I must make sure he knows what he’s agreeing to. “A challenge, your majesty? Here? In our own castle? You may see a side of me you...”

My king waves off my hesitation. “You need not protect me so, Wren. I know what sort of violence happens on a battlefield. I have seen blood before. I will not think less of you for doing what must be done. Nobody will. If I have to command them not to!” He laughs, which I suppose does lighten the mood a bit. “There may be… rumors about you, Wren, but you have saved this nation more times than I can count. As far as I am concerned, you are a hero. I’m asking you to save us one more time. A protracted invasion from the minotaurs, it… I don’t think even the elves could survive it.” Before I’m even granted a chance to voice my concerns, he places a hand on my shoulder. “Do whatever you have to. I will see to it that you have whatever resources you require.”

He just… assumes. Sometimes it terrifies me how much faith my king has in me, just as it terrifies me what lengths I am willing to go for him. But here? Now? If I unleash the Bloody Left Hand in my own home—in front of my king, no less!—will he ever be able to look at me the same way again? I bow my head and give the traditional response. “As you command, your majesty, so it shall be done.”

He gives me a crooked half smile. Perhaps it’s all he’s capable of right now. “Darius?” he calls out.

From my chamber’s doorway enters a dark-skinned man with short, straight black hair. He wears a vest of deep blue covered in rich gold gilding. I know him well. As the Right Hand of the king, Darius is my most obstinate rival for his time and attention. I’m never quite sure how to feel about him. When Leonid sent me to break the siege at Osterfeld, Darius negotiated a surrender before I arrived; after I led the army to capture the fort at Stillian in a nighttime raid, he used the deep-water port to turn the island from a minor military asset—and financial liability—to a central trading hub that was now responsible for nearly a fifth of Umbria’s tax income. I can’t decide if his accomplishments always seem to overshadow mine through intentional effort or just as a matter of course.

Darius approaches the king with solid, precise steps. There isn’t a drop of grace in him, but even this late in the evening he is the picture of poise and control. Not a single thread of his outfit is out of place. He inclines forward in a rigid bow that keeps his back perfectly straight—a custom I’ve heard others say he inherited from his family’s time living among the elves before immigrating to Umbria. “Your majesty,” he says. “I am yours.”

While looking at Darius, King Leonid waves an impatient hand at me. “Wren here is under my direct command until the Peace Summit is over tomorrow,” he says. “See that she is given everything she asks for. Until I say otherwise, you are to assume she speaks with my authority.”

I am sure Darius recognizes what an order like that must mean, given my reputation, but he doesn’t react. Not a twitch crosses his face; he doesn’t so much as flicker a glance in my direction. “As you command, your majesty, so it shall be done.”

“Good!” Leonid gives the most prominent member of his court a good-natured slap on the shoulder. I certainly notice the difference in the way the king treats the two of us. I’m not sure if that means he likes me more or not. Is he afraid to be jovial with me like he is with Darius or is that an attempt to distance himself from the foreign courtier? “I’m going to get to sleep. I trust the situation will be well handled by morning.” He gives me a significant look and I bob my head to reassure him.

“Sleep well, your majesty,” I say.

He gives me a tight smile before turning away. “I will try,” he says over his shoulder. “Peter, Alex,” he calls out to the two guards he has posted at my chamber doors. I haven’t seen either of the royal guards move once since I woke. They snap to attention. “We’re leaving,” King Leonid tells them. They open the door for him and lead the way. I feel guilty for how much of a climb my king has in store for himself to get back to his own chambers.

My handmaiden is still in the back of the room staying quiet. Aside from her, Darius and I are alone now. He folds his arms behind his back and looks down at me where I sit on the floor. No doubt he has his own judgments about my relative lack of propriety in front of the king, but he has the restraint to at least not speak them aloud despite his body language saying otherwise. I mean, he is literally looking down his nose at me! “What are your orders, Mistress Hand?” he asks. Rather than the tight bow he offered our king, his neck only fractionally declines to indicate any sort of deference for the authority the king just placed in me. As the king’s right hand he holds a proper rank in court, and it feels as though he’s keen to make sure I don’t forget that fact.

“Please don’t call me that,” I insist. “Just Wren is fine.”

“What are your orders, Wren?” he repeats.

I sigh. I can tell commanding him is going to be unpleasant, so I try to phrase my next words like a request. “I need sacrifices,” I tell Darius. “In the barn across from my chambers the king has provided me with a number of animals, but for what I’ll need to do tonight that won’t be enough. Can you help with that?”

“You shall have them. How many do you require?”

I laugh. “All of them. I am serious. Every living animal bigger than a goat that you can get here by tonight. Whatever you bring me won’t be enough.”

“We will see,” he says.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

“That’s not a challenge for you to try to bring me more than I can use,” I clarify. “For what I will need to do… I’m not even sure it’s possible.”

“Then I must start immediately,” Darius says. “What shall I do once I have collected these animals?”

“Have the pages bring them one at a time to my chambers, then take them away when I’m done with them. Oh. And make sure Giselle here has as much of that healing juice as she needs.” I indicate my frightened handmaiden in the back of the room. She curtseys low to Darius when he looks her way.

“I will get started right away,” Darius vows. He leaves the room.

“Will there be much more blood tonight, my lady?” Giselle asks when it’s just us.

“It will be like Stillian,” I tell her. “Maybe worse. I’ll find out after the next one.”

“Oh my,” Giselle says. “I’ll get your extra knives ready.”

