Moments later,
Still in the Chamber of Aethelred, beneath the Black Citadel.
The air was thick enough to choke on as Lumira stood at the center of the vast, circular chamber.
The ancient marble streaked with veins of silver that pulsed faintly with restrained magic. Above, chandeliers of floating crystal bathed the Senate in pallid light, their glow falling over a thousand watchful eyes.
The Decemvirate of Shadows and Flame - ten of the most powerful beings in the supernatural realm - sat in their elevated crescent around her.
"A-are you sure that's what you want?" Selena Moondrake inquired, her voice quivering due to the fire in Lumira's crystal eyes.
There were vampires, warlocks, were beasts, faes, and several other supernatural creatures in the hall. Each represented an empire, each despised her family's bloodline, and yet Lumira's voice did not waver.
"I wish to reclaim the Wastelands of Nespresso," she repeated. "By the rites of inheritance, by bloodline, by the seal of my grandmother Evelyn Duskbane, I claim dominion as its rightful heir."
Her declaration rippled through the hall like the toll of a death bell.
For a heartbeat, there was silence. Then, laughter.
It came from Alpha Kaelen Ironfang, the Lycan Lord, whose voice always carried the stench of arrogance.
"A girl who crawled back from death now speaks of dominion?" he sneered. "Tell me, witchling, did the worms sign your claim with their teeth?"
A murmur of amusement ran through the audience of lesser senators, courtiers, and envoys. Their laughter was cruel, like the cracking of ice.
Lady Evelyn Duskbane's cane struck the floor once - crack! - and the laughter died instantly.
She rose slowly, the purple and black folds of her robe whispering as she straightened. Her silver hair caught the light like a blade's edge. Though she was nearly two centuries old, there was nothing frail in her presence only the coiled fury of a woman who'd built and buried empires.
"Mind your tongue, Ironfang," Evelyne said, her voice laced with velvet and venom. "Your pack still owes my house thirty acres of treaty land and two lives. Would you like me to collect them now?"
Kaelen's grin faltered, soon the chamber's mirth bled away.
And that was when the Shadow Emissary appeared.
The torches guttered low as a ripple of darkness spread across the floor. From it rose a tall faceless inhuman figure cloaked in smoke that shimmered with shifting sigils. The temperature dropped, and breaths misted.
Even the arrogant nobles straightened, for the Emissary was not bound by politics or persuasion. It was law given shape.
It moved without footsteps to the dais and spoke in a voice that seemed to come from every corner of the room at once.
"The claim is heard," it intoned. "The House of Duskbane invokes ancestral right, but the law is older than blood.
Only the living may claim dominion.
Only breath may hold land.
Therefore, the claimant shall undergo the Three Trials of Life."
The words fell like thunder, and for several seconds, the hall was nothing but heavy with choking, silence.
Then came the uproar.
Dozens of voices erupted at once—senators rising, cloaks swirling, and hands slamming tables. The air was filled with competing cries: some for order, most for blood.
"Absurd!"
"Let her prove it!"
"It's true she shouldn't even be here!"
"A Duskbane walking free is an insult to the law!"
Lumira's pulse hammered, but she still stood unmoving in the storm.
Above her, her grandmother's fury broke loose.
"You will not put her through that barbaric relic!" Evelyne thundered, voice cutting through the chaos like a whip. "The Trials were outlawed a century ago!"
Selena Moondrake, the High Regent of the Witch Council, leaned forward in her throne of obsidian, lips curling into a smile too precise to be human.p
"Outlawed for convenience, not for justice," she said. "The Trials remain codified in the Aethelred Edicts. You of all people should remember - you wrote them."
"To bind the dead, not the living!" Evelyne snapped. "You dare twist the law to punish my bloodline because you fear it?"
"I do not fear what's already fallen." Selena's eyes glittered.
Murmurs rippled through the chamber again. Fae lords nodded; vampiric envoys whispered behind gloved hands. It was the first time in decades they had seen Lady Evelyne angry - not controlled, not cold, but burning in fury.
The Shadow Emissary turned slightly toward her, its form flickering.
"The law is not subject to sentiment," it said. "The claimant has returned from death once. The integrity of her life must be proven."
Lady Evelyn slammed her cane into the marble again, sparks crackling beneath it. The runes embedded in the floor flared purple.
"You insult the legacy of the Duskbane line," she hissed. "My granddaughter has the breath of the living, the pulse of magic, and the soul-mark of the First Witch herself. She needs no trial!"
"Then she will pass them easily," Kaelen said, eyes gleaming with cruel delight. "Or she won't. Either way, justice is served."
A sharp voice joined him as Lord Veythar, the vampire senator, lounging with studied boredom in his throne.
"Perhaps this will settle a century's worth of gossip," he said. "Let the trials decide what even death could not."
The hall buzzed with eager malice but Evelyne's gaze swept them all, cold and disdainful.
"Vultures. You want to see her bleed because you cannot stomach her living."
She turned toward the Emissary again.
"If she dies in your trials, I swear upon the Twelve Seals, I will burn this chamber to ash and salt the ruins."
The threat hung heavy... because everyone knew she could.
The Shadow Emissary merely inclined its faceless head.
"The law does not fear flame."
A pulse of shadow rippled outward. The torches dimmed even further. The chamber's sigils glowed, sealing the judgment in ancient light.
Lady Evelyn's fury gave way to desperation. She turned to Lumira, gripping her cane.
"Don't do this," she whispered fiercely. "They want you broken. They want you erased again. Let me handle them."
Lumira met her grandmother's gaze. Behind the older woman's defiance, she saw fear - not for reputation, but for her.
And beneath that fear… was faith.
She'd fought her way back from death once before. She could do it again.
Lumira drew in a slow breath. The air tasted of iron and candle smoke. All eyes were on her.
"If only the living may claim dominion," she said quietly, "then let the living prove herself."
Her unshaken and clear voice carried across the hall live.
"Lumira..." Evelyne's lips parted, but Lumira kept going.
"You want your spectacle? You'll have it. I accept the Three Trials of Life."
The words detonated through the chamber.
For a moment, even the Emissary hesitated - as though the shadow itself needed to breathe.
Then, slowly, it bowed.
"So be it. By blood and by breath, the trials have been invoked. The claimant shall be tested by life, by will, and by heart."
A deep rumble answered from beneath the marble, ancient mechanisms stirring in the dark. The crystal chandeliers flickered, bleeding red light.
Old magic had awakened, because the law had been spoken, and there would be no turning back.
Evelyne stood rigid, eyes glistening with unspoken pride and dread. Around them, the senators whispered like carrion birds, already debating wagers.
Kaelen's teeth gleamed and Selena's smile was triumphant.
But Lumira stood tall beneath the dying light, her heart pounding not with fear, but with fire.
The shadows around the dais began to twist, forming a seal beneath her feet - an ancient sigil of life and death intertwined.
The Shadow Emissary's voice rolled like thunder one last time:
"The First Trial awaits.
When the mirror calls your reflection, you will enter.
Survive it, and the Senate shall recognize your life.
Fail… and your name will be struck from every book that remembers you."
The sigil flared, and in that blinding light, Lumira's last thought before the trial began was of Lady Evelyn's trembling hand on hers when the rode in the car - full of iron and warmth, legacy and love.