Three days in Woolhaven. Three days of walking on clouds. Three days of an army fighting the urge to take a collective nap.

  I sat on Coin-Biter, whose golden hooves made zero noise on the Merino-Moss. I was the only one awake, fueled by the adrenaline of compound interest.

  "Four hundred thirty-four thousand," I whispered, vibrating with excitement. "I am approaching half a million. At this rate, I can buy a dragon."

  But while I counted coins, two people were counting their failures.

  Far behind the main column, in a secluded grove of Grey Felt Trees, the air was not peaceful. It was filled with the sounds of frustration.

  York Bladeblood was screaming.

  He wasn't fighting an enemy. He was fighting a tree.

  He punched the trunk of a massive, soft tree.

  POOF.

  His fist sank into the felt. It didn't hurt. It didn't break. The tree just absorbed his anger and bounced back.

  "DAMN IT!" York roared, his voice cracking. "Everything here is soft! Just like me!"

  He fell to his knees in the Memory-Foam Grass. He looked at his hands.

  He was the Prince of the Bladebloods. The heir to the Dragon Riders.

  But now? He was a hostage. A joke. Livia had used him. Wilhelm pitied him. Even the Clayborns looked at him with sympathy.

  "I am nothing," York whispered, clawing at the soft ground. "I am the Prince of Pillows."

  "You are pathetic," a cold voice said.

  York spun around.

  Vera Ironvine stood there.

  She was the "spare" Ironvine. Volpert was the King-to-be. Lydia was the mastermind. Dankmar was the power.

  Vera was just... there. The quiet girl in the green dress who was always told to "stand in the back."

  But she wasn't wearing a dress now. She had stripped down to a training tunic. She held a Needle-Rapier a thin, vicious blade made for finding gaps in armor.

  "What do you want, Ironvine?" York spat, wiping tears from his face. "Came to mock the stray dog?"

  Vera didn't smile. She walked into the clearing, her boots sinking silently into the plush moss.

  "I don't mock dogs," Vera said, testing the edge of her blade. "I put them down if they whine too much."

  She lunged.

  SWISH.

  The rapier stopped an inch from York’s throat.

  York flinched. He scrambled back, tripping over a Poly-Fiber Root.

  Vera lowered the sword. Her eyes were dull, filled with a quiet, simmering rage that matched his own.

  "We are the same, York," Vera said flatly. "Look at us. You are the Prince who lost his kingdom. I am the Princess who is invisible."

  She pointed in the direction of the main army.

  "My brother, Volpert... he is a sadistic idiot. He whips girls. He cries when it rains. And yet... he gets the Crown. He gets the attention."

  She stabbed the felt tree. SHINK. Her blade went deep, unlike his fist.

  "And you," Vera turned to him. "You let Brandan adopt you. You let Wilhelm buy you. You are a pet."

  York stood up. His face flushed red.

  "I am a Bladeblood! My ancestors rode Ignis-Rex! I have fire in my veins!"

  "Prove it," Vera challenged. "Burn something."

  York glared at her. He closed his eyes. He tried to summon the magic his father had wielded. The Dragon-Force.

  He grunted. He strained.

  Nothing happened.

  Just a soft breeze ruffling his hair.

  Vera laughed. It was a dry, hollow sound.

  "See? Empty."

  York snapped.

  The humiliation was too much. The softness of the world, the mockery of the girl, the weight of his failure.

  He didn't try to use magic. He just wanted to hurt something.

  He screamed a primal, guttural roar and punched the tree again.

  WHOOSH.

  It didn't go POOF this time.

  Smoke curled from his knuckles.

  Where his fist connected with the felt, the fabric singed. A black, smoking handprint appeared on the grey trunk. The smell of burning wool filled the air.

  York pulled his hand back. He stared at it.

  His knuckles weren't bruised. They were covered in faint, shimmering Red Scales.

  Heat radiated from his skin.

  Vera stopped laughing.

  She walked over. She didn't look scared. She looked... hungry.

  She touched the smoking handprint on the tree.

  "Heat," Vera whispered. "Real heat."

  She looked at York’s hand. The scales faded after a few seconds, but the potential was there.

  The Dragon wasn't dead. It was just sleeping under layers of shame.

  "You have it," Vera said, her eyes gleaming. "The Spark."

  York looked at her, breathing heavily. "I... I burned it."

  Vera sheathed her rapier. She stepped closer to him. The distance between them wasn't romantic; it was conspiratorial. Two wolves realizing they could hunt better as a pack.

  "Volpert has the Crown," Vera whispered. "Lydia has the Gold. Wilhelm has the System."

