"They've sent you as the messenger."
Trevor didn't flinch. But he didn't deny it, either.
"Hmm…" Trevor mused, tone low. "More like Sera knew I wouldn't keep my mouth shut."
Lucas arched a brow. "Is that supposed to comfort me?"
Trevor leaned back slightly, one arm resting across the back of his chair. "It's supposed to be honest."
That answer gave Lucas pause.
Not because it was kind. But because it wasn't wrapped in diplomacy or court language. There was no sales pitch. No 'we just want what's best for you.'
Just one man, stating plainly that he wasn't going to lie.
Lucas studied him thoroughly. The broad shoulders, the tightly controlled posture, the deceptively relaxed tone. This wasn't an alpha used to getting his way by force. This was someone who wore control like armor, and he did not waste it unless absolutely necessary.
A man who wouldn't play nice if the stakes weren't real.
"Then be honest," Lucas said, voice low. "What did Sera tell you about me?"
Trevor didn't hesitate.
"That you'd earned the right to be left alone," he said. "But the Empire won't allow that. So she's giving you options."
Lucas's throat tightened, uninvited.
Trevor reached for his wine glass, his fingers curling around the stem with casual elegance, like every movement was deliberate—even when it wasn't meant to impress.
"She used my name," he said quietly, "to make sure that nobody would touch you. That from now on, you live how you want."
Lucas didn't speak, but something in his posture shifted—shoulders drawn slightly back, chest still.
Trevor continued, his tone calm but edged in steel.
"Your mother, Misty, declared you dead to the Crown. The Emperor found out about it the day Serathine took you in. Saying that he's mad at Misty and Christian is an understatement." He took a sip of wine, gaze still locked on Lucas. "He is raging."
Lucas exhaled, slow and quiet—but not in relief.
It wasn't the news that startled him.
It was the sudden awareness that for the first time… someone was furious on his behalf.
Not because of what he cost them. Not because he embarrassed them.
But because of what was done to him.
He didn't know what to do with that.
Lucas reached for his own glass but didn't drink. He let the rim rest against his lower lip, as if weighing what it meant to hold something that wasn't poison.
Trevor spoke again, softer now. "He didn't know you existed."
Lucas's eyes flicked up.
Trevor's expression was still composed. But there was something fierce behind it. Something rarely visible in men who always seemed to be in control.
"He thought you were gone," Trevor said. "And when the truth hit him, it hit hard."
He let that hang a moment. No flourish. No dramatics.
Just the truth, laid bare.
"He wants to tell you all of this himself," Trevor added, tilting the glass slightly in his fingers, watching the wine catch the firelight. "But he has to pay for my favor."
Lucas stared at him.
"Are you that petty," he asked quietly, "that you took his chance to tell me the truth?"
Trevor's lips curved—not into a smile, but something far drier. A flash of dark amusement.
"Caelan should be glad I'm not organizing a rebellion for all the trouble he's put me in," he said, setting the glass down with a soft click. "He let Sera manipulate me."
He leaned back in his chair with an unhurried elegance that made the words sting more.
"She warned me not to get sentimental with you."
Lucas blinked. Then laughed, once—sharp and without humor.
"She knows you well."
Trevor arched a brow. "She knows everyone well. That's the problem."
Lucas considered that. Considered the way Sera had stepped into his life like a shield that didn't ask for worship. She didn't love him, not in the way people romanticized protectors—but she had chosen him. And in a place like this, that mattered more than love ever could.
"Is that what this is, then?" Lucas asked, his voice quieter now. "A transaction between tacticians? I'm just a pawn the Emperor forgot and Sera repurposed?"
Trevor didn't answer right away.
He looked at him long and slow, as if he was weighing not how much Lucas could take but how much he deserved to hear.
"No," he said. "You're not a pawn."
Trevor's tone shifted then, softened not with pity but clarity. The kind of clarity that came from living in the upper atmosphere of power for too long and learning exactly how rare sincerity was.
"No," he repeated, "Caelan is a lot of things—but he never treated his children with cruelty. Not once."
Lucas's jaw tightened, just slightly.
Trevor leaned back again, eyes steady, voice low.
"Most of your half-siblings got to choose their lives. Their paths. Their partners. Only the Crown Prince carries that weight on his back, and even he was raised with options—limited, maybe, but real."
A beat.
"He's not interested in selling you for political gain. If he were, you'd already be married off to a minor kingdom by now, smiling in front of cameras with someone three times your age and no sense of humor."
Lucas exhaled sharply through his nose. "Charming."
Trevor's mouth lifted at the corner. "It's a popular match format."
Then the smile faded.
"He's not using you, Lucas," he said. "You scare him. Because he has power—too much of it—and no way to undo what was done. He's not trying to claim you to consolidate anything. He's trying to find a way to give you back what should have been yours."
Lucas looked down at the wine glass. At his own fingers curled too tightly around the stem.
He wanted to believe that.
That Caelan's silence hadn't been a choice. That his absence wasn't rejection, but misdirection. A lie told to him too, not by him.
And yet.
"I don't need him to make up for it," Lucas said finally. "I just need him to stop letting others try to control what's left."
Trevor nodded once, thoughtful.
"Well," he said, his voice dry, "he started with Sera and me. But I have the hunch that Serathine wants me in the Capital for more than just guarding your freedom."
He lifted his hands in mock submission.
"I can't escape her."
Lucas snorted quietly, unintentionally. "No one can."
Trevor tilted his head, a faint smirk forming. "She could have named a private guard. She could've assigned a cousin. Instead, she dropped my name into the Empire's bloodstream like a warning label."
"She does like to make a statement," Lucas murmured.
Trevor's eyes narrowed with amused suspicion. "You're enjoying this."
Lucas leaned back in his chair again, finally taking a slow sip of his wine. "Not yet."
Trevor raised an eyebrow.
"But I will," Lucas added, calmly. "At the Gala."
Trevor chuckled once—low, almost approving.
"Aaaand…" Lucas dragged the word as he set his wine glass down, arching a brow. "What do we do now?"
It wasn't flirtatious. Not even close.
It was practical. Cautious. The kind of question a boy might ask when he wasn't sure if he'd just crossed into someone else's plans—or been offered space to make his own.
Trevor studied him for a beat, then sat again—slow, easy, as if there was no pressure to be anywhere else.
"Well," he said, folding his hands loosely in front of him, "we finish dinner. We pretend the cameras at the Gala don't exist. And we let the Empire think whatever the hell it wants."
Lucas tilted his head slightly. "That's your plan?"
Trevor shrugged, unapologetic. "It's not a courtship, Lucas. There's no proposal coming. I'm not your leash, and I'm not your prize. This," he gestured to the space between them, "is just a partnership. Temporary. Strategic. And only if you want it."
Lucas stared at him.
He liked that answer more than he wanted to admit.
He wasn't good at flirting. He wasn't even sure if he wanted romance, or if he was capable of trusting anything soft again.
But Trevor wasn't asking for softness. Or control. Or promises.
He was offering room.
Lucas sat back in his chair and exhaled slowly.
"Good," he said, voice flat but sincere. "Because I wouldn't know how to flirt even if you paid me."
Trevor smirked. "Sera warned me."
Lucas blinked. "Seriously?"
"She said you'd probably try to offer a political concession instead of a compliment."
Lucas gave a quiet, incredulous laugh. "She's not wrong."
Trevor raised his glass slightly in a silent toast. "Then we understand each other."
Lucas mirrored the gesture.
And for the first time in far too long, he didn't feel like a boy trapped between claws.
He felt like someone at the table.