Page 50 of Renegade Kingdom
The meeting room was chaos in the most organised sense of the word. Maps covered the central table, weighed down with stones and weapons and whatever else had been close to hand. Ezra was bent over one corner, pointing at something while two of his lieutenants nodded along. Dean and Maddox were having what looked like a heated but quiet discussion near the window. Ryder, still bright-eyed from training, was examining a supply manifest with a frown.
But it was Fizzle who caught my attention.
The owl griffin was perched on the windowsill, as was his habit, but he wasn’t participating in any of the conversations. He wasn’t offering cryptic commentary or impatient sighs orany of the other behaviours that had become so familiar over the months I’d known him. He was just... watching. Quietly. His feathers slightly ruffled, his eyes distant.
It set me immediately on edge. Fizzle was never quiet. Fizzle had opinions about everything and no compunction about sharing them whether you wanted to hear them or not. This subdued version was wrong somehow. Unsettling.
I looked at Alyssa and saw her watching Fizzle too, a frown creasing her brow. Something flickered in her expression. Guilt, maybe. Or recognition.
We’d been hard on him, I realised. All of us. The revelation about the secrets he’d kept, had felt like a betrayal. And maybe it had been. But Fizzle had also been fighting at Rhidian’s side for years before Alyssa came back. He’d lost his friend too. And instead of giving him space to grieve, we’d pushed him away.
Perhaps we’d been too hard on the little owl griffin who was only staying true to his oath. Perhaps, in our anger and hurt, we’d forgotten that he was hurting too.
Alyssa straightened beside me, and I felt her make a decision through the bond.
“Stop.”
The single word cut through the noise of the room like a blade. Every conversation died. Every head turned toward her.
Alyssa stepped forward, releasing my hand. “You’re not going.”
Ezra looked up from his maps, confusion written across his face. “What do you mean? All these people came here to fight for you. They’re ready. They want this.”
“And no one is taking this fight from them,” Alyssa said firmly. “But we cannot march two hundred people into the Wildling Forest and expect to walk out with all of them again. The forest is dangerous even for those who know it. For an army of this size,most of whom have never set foot in true wilderness, it would be a slaughter.”
Ezra’s jaw tightened. I could see him wanting to argue, the protective instinct that had driven him to build this army warring with the tactical reality of what Alyssa was saying.
“At least take some of us with you,” he said. “Your best fighters. People who can…”
“If we can’t survive the forest, we’ll never hold our own against Arik.” Alyssa’s voice was gentle but unyielding. “This isn’t about doubting their courage or their commitment. It’s about not wasting lives that we’re going to need in the battle to come. Let us find the Fifth Court. Let us get the answers we need. And when we come back, when we face Arik’s army on a battlefield where numbers and determination can actually make a difference, that’s when your people will matter most.”
The room was silent. I watched Ezra struggle with it, watched the other fighters in the room absorb what she was saying. Some of them looked relieved. Others looked frustrated. All of them were watching Alyssa with the same expression I’d seen on the ship and in the courtyard and everywhere else she went. That mixture of awe and hope and desperate, desperate need for someone to tell them what to do.
She carried that weight so gracefully. They probably didn’t even realise how heavy it was.
My eyes drifted to Fizzle, still perched on the windowsill. And I caught it. Just a flicker, barely there, gone almost before I registered it. But I saw it.
Happiness.
The owl griffin was happy. Not about being sidelined or overlooked or any of the thousand small slights he’d endured over the past few days. He was happy because Alyssa was making the right choice. Because the girl he’d helped raise, thedaughter he’d never had, was becoming the leader he’d always known she could be.
Fizzle caught me watching him and held my gaze for a moment. Something passed between us. An understanding, maybe. Or an acknowledgment of the complicated tangle of love and betrayal and forgiveness that lay ahead of all of them.
Then he looked away, and the moment passed.
Ezra was still arguing, but I could hear the resignation in his voice now. He knew she was right. He just didn’t want to admit it.
“At least let me accompany you to the edge of the forest,” he said finally. “You’ll need supplies for the journey, and someone should know where you went in case...” He trailed off, not wanting to finish the sentence.
“In case we don’t come out,” Alyssa finished for him. “Fine. You and a small group can come that far. But no further.”
Ezra nodded, and I saw the relief in his eyes. It wasn’t what he wanted, but it was something. A way to feel useful. A way to protect her, even if only for a little while longer.
Alyssa turned to the rest of the room, her gaze sweeping across the assembled fighters and strategists and hopeful soldiers. “I know this isn’t what you want to hear, but this is the reality of our situation. The fight that is coming to us is one that not everyone will survive. Train now while you have the chance. Hone your skills and trust that we will make it through to the Fifth Court and get what we need. Arik will know what we’ve done and he’ll come at us fast and with everything he has. We need to be ready. If you need to step away, if this fight isn’t what you signed up for, now is the time to leave for safety. In the meantime, we need to look down the Court, we need to prepare for a siege and to finally face the man who wants to destroy everything we love, who wants to see the end of Nymeria.”
No one argued.
No one even tried.
