The first light of summer crept over the horizon, threading pale gold through the bruised clouds of dawn. Its warmth spilled across the Crown City of Camelot, brushing the glass façades until they glimmered like forged amber. Shadows recoiled between the towers as the city stirred to life.
Above, the sky rumbled with activity. Airships drifted between the spires like steel leviathans, their engines humming a low, thunderous note that vibrated through the morning air. Ropes tightened, gears clanked, and great plumes of steam hissed as vessels docked at the floating platforms suspended high above the streets. Those vast mechanical lotus petals that formed Camelot's upper harbor.
Far below, in the neon-lit arteries of the city, ground traffic crawled through the waking maze of roads. Tires scraped across worn asphalt, horns blared, and the distant wail of sirens wove through the din, scattering the last remnants of the night's stillness.
Already the pavements brimmed with life. Office workers queued outside cafés, drawn by the heady scent of roasted coffee beans and the warmth of freshly baked pastries gleaming behind glass counters. Crystal billboards shimmered and shifted overhead, their vibrant colors rippling like liquid light as they streamed endless adverts and newsfeeds. Weekend getaways to the western beaches of Aecora, sales on the newest gadgets, public advisories, and political commentary.
Yet beneath the city's gloss and summer bustle lay a tension as palpable as a taut bowstring. Avalon's darkest chapter had ended, but its shadow had not yet lifted. Everywhere, from diners buzzing with breakfast chatter to dim taverns where the night's final drinkers still lingered. The conversation circled back to one name.
Lamar Burgess.
His execution had been swift, brutal, and widely broadcast. His unspeakable crimes had stained not only his name but the very institution he once commanded. The Clock Tower, long revered as an anchor of law and arcane order, now teetered on the edge of public contempt.
And its agents felt it.
A.E.G.I.S. Guardians, Tower Guards, Aurors. Those who had sworn oaths to protect, now found themselves the targets of simmering hatred. Cold eyes followed them through markets. Doors shut as they passed. An ugly tension clung to their presence, a whisper of riots waiting for the slightest spark.
Not even Roland Ravenclaw's public address. His apology, his vow to rebuild, his promise of transparency, had soothed the wound. The Dah-Tan incident years before had nearly fractured Avalon's trust beyond repair. Now, with this revelation layered atop old scars, reconciliation felt distant, perhaps unreachable. And without the former heroes of the Tower to lend their names, their weight, their legacy to its broken image, the path forward seemed long, treacherous, and painfully uncertain.
Although the Siege of Caerleon had long ended, its shockwaves continued to pulse across the breadth of Avalon. The upheaval within the Mage's Association. Celebrated loudly by the common folk yet condemned in hushed, outraged tones by the noble class, had split the realm clean down the middle.
The sudden elevation of the Council of Kings, backed unanimously by the Three Bodies, sent tremors through every court and manor. Meanwhile, the Wizarding Council, once revered as an immovable pillar of arcane authority, now found itself dragged into the light and held accountable for the catastrophe it had allowed to fester.
To some, it was justice long overdue. To others, particularly those perched atop centuries of privilege, it was nothing short of a sanctioned coup. Regardless of interpretation, the outcome was undeniable.
The Wizarding Council had been crippled.
Financially, politically, structurally. Every foundation it once stood upon lay fractured. The restitutions demanded by Caerleon alone were enough to bleed coffers dry. Add to that the claims from the families of Burgess' victims, the public investigations, and the loss of trust from nearly every corner of Avalon, and the Council had become a shadow of its former self.
Quiet whispers drifted from those who had witnessed the hearing firsthand. They spoke of King Uther, a man famed for composure, losing it in spectacular fashion. They said the marble floors trembled beneath his fury. That the vaulted ceiling carried his voice to every corner of the chamber.
That his condemnation of the Council had been so fierce, so unflinching, that even the eldest lords blanched beneath it. He vowed consequences. Severe, irrevocable, should such dereliction ever stain Avalon again. Those words lingered still, heavy and immovable as the stones of the Spire itself. A declaration that Avalon, as the world had known it, would never be the same again.
Meanwhile, the aftershocks of King Uther's fury reverberated through the Clock Tower with such force that even the ancient foundations seemed to tremble beneath the weight of it, and the shadow of consequence now hung over the Citadel with the oppressive stillness of an unseen executioner. Those who had grown complacent in the Tower's upper ranks felt the pressure most keenly. It pressed upon their throats like the phantom touch of the Sword of Damocles wielded by Asriel Valerien himself.
