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A dim passage leads into a vast solarium.

Grime covers the glass roof. Dead vines cling to iron supports, their stems dry enough to crumble. Long planting beds contain grey soil cracked into hard plates. Empty pots crowd the walls beneath a century of dust.

A collapsed watering trough blocks one path. Rusted hand tools remain arranged beside a bench, abandoned where their owner left them. The cold has killed every plant that depended upon care.

Near the center, one clean fracture in the grime allows sunlight through.

The narrow shaft strikes a broken planter where a single green shoot has forced itself between stones.

I approach it.

“Whose room was this?”

“The former Lady Morwen’thir kept it,” Briar says. “After she died, the doors were locked.”

“When?”

“Approximately one century ago.”

“And no one entered?”

“Servants inspect the glass from outside. Matron Sarveth forbade changes.”

The chamber has been left as a tomb for a woman no living servant remembers.

I press my fingers into the nearest bed. The surface is dead, but darker soil remains beneath it.

“This room will be cleaned.”

Briar stares at me. “Matron Sarveth may object.”

“She may do so after the dust is removed.”

I return to my travel case and bring out the seeds and root cuttings packed between damp cloth. Rirzed. Fever root. Bitterleaf. Tagetes. Plants selected because Lowtown cannot spare them.

Several cuttings have suffered during the journey. I trim the damaged ends with my healer’s knife and set them into shallow pots where the sunlight reaches.

The green shoot in the broken planter receives the first cup of water.

I arrange the seed packets beside it and begin listing what the room needs. Clean glass. Fresh soil. Watering vessels. Compost. Workers willing to ignore a century of dust and Sarveth’s likely disapproval.

The stronghold has given me rank without freedom and luxury without comfort. I will take what use I can from both.

“This solarium will hold living things again,” I say. “And it will heal people.”

10

RHYSANDIR

The Causadurn Ridge rises from the neptherium war table in ridges of black light.

I guide chaos magic through the metal with my right hand, letting the house ring serve as an anchor. The map answers in precise layers. Mountain passes emerge first, followed by roads, settlements, watch posts, and the crimson boundary of waira territory near Simimuese Bluff. Vesper’s Peak appears beneath Morwen’thir Stronghold as a cluster of pale marks in the narrow pass.

Fragile. Necessary. Expensive to defend.

I adjust the western route. A thread of black light moves between two fortified positions, showing where another patrol might discourage Varrus’s merchants from interfering with caravans bound for my allies. The response must appear protective rather than aggressive. Varrus wants me to overreach. He wants the king to see instability where there is restraint.

The war-room door opens without a knock.