  She grabbed York’s hand the one that had smoked.

  "But we..." Vera smiled, a sharp, dangerous expression that looked nothing like her mother’s. "...we have Spite."

  She looked him in the eye.

  "I will teach you how to think, York. I will teach you the Ironvine way how to calculate, how to wait, how to strike when they are sleeping."

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  "And what do I give you?" York asked, his voice steadying.

  "You become the Monster," Vera said. "You wake up that lizard in your blood. And when I give the signal... you burn everything that stands in my way."

  York looked at the smoking tree. He looked at the girl who was just as broken and angry as he was.

  He didn't pull his hand away.

  "Deal," York growled.

  "Good," Vera nodded. "Now... hit me. We train until we bleed. Pain is the only thing that is real in this soft hell."

  And there, in the fluffy, pastel paradise of Woolhaven, York Bladeblood and Vera Ironvine began to beat each other senseless.

  Not out of hate. But out of a desperate, violent promise to never be the "weak ones" again.

  Far away, atop Coin-Biter, I felt a shiver.

  "Hmm," I muttered, buttoning my coat. "Must be a draft."

  The Grand Army Coalition halted.

  We weren't stopped by a wall of fire or a fortress of bone. We were stopped by a wall of... Potpourri.

  Blocking the soft, cashmere road was the Whitefield Army.

  They didn't look like soldiers. They were a choir of angels but their armor wasn't steel; it was Hardened Porcelain and Woven Diamond-Thread. Their banners were silk sheets that smelled of lavender.

  Leading them were two figures standing on a platform of floating marble.

  One was tall, thin, and frail, holding a golden cane and a sketchbook.

  Vireo Whitefield

  The other was small. A child of nine years, wearing a white hoodie made of polar-bear fur, his hands shoved into his pockets. He had silver hair and eyes that looked like they had seen the heat death of the universe and found it boring.

  Morvin Whitefield

  "Stop," Vireo commanded. His voice was gentle, like a lullaby. "You are ruining the composition."

  He sketched furiously on his pad.

  "Too much grey," Vireo muttered, looking at our Moonclaw Soldiers. "Too much rust. And the depression... it clashes with the pastel sky."

  Livia Whitefield stepped forward from our ranks. She looked at her brothers.

  "Vireo. Morvin. I have returned."

  Vireo looked up. He scanned her muddy dress. He winced.

  "You are dirty, sister. You have ruined your symmetry."

  "I have been a prisoner!" Livia snapped. "I have been held by the Merchant!"

  Morvin didn't look at Livia. He looked at me. He looked at Coin-Biter. He looked at the Blood-Leech Vial.

  He smirked. A tiny, terrifying expression on a nine-year-old face.

  "Interesting," Morvin said softly. "The Merchant collects broken things."

  Vireo cleared his throat.

  "We cannot allow this... stain... to enter Woolhaven. Unless you pay the toll."

  "I have gold!" I shouted, reaching for my purse. "I have 434,000 Gold! How much for the toll?"

  "Gold?" Vireo laughed. "We don't want metal, Merchant. We want Affection."

  He pointed to a massive sign made of pink clouds floating above the army.

  "You must prove you are not savages," Vireo declared. "Kiss your enemies. Kiss your friends. Show us that you are capable of softness."

  My Moonclaw Soldiers looked horrified.

  "Kiss?" a soldier from the Barony of Lament whispered, trembling. "But... lips are for screaming. Not for... mwah."

  "I will not kiss anyone!" Volpert Ironvine shrieked from his carriage. "I am a Prince! I do not exchange fluids with peasants!"

  "Then you will be fined," Vireo said simply. "Or executed. Beauty demands love, Prince."

  Then, Vireo’s eyes landed on the front line of our command.

  He saw Konstantin Shadowgrove,leaning on his cane, his only one leg.

  He saw Astrid Falken, her sleeve empty where her arm used to be.

  Vireo stopped sketching. He looked physically ill.

  "Oh no," Vireo gagged. "Oh, absolutely not."

  He pointed a trembling finger at them.

  "The Cripples," Vireo said, his voice shaking with aesthetic offense. "They cannot participate. They cannot enter."

  "Excuse me?" Gutrum Falken growled, stepping in front of Astrid.

  "Look at them!" Vireo cried. "They are asymmetrical! Missing limbs! Twisted spines! It is grotesque! If they kiss someone, they will infect the land with their ugliness!"

  He waved his hand dismissively.

  "They must wait outside the borders. In the Zone of the Unlovable. We cannot have them ruining the view."