The halls, lined with blackened ashstone and gleaming obsidian, reflected the anxiety simmering within its walls. Crystal sconces cast molten-gold streaks along the floors, illuminating the hurried steps of a broad-shouldered man as he strode forward. Judge Bennett, heavy-set and imposing even without his judicial robes, moved with a pace that betrayed the gnawing dread beneath his composed exterior.
Sweat glimmered across his clean-shaven scalp, catching the light in a way that made him seem fevered. His dark eyes darted from face to face, scrutinizing every passing agent and clerk as if expecting a knife to slip from beneath their coats at any moment. Rumors had become the Tower's lifeblood.
They whispered through the quietest corners of the Citadel, carried on hushed breaths and nervous glances. Reports had begun in the farthest reaches of Avalon. Isolated ports on the western coast, frozen settlements in the northern moors, mountain keeps surrounded by snow-choked passes. Governors, prefects, and captains sworn to the Tower were found dead, their bodies discovered in states too brutal for the official scrolls but recited with feral fascination by those who had seen them.
No trials. No inquiries. No cryptic messages or warnings.
Just the same pattern repeated without variation. Swift, unrelenting judgment executed upon those who once served beneath Lamar Burgess' banner. Something, some force moving with meticulous precision, was hunting them.
Dragging them from their hovels, their estates, their false sanctuaries. Stripping away whatever protection their titles once afforded; and ending them with a savagery that could only be born of intimate knowledge and long-nourished fury. The victims begged the gods in their final moments, or so the rumors claimed, pleading for deliverance from whatever hunted them through the night.
Judge Bennett recognized the signs.
He had read the case files. He had issued sentences for those who committed such atrocities during his decades on the bench. And he knew, down to the marrow, that the victims now piling up across Avalon shared a single thread. Every last one of them had belonged to Burgess' inner circle. And now, someone was methodically severing that circle one life at a time.
At last, Judge Bennett reached the dark ebon door of his office. His hand, broad, steady, but slick with a sheen of nervous sweat, closed around the brass doorknob. The metal felt cold against his palm. He twisted it, and the hinges answered with a long, complaining creak, a reminder he had been meaning to summon Maintenance for weeks but could never quite bring himself to care enough amid the chaos. The door swung inward with a heavy sigh.
Darkness greeted him. Thick, undisturbed, and oddly expectant, broken only by the faint slivers of morning light filtering through the narrow gaps in the blinds. As if sensing the presence of its master, the crystal sconces along the walls flickered to life one by one, casting a warm amber glow across the room.
His office was large enough to convey status, but cluttered just enough to prove he worked for it. The walls were paneled in dark oak, polished to a muted sheen, and the shelves were packed so tightly with leather-bound law tomes that some leaned against one another for support. Their spines, ruby, sapphire, obsidian, gleamed in the torchlight like jewels in a cavern.
A pair of deep, forest-green sofas framed a low coffee table set atop an exotic rug woven in swirling, foreign patterns. The faint aroma of old parchment and sandalwood hung in the air, familiar as a heartbeat.
Across the room, illuminated by the amber glow, stood his desk. Broad, imposing, carved from rich elder wood. Upon it lay neatly arranged stationery and, in pride of place, his jade-and-emerald–encrusted fountain pen. Beside it rested a gold placard, polished to mirror sharpness, embossed in heavy lettering:
Peter Bennett
Magistrate of the High Court
For the first time in weeks, he allowed himself a breath that was not rushed. And yet, even here, in this sanctuary of order and authority, he could feel it. The dread that someone, somewhere, had marked his name next.
Bennett slipped off his judicial robes with the weary, practised precision of a man who had repeated the gesture more times than he cared to count, hanging the heavy fabric upon the rack where it sagged like the discarded weight of his responsibilities, before adjusting the knot of his tie and crossing the office toward the window, his fingers reaching for one of the steel blinds and pulling it down just enough to reveal a sliver of the Crown City below, a view that should have brought solace yet instead stirred a churn of bitterness as he recalled the countless glares and scowls thrown his way over the past several weeks, each one a reminder of how thoroughly the people of Avalon had turned against the Tower and all who served within it.
He remembered the discomfort first in the subtle ways. The tightening of a baker's grip around a rolling pin as he stepped into a shop for a morning pastry, the slight but unmistakable shift of a cook's hand curling more firmly around a kitchen knife when he passed through the diner's doorway, the pointedly careless way waiters allowed wine to spill across his sleeve while offering insincere apologies, and the unmistakable metallic tang of a steak he was almost certain had been deliberately contaminated, all of which made clear that the public no longer held even the faintest respect for the Tower's authority or those who upheld it.
