Later that evening, as the estate quieted, Rowan found Lucien leaning over a map in the study. Candlelight flickered over his face.
"She’s hiding sothing," Lucien muttered.
Rowan didn’t ask who. "You want to press her?"
"No," Lucien said, too quickly. "Just... keep an eye on her."
"You’re starting to care."
Lucien didn’t deny it.
Rowan’s tone changed. "We got word from the southern borders that Petra’s walls had foreign scouts near the riverbank."
Lucien straightened. "Whose n?"
"Unmarked, but not locals. There’s a possibility we’re dealing with interests from the old Elveran coast. And soone at court is feeding them."
Lucien exhaled. "The Minister of Arms was once close to Elveran trade. Pull his travel records."
"You think it’s him?"
"I think soone wants Alden’s reign shaken from the roots. Petra is the softest stone. They’ll start there."
Rowan nodded and left.
Across the courtyard, Liora stood alone in the library with the pendant open in her palm.
Inside was not only the pattern she rembered but also sothing newer, folded beneath the lining. A tiny sliver of parchnt, old and dry. She pried it out gently. There were words etched in a hasty hand:
"Vault. Beneath the black altar. Oakridge."
She stared at it, breath slowing.
Oakridge was a long-forgotten region, abandoned during the last war. But the na stirred sothing in her. A story her mother once whispered when putting her to bed. A place of kings before the current line took the throne.
Could it be connected?
Could her mother have been hiding more than just her?
She closed the pendant and tucked it beneath her tunic. She couldn’t bring this to Lucien. Not yet.
He’d protect her, yes, but she needed to uncover the truth herself first. For her mother. For herself.
Outside, in the shadows beneath a cypress tree, a cloaked figure watched the library window, eyes glinting with cold purpose.
"She’s found it," the figure murmured to himself.
Then he disappeared into the dark, where no torch reached and no guard patrolled.
Two mornings later, Alden’s court convened in the capital...an ergency session.
The hall was crowded with robed ministers and nobles summoned in haste, tension hanging sharp as steel. Alden sat on the throne with his usual stoicism, but even the king’s calm couldn’t hide the subtle unease radiating from his council.
Lucien arrived late, unannounced. His presence drew whispers.
"Prince Lucien?" One of the ministers muttered, surprised. "He hasn’t been to court since..."
"He’s not welco, not anymore," another hissed.
But Alden’s eyes flickered with sothing unreadable as Lucien stepped forward. He gave no formal bow, only a curt nod to his brother. A calculated defiance. But no one dared rebuke it aloud.
Alden signaled the chamberlain. "We have reports of foreign n sighted near Petra’s edges."
"Unmarked, Your Majesty," the old man read aloud. "Not rcenaries. Trained. Coordinated. Possibly Elveran-linked, but they vanished before contact could be made."
One of the generals, Lord Hyreth, leaned forward. "May I speak plainly, Your Majesty?"
"Always."
"This slls of a breach from within. If there’s any truth to the leaked troop arrangents reaching Elveran ears, then soone inside this very court is a traitor."
Whispers spread like wildfire.
Alden’s gaze hardened. "Na your suspects."
"No nas yet. But..." Lord Hyreth’s eyes landed subtly on the Minister of Arms, who didn’t flinch.
Lucien watched from the side, arms crossed. He hadn’t spoken once. But he was watching, listening, reading the air like a soldier reading a battlefield.
Finally, Alden looked his way. "Lucien. You’ve spent years in Petra. What’s your assessnt?"
A pause. The hall went still.
Lucien stepped forward, his voice cool but precise. "Petra is exposed. The rivers are unguarded. The garrisons are under-equipped. And there’s too much traffic through Oakridge lately."
That caught attention. Oakridge?
"It’s barren," said the Minister of Records. "Nobody lives there."
Lucien’s gaze sharpened. "That’s what bothers ."
He didn’t say it aloud, but his thoughts circled Liora. Her pendant. The na was scribbled inside. Vault beneath the black altar. Oakridge.
He knew coincidence had long fled this ga.
Back at the estate, Liora had begun her own quiet research, sifting through old maps and asking Rowan veiled questions about old settlents.
Beatrice noticed, but said nothing. Not yet.
Liora didn’t trust her completely, especially now that Beatrice seed to watch her more closely, as if weighing her worth.
