[Lavinia’s POV — Imperial Dungeons]
The air grew colder the deeper we descended, torchlight bleeding across the stone walls, shadows bending and stretching like they wanted to whisper secrets to .
Chains rattled sowhere below. A groan followed—low, broken.
Marshi padded close at my side, tail swishing, eyes glowing faintly in the dark. Sir Haldor’s steps behind were steady as a drumbeat, the sound of duty wrapped in armor.
The dungeon slled of rust, mold, and sothing sharper—pain.
I smirked to myself. How fitting.
When we turned the final corridor, I saw him.
Caelum.
Once my sparring partner, the boy who used to laugh when I missed a strike. Now slumped against iron bars, pale, sweat-slick, poison gnawing at him from the inside.
I stopped just shy of the bars. My voice slid across the silence, calm and sharp as glass.
"Well, well. My old training mate. You look terrible. Should I be offended that you didn’t dress up for ?"
His head lifted slowly, eyes hazy but burning with defiance. Even on death’s doorstep, Caelum managed a weak smirk.
"Still... sharp-tongued... Princess," he rasped, voice cracked from thirst and pain. "Guess so things... never change."
Sir Haldor set the wooden chair down with the ceremonious care of a man placing a relic upon an altar.
"Your Highness."
I sank into it, crossing one ankle over the other, as casual as a cat in a kiln. Chains rasped at Caelum’s knees when he bowed—humility from a man who’d once sparred opposite in the yard felt almost obscene.
"You’re trembling," I observed, voice low and amused. "Pain suits you, Caelum. It makes your bravado look smaller. Still—credit where it’s due. You kneel like a fighter about to die. That’s honorable in a way."
He gave a smile that was all cracked porcelain. "Because you won’t harm , Princess. I know you."
I let the silence stretch, thin and pressurized. "Such confidence. Tell —what gives you that certainty?"
He strained forward on the irons, stopped by the chain, and leveled with that old, awful arrogance. "Because you need ."
The word cut like salt. I let my smile thin to a wire. "Need you?" I echoed, tasting it with deliberate contempt. "Oh, Caelum. That’s very quaint of you—to think the world revolves around the little conveniences of your survival."
His eyes flicked to Marshi—golden, unreadable—and the beast’s tail flicked once, bored. Haldor stood like a statue, waiting for the show to end.
"You think you’re indispensable?" I tilted forward, fingers tapping the arm of the chair. "You who slipped poison into my cup like a petty thief. You who sat in my garden and plotted while wearing a friendly smile. Tell —was your heart big enough to hold an empire, or was it rely full of sches?"
Caelum’s jaw worked. "You dragged into your nets. You had poisoned and hunted. You—"
"You forget your cris when your throat is dry," I cut him off, letting the words land. "Or maybe you hope to charm into pity. Old habits die hard." My voice went colder. "You were at my side when the maid poured the cup. You passed her that foreign coin. And you think that’s bravery, how stupid of you caelum."
Then I leaned forward, saying, "You are not a wounded wolf—you are a donkey who fancied a crown."
A heavy silence dropped. Caelum bared his teeth. "It was your father who stole my birthright—Cassius took the throne from Irethene."
I let the accusation roll over like a bad scent and replied with the slow, surgical calm of soone who has already decided the verdict. "And it was you—and that priest—who attacked the south. You brought fire to my people, Caelum. You carved your path with blood and called it strategy. If Irethene now breathes easier under my rule, perhaps that is because your ’freedom’ was always code for ruin."
He scoffed, spitting the word like poison. "Peaceful? That’s a nice word for a puppet’s lullaby. You rule with cruelty—thinly veiled as order. An empire cannot be ’peaceful’ when its crown is worn by a child of tyranny."
I humd, almost indulgent. "So that’s your truth. You wanted the throne because you believed you’d do a better job? Because you thought yourself more deserving?"
"What’s wrong with that?" His voice brightened into a brittle edge, suddenly small with fury. "I knew you would never be fit for the throne. Only I deserve it, Princess. You’re a monster... and monsters only bring doom."
. . .
. . .
. . .