It infuriated him that the plebeians. The common rabble, those who by all rights ought to have bowed their heads and scraped their knees before the very people entrusted with their protection and governance, now carried themselves with an audacity that verged on insurrection, daring to sneer at uniforms, to mutter insults at magistrates, and to treat men of law and authority as if they were no better than the dirt beneath their boots.
When for years they had trembled at his approach, shrinking into themselves with that familiar blend of fear and obedience that had always given Bennett the closest approximation to nobility he could claim, only for all of it to crumble in the wake of Burgess' spectacular downfall, leaving his robes not as symbols of status but as emblems of disgrace.
Bennett's lip curled as he considered the absurdity of it, for Burgess had showered them with promises of wealth, influence and the quiet assurance that their stations were secure, and for years they had fed from the bounty of his favour like well-kept hounds, never questioning how high his ambition soared until it carried them all over the precipice and plunged the entire Tower into the filth of his ruin, a betrayal so complete that Bennett could think of no greater wish than to wrap his hands around the man's throat and force him to reckon, even for a single choking moment, with the ruin he had left behind for others to shoulder.
"Well," a man drawled, his tone dipped in a silken chill, "you certainly took your sweet, bloody time."
Bennett froze. His breath hitched. Slowly, stiffly, he turned his head toward the voice.
There, seated with immaculate composure in the leather chair beside the coffee table, was a young man who looked as though he had stepped out of a portrait and into the room. His navy three-piece suit was pressed to an exactness bordering on surgical precision, the fabric catching the amber light with a muted sheen. Black loafers, polished to a mirror gloss, rested casually one atop the other as he crossed his legs, and the gloves on his hands gleamed faintly where the leather creased.
But it was the eyes that held Bennett immobile. Piercing lime-green. Cold. Focused. Brilliant in a way that felt almost predatory behind the frameless square glasses perched with mathematical symmetry upon the bridge of his nose.
Bran Ravenclaw sat with his fingers steepled elegantly in his lap, every inch of him composed, controlled, and radiating a calm that felt far more dangerous than any shouted threat.
"I was beginning to fear," Bran continued, "that you might have found the sense to take the first airship out of Avalon and vanish into some remote corner of the world where no one would think to find you." He tilted his head a fraction. "But it seems pride, as ever, remains the most reliable downfall of men like you."
The name tore itself from Bennett's throat, husky and hoarse.
"Bran."
The word hung in the air, trembling with something far deeper than surprise, though Bennett did everything in his power to keep it from showing.
Bennett's gaze shifted past Bran as he noticed the second figure standing rigidly behind the chair in the dim amber light. An older man in the standard grey uniform of an A.E.G.I.S. Guardian stood at impeccable attention, his hands tucked neatly behind his back. The Captain's stripes stitched in crisp silver across his sleeve. His sword hung sheathed at his hip, its polished hilt catching the glow of the sconces. A thick, bristling moustache twitched ever so slightly, betraying a man caught between simmering fury and the quiet dread of a soldier who knows he is far out of his depth.
"Captain Regan," Bennett managed as he pivoted fully toward them. "How—"
"Concealment spell," Bran interjected smoothly, not bothering to look at Bennett as he spoke. "Though I imagine you deduced that already, given your well-documented disdain for anything that obscures the truth from your rather selective gaze."
The words were delivered with a calm so precise it cut deeper than a shout, leaving Bennett standing in the center of his own office like an intruder in a space that no longer belonged to him.
Bennett's expression tightened at once, the veneer of courtesy falling away as his jaw squared and his eyes hardened to flint. "And perhaps you would be so kind," he said, "as to enlighten me on the reason you have chosen to intrude upon my office unannounced." His attention snapped toward Captain Regan, his tone growing even sharper. "And what business, precisely, does an A.E.G.I.S. Captain and an Adjudicator have with a Magistrate of the Clock Tower at this hour?"
Bran did not answer. Instead, he gave a leisurely wiggle of his gloved fingers and tapped the toe of his polished loafer against the rug with a casual rhythm that felt almost insolently out of place in the gravity of the moment. He released a soft sigh, unhurried and utterly unbothered, before rising from the chair with a fluid grace and slipping both hands into his pockets as he cast his gaze slowly across the room, studying the shelves, the desk, the lights, as though appraising a space he had already judged and found wanting.
