“Your Majesty!” Medith stood her ground, her emerald eyes like twin blades cutting up toward the lofty Queen. “I crossed blades with them last night. They were a ragtag guerrilla of roughly three hundred, scattered like weeds in wind, yet their formation, gear, and anti-magic gave them a steel spine. On a frontal field, they matched a hundred B-rank sharpshooters, like wolves meeting wolves.

“Think about that gap, like a canyon opening underfoot. One unnumbered guerrilla unit already holds more than half the spine of our city’s elites. That’s with my drilling, like a whetstone on dull iron. If a formal force of over a thousand arrives, like a tide under a full moon, we’re finished.

“While there’s time, I beg Your Majesty to issue a decree. One month of strict training, like quenching steel in snowmelt, to brace for the blow that may fall. If not, when humans return like storm banners on the horizon, it will be the day Xurenxus City falls like a snapped bowstring.”

She knelt, arms folded in respect, her voice blazing like a brushfire. Cold ran down Sais’s back like meltwater, her surprise cracking like ice. She’d thought Medith only had a quick tongue, a polish on boots. She hadn’t expected her words to wring sweat like rain from her skin.

It was instinct, like a deer smelling smoke. Sais wasn’t dull, and her gifts sat open as a ledger; that’s why fear pricked her. Medith spoke hard truth. Not worry. Not prophecy. A fact set in stone.

“Your Majesty…” Sais drew breath. The Queen’s Scepter slammed down with a thunderous thoom, and the great hall groaned like an old tree in wind, as if the whole building woke in pain.

Everyone flinched, a winter of silence frosting the air.

“You’re a child—what do you know?” The Queen’s silver teeth ground like grit. Her flawless face twitched like a storm-tossed lake. “You think I don’t know this?

“You know how strong humans are. Do you know how strong my city stands? We have three hundred thousand sprites in the city, like stars tucked in a valley. Thirty thousand can fight, like a blade drawn from its sheath.

“D-rank sprites, fifteen thousand, a forest of spears. C-ranks, five thousand, a ridge of stone. B-ranks, six hundred, barbed arrows in a full quiver. A-ranks, fifty, mountain peaks on the skyline. Holy Elves, four, pillars at the gate. Elders Council, four, old pines that don’t bend. And I sit in command, an anvil at the forge.

“The great Elder factions stand with us, and the veteran city guard holds the walls like mortar. Together they form a thirty-thousand-strong magical battle corps, a storm wall I judge with my own eyes. I don’t need you telling me how to rule.”

She rose in fury, her proud chest heaving like surf. Rage burned through her, a wildfire she’d never expected to taste in public. No one had slapped her face before the crowd—least of all someone she’d admired.

Hearing the muster, Medith’s brows knit like drawn bowstrings. She hadn’t known these figures. Thirty thousand in a magical battle corps, and male marksmen, five hundred strong, like black arrows in a white sky. Above them stood A-rank sprites, and Sais’s so-called Holy Elves, like stars above peaks.

Such force could blunt most assaults, like cliffs breaking waves. Doubt stirred in Medith’s chest like a leaf in a whirlpool. Maybe the peace the Queen leaned on had steel ribs. Maybe her own fear was a phantom she’d chased at noon.

“Keep them ‘intact.’ That’s the Count’s order.”

“I’ve no idea what’ll happen.”

“Strictly speaking, we don’t even have formal numbers.”

“Good. Next time, keep that pride.”

The words flickered through her mind like crows across snow. She saw that emblem again, a beast’s maw like an abyss. She heard that unknown weapon thoom—thoom—thoom, like a heart beating under a mountain. Resolve hardened like frost.

“Your Majesty’s forces are mighty. Our clan’s strength is beyond doubt. Precisely because of that, we must show it like lightning before rain. Have these forces tasted killing war even once, like iron drinking blood?

“Do they have the bones of doctrine and the spine of iron discipline, like a book with rules and a blade with edge? Will they crush their own gentler self and become devils to guard their home, like guardians standing in fire?

“When war strikes like a hammer at dawn, can they set their gear and steady their hearts in a breath, and meet humans like demons, and weapons we don’t yet know? Nobles in the kingdom hold heavy troops like private fortresses. And above them, the Royal Hunt Corps is a spear in the king’s hand. We’re not meeting a legion. We’re meeting a kingdom, like an ocean against our shore.

“Without strict training and law like iron rings, we won’t even have the courage to abandon the city when we must, like a captain scuttling his ship to save lives. War never listens to reason. Never.” A buried memory rose like smoke, and anger burned so hot it drew tears from her eyes like rain from thunderheads.

“Nonsense! Seize her! I’ll take her head!” The Scepter fell again, and the floor bucked with a shockwave, like a drumskin struck by a giant. The nearby throne shattered into gravel, and the shards swept toward Medith like sleet.

She raised no guard. She did not dodge. The stones hammered her armor into pitted dents like hail on tin. Blood sheeted her face like red rain. The force was more than she’d guessed; it almost broke her like a reed.

