Theo?
Theo, who has been kind to me, who always offers a gentle word, who seems incapable of cruelty, has been… interested? And enough for Sebastian to notice?
Theo goes utterly still. The air between them shifts, heavy with something unspoken.
“That’s different,” he mutters, voice firmer now. “You’re confusing concern with-”
“I’m not confused,” Sebastian cuts in. “Not about that.”
A weight settles in my stomach. Whatever they’re talking about, however tangled their assumptions may be… Harper is in the center of it. I can feel it. Her, and possibly me. The world suddenly feels too small, the hallway too close.
Sebastian stops pacing. The silence that follows grates against my nerves.
“I need to see my sister Anne,” he finally says, voice cracking just slightly, barely noticeable unless you’re really listening. And I am. “She’s worse. My uncle isn’t… he’s not doing what she needs. I can’t sit here while hepretends she’s fine.”
Gone is the arrogance. Gone is the superiority. What’s left is something human, frighteningly so.
Theo takes a careful step toward where Sebastian stands, his hand brushing the edge of his desk so he can orient himself. “Then we go. Together.”
“No.” The word is immediate. Final. “Absolutely not.”
“You shouldn’t go alone,” Theo argues, his tone sharpened with real concern now. “If she’s as sick as you say-”
“I said no.” Sebastian’s voice drops low, a dark rasp. “Anne is my responsibility, not yours. I’ve already dragged too many people into my family’s issues. I won’t add you to that list.”
Theo exhales, defeated but not surprised. “Sebastian-”
“This isn’t up for debate.”
There’s movement, a hand grabbing a coat, the brush of fabric against his arm. Then Sebastian murmurs something in old Vireldanian, and the air twists sharply. A dissipation spell. The kind Locke uses when he’s too exhausted for the stairs.
And just like that, Sebastian is gone.
The silence he leaves behind is suffocating.
Theo stands there for a long moment after Sebastian disappears, the dissipated magic still humming faintly in the air like a ghost refusing to leave the room. His shoulders are drawn tight, chest rising and falling in uneven breaths, fingers twitching at his sides as though unsure whether to reach for the door or steady himself against the table behind him. For a man who moves so quietly through the world, listening, sensing, reading everything without ever letting on, this is the first time I’ve seen him look genuinely shaken.
Slowly, almost cautiously, he turns his head toward the sound of the hallway. His pale eyes tremble in their sockets, unfocused but searching. It’s an action I’ve seen a handful of times now, a tell he gives away only when he knows someoneis nearby. And in this moment, it’s as if the entire Vespera wing has gone silent so he can find the single person hiding just beyond his threshold.
“You can come inside now, Liam,” he says.
Not harsh. Not accusing. Just… tired. And sure.
The words land heavily on my chest. There’s no point pretending I wasn’t listening, not when Sebastian’s voice had echoed through the hall, not when their discussion had shifted so abruptly from Harper to me to family secrets and failing health. Something about it all felt too sharp to walk away from, too important to ignore.
I step into the room, closing the door softly behind me. Theo doesn’t move. He stands there with the rigid posture of someone bracing themselves for impact, fingers curling against his palms as if preparing for a blow that isn’t coming.
I swallow and force myself to speak, though my voice comes out lower than intended. “I didn’t mean to overhear everything.”
Theo lets out a breath, one long exhale that seems to take the tension in his shoulders with it. His expression softens, but only slightly, as though part of him is still wound tight around the things Sebastian said.
“Perhaps not,” he replies, calming again into that quiet steadiness he always wields. “But you did. And that means you’ve heard enough to understand why he’s acting the way he is.”
The room feels smaller suddenly, the walls drawing in, the air thick with the weight of the conversation I was never supposed to be part of. The mention of his sister, Anne, still sits heavy in my mind. I’d never heard Sebastian speak like that before. No arrogance. No smug edge. Just fear. Real, bone-deep fear.
“I didn’t know he had a sister,” I say carefully.
Theo nods once, fingers brushing the edge of his deskso he can orient himself before moving to sit. “He doesn’t talk about her. Or his uncle. For good reason.”
