"Where the fuck is he?" Isabella hissed under her breath, lips pressed into a flat, annoyed line as her eyes scanned the crooked courtyard like a predator on the edge of pouncing.
The palace—if one could even call it that—was more of a glorified stone carcass than a marvel of architecture. Sunlight spilled across cracked stone slabs that lined the ground unevenly, some shifted, others chipped, as if the earth itself had grown tired of keeping things straight. The walls were a patchwork of pale stone, some still rough and grainy like they’d been yanked from the mountain just yesterday. In certain spots, moss crept between the gaps like nature was politely trying to reclaim what had been taken.
At a glance, it tried to look regal. There were wide pillars—slightly crooked. Arched doorways—none symmetrical. Animal hides hung lazily over some entrances, stiff with dried blood and smoke from past fires. A few bone chimes dangled in corners, clinking eerily in the breeze like forgotten warnings.
Primitive luxury, Isabella thought. Emphasis on primitive.
She narrowed her eyes, barely containing a scoff. These people couldn’t figure out how to make a decent spoon—still boiling water in inflated goat stomachs tied with vines. Their idea of seasoning was "add more ashes." And yet somehow, somehow, they had carved out an entire palace.
How was this even possible?
"It’s probably magic," she muttered, adjusting Glimora in her arms.
The tiny beast gave a sleepy grumble and nestled closer into Isabella’s chest like an old woman with zero social obligations. Her soft fur twitched whenever Isabella passed under beams of sun, and her tail flopped lazily over Isabella’s arm.
Isabella looked down at her, then back at the building in front of her with a look that said, I hate this timeline.
She muttered again under her breath, "This whole place is just rocks stacked on rocks pretending to have style."
"Maybe the city is even worse," Isabella continued to herself. "A bunch of smug idiots with stone mansions and no socks. Who knows?"
She spotted a group of guards lounging between two upright tusks driven into the ground, talking like they had nothing better to do. Laughing, shifting spears from one shoulder to the other. One of them even held a basket of dried meat like he was mid-lunch.
Isabella strode toward them, movements fluid but sharp—like an irritated swan with perfect posture and no patience.
"Hey!" she called out, voice commanding, but not unkind. She adjusted Glimora again, the beast snuggling like a child being carried after a long tantrum. She looked every inch the tired mother—but a very elegant one. Regal. Wrathful. Exhausted.
The guards stiffened like they’d been caught stealing sacred goat meat. Their chatter ceased. Postures snapped upright.
Because who in this entire region—village or not—hadn’t heard about Isabella and her infamous or rather famous... everything?
The woman who beat a man for sneezing too close to her pink soup. The one who once asked for extra berries and got five. The one who carried around a tiny beast that may or may not fart fire depending on mood.
"Where is Cyrus?" she asked flatly, scanning their faces.
The guards blinked. They looked at one another. Confused. Startled. Definitely not prepared for this level of confrontation while still digesting dried meat.
"Cyrus?" one of them echoed, scratching his head like it might help his memory leak faster.
Isabella inhaled slowly, dangerously. She wasn’t angry—yet. Just unimpressed. And being unimpressed was somehow worse.
"Yes," she said slowly, like she was talking to particularly dim-witted children. "The man with the red hair. Pink eyes. Always lurking near me like a calm shadow."
The first guard’s face lit up. "Oh, you mean your older brother?"
"Mm, yes, my—" Isabella started, but something about that sentence snagged on her brain. Her words halted. She blinked.
She turned her head, brows furrowed. "You said my what now?"
The man’s face paled by two shades, and his adam’s apple bobbed like a fishhooked frog. "Uh... he is your brother, right?" he offered weakly, a nervous chuckle at the edge of his voice.
Isabella stared.
Just stared.
The poor man began sweating like a fire-baked goat. Glimora even lifted her head from Isabella’s chest to glare at the guard like how dare you confuse my mama like that?
Another guard, thinking he was helping, leaned in. "He said, uh, ’your older brother.’" He even mimicked the voice, tone and all, like that would make it better.
Isabella’s head turned.
Slow. Silent. Deadly.
Her eyes slid to the second guard with the same calm a crocodile might show before snapping your spine.
The first guard let out a long, shaky breath of relief. Not me anymore, he clearly thought. She’s locked on someone else.
The others—gods help them—they watched silently. Tense. Curious. Half-horrified. Half-entertained. Like this was their best show of the week and they didn’t want to blink.
The second guard looked like he just realized he’d wandered into a sacred ritual wearing only his underclothes. He blinked twice. Didn’t move.
Because Isabella’s gaze wasn’t like other women’s.
She didn’t have a particularly imposing body—she was lithe, pretty, feminine. Soft, even. But the thing that made her terrifying was how those delicate features never changed when she was pissed.
She didn’t yell. She didn’t growl.
Her eyes did all the work. Beautiful, blue, and unfiltered.
When Isabella was angry, her eyes looked disappointed. Like you’d failed a very easy test and she wasn’t even mad, just... resigned.
That’s what made people scared.
"My older brother," Isabella repeated, voice silky. Too silky. Like venom in a flower petal.
The second guard swallowed. Nodded.
Isabella said nothing.
Just stood there, expression unreadable.
Then—she laughed.
A sound so sudden and unexpected that Glimora flinched and half-fell from her arms. Isabella caught her, giggling harder now, holding her like a fussy baby who just needed a warm blanket and a witness.
She laughed like someone had just told her the dumbest joke ever written in stone. Like she’d been holding in a scream and it turned sideways in her chest and came out as music instead.
The guards looked at each other.
Oh no.
They had unleashed something.
They didn’t know what it meant yet.
But they were about to find out.