"Do you recall the last time I was in this office?" he asked, his head tilting with a feline sort of curiosity. He took a step forward, just one, and the older judge instinctively stepped back. "Yes… it was the week before Yuletide, when your secretary informed me that you were terribly busy with urgent work, only for me to overhear, through that unfortunately thin door of yours, your rather spirited discussion with your family about roast goose and eggnog."
"I haven't the time or the patience for your games, nor for your meaningless chatter," Bennett snapped, though the edge in his words betrayed something far closer to fear than authority. His eyes narrowed to slits. "State your business at once, or I will have you escorted out."
Slowly, almost imperceptibly at first, the glimmer of amusement drained from Bran's features, the youthful sharpness of his face settling into a steady, unnervingly composed stillness that tightened the air in the room and sent an involuntary shiver crawling down Bennett's spine. His lime-green irises, catching the low amber light, seemed to glow with a quiet, predatory intensity. Like some patient creature studying the exact moment to strike from the reeds.
"Tell me," Bran began, his tone calm in a way that felt far more dangerous than any anger, "how long have you sat on that bench, Judge Bennett? How many years have passed since Burgess hauled your pasty arse onto that seat, draped you in robes you never earned, pressed a gavel into your soft little hand, and whispered a tidy list of duties and expectations into your ear, only to drown you shortly after in every indulgence your twisted, grasping heart ever coveted?"
Bennett's face flushed with outrage as he jabbed a finger in Bran's direction. "Mind your tongue when you address me, young man," he snapped, trying, and failing, to reclaim the room. "I will not stand here and be spoken down to by some low-ranked Adj—"
The word caught, strangled midsentence, as his eyes dropped to Bran's chest.
Pinned to the lapel of the immaculate navy suit was not the familiar insignia of an Adjudicator, but a badge of far heavier design: silver bordered in gold filigree, suspended from a chain, its crest unmistakable even in the dimmest light.
Not an Adjudicator.
An Inquisitor.
Bennett's breath hitched as he dragged his gaze back to Bran's face. "What… what is the meaning of this?"
Bran lowered his eyes for a moment, as though idly reminded of the badge's existence, then brushed it with a gloved fingertip, the faintest ghost of a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.
"A promotion," he said lightly, tilting his head with infuriating ease. "Didn't you receive the memo?"
Frank stepped forward with the steady, disciplined gait of a career soldier, circling the chair before coming to stand at the edge of Bennett's desk. From beneath his coat he withdrew a thick manila folder, its edges worn, its weight unmistakable, and he tossed it onto the lacquered surface with a heavy, resonant thud next to ash-filled crystal ashtray that echoed through the office like a gavel striking judgment. Once the file lay still, he stepped back into position, hands clasped before him, posture straight as a blade.
Bennett stared down at the folder, the sight alone pulling a slow coil of dread through his chest, before lifting his gaze to Bran, who merely inclined his chin with a small gesture, his eyes flicking toward the file in silent command.
Resigned, Bennett moved behind his desk and lowered himself into the polished leather chair, its familiar creak offering no comfort. He reached for the spectacles resting neatly upon the blotter, sliding them onto his nose with hands that betrayed the faintest tremor, then drew the folder closer and flicked it open.
The breath left him.
Page after page unfurled like the slow opening of a noose. Detailed accounts of misconduct, each one a precise blade carving away the veneer of legitimacy he had so carefully curated over the years. Lists of derelictions, abuses of authority, and judicial manipulations laid out in clinical, merciless prose.
Photographs printed in muted shades of grey showed him shaking hands with powerful, cloaked figures, the smiles broad and far too familiar. Other images captured intimate dinners in private salons, cutlery glinting, crystal glasses filled with aged liquor, the tables laden with gifts wrapped in silk. Scenes where he laughed easily, dressed in tailored suits paid for by men who never donated without expecting something far larger in return.
Each photograph felt like a strike, each page like the tightening of a rope, and the weight of it all pressed upon him until he could barely draw breath. And across the desk, Bran watched him as though observing a creature finally becoming aware it had stepped into a trap woven long before it ever realized it was prey.
"It took quite some time, you know," Bran murmured, easing back against the edge of the desk with a languid confidence that made Bennett's skin crawl. His arms folded neatly across his chest, his gaze drifting over his shoulder toward the judge with a measured, almost clinical detachment. "A few sleepless nights in the old archives, shifting through mountains of parchment and dust, combing every ledger, every transcript, and every scrap of paper that charted your illustrious journey up the ranks."
