Taeyang flinches. It’s small, but I see it.
I step in then, palms open. “We’re going to layer protections you can toggle, Yun. Guard when you want, shadow when you—”
“Stop.” Taeyang’s voice claws through mine. His fear has finally found teeth, and it bites the nearest thing that looks like control. “You’re not listening.Sheisn’t listening.”
“Taeyang,” I warn.
He looks at Yuna like the sky is falling and it’s her fault for standing beneath it. “You’re being reckless,” he says, and the words keep coming because he’s drowning and can’t tell the difference between a hand and a wave. “You’re not untouchable. You’re not invincible. You’re—”
“Careful,” Seori murmurs.
“—pathetic,” he spits, and the room goes dead, “if you think you can do this alone. Youcan’t.You need us.”
The words hang there, ugly and smoking. Yuna doesn’t move. Doesn’t blink. The bowl of petals nearest her blackens at the edges, scent shifting from sweet to singed. She inhales like someone learning air from scratch. Kaelen takes a half-step forward. Rheon doesn’t let him take a second.
I move first.
“Say it again,” I tell Taeyang, and my voice isn’t loud, but it carries. “Say it to her face and then look me in the eye and tell me you meant it.”
His throat works. The fire in him gutters, leaving ash. All that’s left is the shape of fear.
“I—” He swallows. “I didn’t—”
“You did,” Yuna says, quiet as a blade slipping into its sheath. She looks at him like she is excising something cruel and necessary. “And you meant it enough to let it out.”
Petals lift from the bowls across the table, one by one. They hover, trembling, then catch with a soft hiss, tiny flames cupped in fragile skin. Fire and flowers, held in the same breath.
“I won’t be protected by contempt,” she says. “I won’t be guarded by someone who needs me small to feel useful.” Her eyes shine, not with tears—those are beneath, brined and private—but with a steadiness that makes the rest of us step back. “I will take help. I will takestrategy.I will not take cages. Not from this court. Not from my blood. Not from you.”
Taeyang looks wrecked. “Yuna,” he whispers, and I hear what hemeantto say—frightened, frantic, feral love—but meaning doesn’t fix impact.
“Minji,” she says, without looking away from him, “build your net. Three safehouses. Two decoys. One route no one but us knows.” She finally blinks. “And put Jisoo in my shadow. If anyone’s watching me in the dark, it will be someone who knows how not to break me.”
That hurts both of us, differently, and maybe that’s fair.
Taeyang’s mouth opens. Seori’s hand lands on his wrist like a blade turned flat. “Don’t,” she says. “Not yet.”
Rheon’s voice follows, level steel. “Protecting someone starts with not cutting them.”
Silence. Then a breath leaves Taeyang like surrender’s first step. He bows his head—once. Not to the court. To her.
“Understood,” he says, hoarse.
I draw a calming circle over the table’s edge. The petals dim, their flames shrinking to embers, then to glow, then to smoke. “Here’s the plan,” I say, because plans can hold what apologies can’t. “Kaelen runs the daylight detail; we rotate twofae you trust. Jisoo and I map blind corridors and bolt holes. Seori and Rheon liaise with the Queen for deniability. Taeyang—” I pause, choose the word carefully, “—you take the perimeter. Far enough to breathe. Close enough to arrive in one breath.”
He nods. It costs him, but he nods. Yuna exhales, shoulders loosening. For the first time tonight, the wind coming through the balcony is only wind. We break. The court melts into corridors. Kaelen shadows Yuna as she leaves, but at the threshold she turns back—not to Taeyang, not to the table. To me.
“Thank you,” she says.
“Always,” I answer.
When the room is nearly empty, Taeyang remains, palms flat on glass, head bowed. I collect the blackened petals into my hand. They’re still warm.
“You can love a thing and still hurt it,” I say, not unkind. “But if you keep doing both, you’ll lose it anyway.”
He closes his eyes. “I know.”
“Then prove it.”
