The touch was not what Vane had braced for. He had spent his life preparing for the bite of cold steel or the incinerating heat of a spell, but the palm cupping his cheek felt like a sun-warmed stone. It was a soft, radiating heat that seemed to seep through his skin, quieting the frantic rhythm of his mana-core.

Vane remained frozen as the Absolute Zero looked at him. Up close, her eyes were not just blue. They were shifting fractals of cerulean and silver, holding a depth that made his Target Analysis stutter and blur. He could not read her. He could not even perceive the edges of her existence.

'She is not cold,' Vane thought, his mind racing to keep up with the sensory contradiction. 'The legends say she is a blizzard given form, but her hand is as warm as the hearth in a winter cabin.'

"You really did quite a number on my little Isaac," Isadora said. Her voice was a playful lilt that carried to the furthest corners of the silent ballroom. "I was beginning to worry he would grow up to be nothing more than a very handsome block of ice. But look at him now."

Vane felt a strange, unfamiliar ache in his chest. He looked at the way she held his face, her touch lacking any of the condescension he usually received from the high-born. It reminded him of Helena. He remembered his mother holding his face in their damp shack in Oakhaven, checking for bruises after he had been in a street fight.

'I thought only mothers in the dirt were this kind,' Vane wondered. 'I did not think a Queen would look at a stranger like this. Is this what it means to be a mother? Or is she just so powerful that she does not see a rat or a king, only children?'

He remembered the Headmistress. Evangeline was Rank 9, a Transcendent who could level cities, but Vane could feel the difference now. Even without being able to see their levels, Vane knew that if the two were to clash, the Absolute Zero would win every time.

"Mother," a stiff, pained voice interrupted.

Isaac Glacium was approaching. The Monarch of Zenith, the boy who had frozen an entire floor of the Labyrinth, looked like he wanted the floor to open up and swallow him. His usual mask of crystalline indifference was gone, replaced by a look of sheer, helpless mortification.

"Please," Isaac hissed. "We are in public. Everyone is watching."

Isadora let go of Vane's face and instantly descended upon her son. To the shock of every noble present, she did not offer a regal greeting. She grabbed Isaac's cheeks and squeezed, pulling his face down so she could inspect his forehead.

"Oh, hush, Isaac. I am your mother. I do not care if we are in a ballroom or a battlefield," she scolded gently. She pulled a silk handkerchief from her sleeve and began to aggressively rub a phantom smudge off his cheek. "You look thin. Are you sleeping? Are you eating? I told the Headmistress to make sure you had the winter-marrow soup every Tuesday."

"Mother, I am an Elite," Isaac whispered, his face turning a shade of pink that matched the lavender drapes. "I am Rank 2. I do not need soup. I have mana-restoration cycles."

"Nonsense. Mana cycles are not a meal," Isadora countered. She stepped back to fix his collar, her movements brisk and practiced.

Vane watched the exchange with a dry throat. Behind them, the nobility of the Empire stood like wax figures. Duke Valandis was still clutching the stem of his shattered wine glass, his face a mask of pale, sweating terror. Grand Marshal Varron remained on one knee, his head bowed so low his chin touched his gorget.

There was a profound, terrifying absurdity to the scene. This woman could turn the entire archipelago into a tomb of ice before the guards could even draw their swords. Yet, here she was, fussing over a teenager's hair.

'Nobody is stopping her,' Vane realized. 'The Grand Marshal, the Dukes, the Princess. They are all holding their breath. They know that as long as she is playing the role of a mother, the world is safe. If someone speaks out of turn, the winter returns.'

Isadora finished her inspection of Isaac and turned back to Vane. The motherly warmth remained, but for a split second, her eyes sharpened. It was a brief glance that felt like a glacier sliding over his soul. In that moment, Vane understood. She knew exactly what he was. She saw the Usurper. She saw the silver fluid of his core. And she found it amusing.

"Thank you for taking care of him, Vane," Isadora said. She reached out and patted his shoulder, the gesture carrying a genuine weight of gratitude that caught him off guard. "Very few people have the courage to tell Isaac when he is being a fool. You gave him something I could not. You gave him a reason to try harder."

Vane felt a lump in his throat. It had been years since someone had thanked him for anything other than a kill. To hear it from a stranger, let alone the most powerful being on the continent, felt like a physical blow to his defenses.

"I simply did what was necessary to win," Vane said, his voice sounding raspy even to his own ears.

"Of course you did," she said with a knowing smile.

She hooked her arm through Isaac's, despite his visible attempts to pull away.

"Now, I must go mingle with these people before they all faint from the tension," Isadora said. She began to lead Isaac away toward the center of the ballroom where the musicians were frantically trying to reorganize themselves. "Come, Isaac. You are going to introduce me to your little friends, and then we are going to find some actual food. This nectar is far too sweet."

Isaac looked back at Vane, his eyes pleading for a dignity that was long gone. Vane could only offer a slow, stunned blink in return.

Just before she vanished into the crowd, Isadora Glacium paused and looked over her shoulder. She did not offer a royal wave or a parting decree to the room. She simply winked at Vane, a flash of playful, silver light in her eye that seemed to say they shared a secret.

'She is the strongest person I have ever met,' Vane thought, watching the silver-haired Queen drag the most feared student in the academy away to go get snacks. 'And she is more human than anyone in this room.'

He looked at the terrified faces of the Imperial nobility who were only now starting to stand up. He realized that the greatest mage in the world had just given him her blessing. And in a room full of sharks, that was the most dangerous gift of all.

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