The tension held.

No one spoke. The air was too thin for it, stretched tight across the hall like glass waiting for the smallest sound to break it. The chandelier lights caught on crystal edges, refracting across polished faces that dared not shift or breathe. Every guest present understood that something fragile balanced between them, and none of them wanted to be the one to disturb it.

Lord Sarn moved first. The sound of his glass touching the table was almost delicate, but the deliberate control behind it made the gesture louder than any voice. He adjusted his cuff links, took his time straightening them, then looked up at Vaeliyan. "You speak with conviction," he said, tone perfectly neutral. "That will serve you well tomorrow."

Vaeliyan met his gaze, posture steady. "Tomorrow?"

Lady Sarn's reply came smooth, practiced, and honeyed. "There will be a formal investigation, as procedure demands. It will not fall under the Citadel's purview, nor the Legion's. This matter belongs to House Sarn." Her words were velvet-wrapped commands, every syllable measured to remind the hall that her word was law when it came to truth and consequence.

She allowed the silence to hang after that, savoring the weight of it. The nobles nearby leaned in without realizing it, drawn by her composure. "You and your unit will attend our estate in the morning," she continued. "It is presently docked above Kyrrabad's eastern spires. You will be received personally." Her tone was not invitation but decree.

Elian straightened beside Vaeliyan, shoulders locked, hands folding tight behind his back. His father's eyes found him and pinned him in place. Lord Sarn's stare was an instrument, precise and unrelenting, dissecting his son's reaction without ever seeming cruel. The man did not need anger; he carried authority like gravity.

"This will be an official interview," Lord Sarn said, each word deliberate. "Nothing more. You will recount the events, and we will confirm them. Every instructor involved will be notified. It is a matter of record, not punishment." The reassurance sounded procedural, but everyone in the room knew it was still an interrogation. The law, dressed in courtesy.

He turned his gaze back to Vaeliyan. "You understand that, I trust. This is a formality. But one that must be observed. House Sarn does not let rumors breathe." His voice dropped slightly on the last line, and several onlookers instinctively looked away.

Vaeliyan inclined his head. "Of course." His tone was polite, cool. Then, after a heartbeat, "And the reparations?" The question was framed as curiosity, but its edge gleamed underneath.

Lady Sarn smiled, beautifully and without warmth. "There will be reparations, yes. House Sable lost one of their own. Even when justified, death among nobility demands acknowledgment." She gestured faintly with one hand, her rings catching the light. "You will not carry it alone, but it will be paid. Properly."

Elian's throat moved as he swallowed, and the sound felt thunderous in the quiet. He wanted to speak, to argue that Michael's death had been justice, but his parents' composure reminded him that in this room, truth was irrelevant without timing.

"Of course," Vaeliyan said, tone smooth but heavy with implication. "Wouldn't want to offend propriety." The irony in his voice was sharp enough to draw blood, though couched in elegance.

Something in Lady Sarn's eyes flickered, an acknowledgment, subtle but real. Lord Sarn inclined his head in that exact way the powerful used to end a conversation without ending the tension. The gesture was the final punctuation to a statement that had already been made.

"Tomorrow morning," he said. "At dawn. Our doors will open for you." The phrase was ceremonial, heavy with history and tradition. For House Sarn, dawn meant judgment.

The silence that followed lingered longer than it should have, as though the room itself was reluctant to breathe again. When sound returned, it did so in pieces: a cough, a glass clinking against marble, the faint attempt of conversation trying to knit the social fabric back together. Nobles whispered about protocol and politics, pretending not to stare at the young men who had just been named the center of tomorrow's scrutiny.

The Sarns turned away together, the symmetry of their movement unnervingly perfect. Authority didn't walk; it glided. Even their departure was orchestrated. The crowd parted for them instinctively, and the hall seemed smaller once they were gone.

Ruby's voice came after the silence had settled again, smooth and steady over the faint hum of resumed chatter. "Well," she said softly, breaking the tension without shattering it, "that could have gone worse." Her tone made it sound like a question more than a statement.

Vaeliyan didn't respond. His reflection in the mirrored glass beside him looked untouched, calm, unreadable. But the air around him still carried their weight. He could feel the threads of expectation closing in, delicate as spider silk, invisible as pressure. The nobles were still watching him even when they pretended not to. They were memorizing every breath, every glance, every pause.

He stood there a moment longer, feeling the tension hum in his bones like a low current, before finally stepping away. Behind him, laughter began to rise again, hollow and perfunctory, the kind of laughter that came from people grateful to have survived proximity to power.