He clicked his tongue. "Ordinarily, that folder sitting in front of you would have been more than enough to justify dragging your fat arse out of this office in chains, and I do mean that in the most literal sense."
A soft, cold laugh escaped him. "But no… that would have been far too generous. I wanted more. I wanted every stain, every hidden rot. Every foul, festering truth beneath that smug grin you insist on wearing as though it were a badge of honor. And by the Gods…" His lips curved into something that wasn't quite a smile. "Did I find it."
Bran pushed off the desk and turned fully, the soles of his polished loafers whispering against the floor as he approached the trembling judge. "The trail of breadcrumbs, as it happens, led me somewhere rather interesting. A quaint little establishment by the name of Ellsworth Juvenile Corrections Facility."
Bennett's eyes widened, his breath sputtering as panic cracked through his composure. "I—I have no idea what you're—"
"And," Bran cut across him, "I had a delightful chat with the warden."
He slipped a hand into his pocket, almost casually, as though reaching for a sweet. "Smug man. Insufferable, really. Very much your temperament. Although he did have a certain fondness for gold." Bran paused, tilting his head. "Particularly in his teeth."
His hand emerged as a closed fist, hovering above the desk. He opened his fingers slowly, deliberately, and several small, metallic objects tumbled onto the polished wood, clattering and spinning until they settled in a scattered, gleaming cluster.
Bennett stared. His breath stalled. His face drained of color.
They were teeth, a whole mouthful of them, each one capped in gold, each one a perfect, silent confession.
"And by all that is holy and true, did he sing like a caged canary in a gold mine," Bran said. "Told me everything. How you've been funneling children into that facility for a neat little payout. A tidy quid pro quo arrangement. He keeps his numbers up and secures continued funding, while you pocket your share of the profits and call it justice served."
Bran's eyes sharpened, a cold green blaze behind the frameless lenses. "What you didn't know. Or perhaps what you did, which, frankly, would surprise me not at all, is that the warden runs a fight ring for the boys. Bare-knuckle, bloody, brutal. And for the girls…" He cleared his throat, though the gesture did little to mask the simmering rage beneath it. "I'll leave that to your vile imagination."
"And you, Judge Bennett," Bran pressed on, drawing closer with every measured step, "fed him the bodies."
The words hung in the air like a noose tightening, and Bennett's breath hitched, his fingers gripping the edge of his desk as though he might steady a world suddenly tilting beneath him. Bran's expression, once coolly amused, shifted into something darker. An anger so tightly controlled it felt colder than any shout.
He stopped just shy of the man, lime-green eyes fixed upon him with predatory precision.
"So," Bran murmured, "why don't we drop the pretense?" His gaze dipped briefly to the judge's trembling hands before rising again, unwavering. "Do us both a favor and peel off that mask you love so dearly. I want to look upon the real thing. The wretched, twitching piece of slime cowering beneath all that pomp and fabric."
Bennett sat in rigid stillness for a heartbeat, his trembling fingers rising almost of their own accord as he removed his glasses and set them carefully atop the scattered papers and photographs, arranging them with the mechanical precision of a man desperate for anything that might ground him. Only then did he turn fully toward Bran, lifting his chin in a final, pitiful attempt at dignity, his narrowed eyes clinging to the last threads of defiance like a drowning man to driftwood.
"So," he breathed, "what now?" His words, brittle yet still marinated in entitlement, drew a subtle tightening across Frank's features. Bennett gestured broadly, waving a hand over the incriminating mess spilled across his desk. "You barge into my office with… this. This parade of accusations and dramatics, and you expect what, precisely?"
His lip curled in a bitter, mocking sneer. "That I should fall to my knees? Confess every little sin you decide to throw in my face? Beg for mercy like some gutter rat? You imagine you'll drag me before a panel and have me shipped off to rot amongst the very filth I spent a lifetime cleansing from this society?"
He rose slowly, as though invoking the authority he believed should still cling to him. "I have sat on that bench," he said, "draped in those robes, wielding the full weight of the law, since long before you stopped soiling your diapers and suckling at your mother's teats."
His face twisted into something sour and ugly. "And now you dare. You dare, stand here before me, a Magistrate of the Clock Tower, an arbiter of justice itself, with your fresh new rank pinned to your chest, believing for even a moment that it gives you the slightest authority over me."
He stepped forward, jabbing a finger into Bran's face, his breath hot and shaking with fury. "Who in Hell do you think you are to question me? To accuse me?" he spat. "You think that badge grants you power, boy. You think your father warming the Director's chair lends you strength. That is where you are wrong. So catastrophically, laughably wrong."
