Kael was forty years old when he realized he was no longer young.
It was a small moment. He was training with Lyris in the courtyard, practicing the footwork that had saved him countless times. His movements were still fast. Still precise. But there was a slight delay. A hesitation that had not been there before. His body was beginning to slow down.
That evening, he sat alone in the forge and thought about what it meant.
One day, he would die. The others would die too. Lyris. Mira. Rowan. Marcus. The king. Sera. The Council of Seven was built on the idea of shared power, but what happened when the people who held that power were gone?
The next morning, he called a meeting with the Council.
"We need to talk about succession," Kael said without preamble. "We need to think about what hap