Tomorrow would not bring peace. It would bring clarity. And clarity was often worse.

After the Sarns had left, Ruby excused herself with the same polished grace she used on stage, murmuring that she needed to speak with someone about a matter. Her words were light, but her posture wasn't. Vaeliyan noticed how her eyes had shifted, fixed not on him or the crowd, but on someone moving through it.

He followed the direction of her gaze and only then understood why.

The hall shifted as Justinia Verdance approached.

The crowd parted, not from deference but instinct, as though the air itself recognized the weight of her presence. Her every step carried the slow inevitability of a tide rolling over stone. The air shimmered faintly around her, the faint silver of her gown catching the engineered light from the chandeliers above. Conversations faltered, laughter stuttered and died, and the orchestra softened into a quiet hum that seemed to bow beneath her passing. She did not demand attention; the world simply offered it. Power did not need to announce itself when it had learned how to breathe.

She moved with measured grace; a calm so deliberate it pulled at the edges of every gaze. When she stopped before him, her shadow fell across Vaeliyan like a benediction and a threat. For a moment, her eyes swept across the room, cataloging every noble who dared to watch, every smirk half-hidden behind a glass. Then her gaze settled on him, and her expression softened, the faintest fracture in an otherwise flawless mask.

"My dearest grandson," she said, her voice smooth as silk drawn across steel, "it is so good to see you." The tone melted through the hall, warmth and authority braided in a single breath. The crowd heard pride; Vaeliyan heard the weight of lineage tightening like a collar.

She reached out and touched his cheek, light, almost tender, and the motion carried the same precision as a sword being returned to its sheath. "I am so very proud of you," she said. "You have no idea what this means for the Legion, for the people of the Green Zone, for our family."

The words carried further than they should have, her voice touching every corner of the hall. Around them, nobles began to murmur. A Verdance blessing meant fortune. It also meant obligation.

"And as such," she continued, with a faint smile that carried both warmth and warning, "House Verdance would like to extend its full support to the Complaints Department. My grandson will want for nothing. Want for nothing." The repetition lingered in the air like perfume. It was comfort and control disguised as affection.

It was kindness, gilded and polished for the watching crowd, but Vaeliyan could feel the message under the surface: our support is your lifeline, and we can just as easily cut it. The crowd saw only grace; he felt the knife edge beneath it.

He bowed slightly, the motion respectful but deliberate, choosing how deeply to bend. "I appreciate that, Grandmother," he said. "But I wanted to bring honor to the House on my own terms. I thought it would mean more if even its bastards could earn their names through merit."

Her smile deepened by a fraction, something almost fond in it, almost proud, something that shouldn't have been there and yet was. The air between them crackled with unspoken recognition, two predators measuring the same room, one younger, one older, both refusing to yield.

"Then keep earning it," she said softly. "We will stand behind you." The pause between the words gave them weight. To anyone else, it was reassurance. To him, it was a blade in silk, sheathed but visible.

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And yet, beneath it all, she did mean it. She was impressed, despite herself, that he hadn't folded. That he looked her in the eye and didn't blink. It wasn't defiance; it was inheritance, the Verdance kind she hadn't expected to find in a bastard child.

Justinia's hand fell away, her composure unbroken. She turned slightly, satisfied, allowing the court to see a matriarch beaming with pride. The ripple that moved through the crowd was immediate. Every head dipped, every noble recalibrated their estimation of the young man before her. A bastard, yes, but one claimed by the House Verdance. And claim meant protection.

The applause that followed was polite, practiced, and perfectly staged. Glasses lifted. Compliments whispered. The machinery of nobility spun back into motion, greased by spectacle.

Then, as if the moment had been choreographed by fate itself, the atmosphere tilted. A new hum rippled through the crowd; a murmur of recognition mixed with intrigue.

Ryan Ryan entered, a picture of feminine perfection in motion. Vaeliyan had only ever seen Ryan in their masculine form before, the charming prince of fashion and identity who ruled with calculated flamboyance. But this, this was something else entirely. Now Ryan embodied what it meant to be a woman, flawless, radiant, terrifying in her completeness. She was the final argument in a debate about beauty that no one had realized was still happening. She wore masculine lines that refined her figure into something sculpted, something that wasn't defined by the clothes she wore but by the body that commanded them.

