Colmes stared at Harwin with constrained anger in his eyes. "These are restricted items, Harwin! They aren't dropped pocket watches or rusted knives. The church does not ask permission to remove madness from civilian hands."
"And we are not civilians offering up dropped weapons," Harwin countered. He didn't blink under the pressure. "We are a commercial entity claiming our right to salvage. These men died while trespassing on private Vale property. They caused extensive physical damage to the lower commercial yard and injured the master of the house. Under Pritz Harbor law, their remaining possessions serve as immediate compensation."
Colmes stood up. He didn't move fast, but the sheer threat of the motion forced Rusk to push his own chair back.
"You are discussing concentrated madness as if it were a misplaced shipping crate," Colmes said. His voice dropped into a dangerous, thrumming register that vibrated against the glass. "The Mandated Punishers do not negotiate for the safekeeping of Beyonder characteristics."
"Then the Punishers must remove them through official channels," Harwin said smoothly. "If the Church of Storms wishes to purchase them for safety reasons, we can arrange a meeting with our solicitors to determine a fair market price."
Rusk let out a sharp breath. He looked from the butler to the bishop, instantly recognizing the snare.
Colmes stared at Harwin. "You are attempting to bill the church for a heresy confiscation."
"I am attempting to follow the law," Harwin said. "To seize assets from the Vale estate without compensation, you'll need to convene a public magistrate's tribunal. We will be forced to present our damage ledgers. You will have to explain on public record exactly how a crazed, violent force managed to bypass your harbor watches and lay siege to one of your largest benefactors."
Colmes didn't blink. His eyes remained cold and calculating. The church needed the harbor quiet, and a public tribunal detailing their failure to protect Vale House would shatter the delicate confidence of the local nobility. Harwin was actively weaponizing their need for silence.
"You are handing a loaded gun to a child," Colmes told the butler.
"I am ensuring the master of this house retains the compensation he bled for," Harwin replied. "House Vale possesses secure vaults built for sensitive maritime cargo. We will hold the items."
Colmes turned his gaze back to Lucian. The wind outside howled, rattling the tall window frames.
"You intend to keep them," Colmes stated. It sounded like a death sentence.
Lucian met the bishop's eyes. He let the silence hang for a second to steady his breathing. "My butler handles the estate's liabilities. If he says the law grants us the salvage, the salvage stays."
"A wild Beyonder hoarding these items is exactly the kind of rot my men dig out of the gutters," Colmes warned. "These things draw desperate, crazy people like a lodestone. If you lock that inside your vault, you invite endless violence to your doorstep."
"Then they will die in the yard just like Pike," Lucian said.
Colmes exhaled a long breath. The unnatural pressure in the room finally broke, retreating back into the bishop's calm posture. He had weighed the cost of a massive political scandal against the danger of leaving the items in Vale hands, and the scandal lost.
"Very well," Colmes said. "You will take those items and you will bury them deep, Mr. Vale. If they draw the kind of madness we both know they attract, or if I hear a single whisper that you have allowed them to affect the city, this fragile understanding between us is over. I will follow the trail back to this room, and the next time I arrive I will not bother knocking."
"They'll remain secured," Lucian promised.
"See that they do," Colmes said.
The bishop finally lifted his porcelain cup and drank. The tea had likely gone cold, but he drank it anyway to signal the absolute end of the dispute.
"Your father maintained a long, deep relationship with the Church of Storms. The financial donations were only one part of it. Vessel blessings before long voyages, memorial prayers for the lost, funerals for drowned men, critical repairs after bad weather hit the docks, and practical help around the lower road and the private landing. In a city like Pritz, those institutional ties mean something real."
Lucian understood where this conversation was heading. "You want to make a public statement."
"I want the entire harbor to know that Pike entered Vale ground heavily armed and died in the mud," Colmes said. "I want them to know the Punishers consider the attack a serious matter, and I also want them to know that House Vale hasn't been left isolated and unprotected simply because your father is dead."
