Soon after we drifted back into my tea room, Morres appeared like a draft through the window—sober, tired, shoulders hunched the way a man carries a winter coat after a long march.

"Listen. Alex. We're sorry. We just wanted—" he began, the apology already practiced into the cadence of his voice.

I cut him off with a punch. Not a shove or a theatrical gasp, but a clean, precise strike into the peacock of his chest that landed like a bell. He stumbled, a surprised exhale escaping him as he took a step back and steadied himself against the carved arm of a chair.

Silence slammed into the room after the sound. The teacup on my desk kept its gentle steam and my starlight forest kept its patient glow, as if nothing else in the world was permitted to rattle them. Nobody moved. Nobody breathed too loudly.

"I. Don't. Care." I said, each word finding a separate gear in my jaw. "For the past year and a half I've been the bit in your mouth to chew on when it's convenient. Pandora's Box wants me for something—fine. Solomon's Gate wants me for something else—also fine. Barbatos at least had the decency to be blunt. You and the rest? You parade me through corridors like a prize and expect me to smile."

Morres opened his mouth to speak and I pushed on.

"Enemies unite when they're desperate. Plans overlay plans until the person in the middle is confused enough to applaud. I'm tired of being the puppet that keeps getting unstrung and restrung just for a better show. So royally—fuck off."

He didn't sputter. He didn't plead. For the first time I saw the old soldier under the cloak—the one who had probably watched too many clever people die with their last smiles still in place. He only nodded once, slow and measured, and then he folded into himself like paper. The room felt colder in the space he left.

Gin rolled into existence a moment later, smiling like a cat that had walked through an empty bakery. He never arrived half-heartedly; his entrances were performances. He sprawled on his cloud across from my window, bells on his garments chiming like distant laughter. He regarded me as if I'd just delivered him his favorite entertainment.

"Fuck off as well, Gin," I muttered, because the honesty felt good and unfairly cleansing.

"Oh trust me. I'd love to," he said, and his grin widened. "I'd love to be far, far away from here. But sadly, what we get is worse than we hoped, and better than we feared."

He tore an apple from somewhere—his pocket, some knot in reality—and bit into it with exaggerated civility. Juice shimmered like mana on his lips. I watched him chew, waiting for the cruelty I'd come to expect to lace his next sentence.

"Luckily, the Fallen approaching is easily dealt with," he continued, voice syrupy and calm. "A member of the Seraphic Court is handling the immediate threat."

My stomach dropped. "They'll be closer to me."

Gin nodded, like that was a problem he'd already penciled into the margin and not circled in red. "Yes. They will be. Which complicates the choreography."

I wanted to ask which Fallen and which Seraph, but I didn't. Names with wings tend to carry long lists of consequences, and I'd learned to read consequences by the way Gin's smile rearranged his face.

"You also have someone interested in speaking with you," he said, swallowing another bite. "And that conversation would not be great for you right now either."

"You mean another Dominus?" My voice was level, but there was a low thrum of warning along the inside of my ribs. Dominus visits were like tax audits you hadn't consented to—polite smiles, then knives.

Gin's tail swished once, toyishly. "Not a Dominus. More…ceremonial. Someone with teeth and bone and a very particular set of expectations. If you punch him, you'll break every splinter and bone in your body."

"I don't need a lecture on physiology from you," I said, and then, because spite is often the first honest thing we offer, I added, "But I accept your implication: Don't punch him."

"Excellent choice." Gin's expression softened just enough to be believable. It was a horrid little kindness. "After all, it would be tedious to have to explain why the boy who bruised a Dominus's ego was also broken into a dozen honest pieces."

Basaroiel whuffed in his bag—tiny impatience, a feathered shrug of what passes for griffin commentary—and in that small noise I found an anchor. The chick's steady breathing reminded me that not everything in my life was scheming and consequence and political theater. Not everything wanted my throat.

"So who is it?" I asked, because the air had filled with this new string of dangers and I wanted to know which wire to cut first.

Gin shattered an apple core with his teeth, chewing the sound like a bell. "A representative of a court you've avoided looking at. No point widening your social portfolio yet. He will come at dawn. Prepare to behave as if you value the lives of a thousand strangers who think you're an amusing pet."

He paused, letting that settle.

"And one more thing, Alex," he added, voice folding into something almost like adult concern. "Thirty-one days, remember? That is still the clock. It has been ticking. The urgency isn't a rumor."

Heat blossomed along the back of my neck at the reminder. Thirty-one days had become a drumbeat in my chest; it was both an accusation and a promise. Whatever game they were playing with books and lies and lessons, that number had teeth.

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Gin popped the last bite of apple into his mouth and chewed, content. "Besides," he said, eyes glinting at me like coins, "someone must get you somewhere to learn not to be a tyrant. I promised you cruelty. And what is cruelty?"

"Cruelty is kindness," I said under my breath—his motto, and perhaps the only thing he meant as truth.

***

I hadn't even realized my hands were trembling until I set the Chancellor down on the low tea table. It rattled louder than it should have, like the steel of the barrel and the lacquered wood both wanted to betray me. My whole body had been carrying tension ever since Gin slinked off, his laughter still dripping like tar somewhere in my ears.

Fally noticed, of course. She always did.

