White hair. Blue eyes. Doesn’t look like her... but fine. It will serve.

"My Emperor, allow these two tributes from the Shadowlands to soothe your temper while we discuss strategy."

General Thalor bowed sharply.

The white haired tribute, Lirandel climbed the steps to the throne on unsteady legs. Behind her, the second tribute, Iris, dark-haired with wide violet eyes knelt beside the throne.

The Emperor leaned back, robes parting with casual ease. She hesitated only a heartbeat before straddling his lap. Her breath caught as she lowered herself onto him, taking his length slowly into her slick heat.

With one sharp tug of his clawed fingers, he ripped her gown from neckline to hem. Glowing Fae markings along her ribs and thighs flickered.

"She’s blessed," the Emperor commented casually, examining her exposed body as if appraising livestock. "The Shadowlands did well."

He let a pulse of green magic flare from his palm, and it sank into her skin.

"Begin," he ordered, one hand settling on Lirandel’s hip while the other gestured for the meeting to continue.

Thalor cleared his throat, forcing his gaze to the fractured map. "The coalition forces closed every viable route in Skardos."

Lirandel’s hips rolled slowly, her dyed white hair swaying with each shallow rise and fall. The Emperor watched the unnatural color catch the light and curled his lip slightly.

"Not naturally white, is it?" he commented. "Dyed. How quaint."

The High Empress Vespera sat to his right in her smaller throne, reviewing a scroll with perfect neutral poise. She glanced once at the white-haired girl riding her husband, then returned to her notes as though the act were no more remarkable than the turning of a page after six years of marriage.

Thalor continued, voice tight. "They predicted our mage portal strategy, and moved to deny those corridors entirely. We must assume they had intelligence on the Queen Mother’s connections in Elaris."

"Faster on the descent," he murmured to Lirandel, almost conversationally.

Thalor leaned forward, expression grim. "We were essentially blind on a clock, and had to withdraw from Valegrave."

Lirandel’s movements grew more desperate. The Emperor gripped her hips tighter, driving up harder as irritation flared.

Vespera’s eyes stayed on the scroll. They had not moved across a single line.

"They also seized the eastern mountain pass," Thalor continued. "The terrain heavily favors their wolf armies in ground combat."

"So we enact our portals in Viremont," the Emperor commented, never breaking rhythm.

Vespera spoke calmly, voice perfectly even. "Viremont has reclaimed his throne with our backing and a contingent of Fae forces."

Thalor nodded. "Correct. Nightspire cooperated, and forced Rathmore to give the portal zones and intelligence networks without resistance."

The Emperor’s hand tightened on Lirandel’s hip. Viremont. The man had slithered back onto his seat with Orosian steel at his back. Useful for now.

"Their coordinated fronts guaranteed ground warfare in wolf-heavy terrain," Thalor concluded heavily. "Which plays directly to their strengths and our shortages."

"It would appear one of those Alpha Kings actually has a brain, and the respect to get that coordination between kingdoms," the Emperor commented, voice deceptively calm. "My assumption is the Drakenfell King."

"He’s been a problem. And my leverage over him has been removed." His voice rose with each word, irritation sharpening into anger. "Yet I have yet to receive any form of reconciliation from the High General of the Velanori Isles or Velanthor."

"The High General of Velanthor and The Velanori Isles both have loyal subjects and armies, my Emperor," Vespera said, voice calm. "It would be foolish to punish either."

"It still does not change the fact that they failed," he snarled.

Silence fell, broken only by the rhythmic, wet sounds of Lirandel’s body moving on the Emperor.

He pounded up into her faster. His emerald magic surged, flooding her veins and turning every drive into overwhelming ecstasy, causing her to spasm wildly around him. Soft, whimpers spilled from her lips.

Vespera watched with detached elegance, her expression never changing. "No, it does not," she agreed calmly. "But both are in debt to us now. We use that."

"Fine," the Emperor snapped, voice tight with building pleasure.

The sounds of flesh slapping against flesh filled the war room. Lirandel’s broken breaths turned into moans, growing louder with every thrust, while her face burned as she was made to maintain eye contact with the silent officers.

Thalor never stopped talking. Not one officer in that room so much as blinked.

Vespera sat beside him, occasionally glancing at the obscene display as if it were merely another report.

"Faster," he ordered Lirandel.

When the Emperor felt his climax building, he yanked Iris’s legs even wider.

"Show the room how well you break," he growled into her ear.

The Emperor buried himself deep in her and came, green light exploding around them. Lirandel cried out sharply, her own orgasm crashing through her at the same moment. The excess leaked out around his cock and dripped onto Iris’s tongue and face.

He held Lirandel open for several long seconds afterward, letting the room see his glowing seed slowly leaking from her.

"Adequate," he said coolly, still buried inside her. "Train her further. Tomorrow she will ride without correction."

Vespera rose gracefully. "I will see to her cleaning, my Emperor."

"Do so."

He gave her a brief, dismissive glance, where he caught the faintest flicker in Vespera’s otherwise flawless composure — a tiny fracture in the old marital bond after six long years.

Interesting. Perhaps the white-haired one would prove more entertaining than he had first assumed.

✦✦✦

Serena sat upright in bed, sweating and shaking, her breath sawing in and out of her chest.

Fin sat up beside her instantly, arms still wrapped around her because that’s how they slept.

"Serena?"

She didn’t.

"Hey. Hey, look at me." His other hand came up to cup her jaw, thumb brushing along her cheekbone. "Bad dream?"

She tried to reach for whatever had ripped her out of sleep, but the harder she chased it, the faster it dissolved, leaving only the shape of dread where the dream had been. Green. There had been something green, and a feeling of being watched from the inside out, and then nothing at all.

"Breathe, Serena."

Serena inhaled a sharp breath. Fin pulled her on top of him, and rubbed her back.

"I can never remember," she whispered, frustrated, pressing her forehead against his collarbone.

"Good," he murmured into her hair. He shoved calm into her through their matebond. "Whatever it was, it doesn’t get to follow you."

She let out a shaky breath against his throat, and his lips brushed the crown of her head.

"There was green light in it," she said, swallowing.

Fin’s eyes opened, staring at the ceiling. "Maelor’s magic is green, right?"

"Yes. But it’s the most common color for Fae magic."