Rusk added his own heavy weight to the offer. "Men are out there sniffing around the edges today. Some of them need to hear that if they try to follow Pike's example, they might not even reach your gate before they bleed out."
Lucian looked directly at Colmes. "That definitely helps me, but it also creates an entirely different kind of problem."
Colmes waited in silence.
"If the church speaks too loudly on my behalf, people down in the harbor may decide Vale House now stands only because the Church of Storms is physically holding it up. That assumption invites a different kind of dangerous pressure. I need them afraid to attack me, Bishop. I refuse to have them thinking the church now manages my estate."
Rusk's thick brows lifted in genuine surprise. "You're careful for a young man who was bleeding his life out onto the stones last night."
"I have more to lose this morning," Lucian replied.
Colmes slowly nodded his head. "That's a reasonable concern to carry. The public message will be exactly this. The church strongly condemns the armed intrusion, fully recognizes the old relationship with House Vale, and severely warns against any further violence on Vale ground. It will refrain from suggesting that we're managing your private affairs or speaking in your name."
Lucian carefully considered the precise wording. "That's acceptable."
"It's also the truth," Colmes stated. "Those two concepts don't always travel together in this city, so we should use the rare chance while we have it."
"I can repeat that line on the harbor side." Rusk said with a brief grunt.
"Repeat the general meaning," Colmes instructed dryly. "Refrain from reciting the entire polished sentence."
"I know how to talk to sailors."
"That is precisely what concerns me."
For the first time since entering the tense room, Lucian felt the air ease just slightly. The dangerous conversation had finally found solid predictable ground.
"There is one final matter," Colmes said, his tone shifting back to institutional gravity. "I won't press the issue far this morning, but I can't leave this house without saying it out loud. If there are other strange things in this house connected to Beyonders, or buried in your father's old dealings, I would vastly prefer to hear of them right now before they explode into a public disaster."
Lucian thought of the locked drawers in the study and the connection between his father and Thomas Rill. If he surrendered everything to the church right now, he would lose control of his own family's legacy in the exact same hour.
"If I find something hidden here that threatens Pritz Harbor or this household beyond my personal ability to contain it, I'll immediately send word to you," Lucian promised.
Rusk frowned heavily. "That convenient promise leaves you deciding exactly what counts as beyond your ability."
"Yes," Lucian said smoothly. "It does."
"I'll accept that compromise for today," Colmes said, holding Lucian's gaze. "I want zero misunderstanding between us moving forward. If Pike's violent death draws more Beyonder trouble to Pritz Harbor, the Mandated Punishers will aggressively act to crush it. I would prefer to act with your full cooperation."
"That's clear," Lucian said.
The rest of the morning visit moved into mundane logistical matters. Colmes asked who had seen the bodies and whether the lower grounds were being scrubbed clean. Harwin stepped forward to answer the operational details while Lucian handled the broader strategy.
When Kell's specific name surfaced, Rusk's attention sharpened like a blade.
"Keep that one close," the churchman ordered. "The East Pier gangs will want him scared, bought, drunk, or dead. If he starts talking, make damn sure he talks to you first. Keep him far away from any men down there who can sell him cheap comfort by the cup."
"I understand," Lucian said.
When the two churchmen rose to leave, Lucian forced himself to stand as well. The stitched wound pulled viciously against his side, and he kept his pale face still until the sickening feeling passed.
At the heavy door, Colmes turned back to face the room.
"Mr. Vale, one more piece of advice. Men often survive a terribly violent night and make poor decisions the next morning because they think standing upright means they have recovered. That is false. Rest whenever you can today. Decide only what must be decided. Send word to us before the next problem reaches your front road."
Lucian respectfully inclined his head. "I will."
Rusk pulled the heavy door open, then looked back over his broad shoulder. "And if someone dangerous does reach your road before we hear about it, just shoot the bastard until he stops moving. You can worry about looking respectable after the smoke clears."