I arrange the pillows of my bedding until the double doors to my chamber open. One of the young pages that works in the stable across from my bedroom enters leading a goat. The animal’s hooves clatter on the hard stone of the floor as it calmly follows its minder.

“Bring it in over here,” I instruct him, indicating the metal contraption mounted to the floor next to the pile of pillows I use as a bed. It’s a rectangular, custom-designed “bleeding post” that I use to call my visions. I don’t recognize this particular page, but he figures out how the bleeding post works: the animal approaches from the side and sticks its head between the bars, then a chain lashes over the top of the head to stop any struggling. The result is a reasonably calm animal standing right in front of my bed with its throat exposed. Giselle approaches from behind without my even needing to ask and hands me a sharp knife, handle first.

I grab the knife; scoot forward on my pillows; and pause my hand mere inches from the animal’s throat. I look up at the young boy. He’s watching me, eyes just a little too wide. “Get out of here, kid,” I tell him. “You don’t want to be here for this.” He scurries off back across the small courtyard to the stables.

I then nod at Giselle to close the door and only when she does do I slash open the goat’s throat. It bleats loudly for a moment, but I have more experience killing than anyone has a right to. My knife cuts deep, parting hair and flesh and life-giving veins in one smooth movement. As soon as I’m done, I drop the knife and hold my hands out under the rush.

Blood. Hot blood. My mind tickles with excitement as I feel its warmth; the way it slides between my fingers, the way it oozes into the gaps in my nail bed. I rub my hands together and let the blood flow across my fingers. It follows the infinitesimal rivulets on the back of my hand to drip to the ground. In this pattern of deep red drips, I find The Bloody Path. I see the permutations. I see the way Giselle will soon return across the room after closing the door. How she will catch me as my seizing body falls backwards and lower me onto the blankets and pillows behind me. How she will call for the dead goat to be dragged away and the next animal will be brought in. These actions are close, certain. But they are not what I have stolen this life to see. I must travel further. To tomorrow. To the Peace Summit my king has called. The time for talks has ended. It is time for me to act.

Red blood clears from my eyes and I find myself standing behind my king. We are at the Peace Summit. The leaders of the other major nations are assembled around the circular table, each with their chosen advisor standing behind them.

I lean forward and whisper into my king’s ear. “And we will offer as tribute fifteen hundredweight of gold.”

“And to signify our desire for peace the nation of Umbria will offer as tribute”—King Leonid stops and glances over his shoulder at me; I nod encouragingly—“fifteen hundredweight of gold.” My king knows to trust me, though he must realize the royal treasury isn’t capable of producing even half that much gold. That’s not why I’m telling him to say… wait, has this happened before? What was I supposed to do? Study… I study the monster seated on the opposite end of the round table for its reaction.

In truth, the “monster” across from us is actually another king. Emperor, really. Emperor Klotak VII, of the Klotian Empire of minotaurs. It’s just that I find it easier to think of him as a monster because he sort of looks like one. He has the face of a bull with curling horns growing above his floppy, gold-studded ears. Unlike the other leaders seated around this table he’s been forced to squat directly on the ground and still he looks down at the rest of us. Arms thick as tree trunks and rippling with muscle weigh down his end of the table, causing it to tilt in his direction. I see the tilting of the table as a metaphor for how Emperor Klotak’s increasingly irrational demands and bull-headed desire for war are really the driving force behind this entire Summit. His flat, rectangular nose twists with uncertainty. He’s probably trying to figure out how the “stupid” human king just named the precise volume of gold he was himself about to demand as tribute.

I look around the table to see how the other leaders are reacting to my king’s offer of so much gold. To our right the elf queen is stoic as ever, her face a smooth mask that reveals nothing. To our left sit first the owling, then the dwarf kings. The white-feathered owling has turned his head in that creepy way of his to look directly at me. I don’t like the way his eye contact is probably tipping off Queen Phaise that I am the one telling my king… No. I have seen this permutation before. I am sure of it now! The dwarf king, Hralda, will tug his beard in irritation as he runs the calculations in his head and suspects my king of lying. I look his way; he tugs his beard.

I have lived this future before. It will lead to Umbria’s destruction. It tries to assert itself and force me into the natural flow of a predetermined path. My blood surges in my veins as I step away from that Path. I can hear it pounding in my ears as I take a step forward, can hear the dying gasp of the goat that gave its life to give me this unnatural power.

After giving it some thought, Emperor Klotak has decided to be angry about the offer of tribute. He bangs a weighty fist down on the table, causing the far side to bounce up. “You insult me with such a puny offer!” he shouts. “Your soldiers butchered—”

“You will not accept our gold?” I ask the minotaur emperor out-of-turn. “Then we demand satisfaction!”

My king tugs on the corner of my sleeve. “We do?” he asks in a small voice. I hold my left fist over my heart and incline my forehead in his direction: our secret signal that I am walking the Bloody Path and must be obeyed. He nods his understanding. He clears his throat. “Yes, the Kingdom of Umbria demands… satisfaction, as my advisor will explain.” He opens a hand to prompt me to continue, appearing as though he was behind my words from the beginning.

“Bah!” Emperor Klotak says. “What is the meaning of this? What satisfaction do you demand from us?”

“We demand the right to the Challenge of Combat,” I say. The room goes quiet. Emperor Klotak wrinkles his snout as he tries to work out how a tiny human girl could possibly be making such claims of him.