A heavy boot struck the flagstones just outside the iron-banded door, rattling the hinges in their mortar beds. I turned sharply on my heel, ready to slip past the dark shelves and out into the lower utility tunnels before anyone could spot the Queen hiding in a dusty archive. Levin caught my wrist before I could take a second step. His fingers were cool against my skin, smelling faintly of crushed pine and damp earth.
“Let go,” I hissed, keeping my voice low enough to barely clear the space between us. “If the elders find me down here arguing with an outcast elf about my own laws, they will have a field day at the solstice council.”
“Let them look,” Levin murmured, tightening his grip just enough to keep me in place without causing a bruise. “The bottles are already endless, Lilly. They will never run low again, no matter what nonsense is being whispered in the upper corridors.”
I yanked my arm free, though I did not move away from him. “You do not understand how these factions work, Levin. If they think the source is failing, they will tear the court apart to find a scapegoat.”
“Even if the plant did need sunlight, your kingdom will never go hungry again,” he said, his tone softening as he stepped closer. “You have plenty of time to make a new plant. You are the one who grew this thing from a single northern seed, after all.”
“It is not that simple,” I muttered, staring past his shoulder toward the far corner where the Great White Fern sat in its mineral-lined wooden crate. “A conduit cannot simply be moved into the sun without losing its magical charge. The subterranean air is the only reason it holds the synthetic formula.”
“Then go look at it,” he challenged, nodding toward the dark alcove. “See for yourself what you actually built before you start panicking like a novice gardener.”
I crossed the damp floor, my velvet hem sweeping over the grit, and knelt beside the wooden box. The fronds of the Great White Fern pulsed with a faint, ghostly luminescence in the dark. I reached out, pressing my palm against the cool soil and channeling a trace of my botanical magic into the roots. The plant shivered, absorbing my energy with a familiar, greedy hum.
Then I traced a finger along the edge of the central frond, feeling the cellular density beneath the pale skin. My stomach dropped as the realization settled over me like a block of ice. Direct sunlight would not help this specimen thrive. It would scorch the delicate magical veins and kill the plant within a single hour.
“Well?” Levin asked, stopping just behind me. “What does your magic tell you?”
“It tells me the rumors are entirely false,” I said, standing up so fast my head spun. “Whoever told the elders that this fern needs sunlight to produce the endless blood was either profoundly ignorant or deliberately trying to sabotage the entire operation. If I had moved this to the upper courtyards as they demanded, the whole supply would have collapsed by sunset.”
I let out a harsh laugh, turning to face him with my hands clenched into fists at my sides. “They sit up there in their polished velvet chairs, trading lies and manufacturing crises just to test my patience. I spend every waking hour keeping this damn kingdom from tearing itself apart, and they cannot even be bothered to understand basic botany before they start demanding changes.”
“You give them too much credit,” Levin said quietly, watching me with an unreadable expression in his green eyes.
“I give them competence!” I snapped, my voice rising off the stone walls and echoing down the dark corridor. “I give them endless synthetic blood, I give them peace, and still they listen to every petty rumor whispered by Cassian’s lapdogs. I am sick of managing every single paranoia in this wretched domain.”
A sharp intake of breath echoed from the doorway. I spun around, my heart hammering against my ribs. Hunter stood in the open archway, his dark coat dusted with soot, flanked by two senior royal guards whose faces were carved from pure granite. They had heard every word.