Colmes closed his eyes briefly in obvious pain. "Rusk."
"What? The kid survived and Pike is dead. I'm simply improving the method."
Lucian's fingers tightened once around the carved wooden back of his chair. For a terrifying split second, the bloody lower grounds returned in vivid shattered pieces. The freezing wet stone. The smell of burning oil. Pike's collapsing weight.
"I'll remember it," Lucian said quietly.
Rusk looked grimly satisfied. Colmes looked resigned to his subordinate's nature. They stepped out into the hall and left.
Harwin closed the door firmly behind them, checking the latch before returning silently to the silver tea service. The morning room still held the lingering marks of their intense visit. The slightly scraped chair, the untouched tea, and the faint damp smudges near the carpet's edge felt more noticeable in the quiet space.
Lucian stood by the window. He watched the grey mist swallow the black carriage as it descended toward the harbor road.
"Colmes knows exactly what we are," Lucian said. He finally turned away from the glass. He felt the cold weight of the Bishop's departure lingering in the corners of the room like a physical pressure.
Harwin did not look up from the silver tray. He gathered the porcelain with a steady hand. "He was never going to miss it. A Wind-blessed of his sequence feels the shift in the atmosphere before the first greeting is even finished."
"And now he has every reason to look at my father's old shipping logs," Lucian said. He leaned his weight against the heavy mahogany desk to ease the pull on his ribs. "He can see the line stretching from Pike's body right back to the illegal tracks that kept this house wealthy. We are wild Beyonders in his city now, Harwin. That is a death warrant."
"He possesses enough pieces to form a very dangerous suspicion," Harwin agreed.
The heavy click of the latch echoed through the morning room as Harwin returned to the task of clearing away the silver tea service. Lucian stood by the window and watched the grey mist swallow the black carriage as it descended toward the harbor road.
"Colmes knows exactly what we are," Lucian said as he finally turned away from the glass. He could still feel the cold weight of the Bishop's presence lingering in the corners of the room like a physical pressure that refused to lift.
Harwin did not look up from the silver tray as he gathered the porcelain with a steady and practiced hand. "He was never going to miss the signs of a potion. A man in his position has spent his entire life hunting down people who hide in the shadows and he likely felt the shift in the atmosphere before the first greeting was even finished."
"And now he has every reason to look at my father's old shipping logs with a magnifying glass," Lucian said as he leaned his weight against the heavy desk to ease the white-hot pull on his ribs. "He can see the line stretching from Pike's body right back to the illegal cargo tracks that kept this house wealthy for twenty years. We are known wild Beyonders in his city now, Harwin. That is a death warrant that he hasn't bothered to sign yet."
"He possesses enough pieces to form a very dangerous suspicion," Harwin agreed.
Lucian looked at the butler and remembered the moment of absolute silence when Harwin stared the Bishop down. "Then tell me why you pushed him so hard. You stood there and practically dared him to call the Mandated Punishers to raid this estate. Why would you argue to keep those characteristics when we are already walking on such thin ice?"
Harwin set a saucer down and looked at Lucian with a calm that was almost unnerving in the quiet room. "If we had surrendered those items the moment he asked for them, we would have looked like frightened civilians who were guilty of a crime. Frightened civilians get their doors kicked in every week because the Church knows they have no defense and no teeth. By claiming those remnants as legal salvage for the attack, I forced the Bishop to choose between a quiet truce and a very loud public scandal that would have ruined his reputation."
"You used the law to trap a man who carries the Storm in his pocket," Lucian murmured.
"I don't know the full extent of the Bishop's personal power, but I know that he fears the kind of chaos that interrupts the harbor's trade," Harwin said as he picked up the silver tray. "The Church will always tolerate a predator if that predator keeps the other rats in line and ensures the taxes are paid on time. If the Bishop suspects you inherited a dangerous empire, he needs to believe that you have the iron to keep it orderly so he doesn't have to waste his own men fixing your mistakes or chasing the madness those remnants attract."