She perched on the armrest of my chair first, the way she always tested the air before committing to closeness. Then, with a tilt of her chin and a little smile meant to be casual, she slid down beside me. Her arm brushed mine. Light, careful. An invitation, not a command.

"You look like you're about to eat that table," she said softly, her voice deliberately teasing. "And it's much too nice of a table to eat."

I tried to exhale a laugh, but it cracked in my throat. "Sorry. Just… it doesn't stop, does it?"

Her eyes caught mine, dark and patient. "No. But you don't have to carry it alone."

That's what did it. Something inside me splintered open, and all the words I'd been swallowing since Morres and Gin had played their games started pouring out before I could cork them.

"I'm sick of it, Fally. Sick of being pushed around, sick of everyone acting like I'm some board piece to be nudged across their strategy maps. Pandora's Box, Solomon's Gate, even Gin—they all want something from me, but none of them have the spine to say it outright. They just dangle strings and expect me to dance. And for what? For their amusement? For some grand design that I never agreed to be part of?"

My voice sharpened as I went, and I slammed my palm against the table, rattling the cups.

"They think I'm disposable. A resource. 'Oh, he's strong, he's clever, he'll survive another round. Push him here, shove him there, feed him to the wolves and watch him crawl back.' And I've done it. Every damned time, I've crawled back. And the only thing I get in return is another leash around my neck."

Fally let me pace. She didn't reach out yet, didn't soothe, didn't interrupt. She knew me too well; she knew if she cut in too early I'd only shut down.

"I try to focus on what matters. I try to protect people, to fight the threats that are in front of me. But every time I do, someone else comes out of the shadows with another secret, another bargain, another warning. Thirty-one days, Alex. Behave, Alex. Don't punch this one, Alex. It's endless. And I'm…"

I stopped. My throat burned, and I realized I'd clenched my fists so tight the paper under my nails had creased.

"I'm tired, Fally," I whispered, softer now. "So tired of being their weapon. Of pretending like I care about their schemes. I don't. I care about my family. I care about you. I care about the people beside me. But they—Pandora, Solomon, Gin—they don't see people. They only see tools. And I'm… I'm done being a tool."

Silence stretched. My pulse pounded in my ears. For a moment, I thought she might not answer, that maybe I'd said too much, shown too much weakness. But then her hand slid over mine, warm and steady, pressing against the knotted tension in my fingers until I let them uncurl.

"You're not a tool," she said firmly. "Not to me. Not to any of us. You're Alex. The one who saves us, yes. The one who fights. But also the one who sits with me and calls me Fally and makes me tea when I'm too nervous to sleep. The one who folds his nightmares into paper walls so the rest of us can rest easy. The one who still knows how to laugh, even if it's only sometimes. That's who you are."

I wanted to believe her. I did. But the weight pressing on my chest wouldn't loosen.

"Then why does it feel like I'm nothing but leverage to everyone else?" I asked bitterly. "Why does it feel like the only thing I'm good for is bleeding in someone else's war?"

She didn't flinch. "Because they're wrong. They've decided on the easiest story to tell about you: that you're strong, that you can take it, that you'll keep standing no matter what they throw at you. But that's not the truth. The truth is you keep standing because you choose to. Not because you're their piece. Because you're yours."

Her words struck something fragile inside me, and I swallowed hard against the lump in my throat.

"Choice," I muttered. "Feels like I haven't had a real one in months."

"You chose me," she said quietly.

That silenced me.

Her hand was still over mine, her fingers smaller but unyielding. She leaned her head gently against my shoulder, and for the first time in hours, I felt my body let out a fraction of its tension.

"You chose to let me stay," she continued. "When you could have told me to run. You chose to trust me, to bring me into your plans, to let me be part of your world. That wasn't someone else's game, Alex. That was you. Your decision."

Her voice dipped lower, softer. "And you keep choosing. Every day. Even when it hurts. Even when it's messy. That's what makes you different from them. That's why I trust you."

I closed my eyes. The scent of her hair—something sweet, like summer berries—filled my senses. The warmth of her leaning against me felt like an anchor against the chaos of everything else.

"I don't deserve that trust," I said, the words spilling out raw. "I lash out, I get angry, I punch allies, I—"

"You're human," she interrupted firmly. "That's all. And maybe they've forgotten what that means, but I haven't. Anger doesn't make you less. It makes you real. And right now, I think you needed to let it out. So let it out."

And I did.

I told her everything I'd been holding in—the frustration with the endless games, the fear of the thirty-one days hanging over me like a guillotine, the guilt of dragging her and the others into the storm that seemed to follow me everywhere. I confessed the exhaustion of always being the one who had to stand tall, the one who had to make choices that cost more than I ever admitted aloud.

She listened. She didn't judge, didn't argue. She just held my hand and let me empty myself until I felt hollow.

When I finally stopped, when the words ran dry, she lifted her head to look at me. Her eyes were shining, not with pity, but with a steady kind of fire.

"You're not alone, Alex," she said. "Not now, not ever. As long as I'm here, you'll never have to carry it alone again."

Something inside me cracked then, but it wasn't pain this time. It was relief.

I pulled her closer, resting my forehead against hers. For a long while, neither of us spoke. The storm inside me had quieted, not gone, but gentled by her presence.

Then, another guillotine dropped, as she pushed me into the wall, pressing her mouth to mine.

"Now shut up little rabbit or this dragon will eat you."

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