Albert stood paralyzed for a moment. His eyes roamed her face, and the voice he wanted to form simply wouldn't come.
But it wasn't his silence that silenced him.
It was her gaze.
A gaze that pierced the raised blade and crushed any remaining emotional defenses.
"I understand…" Scathach's voice wasn't a scream now. It was something much worse: low, icy… and filled with a revulsion that coiled like poison. "I understand why my son would never want to go near this place."
The word "mine" came out as if it were a warning of possession and a threat at the same time.
And then he realized—her hatred wasn't just for what was happening now. It was something deeper.
In the seconds before the attack, Strax had told her. Everything.
The contempt. The life thrown away. The random family who took him in as a burden. The mine. The "slave labor." The cold, the hunger, the humiliation.
And Albert… despite who he was… allowed it.