His eyes swept Bran from head to toe with a sneer of pure contempt.
"The truth is, you're nothing. Absolutely nothing," Bennett hissed, the words torn from him with a hatred so deep it seemed to curdle in his throat. "Just like your father, and his father before him. A lineage of lost, pathetic little ravens… sniveling, insignificant, low-bred insects I'd sooner crush beneath my heel than spare a passing thought!"
Bran let the silence stretch, letting it breathe and settle like dust in a long-abandoned room. Only then did he draw a long breath and release it in a slow, exhale, the kind meant to steady a man who no longer wished to be steady at all. His gloved fingers slid back through his hair as he nodded to himself, gaze drifting away from Bennett as though the judge were barely worth the effort of looking at directly.
"You know," he murmured, gesturing with a languid sweep of his hand toward the bulging folder sprawled across the desk. "In complete honesty, I find I couldn't care less about the laundry list of transgressions you've so meticulously committed over the years. Every stain, every whispered deal, every smiling handshake immortalized in those photographs… none of it surprises me."
He tilted his head slightly, expression flattening into a cold, weary disdain. "I long suspected that Burgess' little basket of deplorables had hollowed themselves out so thoroughly that whatever humanity once lived inside them had long fled. You became caricatures. Parodies, really, of what villains believe themselves to be."
His gaze grew darker, the light in the room seeming to bend around the shift in his temper.
"No," he continued, "what preys upon my thoughts is not the corruption laid bare on those pages. It is something far smaller, yet far more monstrous. Something that stalks the back of my mind every waking hour. Something that burns so hot it threatens to consume every fragment of restraint I have left."
He stepped forward, the weight of his words pressing against the air.
"Which brings us back," he said quietly, "to the last time I stood in this office."
Bennett swallowed once, irritation breaking through the fear.
"I came to you regarding a girl," Bran said, each word gaining weight as he advanced, forcing Bennett to retreat by instinct alone. "A wolf therian from Caerleon. A former slave. A girl who had seen more suffering than any mortal soul should ever be forced to endure." His eyes narrowed, the green burning like low fanned embers. "I asked for a stay. A simple exception. A small mercy, barely an inconvenience to a man of your position."
His jaw clenched as a tremor ran through him.
"And you looked me dead in the eye," Bran said, "and you said no." The tremor deepened. "Not simply 'no'. You laughed." His teeth bared, the memory carving itself freshly into his expression. "By the Gods above, you laughed."
A long, dangerous stillness settled in the space between them, the kind that drew every sound in the room into a single, suffocating point. Only then did Bran speak again, his voice cracking at the edges as though something inside him finally splintered.
"And with that," he hissed, the words trembling with rage and something deeper, more wounded, "you forced me to do something so wretchedly vile, so thoroughly twisted, that even now the memory turns my stomach. You made me bear an act so cruel it stains the very marrow of my bones, a shadow I will carry to the end of my days. Because you, in all your smug indifference, couldn't be bothered to lift a single finger."
His breath shuddered through his chest.
"You made me watch," Bran continued, "as I tore two lovers apart. Two souls clinging to each other after surviving horrors you cannot begin to imagine, and I had to wrench them from one another's arms because you refused to help. Because their suffering was nothing more than an inconvenience to you."
He drew in a sharp breath, steadying himself enough to speak, though the fury burned through every syllable.
"Tell me," he whispered, leaning forward until Bennett could feel the heat of the words against his skin, "do you still remember what you said to me afterwards? Because I do. I remember it every single day. Every time I close my eyes."
A beat passed, pulsing like a heartbeat.
"You told me," Bran said, "that sometimes… we deserve what we get."
Bennett's eyes widened for a heartbeat, but the shock slipped quickly into something uglier, his features twisting as though offended by the very premise of Bran's outrage.
"Is… is that what this is truly about?" he asked, as if Bran had just uttered the most childish grievance imaginable. "Your entire little crusade. Your posturing, your threats, all of this… is because I wouldn't grant you a stay?" His lip curled into a sneer. "All this… all this righteous fury… for that bloody pelt?"
The word hit the air like poison.
And Bran snapped.
The movement was so swift, so sudden, that Bennett barely had time to register it. Bran's hand seized the crystal ashtray resting on the edge of the table, and in the next instant it crashed into the side of Bennett's skull with a bone-splitting crack. The man jerked violently, blood arcing across the wall in a spray that splattered over framed certificates and inked commendations, streaking them crimson.
Bran didn't stop.
