PRINCESS LUTHIEN POV
The medical wing of the New Jorgen Spire was a vault of white stone and artificial silence, a sharp contrast to the chaotic, industrial roar of the construction outside. As the Elven Envoy moved through the corridors, our silken robes whispering against the polished floor, I felt a localized pressure in my chest. It wasn't the Ascendant's Authority; it was the atmosphere of a sanctuary. This was the heart of the North's recovery, and we were walking into it like intruders.
Aridel walked with his chin high, his hand resting on the pommel of his blade, his Star-Impulse humming in a low, defensive frequency. Behind us, the four High Mages of our delegation—the Seers of the Silver Moon—were already preparing their focal points. Their eyes were clouded with a milky, iridescent sheen, a sign that they were reaching past the physical world and into the resonance of the room.
"Stay back, Princess," one of the Mages, a tall, gaunt Elf named Eron, murmured to me. "It appears Eve's core is an unstable thing. If the reports are true, her spirit is a fractured sun. We must be delicate, but we must be thorough."
We entered the private suite.
The room was bathed in the natural sunlight of the North, the clear blue sky visible through the massive, reinforced windows. In the center of the room, surrounded by humming resonance-stabilizers, lay the girl.
Eve.
She looked... fragile. In the songs of our spies, she was a silver titan, a girl who had outrun the laws of physics. But here, tucked beneath white sheets, she was a pale, motionless child. Her breathing was slow, agonizingly rhythmic. I could see the faint, silver scars on her arms—jagged lines of history that seemed to throb with a dull, residual light.
And she wasn't alone.
Sitting in a chair by the window was a girl dressed in a black uniform that seemed to swallow the light. She had honey-colored eyes behind a pair of thin glasses and a crest pinned to her collar, I could tell she didn't like the crest one bit. She didn't stand up as we entered. She didn't even look at us. She was sharpening a short, black blade with a whetstone, the skritch-skritch-skritch of the metal being the only sound in the room.
"Step aside, child of the North," Eron commanded, his voice echoing with the melodic arrogance of the South. "The High Mages of Konsu are here to provide a diagnostic. We intend to map the damage to Eve's core."
The girl in black—didn't stop sharpening. "She isn't a map," she said, her voice a flat, terrifyingly calm monotone. "And she isn't 'some sort of monster.' She is a person who is tired. You are guests in this city, not inspectors."
Aridel stepped forward, his Star-Impulse flaring slightly. "We are here at the request of the Throne, girl. Our Mages are the finest in the world. If there is a way to heal her, they will find it. Stand down."
Kagura finally looked up. Her eyes were like a vacuum—cold, empty, and devoid of fear. "You think you can heal what you don't understand. You think her core is a puzzle to be solved. It isn't. It is a wound. And wounds do not like to be touched."
Eron ignored her. He was a High Mage; he did not negotiate with "commoners." He stepped to the side of the bed, his hands glowing with a soft, lunar radiance. He closed his eyes, his consciousness reaching out to bypass the physical shell of the girl and dive directly into her spiritual center.
"Scanning the primary nodes," Eron whispered. "The resonance is... it's vast. It's like staring into a broken mirror of the Rift. I can see the cracks. I can see the violet-black stains left by the Ascendant. I will reach deeper... I will pull the data from the center..."
He leaned in, his glowing fingers inches from Eve's chest. His eyes snapped open, turning a brilliant, blinding white as he prepared to force a deep-layer spiritual probe.
In the South, a Mage's scan is considered a sacred act of observation. In the North, it seemed, it was considered an assault.
The movement was so fast I didn't see it happen. I only heard the sound—a singular, sharp shlick of steel cutting the air.
Eron let out a sound that wasn't a scream; it was a choked gasp of disbelief. He stumbled back, his hands flying to his face. Blood—dark, Elven blood—erupted from between his fingers, staining his white robes.
Kagura was no longer in the chair.
She stood between Eron and the bed, her short, black blade held in a reverse grip. There wasn't a drop of blood on the steel. She hadn't killed him. She had executed a strike of such surgical precision that she had only slashed across his eyes, severing the optical nerves and the spiritual focal points he was using to "see."
"The next one to look inside her," Kagura said, her voice dropping into a register that made the Star-Impulse in my veins go cold, "will not have hands to hold their face."
The room erupted.
Aridel's sword was out in a flash, the golden-plate of his armor humming with a violent resonance. The other three Mages retreated, their hands glowing with offensive spells. But Kagura didn't flinch. She entered the "Silence," her form becoming a flickering shadow that seemed to exist in the spaces between our vision.
"ARIDEL, NO!" I shouted, stepping between my brother and the black-clad girl.
"She blinded a High Mage, Luthien!" Aridel roared, his eyes wide with fury. "In the middle of a diplomatic envoy! This is an act of war!"
"It is an act of fairness," a new voice boomed.
The door to the suite swung open, and Valerius stepped in. Her wings of a thousand hands were unfurled, though they were tucked tight against her back, radiating a silver-gold authority that filled the room. Behind her, the Father, Kwame, loomed like a thundercloud.
"Kagura," Valerius said, her voice firm but not angry.
Kagura didn't lower her blade. "He tried to touch her, Mother(the way she mentioned "mother" is forceful). He tried to force his sight into her core."
Valerius looked at the blinded Mage, then at Aridel. "My daughter has a very protective temperament, Prince Aridel. And she is correct. We did not give you permission to perform a deep-layer scan. In the North, we do not 'peek' into each other's souls without an invitation."
"This is an insult to the Southern Throne!" one of the other Mages hissed, his hands trembling.
"The Southern Throne is currently standing in a room with three people who killed a god," Kwame said, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. He walked over to the bed and placed a hand on Eve's head, his bronze skin glowing with a protective Golden Impulse. "I suggest you take your wounded and leave. My daughter needs her rest, and I am starting to lose my patience with your 'refinement'."
Aridel stared at Kagura. The two of them were locked in a silent war of intent—the Golden Prince and the Shadow Cleaner. I could see the calculation in Aridel's eyes. He wanted to fight. He wanted to see if his Star-Sliver could catch the girl who moved like a ghost.
But then, he looked at Eve.
She hadn't moved. She hadn't even flinched during the violence. She was still a pale, broken child in a coma. And for the first time, I saw a flicker of doubt in my brother's expression. He realized that if he fought here, if he turned this sanctuary into a battlefield, he would be no better than the Ascendant.
Aridel slowly sheathed his sword. "Take Eron to the barge," he commanded the Mages. "We will find our own healers."
He turned to Valerius and Naram, who had appeared in the doorway. "This is not the end of this conversation, High Elder. The South does not forget a drawing of blood."
"Good," Naram said, his Golden-White eyes shining with a tired, amused light. "Maybe you'll remember to knock next time."
As the Envoy retreated, carrying our blinded Mage through the white corridors, I stayed behind for a heartbeat. I looked at Kagura. She had returned to her chair and was once again sharpening her blade, her back to me.
She wasn't a monster. She was a weapon that had been given a home.
And as I looked at Eve—the unconscious girl who was being guarded by a "Mother," a "Father," and a "Sister" who were willing to blind a world for her—I realized that the South didn't understand power at all. We thought power was a throne.
Here, in the North, power was the fact that you couldn't touch a sleeping girl without losing your eyes.