**Warcry—LUDEN, Clara Sorace**
Ember gripped the parchment, body frozen as her eyes roamed the words etched in ink over and over again as if reading it more times than twice will help the message sink in.
'To Her Majesty The Queen, Serpentine Andal Thorne, if you're reading this, then you must have survived tonight…surprise!
If there's anything I've ever liked about you, then it would be your name. It reminds me of the tale of the Serpent Who Eats Her Own Tail.
Except you never ate your own tail…it was I who helped you to eat it. Eighteen years ago, I contemplated whether strangling your little Elara would be better. I mean, it certainly would have been faster. Yet when I poisoned her because the sweetest deaths are the ones drawn out for long, you came back with her ten years later, the very picture of perfect health.