The sharply cut black suit moved like poured shadow, its stitching so precise it looked like intention incarnate. The fabric clung and curved where it shouldn't have, power and grace balanced in impossible harmony. Every step she took was deliberate poetry, confidence turned tangible. Her short-cropped hair gleamed beneath the lights, platinum at the edges and darker at the roots, a gradient of rebellion made elegant. Her lips carried the faintest trace of gold gloss, subtle and dangerous. Her smile was the kind that conquered nations, beautiful because it knew exactly what it could destroy.

"Ah, the King in Yellow," Ryan said, tone all glitter and mischief, each word sliding into the silence like a practiced performance. "We're going ahead with the production. You'll be seeing a credit advance soon, from House Ryan to your personal account. Congratulations again. I'm delighted you didn't work with her."

Vaeliyan didn't miss the tension that flared between the two Houses. Justinia's gaze turned to glass; Ryan's smile only grew brighter. The audience felt the temperature drop and didn't dare breathe. The polite laughter that followed came too late and too carefully.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Vaeliyan said carefully, tone even but guarded.

Ryan's laugh was liquid sunlight and venom; the kind of sound that made people want to believe her even when they shouldn't. "Of course you don't, darling." She tilted her head slightly, her earrings catching the light, each facet a calculated distraction.

She brushed past, trailing perfume and challenge, leaving the air behind her charged and humming, the faint scent of ozone and roses blending into memory.

Justinia's eyes followed her for a long, cold heartbeat. Then she looked back at Vaeliyan and, to his surprise, smiled. A real one this time, the kind that meant she saw something she hadn't expected and almost liked it. It was the closest thing to affection a woman like her could show.

He realized then that her approval, dangerous as it was, might be the most perilous gift of all.

Then she was gone, the hall exhaled, and the world remembered how to move again.

It took Vaeliyan far longer than he cared to admit to realize his entire squad had abandoned him. They hadn't left out of malice; they had escaped. He was still the bright, miserable center of attention, surrounded by an orbit of nobles, merchants, and corporate courtiers who smelled opportunity in his name. The hall's lights glimmered across jeweled throats and polished smiles as they closed in on him again and again, their perfumes clashing in an invisible fog that pressed closer than any enemy ever had. His squad had been clever enough to vanish, slipping into corners where the music and noise could hide them. He envied them. It wasn't betrayal, but it damn well felt like one. The bond whispered their laughter across his mind, faint threads of amusement brushing against his thoughts. They found his suffering delightful. He couldn't even be angry. They were right to laugh. He'd have done the same.

Every few steps, another parasite appeared. A lord offering trade routes he didn't care about. A lady promising introductions to Houses that meant nothing to him. A corporate representative from P.G.I., almost trembling with ambition, slid close with talk of innovation and partnership, of history and legacy. They wanted his lance specifications, his weapon's design, the heart of something they could reproduce if he let them, but he wouldn't. Not now, not ever. They spoke in circles about collaboration and progress, but what they meant was theft disguised as respect. His lance wasn't theirs to understand. It wasn't Legion issue. It wasn't P.G.I. The thought of them prying into its secrets made his skin crawl. They didn't know what the hells they were looking at, and that ignorance only made them more desperate. The pushiness of it all gnawed at him, the way their smiles never reached their eyes. Every word was bait; every handshake a contract waiting to be signed in blood. Vaeliyan smiled, when necessary, nodded at the right times, and let his replies drift between politeness and deliberate ambiguity. That was all they wanted anyway: the illusion of understanding, the fantasy that they mattered.

He had imagined leadership as something noble, something defined by strength and command. Instead, it came with endless performance, a suffocating ritual of false courtesy and hollow praise. Every sentence he spoke was dissected, repackaged, and turned into someone else's tool. Even his silence was a commodity, a space for others to fill with their own ambitions. The air around him buzzed with the hum of greed disguised as admiration.

Through the bond, the others shimmered faintly at the edge of his mind. Sylen's quiet amusement flickered like a smile behind glass. Fenn's smugness pulsed, light and teasing. Torman's laughter came low and exhausted, a man already halfway to the exit. They weren't mocking him cruelly; they were surviving, slipping between the shadows while he burned under the light. The bond pulsed with their shared humor, and he felt it settle deep under his skin, a warmth that should have irritated him but didn't. Someone had to stand in the spotlight, and tonight that someone was him.

He was the story they wanted to sell: a man who had come from nowhere, who had forged legends out of chaos and raw talent. The mystery made him marketable. They didn't need to know who he was, only that he looked the part of a hero. No one asked about his past; they were too afraid of the answer. The unknown was safer. It let them romanticize what they could never control.

