.”

But before anyone could move, an explosion rocked the north wall Mara’s doing, or Elira’s. The crowd panicked. In the confusion, Velka seized my arm and pulled me back, running for the catacomb entrance.

“Come on,” she hissed. “They’re moving the twins. We can cut them off now!”

We ran through dust and fear and the shouts of battle, down twisting stairs and into the cold belly of the city.

I was Elyzara, daughter of queens, would-be tyrant, half-broken leader powerless, desperate, and for the first time, certain that my story was not going to end with a miracle.

But I ran anyway. Because sometimes, hope is just running toward the fire, with nothing left to lose but everything you love.