The corner of my mouth tilted. "Monster. Such a quaint accusation."
I let the word sit between us like a dropped coin. "But let school you in reality, Caelum. Thrones are not handed to those who shout the loudest about how much they ’deserve’ them. Thrones are held by those who keep a people fed, a city breathing, and an enemy silent. You dread of wearing a crown as if it were a halo. Your ’salvation’ left behind smoldering villages and corpses. Your ’deserve’ reeks of ash."
His face contorted—fury and a flash of sothing else, sha or fear, or both. And there was deadly silence.
I rose, moving with the cool, effortless ease of soone who has long practiced making room for terror. The rack and the instrunts along the wall waited like clinical props—iron, leather, and a collection of old, rusted promises. I inspected them with the bored curiosity of a student glancing at a dull lecture.
"I don’t have all day to play dress-up with your confessions, Caelum," I said, voice casual as tea-ti. "If you fancy dying peacefully, simply confess. Make it easy. Make it boring."
He Scoffed.
"Speak plainly, Caelum," I repeated, stepping closer until the torchlight etched the angles of my face. "Who aided you? Nas. Houses. Priests. Coin-bearers. Lay out the map of this conspiracy or your ’deserve’ becos dust I can sweep away."
He t my stare with a grin that slid between madness and bravado. "Do you think I fear you? The—" He tried to make the old charge sting—"the princess I grew up with would never ever dare to kill any—"
SLASH.
The rusty blade flashed as I slashed it at his shoulder.
"AGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"
He howled, a raw sound that scraped the stones. Blood beaded at the cut, bright and sudden. He trembled with pain.
And then, I pulled the blade free as if examining fabric.
"AAAGHHHHH!!!!!"
"Hm. Not deep," I observed, my voice annoyingly casual as though comnting on tea temperature.
Caelum curled beneath , trembling. Sir Haldor’s face remained an unmoving cliff. I turned to him with serene, administrative calm. "Sir Haldor—have soone replace these relics. They’re old and rusty. It would be shaful to make the work unentertaining."
Haldor inclines his head smoothly. "I’ll see to it, Your Highness."
I looked back at the chained man and let my smile sharpen into sothing surgical. "You were saying, Caelum? You were about to explain why the little world kept spinning around your wants."
He swallowed, fury and pain warring for control. The torchlight threw his features into dramatic relief; he was dangerous in defeat because he still believed himself dangerous.
"Start talking," I said, silky and cold. "Or the next blade won’t be ceremonial. It’ll be practical."
Pain trembled through him; his jaw worked. "No—no one helped ," Caelum rasped, each word a wet cough. "It was— it was all my doing. I staged it. I played the abandoned son. I begged to be taken in. Marquess Everett... had no idea."
Silence dropped like a curtain.
I let the mont hang, heavy and delicious. Then I turned my head, slow as a predatory cat, and looked to Sir Haldor. "Well? Your opinion, Sir Haldor?"
Haldor’s stone face never moved—except now, sothing like a thin smile ghosted at the corner of his mouth. "He’s lying, Princess," he said flatly. "A marquess who takes pity on a penniless stranger? Pity is not the currency of House Everett. That’s the joke of the century."
I tilted my head at him and smirked. "I really did a good job hiring you, Sir Haldor."
He bowed crisply. "Thank you, Your Highness... but—" His tone never shifted, his face carved from marble. "... If you were to raise my salary, I could demonstrate even greater loyalty."
My brows arched. "Oh? So this loyalty you’re showing now..."
"Exactly twenty-five percent, Your Highness."
I blinked. "...Only twenty-five?"
"Yes. The rest is... pending paynt."
A long sigh slipped out of . "I guess...I have no choice but to raise your salary."
His stone face didn’t crack. "Gratitude, Your Highness."
He bowed like a man who’d just sold his soul for better armor. It was the most wholeso corruption I’d ever seen.
Then I sighed, saying, "Now, beat him with the leash until he utters a na. Not to kill—yet—but until the truth bolts out. Make it disciplined. Make it clean."
Haldor inclines his head. "As you command, Your Highness."
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