And so, the night dragged on. He smiled until his cheeks ached, shook hands until his fingers throbbed, and endured the endless carousel of questions: Where are you from? Who trained you? How did you build such unity among your people? Over and over, the same hollow inquiries wrapped in etiquette and false respect. He gave them nothing of substance, and they mistook it for wisdom. They didn't want truth; they wanted myth.

As the crowd thinned and the champagne dulled, the fatigue began to settle into his bones. The music faded to a slow murmur, the kind that filled silence rather than celebrated anything. His reflection in the glass beside him looked too still, eyes sharp, expression calm, the ghost of a soldier pretending to be something civilized. For a moment, he hated the stillness.

Then came the voice. Calm. Unmistakable. Command made flesh.

"Apprentice," Imujin said, stepping through the thinning crowd. The noise bent around him, conversation faltering as the older man moved with that effortless authority that didn't need volume. "It is good to see you again." His gaze flicked briefly across the room, then back to Vaeliyan. "Though I suppose I am no longer the master I once was to you."

Vaeliyan turned, tension bleeding into a faint grin. "You flatter me, master."

Imujin's smile was small but genuine, a rare thing among the polished deceit around them. "I will need to speak with you and your squadron," he said. "We have many things to discuss before your final departure." His tone carried a weight that settled over the nearby nobles like dust; they could sense command even when they didn't understand it.

He gestured toward the room's edge, where Vaeliyan could sense the others through the bond, lurking, pretending not to watch. "Please accompany me to my sanctum when this soirée ends. I will gather the rest as it winds down." Then, softer, a private murmur meant for no one else: "There are reports I think you will want to see. Some good, some bad. All from the Shatterlight Trial."

The words landed heavy. Reports. Good and bad. They rippled through the bond, silencing even the faint laughter that had lingered. Vaeliyan's expression didn't shift, but the air around him seemed to still, a pause between one breath and the next.

The night wasn't over. It was simply shedding its skin, turning from performance into consequence. And beneath the polite clatter of conversation and the soft waltz of strings, the world outside was already waiting for him to step back into it.

As Vaeliyan and the Complaints Department stepped off the pad and into Imujin's meadow they could finally breathe again. The air here was still, soft, untouched by the noise of Kyrrabad. This was one of the only places in the Green that knew peace. No eyes watched them. No whispers followed. It was a rare corner of the world where truth could survive without being caged.

They all knew it. Every one of them carried secrets that would never leave this place. Here, among the trees and the drifting light, those truths could finally be spoken aloud.

Vaeliyan stood at the edge of the stream, staring into its broken, perfect flow. The water curved around fragments of stone and root, shimmering with quiet life. It always struck him how beautiful it was, how flawed, how utterly real. This place had always grounded him. The thought that this might be the last time he would see it caught in his chest. He wasn't sentimental, but this meadow reminded him what honesty felt like.

That celebration, that farce, had been a lie from start to finish. Every laugh, every cheer, every toast had been rehearsed. Every word had been a performance. Out there, everything was planned, polished, hollow. Here, they could finally speak freely.

The instructors arrived one by one, their presence steady but heavy with understanding. Vaeliyan looked to them, his voice steady. "We have so much to discuss."

Josaphine nodded, folding her hands behind her back. "Yes," she said. "There is much to discuss on my end as well."

Elian's voice broke the quiet next. "Theramoor," he said. "Why did my parents do that? They came at us in public. They brought up those allegations. I thought you were working on making this all go away."

Theramoor's expression softened. "My dear Elian," she said gently, "they did make it go away. They made it public so no one else could use it against you. They took the hammer from every hand but their own and placed it in yours." She stepped closer, voice calm and deliberate. "They accused you, yes, but they did it in a way that invited rebuttal. Every accusation was carefully shaped, soft enough that when you pushed back, it would look justified, reasonable. They told you there would be reprisals, but they dulled the blade before it could ever cut."

Her tone sharpened slightly, a thread of admiration weaving through it. "They made sure that if House Sable questioned their decision, it would not appear as favoritism. You are their son, yes, but you were also part of removing a pest they had the misfortune to call their own. Michael's death at your hands was not sanctioned, but once you became High Imperators, they could use that title to shield you from the cost of his death. It was protection, Elian, political, deliberate, and public. They turned judgment into mercy before anyone else could weaponize it."

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