Days later, the palace hummed like a hive about to split open. The coronation dais was built, the vows scripted, the processions rehearsed until the footmen dreamed in formation. Damian had already burned through a week of council sessions, delegating each petition, sanction, and negotiation with the ruthless efficiency of a man who saw politics as another battlefield.
Which left Gabriel, by design, with nothing to do but wait.
At least, that had been the theory.
The Empress's office looked less like a seat of state and more like a warehouse after a flood. Towering stacks of chests and crates leaned against the walls; tables groaned beneath lacquered boxes tied with silken cords. Every noble house, every provincial magistrate, every foreign court worth a scrap of ink had sent "tributes" for the coronation and wedding, and the department meant to sort them had finally collapsed under the avalanche.
So now it was Gabriel's problem. 'Of fucking course.'
