Chapter 696: Yet.

SHADOWCLAW — WAR ROOM - FOUR HOURS AFTER ATTACK

Every kingdom has a war room. Most of them have a king in it.

Serena sat in Fin’s seat at the head of the war table, running on adrenaline and grief and her desire to protect Shadowclaw in their king’s absence.

Nobody in this room knew that the Alpha King of Shadowclaw had told the woman sitting in his chair to get the fuck out of his castle. Nobody in this room knew that she had spent the last half hour holding his unconscious hand in a dark chamber, whispering every detail of the night to a man whose eyes were closed.

None of that showed on her face because war room debriefs always boil down to perception. Power is a costume. If they believe the bulge, they won’t check what’s actually hanging.

The war room was full. Beta Sharpe was on her right. Gamma Knox to her left. Captain Ravenhall occupied the far end. Aeron leaned against the wall near the door in his usual position, arms folded, watching the room the way he watched most rooms, which Serena had noticed since working closer with him. The Master Mage was quiet, deadly observant, and cataloged everything.

Elders filled the remaining seats. Most had been in the throne room when she killed Alistair Creed and the evacuation tunnels on her order. A few had been on that wall. All of them were looking at her with expressions that had been fundamentally reorganized in the last few days.

Beta Sharpe didn’t waste another second. He stood and addressed the table.

"At approximately midnight, a fleet of one hundred dragons corrupted by Dark Fae magic approached Shadowclaw from the east. The Luna identified the fleet before our scouts did and initiated full wartime protocols, including civilian evacuation, perimeter defense, and the deployment of a Red Death countermeasure that neutralized the enemy’s aerial chemical weapon before a single arrow crossed our walls."

His voice carried the measured cadence of a military officer delivering a formal report, every word weighed, every sentence constructed with the awareness that this room would produce a record and the record would outlast everyone sitting in it.

"Drakenfell was also under siege. The Draken Forces were already mid-battle. So the Luna Queen then called upon the army of Aevamorra Vyracarum instead, a kingdom in the Crythian Expanse, with whom the Luna Queen had built a relationship with during a prior engagement. They deployed an army of one hundred frost dragons, spotters, and riders within the hour to match the incoming threat."

He paused, letting that settle. No one in the room so much as breathed.

"The Luna Queen took to the sky on one of their dragons and engaged the corrupted fleet directly. She eliminated every Dark Fae rider and spotter and cleansed every corrupted dragon through physical contact. One hundred dragons were recovered. Zero casualties on our side. Zero injuries. Zero breaches."

The room absorbed this the way rooms absorb information that exceeds the processing capacity of the people sitting in them. Slowly. In stages. With the occasional blink that lasted longer than a standard blink because the brain behind it was requesting additional time.

"We have confirmation that the enemy combatants were Dark Fae," Beta Sharpe concluded. "No wolves. No regular Fae. The force composition was entirely Dark Fae, which narrows the origin to a limited number of powers."

He gave a nod to the elders and sat.

An elder at the far end of the table leaned forward. Elder Callum. The evacuation leader. He had followed the future Luna Queen’s orders, getting women, pups, elders, and innocents into the tunnels, and the future Luna Queen ended up being right.

"Is the source confirmed? Is this Orosia?"

The question was directed at the room. The room directed it at Serena.

She met Elder Callum’s eyes.

"We have no confirmed intelligence linking this attack to the High Emperor or to Orosia directly. Dark Fae detonate upon death. We were unable to capture a single combatant for questioning. Every rider and spotter was eliminated in the field. The evidence is circumstantial."

The answer was factual with zero emotion, answered how Tiberon Drakenfell would answer it. Speculation spoken with certainty became policy, and policy built on speculation collapsed under scrutiny.

Elder Callum studied her for a moment. The studying was different from two days ago. Two days ago Callum had been looking for the crack. Now he was angled toward her like her answer had mass and he intended to take the hit.

"What is your opinion, Luna? Setting aside confirmed intelligence. In your assessment, is this connected to Orosia?"

The asking was a moment.

An elder requesting the opinion of a future Luna was protocol. An elder requesting the opinion of a woman whose judgment he trusted was something else entirely, and the something else was visible in the way he leaned forward and the way his voice dropped a register and the way every other elder at the table turned towards her when he asked it.

Serena held his gaze for two seconds. The seconds were respect, given in the form of consideration rather than haste.

"Yes. In my assessment, this is connected to Orosia and to Viremont. The force composition, the timing, the use of Caustic Suppression Miasma, and the corruption method applied to the dragons are consistent with Dark Fae doctrine as I have encountered it across three engagements. The coordination required to deploy one hundred corrupted dragons across an ocean suggests state-level resources and state-level command."

Her answer chess-moved across the table and stayed there, which was impressive, because most answers in war rooms bounced around for twenty minutes before someone tried to water them down.

Gamma Knox broke the silence. His entire emotional range existed somewhere between dry and arid, and today he was operating firmly in desert.

"On the positive side. The Dark Fae picked the wrong kingdom to attack. They also just handed us one hundred dragons."

A few mouths around the table twitched. The twitching was involuntary, the response of men whose night had been long enough that gallows humor had become the only humor their bodies would accept.

Elder Callum tapped the table once. "That raises a question, Luna. One hundred dragons is a considerable force. We do not possess Drakenfell’s infrastructure. No roosts. No handlers. No feeding protocols. No training facilities. What do we do with them?"

Serena flashed a soft smile.

"Yet."