Lucian looked down at the dark dregs in his porcelain cup and realized the butler was playing a much larger game. "So the characteristics are bait. You want the vultures to come to this hill."
"I want the Bishop to watch them come here and fail so he understands that House Vale is the only thing keeping the East Pier from exploding," Harwin replied. "Every time someone tries to bite this house and breaks their teeth on your walls, your position becomes more secure in the eyes of the Church. We have to prove that we are a necessary piece of the harbor's machinery if we want to survive the month."
Lucian felt the sharp pull of the stitches in his side as he took a breath. It was a cold reminder of how close he had come to losing everything to a man like Pike. "He saw the blood on my shirt today and that made us a liability. Now we have to give him order."
"Order is the only thing the Storm respects besides raw strength," Harwin said.
"Then we start the work now," Lucian said as his voice hardened with resolve. "I want the men in the yard paid their full wages by noon today. I want the gate guards doubled and I want Kell moved to a room where he can be watched without feeling like he is in a cell."
Harwin inclined his head in a slow and meaningful motion that carried the weight of a silent pact between them.
"Bring Kell in," Lucian commanded. "I want to see how much of my father's shadow is still hiding in that boy's head before the sun goes down."
Beyond the manor walls, the heavy iron gates groaned as they were pulled open to let the Church officials back toward the harbor road.
The gravel crunched rhythmically beneath their heavy boots as Bishop Colmes and Rusk walked down the long, winding drive of the Vale estate. The coastal rain had thinned into a clinging mist, leaving the morning air bitterly cold.
Neither man spoke until the great iron gates closed behind them with a resounding clang.
Rusk stopped in the middle of the road. He pulled a crumpled tin case from his coat, retrieved a thick cigar, and struck a match. The sulfur flared bright against the gray mist.
"You're really letting him keep those things in his vault?" Rusk said. He snapped the match out and tossed it onto the wet stones. "Two pieces of raw madness, and you just nodded and left them in a civilian vault! The kid played you with a ledger."
Colmes continued walking toward the black carriage waiting at the bottom of the hill, his dark coat carrying the damp smell of rain and sea wind. "I didn't get played, Rusk. I made a calculated choice."
"Explain the calculation," Rusk growled, catching up in three long strides.
"Because from where I'm standing, we just walked out of a den. Think about the math we just saw in there. The young master takes out a Sequence 8. He took a knife to the ribs, his hand was perfectly steady, and he understood exactly what he was fighting. The yardman, Morven, fights right alongside him and survives. That old butler doesn't even blink when threatened by a Wind-blessed. And that East Pier rat Kell is sitting in their parlor right now, likely next in line for whatever potion they have brewing."
"I am acutely aware of what they are," Colmes said quietly, his pace unbroken. "But if we dragged those characteristics out of the house by force today, we would have had to kill all of them. If Harwin forced the matter into public procedure, we would have had to explain why Pike was allowed to grow bold enough to attack one of our largest benefactors. A fully entrenched Beyonder house fighting the Punishers on a hill above Pritz Harbor would not remain a quiet matter."
"The harbor would panic," Rusk said.
"The harbor would panic. The merchants would ask whether the church can actually protect them. The nobles would pull their funding, wondering if their donations purchase anything more than condolences. Every ambitious rat on the East Pier would hear that Vale House is weak enough to be raided and dangerous enough to need suppressing. We need Vale House standing. Not free. Standing."
Rusk scowled, the cherry of his cigar flaring red in the damp mist. "So you gave him a tether. One that just lets them sit up there hoarding power."
"I gave him several," Colmes corrected, adjusting his gloves. "His own pride. His need for legitimacy. The public statement. The characteristics in his vault. And the knowledge that if he mishandles any of them, I will return with more than advice."
