“The Lady of Ember raises valid concerns about commitment and cost,” he says. His voice is softer than either of theirs, but it carries. “I have a different question.”
He turns. Faces Maximus and me directly.
“What runs between these two vampires before us. They are bonded in a way I have not seen in vampires from the mortal realm. It carries witch magic. Old magic.” His eyes move between us, slow and precise. “Magic that resonates with the foundations of this realm. The Lithenmere responded to it when they entered. The gold brightened. The stone warmed.”
He waits.
“Is that coincidence or consequence?”
The hall goes silent. Four courts focus on us.
Lanthar answers. “It carries witch-dark ancestry from Lord Maximus’s bloodline. Magic that predates his turning.” He looks at Maeven. “The Lithenmere recognizes it because it shares a common root with the deep magic of this realm. The connection was already there. It revealed it.”
Maeven’s gaze stays on me. On Maximus.
“Evidence,” he says. To Lanthar. To us.
Then he returns to his court.
Maximus moves to take the floor again.
I touch his wrist.
He stops.
“This part is mine,” I say. Quiet. For him only.
His jaw works once. Heat flares between us, half a second, then settles. Then he steps back to give me the floor.
I walk to the center.
The stone is cool and damp under my boots. Water in the channels curves around me, threading past my feet in silver lines. Four courts. Every face. Magic against my skin.
I start shaking before I reach the floor.
Behind me, he’s steady. The steadiness is in my spine.
Okay. You’ve had worse rooms.
Name one.
I’ve fought in underground rings with broken fingers. I’ve walked into Konstantin’s facility knowing I might not walkout. I’ve lain on concrete in an alley behind The Vortex with contaminated blood shutting down my body and a stranger standing over me who hadn’t decided yet if I was worth the trouble.
None of that was this.
This is standing in front of beings who don’t have to care about a problem they didn’t make and asking them to care anyway. I can’t outpolitick them. I can’t outmaneuver them. I don’t have Syrenne’s rhetoric or Maeven’s precision or Lanthar’s patience.
I have the truth. That has to be enough.
“I grew up fighting in rings for money,” I say. My voice doesn’t shake. I’m surprised by that. “Nobody in those rings cared about politics or precedent or which court ran which mountain. Most didn’t even know those things existed. They cared about one thing. Who’s still on their feet when the bell rings.”
My voice reaches the back rows. Same as theirs did.
“Lord Maximus has told you what Konstantin is building. I’m here to tell you what it costs.”
“My sister spent weeks in one of his facilities. Starved. One guard brought her food when the others let her forget she was a person. By the time we got her out, she’d stopped speaking. She’s still re-learning how to be in a room with people.”
My hands shake behind my back.