He swung again, and again. Each blow punctuated by a wet, sickening crunch as the ashtray fractured, then splintered, then finally shattered in his hand. Bennett reeled backward, dazed, staggering like a felled bull, before Bran drove a vicious kick into his chest and sent him collapsing into the leather chair, gasping like a fish dragged onto shore.
Bran tore off his gloves and let them drop to the carpet like shed skin.
His bare fists came down in a relentless barrage, knuckles slamming into Bennett's face with brutal precision. Each strike broke something. Cheekbone, nose, jaw, until Bennett's features twisted under Bran's fists into an unrecognizable ruin. Blood splattered across the desk, across Bran's sleeves, across the floor, each impact echoing with another ragged cry of fury torn from Bran's throat, as though every punch were a piece of pain he'd been forced to swallow finally being expelled.
Frank stood nearby, rigid as stone. He didn't move to intervene. He simply turned his face away and let the storm run its course.
Bran's fists continued their merciless assault, each strike landing with a heavy, sickening thud that turned flesh to pulp beneath his knuckles. He seized Bennett by the collar, dragging the man upright just long enough to drive his knee into his ribs. Once, twice, until the force toppled both judge and chair, sending them crashing backward onto the polished floor. The chair skidded away with a hollow scrape as Bran kicked it aside, stepping over the sprawled figure with the cold authority of an executioner approaching a condemned man.
He dropped to a knee, seized Bennett by the front of his robes, and resumed the onslaught. His right fist rose and fell in a bloody rhythm, each blow splitting skin, crushing bone, sending splinters of teeth skittering across the floor. Blood washed over Bennett's face in crimson waves, drowning his features beneath the relentless pounding. The wet, brutal percussion of knuckle against flesh filled the office, almost drowning out Bran's ragged cries. Raw, visceral sounds torn from somewhere far deeper than anger.
At last, Bennett threw his hands up, or what trembling motion he could manage.
"P-please… please s-stop," he stammered, the shards of broken teeth drifting in the pool of blood gathering at his lips. "I yield. I yield… arrest me, trial me. Anything… just stop."
Bran exhaled, breath heaving, before letting the man drop in a sodden heap. He rose slowly, chest rising and falling with fury that refused to dissipate, and turned his gaze to Frank. A simple nod passed between them. Frank reached into his coat, drew out a length of paracord woven in black and yellow. The colors twisted together like the coils of a serpent, and tossed it across the room. Bran caught it effortlessly.
Bennett blinked, dazed, trying to comprehend through the haze of pain. "W-what… what is that?"
"When my father appointed me Grand Inquisitor," Bran said, unravelling the cord with calm precision, "he granted me one charge." He crossed back to the desk and looped the cord around its carved wooden leg, pulling it tight. "To hunt down, drag out, and purge every last trace of Burgess' filth from the Tower. From Avalon." He walked back toward Bennett with the cord stretched between his hands. "Root to stem. Nail to bone."
Bennett's eyes widened, the remnants of fear finally overtaking his pride.
"W-wait—wait, what are you— no—no, stop, please—"
Bran ignored him. He hauled the man upright by the collar, wrapped the cord around his throat, and pulled it tight enough to cut his plea into a choking gasp. Bennett's hands clawed at the cord, fingers slipping on the slick blood, but Bran was already dragging him across the polished wooden floor, the man's heels scraping and thudding in uneven rhythm.
"I assume you've heard a whisper or two," Bran said through clenched teeth as he pulled, "about how I've been keeping myself occupied." He tightened his grip, forcing Bennett to gag. "Altissia, Nordgard, the Shadow Coast… I've found them all. The Norsefire deserters, the enforcers, the brokers, the magistrates, the adjudicators, and every worthless maggot that feasted and grown fat on Burgess' power, and I've been nothing short of thorough."
He hauled Bennett upright once more, forcing the man to face him. Bran's lime-green eyes burned with a quiet, terrible certainty.
"And I made certain," he whispered, "to save the best for last."
Bran then cocked his head slightly, that strange, unnerving smile curving across his lips as if he were examining an insect pinned beneath glass rather than a man fighting for breath. He regarded Bennett's ruined face with a quiet fascination, almost contemplative.
"I often wondered what Asriel must have felt. Standing before men so wretched, so unspeakably cruel that every intrusive thought he'd ever tried to restrain suddenly felt justified." His eyes narrowed, a cold gleam catching the crystal light. "Once upon a time, I might have called those thoughts abhorrent. I might have believed that the wrath he carried from Tartarus was proof he had become a monster."