Colmes descended the final slope, his voice remaining entirely even. "If those characteristics ever hit the black market, I have all the legal authority I need to tear Vale House down to its foundations. Until then, they sit in his vault and draw every greedy, desperate crazy person in Pritz straight to his doorstep. He wants to act like a predator? Let him deal with the vultures. It saves our men the trouble of hunting them down."
"And if the boy loses control of it?" Rusk asked slowly.
"Then we no longer have a legal inconvenience because we will have a clear case for his arrest," Colmes replied.
They continued down the winding road. After a few steps, Rusk exhaled a thick cloud of gray smoke, conceding the point.
"Fine. He acts as bait," Rusk said. He exhaled a thick cloud of gray smoke. "But we still have a massive problem. Pike wasn't a Sailor. Noll wasn't a Sleepless. They were a Sheriff and an Arbiter. You don't buy those formulas in a dirty tavern on the East Pier."
Colmes slowed his pace. The cold sea breeze pulled at his heavy black robes.
"I am aware of their pathways, Rusk."
"You don't buy Arbiter formulas in a dirty tavern on the East Pier," Rusk pushed. "You don't just trip over Sheriff ingredients by accident. Those are pathways connected to the royal family. The military guards them. MI9 bleeds anyone who tries to smuggle them. So how did a dockside extortionist get his hands on two consecutive stages of the crown's own power?"
"A leak in the military," Colmes said, his tone grim. "Or a smuggling ring bold enough to steal directly from them."
"If MI9 finds out wild Beyonders were running around Pritz Harbor using their abilities, they will swarm this city. They'll step right over our jurisdiction."
"Which is exactly why we will notify them first," Colmes said. "We draft a formal report by noon. We state that the Mandated Punishers successfully identified and neutralized a rogue element utilizing stolen royal characteristics. We hand the problem back to the military's dogs and let them sniff out their own leaks. It forces them onto the defensive."
They reached the bottom of the hill. A sleek black carriage bearing the insignia of the Church of Storms waited in the mist. A man stood beside the open door, holding a wide black umbrella.
Priest Thorne wore the immaculate dark suit of a church official. He possessed a sharp, narrow face and eyes that always seemed to be tallying figures. He was a man who handled the Punishers' seized assets, internal records, and quiet harbor logistics.
"Bishop," Thorne said, stepping forward to cover Colmes with the umbrella. "I brought the morning dispatches from the central district. The East Pier is growing restless."
"News travels fast," Colmes murmured. He stepped into the umbrella's dry shadow. "What is the street saying?"
Thorne lowered his voice, casting a quick glance up the hill toward Vale House. "Panic, mostly. Pike's men are scattering. Local gangs are already fighting over the gaps in his territory. It is turning into a scramble for coin and ground. Do you want me to lock down the immediate dockside taverns? We could arrest a few of the louder lieutenants and restore order before it spills over."
Colmes stopped with his hand on the carriage door. He looked closely at the priest. Thorne was a man of ledgers and quiet efficiency. He usually advocated passive observation to save the church's resources.
"No," Colmes said. "You will not lock down the taverns. You will leave the East Pier alone."
Thorne frowned slightly, a picture of genuine concern. "Bishop? The violence might escalate."
"Let them panic," Colmes instructed. "Let the street tear itself apart for a few days. Two men died with military pathways in their blood, Thorne. Someone with deep pockets and serious connections armed them. If we lock down the docks, that supplier will just quietly slip away into the shadows. I want to see exactly which rats run when the ship shakes."
Thorne gripped the handle of the umbrella. He nodded, seamlessly accepting the wisdom of his superior. "Understood. I will shift the men to observation only. We will watch who steps in to fill Pike's vacuum."
"Draft the report for MI9," Colmes ordered. "And bring the names from the East Pier directly to me."
Rusk climbed into the carriage and slammed the heavy door shut. Colmes leaned back against the leather seats as the horses lurched forward, dragging the carriage into the gray mist of the city.