Lady Veyra returned to her seat, her shadow dancing across the fire-lit stone like a coiling serpent. Her voice, once heavy with history, now slipped into something sharper—more immediate.
"But that's not the end of it," she said, placing her goblet down with a soft click. "Word has reached the main branch. They know."
I stood still in the corner of the chamber, barely daring to breathe. My heart beat louder than the crackling flames. She looked at me, not with softness or cruelty, but calculation.
"They've caught wind of your awakening. That explosion of power the night of the assassination was no whisper in the dark. It was thunder. And the palace always listens when thunder rolls near the walls of its stolen throne."
I opened my mouth to speak, to ask, but she raised a single finger, and silence returned.
"They won't act rashly. Not yet. But they've already begun weaving their net. A quiet investigation. Watching your tutors. Reading your progress reports. Every magic reading will be reviewed. Every leak traced."
She leaned forward now, her voice nearly a whisper.
"They will not underestimate you. Not like we once did."
I swallowed hard, hands clenched at my sides. "Then… what will they do?"
Lady Veyra's lips curved—not in cruelty, but in dark amusement.
"They will send someone."
Her eyes flickered with a deeper glint. "Damnatio Kira."
The name echoed in my chest like a silent hammer.
"You've likely heard of him. Advisor to the King. Arbiter of Magic. A man of flawless control, both in judgment and in spellcraft. His word has the weight of law. His presence brings scrutiny. And he is loyal… painfully loyal… to the King."
She stood again, walking toward a small drawer behind the desk. From it, she pulled a scroll sealed with black wax bearing the Kira crest—an eagle over a broken crown.
"This arrived two days ago," she said, tossing it to the table. "A request—polite in tone, but unmistakable in purpose. He'll be coming to observe your condition. To test your mana signature. To classify your magic. A preliminary evaluation... before they decide what to do with you."
My mouth was dry. "And if they see me as a threat?"
Lady Veyra smiled—this time, bitterly. "They already do. The only question is: how big a threat? If you're weak or controllable, they may let you remain as a political tool, a pawn under constant watch."
"And if I'm not?"
She stepped closer, her voice lowering to a hiss.
"Then you'll disappear. Quietly. In the name of balance, security, and peace."
The fire cast long shadows across her face as she leaned in and whispered:
"Damnatio is not a brute. He won't torture you. He won't even raise his voice. But every word he says will be a cage. Every compliment a test. He will speak of order, but what he truly worships… is control."
A long silence stretched between us.
Finally, Lady Veyra turned and walked back toward the window, pulling aside the curtain to reveal the moonlight over the manor courtyard.
"When he arrives," she said without turning, "you will smile. You will obey. But never forget… the lion may wear silk, but its fangs are always sharp."
She let the curtain fall and faced me once more.
"Be ready, child. The games of nobles are always played with daggers hidden in their smiles. And you… you were born with a crown no one can see, but everyone fears."
Valery let the silence linger, allowing her words about Damnatio Kira to settle deep in my bones like frost.
Then, as if pulled by an unseen thread, she stepped away from the window and circled slowly around me, her fingers lightly trailing the edge of a gilded chair.
"You know," she murmured, "your family has always been… difficult to understand."
I frowned. "The Kira family?"
A nod. "Yes. The bloodline of silence. No signature element, no famed spell or noble artifact like the Silva or Vermillion. No battlefield legends or flash of grand heroics. And yet—" she stopped in front of me, her eyes gleaming in the firelight "—they endure."
She tapped a finger to her temple.
"They linger behind the thrones of kings. They sit in the corners of council chambers. They whisper in the ears of cardinals and judges, untouched by scandal, unshaken by war."
Her voice lowered to a conspiratorial hush.
"Magic scholars have tried for years to catalogue Kira talents. Some call it soul-based. Others say it adapts based on threat. Some even whisper that the Kira possess an ancient seal, a lineage touched by an older force—something older than the clover grimoire system itself."
She smiled faintly.
"But what all agree upon is this: the Kira are dangerous not because of the magic they show... but because of the magic they hide."
She let the words hang in the air for a moment, sharp as broken glass.
"That includes you."
I didn't respond. I wasn't sure I could. My chest felt tight, as if I were caught in a current pulling me somewhere deeper, darker.
Valery turned back toward the desk, brushing a scroll aside.
"Your awakening wasn't just raw. It was unclassifiable. No element, no school, no precedent. Not even the mana resonance crystals could measure it."
She glanced over her shoulder.
"You're not just a threat to the throne. You're a puzzle. And in a kingdom built on balance, puzzles are the first things to be broken apart."
The heavy doors of Lady Valery's chamber groaned as they closed behind me. Her words still echoed in my mind like distant thunder.
You're not just a threat to the throne. You're a puzzle.
I walked down the torchlit corridor, each step more uncertain than the last. The cold stone beneath my boots felt like it had become part of me—silent, immovable, waiting to be broken.
Was there a place for someone like me here?
Was I meant to become a weapon? A symbol? A danger?
Or worse… a sacrifice?
My fists clenched as the hallway opened up into the northern balcony. The wind whipped through my hair, brisk and biting. Below, the estate's training fields stretched out like a map of routine and violence.
Part of me wanted to run.
To escape this cold house. These cold bloodlines. The secrets stitched into the shadows of my family's name.
But part of me knew better. If I ran, they would chase. Not because they feared me.
Because they wanted to use me.
I leaned against the balustrade, letting the wind burn my cheeks. The sky above was iron-grey—neither day nor night, like my future.
Was surrender an option?
Could I simply fall in line, do what they asked, and buy myself time? Or would they chip away at me until there was nothing left of me at all?
What do I want?
The question came out of nowhere. I couldn't answer it.
Not yet.
But I knew one thing: nothing would be the same after today.
From the Shadows
Unseen by the boy lost in thought, two figures stood cloaked in a side corridor that opened into the hall.
One was gaunt, robed in green and white, with spectacles perched on the edge of his hawkish nose. The family physician.
The other leaned heavier on a cane—Lord Calmreich, Finesse's father.
They had watched silently, unnoticed, through a thin crack in the carved wall—once a hidden door now long disused.
"He's changing," the doctor whispered, adjusting his spectacles. "Faster than I expected."
Lord Calmreich's jaw was tight. "He has the look of someone who's beginning to think for himself."
"And that, my lord, is precisely what we must prepare for."
The doctor produced a sealed parchment from his robes and handed it over. "His body withstood a massive mana awakening with no visible damage. And when I examined the residue of his aura—what little we could gather—it was stable. If he receives proper training, I believe he may become a compatible vessel."
Lord Calmreich turned to face him fully. "For Finesse?"
The physician nodded gravely. "She's weakening. Her mana is overflowing, corrupting her organs. If we don't divert it, she will not last more than a year or two."
A heavy silence fell between them.
"No ordinary child could bear the transfer," the doctor went on. "It must be someone with the right bloodline. The right foundation. Someone strong. Alive."
He glanced toward the balcony.
"And he may be the only one."
Lord Calmreich folded the parchment slowly. "Then he must be trained. Sharpened."
"And prepared," the doctor added softly, "to become her salvation… whether he agrees or not."