He leaned in just enough for Bennett to feel his breath.
"But standing here, right now, looking at you… I understand him... completely."
Bennett's head jerked as much as his battered neck allowed, terror pooling in his eyes. "Please… y-you don't have to do this," he stammered, trembling through broken teeth. "Y-you've always been… o-one of the good ones."
A long stillness followed, heavy and suffocating.
Bran's expression shifted, not with pity, but with a quiet, mourning sort of anger. "The good ones?" he repeated. "They're gone. Every last one of them. And men like you, each rancid creature who clung to Burgess' shadow, made certain of that." His grip tightened in Bennett's collar until the fabric bunched in his fist. "So now… you get me."
Bran leaned in until his shadow swallowed the judge's trembling frame, his breath brushing the battered curve of Bennett's ear as though confiding a secret meant for no other living soul.
"This," he whispered, "is for Godric… and for Raine."
He released him with a sharp shove, sending Bennett staggering backward, arms flailing as he fought to stay upright. For a moment, the judge's breath caught in his throat.
Bran stepped forward and drove his foot squarely into Bennett's chest, a brutal, decisive kick that launched the man backwards with a ragged gasp. Bennett flew into the window with enough force to rattle the entire pane; the blinds snapped, the glass cracked, then shattered outward in a glittering spray that caught the morning sun as if it were snowfall made of diamond dust.
Bennett tumbled through the gap, his scream tearing across the open air. His eyes bulged as the paracord whipped tight, uncoiling from the window frame with a violent snap. The heavy desk skidded several inches across the polished floor before the cord reached its limit, anchoring itself with a savage final jolt.
A guttural choking sound rose from the level below. A ghastly, strangled rhythm that echoed through the stone and glass. Bran stood motionless, watching the cord tremble, vibrate, and strain against the weight it now bore. Frank closed his eyes, jaw clenched, hands folded behind his back in grim silence. The choking faded by degrees, dwindling into rasping sputters, then into nothing at all.
Minutes slipped by, slow and inevitable, before the cord finally stilled.
Bran drew a long, unsteady breath, the morning breeze curling through the shattered window and threading itself through his hair as though trying to cool the heat still simmering beneath his skin. He crouched, retrieved his gloves from the blood-splattered floor, and tucked them neatly into his coat pocket before lifting his gaze toward Frank. The Captain stood rigid, carved from stone, every line of his posture reflecting a discipline only barely masking the tumult beneath.
"Is there something you wish to say, Captain Reagan?" Bran asked.
Frank's jaw shifted. "Nothing I haven't said already." He paused, the weight of the new title clearly sitting uncomfortably on his tongue. "So… where to now, Grand Inquisitor?"
A faint huff of laughter escaped Bran, the sound small and strangely human after the violence that had stained the room. "Now," he murmured, brushing a last fleck of blood from his fingers, "I think I could use a spot of tea. And perhaps some scones. I know a quaint little place not far from here." He tilted his head, the shadow of a smirk appearing. "My treat."
He stepped across the ruined office, glancing down at his hands. The knuckles raw and purpled, one splinter of enamel lodged beneath the skin. With a small wince, he plucked it free and flicked it aside as though discarding an inconvenient crumb. Frank watched him silently, his gaze lingering on the broken window and the ragged curtains swaying in the cold draft before he finally closed his eyes and let out a slow breath, then followed.
"You think we should check on the others?" Frank asked once they stepped back into the hallway, the torchlight shifting across the polished marble as though trying to erase the trail of what had just transpired.
Bran waved a hand dismissively, not even granting the question a backward glance. "I wouldn't trouble myself over them," he replied, drawing a folded handkerchief from the inner pocket of his jacket. He began to clean the streaks of blood from his cheek and jaw with a slow, methodical precision. "At this point, I'd daresay my fellow Inquisitors have already grown quite accustomed to the work."
He paused mid-wipe, lowering the cloth just enough for the light to catch his expression. Whatever trace of a smirk had lingered moments before dissolved into something far colder. "Exceptionally so," he finished.
Their footsteps echoed down the corridor, swallowed slowly by the depths of the Citadel.
Outside, beyond the blackened walls, windows exploded outward in cascading showers of glass. Bodies were hurled through the openings. Dozens, then dozens more. Each neck cinched tight with paracord that snapped taut as they fell. Some thrashed and clawed at the coils with fingers already slick with blood. Others kicked against the air, choking on their final breath, their bulging eyes searching desperately for mercy that would not come.
And, in time, as always, they stilled.
They always do.