The room is silent. Julian is reading it over my shoulder. Celeste is reading my face.
"He gave us the farms," she says.
"Yes."
"And Carson."
"He's threatening Carson."
"He's doing more than threatening." Julian's voice is tight. "He's telling us he has a better version of the prototype. If that's true, Carson's value to the coalition just became the only thing keeping the lords from taking Konstantin's offer."
Seraphina's fingers move in the air. Reading something the rest of us can't see. "The letter carries no magical signature. No ward. No trace. He sent it clean."
"Because the message is the weapon," Celeste says. "He doesn't need magic. He needs us to read it and wonder which part is a lie."
"None of it," I say. "He doesn't lie. He positions."
I set the letter on the table. The shadows rise from my skin without being asked. They move like cold smoke, finding the wax first. The serpent seal cracks under them. They tear at the edges of the paper and the elegant script vanishes into them piece by piece. They wrap the serpent-mark last. They take their time with that one. They pull it apart slowly enough that I can watch the curl of its tail go before its head does.
When they retreat into my skin the cold goes with them. Nothing left on the table. No paper. No wax. No ink.
They don't touch the photograph. I don't ask them to.
I pick it up. My father's signet ring on a hand that has no right to wear it.
"Double the guard on Carson's lab," I say. "Rotating shifts. Marcellus's best. No one enters without clearance from me or Celeste."
"Done," Marcellus says.
"Julian. I want everything we have on Konstantin's research infrastructure. If he has a working prototype, he has a facility. Find it."
"Working it."
"Seraphina. Those three remaining sites. How fast can you and Mira bring the wards down?"
"Two nights. Possibly one if Lanthar's people assist."
"One."
I look at Celeste.
She looks at me. Her jaw is set. Her hand is at her side, not on her stomach, not reaching for a chain that isn't there. At her side. Ready.
"He will keep doing this," I say. "The letters. The threats. The positioning. He will keep trading pieces we value for advantages we can't see until it's too late. He will keep letting us win battles that cost him nothing while the war tilts in his direction. He will come for Carson. He will come for the prototype. He will come for everyone in this room."
The conference room holds still.
"There is no peace while he exists. There is no safety. There is no future for the lives we're building until that ends."
Celeste's eyes hold mine. Brown in the conference room light. Steady.
"Then we stop defending," she says. "We go to him."
"Yes."
"How?"
"Vivienne's intelligence. Konstantin's estate location. His communication routes. His safehouse network. Julian maps it. Seraphina breaks the wards. The coalition commits or it doesn't. Either way, we walk in."