She’d overheard the old woman once, muttering to herself.
"She’s not as dull as the others. But Lilian won’t like this one growing roots."
Liora hadn’t forgotten those words.
That night, as Lucien returned from the capital, he found Liora asleep by the unlit hearth, books scattered around her. Her fingers still held an old scroll, her hair brushing the cold stone floor.
He watched her for a mont.
In sleep, she looked... different. Not softer, but truer, stripped of the mask she wore around others.
He knelt and gently removed the scroll, placing it aside before lifting her into his arms.
She stirred, murmuring sothing too soft to catch. But she didn’t resist.
And Lucien... didn’t let go.
The dawn at the estate broke grey and cold, a veil of mist still clinging to the lower woods. Lucien hadn’t slept. Not really. His return from court had left his thoughts scattered, a war council thundering in his head, while the image of Liora asleep by the hearth lingered.
He hadn’t spoken to her that morning. Only watched as she moved about with silent determination, keeping her distance more deliberately than usual.
Rowan caught it too. "She’s looking into sothing," he murmured to Lucien when they crossed paths outside the stables. "Old records. Property deeds. Areas abandoned after the famine."
Lucien didn’t answer, but his expression told enough.
"And," Rowan added under his breath, "we have a guest arriving. An envoy."
Lucien looked up sharply. "From the capital?"
"No. From the southern borders. Claims to be from Caervale."
That na sent a pulse of suspicion through Lucien’s chest. Caervale wasn’t neutral. It was a kingdom veiled in honeyed diplomacy, but their eyes had long lingered on Eldrin’s fractured edges.
"Na?" Lucien asked.
"Lord Nereas."
Lucien frowned. He hadn’t heard that na in years.
By noon, the estate’s gates opened to a sleek black carriage. From it stepped a tall man dressed in muted silver and dark green, his features sharp and refined. He bore himself like a man who expected the world to move aside for him, and often, it did.
Liora stood on the porch as the carriage ca to a halt, unsure whether to greet or retreat. She recognized the crest, a stylized stag entwined with thorned vines. Not Eldrin’s.
As Lord Nereas stepped forward, his eyes t hers and lingered.
"You must be the lady of this house," he said smoothly, though he knew well she wasn’t. "I’m honored."
Liora dipped a shallow nod. "I’m rely a guest, my lord."
"And yet," he said, eyes glinting, "you carry yourself like soone who commands a room."
Lucien appeared behind her just then, his voice like a blade unsheathed. "She does not entertain visitors without my knowledge."
Nereas turned, unbothered. "Ah. Prince Lucien. I wasn’t sure you’d greet yourself."
"I don’t entertain snakes in my house either, but here we are."
A subtle smile curved the envoy’s lips. "Then perhaps we’ll surprise each other."
Later that night, in the quiet of her chamber, Liora couldn’t sleep. Nereas’s presence unsettled her. His gaze had been curious, too curious. And oddly familiar.
She stood by the window, staring into the dark. From the courtyard below, she spotted movent. Lucien was there, pacing slowly, his face lit only by the faint lantern glow.
He was always alone in the night. Always carrying sothing he wouldn’t na.
A part of her wanted to go to him.
Another part still didn’t know if she could.
But what she couldn’t deny anymore... was that sothing had shifted.
Not between them.
But within her.
The estate had never felt this watchful.
Even the servants moved with hushed steps, whispering when they thought no one could hear. Lord Nereas had requested to stay for three days, citing vague diplomatic reasons, and Lucien, after much deliberation, had allowed it. But every instinct in him scread against the man’s presence.
Rowan kept eyes on the envoy at all hours. Samuel doubled the guard around the estate, but Nereas remained unfazed. He walked the halls like a man already at ho.
Lucien hadn’t spoken to Liora about it.
He couldn’t explain why that bothered him more than it should.
She hadn’t spoken to him either, not really. She kept to herself, focused on the injured villagers she was tending, barely eting his eyes during als. If she noticed Nereas watching her, she showed no sign.
But Lucien did.
That evening, as dusk painted the skies with a bruised violet hue, Lucien stepped into the west wing study only to find Nereas and Liora alone there.
She stood by the old maps cabinet, holding a rolled parchnt, her back tense. Nereas was seated, legs crossed, sipping wine far too comfortably.
Lucien didn’t speak at first. Just walked in.
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