A Dance Of Crowns & Thrones | Book I

Chapter 53 | "Do You Give In?" ❤️

There was one thing that got on his highly strung nerves some days more than others when it came to this war. In his experience of his twenty-two years of life, the most volatile, menacing, pain-in-ass woman that called herself a warrior and took the cake above all else.

Snow, fucking Snow, he nicknamed her accordingly, for she was a fucken ice queen.

She had been the one from his youth, she had been given a crystal like the four of them had and told to wait till the timeskeeper came back into their lives.

Snow was the very same warrior that he would gladly feed to any monster on any given day, and by all means, it did not mean he had to tolerate her existence, nor was it set in stone that she was important. Anyone could use that crystal.

Matthew also knew that the same timeskeeper left Cid a few other crystals to find further warriors for fighting the war, from what was explained to him by Cid. The timeskeeper also instructed the Headmaster to build the academies as they were today and survive.

Cryptic and oddly disturbing in hindsight, but a saving grace nonetheless. What he can't place together is why her.

The foul-mouthed, abusive and arrogant warrior that held no regard for her life and that of others around her. Besides her acidic and selfish personality, the only constant aspect about her was that she was fixated on her revenge against Ezra. Truth be told, they all were.

Every single person he ever met was fixated on that goal; Snow just seemed to take it to a whole new level as the years went by. She, like them, from what he could gather, was no exception to the very fact that they weren't chosen but gifted a crystal.

He doesn't believe in fate and destiny; there was no preordained path you're meant to follow. There is no clever method to the madness; you're a fool to think otherwise.

Even if Teddy believed differently, Matthew knew better.

His thoughts on this war are what he could control; the other thing he could control would be eventually finding Snow in real life—taking the crystal from her cold hands and ensuring that she stopped interfering in his plans of war against their enemy.

Snow knew how to fuck up some of his carefully laid decisions since he met her at the ripe age of twelve.

Uncontrolled as they were as warriors back then, brimming with potential, they were and still are a force to be reckoned with. Snow's downfall, Matthew found, was that she adhered to nobody, followed no one and did what she felt like doing regardless of the consequences.

Today was another perfect example; when he had been out at the Eastern border with Toni, Richie, and Jesse just before evening fell, they discovered a trail of dead monster's bodies in the wake of her fit of rage.

Butchered, slaughtered, beheaded, decapitated.

Who the fuck has the time and patience to decapitate monsters into literal pieces?

She left the scene a bloody mess, which is entirely her style, the mildew grass evident of the violence that took place.

Only when they realized there was nothing else for them there on the outskirts, no other form of animal for miles on end, and with no way forward into the region due to the barrier, did they find themselves back home that night.

Reporting to Cid on what they had seen, the Headmaster wrapped up the meeting shortly after that, confirming that the funeral was now set, the publishing houses were officially notified, and the news would be widespread by early morning.

The courts understood what was expected of them, and the Academies were now on standby if something happened between now and then.

It left Matthew finally sitting in the cafeteria that absurdly late night; he felt his palms itch, and a lot would take place in the days to come. The measure they would need to go to to ensure the funeral did not backfire in any more deaths meant very little sleep for himself and the soldiers of Allegiant.