Dragging a body that swayed like a burnt banner, she groaned, voice a thin ember in wind. “A long levee fails from an ant’s burrow; a snug room burns from a hairline wisp. To stand, we must break; after ruin, we build. Those beyond our kin will never share our heart. The realm’s rise and fall sits on every shoulder like a stone. When a ruler strays into fog, a vassal must speak like a bell. If even one line reaches Your Majesty’s ear, what fear have I of death?”

Blood masked her face, yet she looked at the Queen with eyes like a river of stars. Hearts in the hall stumbled, like hooves catching on stone.

“Your Majesty, Medith is loyal to the bone,” Euticles caught the tottering girl, his voice steady as a stake. “She bears our burden like a packhorse, but she’s still young, untried by wind and dust. She is rare talent, and a true minister. Show mercy.”

“Your Majesty!” Sais knelt, her robe pooling like water. “I propose we confine Medith in the Place of Judgment, then let Your Majesty pass sentence. She just won a great victory, known citywide like a bell heard at dusk. If she dies unexplained today, the ministers will wail like winter wolves. Please think twice.”

“You dare threaten me?” The Queen’s silver teeth clicked like ice cracking. She felt her crown slipping like sand through fingers.

“Your Majesty, you’re in anger’s grip like a storm-tossed boat. I beg you to think, then act,” the Elders Council and the sprites in the chamber all knelt, their plea rising like a tide.

“Fine. Fine. Fine!” The Queen laughed in fury, a blade’s cold ring. “She shakes our foundation like an earthquake. She shakes our faith like wind in flame. She desecrates the forebears’ work like muddy feet in a shrine. Every day, war, war, war!

“Our ancestors bled beside humans to buy this peace like a harvest after famine. What’s wrong with enjoying it? Must we paint rivers with blood to be satisfied? I’ll kill her. If you won’t move, I will.” She raised the Scepter, the crystal head glinting like cold dawn, aimed at Medith.

“Your Majesty, I invoke veto power.” Euticles drew a broken token from his breast, its carved head of the Ancestor Master gleaming like old jade, three pieces missing like teeth.

The Queen froze, a ripple across glass. “Euticles, you would defy your sovereign?”

“I only use my right,” he said, voice flat as a whetstone. “If Your Majesty calls that defiance, I have nothing more to say.”

“I invoke veto power,” another Elder intoned, steady as rain.

“I invoke veto power,” the third followed, like a second drumbeat.

“I invoke veto power,” the fourth finished, like thunder completing the roll.

The four tokens rose and clicked together like magnets, becoming one. The Ancestor Master’s likeness bloomed in full, the same face as on the statue, like a mirror catching light.

“Fine. Fine. Fine!” The Queen flung down the Scepter, its ring sharp as steel. “Remember what you did today. When humans break our gate like a battering ram, that will be your day of regret. War has no winners.” She hugged her book to her chest and strode off like a meteor, vanishing beyond their sightline.

Sprites withdrew like a plague wind sweeping a field. In under a minute, only the Elders Council remained with Sais, Melia, and a few others, like lights left after festival lamps go dark.

Medith’s vision blurred like ink in water. She looked at them, and darkness closed like a curtain.

…

…

“So the Elders used their once-in-a-century veto for me?” Medith spoke through a green wreath on her head, the leaves cool on her brow like dew.

Sais nodded. “When the Ancestor Master founded the Elvenfolk, he foresaw this, like a chess player thinking ten moves ahead. To prevent a Queen’s mistake, he gave the Elders Council veto power. All four must agree, and they get it once a century, like a comet’s pass.

“The Queen can’t deny the token. That would deny the Ancestor Master, like spitting at the sun. If she still pressed on after the token, the Council Assembly and the Elders Council could depose her. It’s iron law, like chains on a gate. Even if we didn’t act, other Queens would send people to cleanse a Queen who broke it.”

“Other Queens?” Medith’s confusion rose like mist.

“Our Wind Sprite line alone has four Queens,” Sais said, laying out more truths like stones on a river path. “Not to mention the Light Elves and the Dark Elves.”

“The Elf Clan isn’t as simple as I thought,” Medith rubbed her temples, a headache blooming like a bruise. She’d fallen out with the Queen, and the Elders had spent their thunder, like a thunderhead emptied of rain. Winning the Queen back would be like catching the moon in a well.

“Damn. I should’ve asked her for some base forces first,” she muttered, a spark in dry grass. “But I don’t regret it. Time’s a knotted rope. They’ll return, muster, and move within a month, like geese wheeling south. If I don’t gamble now, we won’t make it.”

“I know. So I’ll help you in secret,” Sais said, ruffling Medith’s hair like wind in young wheat. “You—your tongue is a knife, and your guts are fatter than a boar’s. You’re the first to corner a Queen like this, in all our annals. The ‘worst’ sprite in history.”

Medith said nothing. Her gaze slipped to the peaceful view outside, rooftops and trees like silk under sunlight. Her expression tangled like vines.