Miyara's POV
"Watch your step, Miyara. You almost tripped over that rug again."
I turned my head and met the amused eyes of Lady Serina, one of the minor courtiers who, for reasons I didn't yet understand, seemed almost genuinely glad to see me here. I tried to smile. It was stiff, the kind of smile that tells people you're harmless, even though the truth was I was nothing but sharp edges beneath the skin.
"Noted," I said, my voice calmer than I felt. My hands itched. I flexed my fingers subtly under the folds of my sleeves, letting a tiny spark of warmth crawl along my skin. No fire yet, not fully awake. Patience, I reminded myself.
Serina tilted her head. "You'll get used to it, I think. The palace… it's different now, but you will "
I didn't answer. I kept my eyes on the carved floor panels, tracing the worn paths with my gaze. Nothing about this palace had changed since my first life, yet everything had.
I remembered that life with brutal clarity. I remembered Zaneri. I remembered war and fire. I remembered the way the blood never quite left my hands, even when I wanted it to.
I met Zaneri for the first time on the battlefield. He was almost dead, his armor torn and bleeding, soldiers collapsing around him. I didn't know him then. I didn't care. But I couldn't let him die. I was the Dragon Queen, even before the crown. My claws tore through the air, through steel and bone, through chaos, until I pulled him from the flames. He looked at me with eyes that still haunted me, the kind that makes you feel like you're the only thing left in the world worth saving. That moment changed everything.
He fought beside me after that, not out of fear, but out of love. Not the soft, easy kind, but the kind that made him brutal in the courts, ruthless with anyone who threatened me. Zaneri had enemies, plenty of them. This werewolf world wasn't gentle to outsiders, especially not a rare breed dragon. I was powerful, yes, but they hated me for it. They whispered behind my back. They called me unnatural, dangerous. They wanted me broken. Zaneri wouldn't let them. He carved a shield around me, even when he knew it meant enemies at our table.
And now he was dead.
I shook my head. I'd woken up in this body, this fragile human shell. My bones screamed. My flesh felt alien. And yet, inside, the fire never went out. I flexed my toes and felt the small surge of energy beneath my skin. The dragons inside me were patient, but hungry.
My husband, my first husband, the one the courts loved to talk about had died trusting me, loving me. I had trusted him with everything, and in the end, the blade had been mine to feel, to absorb. Not from a stranger, but from the one I should have been able to trust.
I let out a small breath. "Don't think about it now," I whispered to myself.
Serina must have caught the edge in my voice. She gave a small, knowing nod.
I wandered down the corridor, paying careful attention to the tiles underfoot. I was smaller now, weaker, but there was a sharpness in my mind that hadn't dulled. Observation, strategy, patience those were my weapons now. I tested a small spark, feeling it coil along my spine and fingertips. Nothing visible yet, but I could feel Hizumi ( one of my dragons) stirring.
Zaneri had been that thing. That thing I didn't save because I first fell for, but because I thought at least once in my life I should protect something.I had always been the out cast in my family, but Zaneri saw something in me. He taught me about "mates" and how it was used in the werewolf world. When I agreed to follow him my family completely ousted me and he warned me it wouldn't be easy, werewolf and dragon had no history and the few ones written down, dragons always seized werewolf lands or murdered or banished them, they saw dragons like bullies and even after I decided to cut of my wings and did everything to prove myself to them I guess It was never enough.
Afterward, when he returned to his Alpha pack, when he had called me Queen, I learned werewolves also refer to this as Luna, when he had taken my hand in the aftermath of war I had understood loyalty and love at the same time, we had this pull this attraction and I just knew Zaneri was the werewolf and husband I never knew I needed and wanted to complete me. But death doesn't care for love. Death doesn't care for loyalty. It only leaves the empty space, and I am stuck inside it.
I walked past the throne room, noting the guards and their posture. Some were too relaxed. Some were too stiff. All suspicious. I'd need to study them, remember them. A human body was fragile, but a dragon mind is dangerous.
I went to the private chambers, places I had once walked in my former life. I touched the walls, the tapes
tries. . I closed my eyes. Focus.