  Konstantin let out a dry, clicking laugh.

  "The Zone of the Unlovable? I believe I own property there already. Do I get a tax break for being hideous?"

  Astrid didn't laugh. Her hand went to his Weapon.

  "I will cut off his other leg," Astrid whispered to me. "Then he will be asymmetrical too."

  "Hold on," I said, sweating. "Vireo, this is discrimination! You can't just "

  "Quiet, Vireo," Morvin said.

  The nine-year-old stepped off the floating platform. He walked across the soft, cashmere grass. His hands were still in his pockets. He ignored the beautiful Livia. He ignored the Golden Merchant.

  He walked straight up to Astrid.

  The Whitefield soldiers gasped.

  "Lord Morvin! Do not approach the Flawed One!"

  "She is incomplete! Contagious!"

  Morvin stopped in front of Astrid. He was short, barely reaching her chest. He tilted his head, studying her empty sleeve with the intensity of a surgeon examining a tumor.

  "Fascinating," Morvin whispered.

  Astrid glared down at him. "Get away from me, child. Or I will punt you."

  Morvin ignored the threat.

  "Vireo sees a missing arm," Morvin murmured, his voice smooth and detached. "I see... efficiency. Weight reduction. Aerodynamic balance."

  He took a hand out of his pocket. He reached toward her face.

  "You are not ugly," Morvin said, a strange, obsessive light in his eyes. "You are a puzzle. A puzzle with missing pieces."

  He leaned in.

  He puckered his lips.

  He was going for the Kiss of Peace.

  The entire army held its breath.

  A Whitefield Prince kissing a Falken Cripple? It was unheard of. It was scandalous.

  Morvin closed his eyes, leaning toward Astrid’s cheek.

  POW.

  Astrid didn't hesitate. She punched the nine-year-old boy directly in the face.

  THUD.

  Morvin flew backward. He landed in the soft, marshmallow grass.

  Silence.

  Absolute, terrified silence.

  Vireo dropped his sketchbook.

  Livia screamed.

  The Whitefield Soldiers drew their porcelain blades.

  "SHE STRUCK THE CHILD!"

  "SHE REJECTED THE KISS!"

  "KILL THE MONSTER!"

  I drew Cinderbrand. "Astrid! You just punched the diplomat!"

  "He tried to kiss me!" Astrid shouted, wiping her cheek as if it were contaminated. "I don't care if it's the law! He's creepy!"

  Morvin lay in the grass. He touched his lip. It was bleeding.

  A drop of red blood fell onto the white cashmere.

  Vireo pointed his staff. "Execution! Kill them all! They have assaulted the "

  "Wait."

  Morvin sat up.

  He wasn't crying. He wasn't angry.

  He was... smiling.

  He licked the blood from his lip. He looked at Astrid with pure, unadulterated adoration.

  "Did you see that?" Morvin whispered to his soldiers.

  He stood up, dusting off his polar-bear hoodie.

  "Vireo," Morvin said calmly. "You misunderstand. She did not reject the kiss."

  He pointed to the bruise forming on his cheek.

  "This is a Kinetic Kiss. A transfer of energy. It was... direct. Honest. Efficient."

  He looked at the horrified Whitefield soldiers.

  "Why do we kiss with lips?" Morvin asked philosophically. "Lips lie. But a fist? A fist is truth. She touched me with pure truth."

  He turned back to Astrid, his eyes shining like a cult leader who just found his goddess.

  "You are magnificent," Morvin breathed. "Most people here are soft. You are hard. You are jagged. I want to study you."

  He turned to the army.

  "Let them pass! The Cripple has paid the toll! She has given me the gift of Pain! And it was exquisite!"

  The Whitefield soldiers looked confused. But Morvin was the genius. Morvin was the prodigy. If Morvin said a punch in the face was a form of love... then it must be true.

  "All hail the Kinetic Kiss!" a confused captain shouted.

  "Hail!" the army echoed uncertainly.

  Konstantin looked at me.

  "Wilhelm," he whispered. "That child is a psychopath."

  "Yes," I whispered back. "But he's a psychopath who just saved us a 40 Million SP fight."

  Morvin walked back to his floating platform, touching his bruised cheek tenderly. He winked at Astrid.

  "I will see you at the palace, One-Arm," Morvin called out. "I have so many experiments... I mean, games... we can play."

  Astrid shuddered. "I hate this place. I hate the pillows. I hate the kissing. And I really hate that kid."

  I patted Coin-Biter.

  "Just keep punching people, Astrid," I said. "Apparently, in this country, it's flirting."