Chapter 128

Ronan’s POV

Severin’s voice had no body in the room, only the old conclusion that fear entitled someone to rule. It showed me a ward around a sleeping child in Ashfall going dark. I could restore it before the cold reached the nursery if I accepted the command route for one moment. The image was sharp enough that I looked for the child’s breath in the red light.

“Soren,” Mara called toward the gate, “ask Ashfall whether they have a willing ward team ready.”

The communication stone crackled. Lucien answered from miles away, breathless and annoyed that the House had interrupted an argument already in progress. “The nursery ward has a council and two healers here. They know it may fail. They are putting a local one in place.”

The child mattered. So did the people beside her bed, already making a safer plan than the one offered to me f