Keiser found himself staring at the gleam of steel yet again, cold air brushing the skin of his neck where the edge hovered dangerously close. The princess had moved so fast that even he almost didn't catch it---her blade flashing free, pressing against him before he had fully turned.
Lenko yelped behind him, nearly tripping over his own boots when Keiser shoved him back, shielding him out of reflex. "Stay behind," Keiser muttered through clenched teeth, his hand coming up to press lightly against the flat of the blade, pushing it aside just enough so the edge wouldn't bite into him.
Her eyes blazed. Suspicion had turned into something sharper, something almost personal, as though she were daring him to keep dodging her questions.
"Even when---" she hissed, her short sword tilting higher, its edge grazing dangerously close to his jaw. "Even when I never turned my back, you're whispering, hiding things. Did you really think I wouldn't notice---when you do it right in front of me?"
The murmurs swelled around them. People slowed their steps, some freezing outright, watching the confrontation unfold. The metallic hiss of the drawn blade seemed to echo against the tunnel walls.
Lenko spun around, forcing a laugh far too loud and far too nervous. "Hahaha! Don't mind them, everyone! They're always like this---arguing, snapping at each other. Think of it like…uh, like family bickering, hah? No need to panic!"
His hands flailed as he herded a few gawkers away, shooing them like restless chickens. Some obeyed quickly, scurrying back to their work or their chambers. Others lingered at a distance, whispering under their breaths, eyes flicking between Keiser and the princess.
The older ones, wary and tight-lipped, moved with more purpose---gathering the little ones who had been playing nearby and ushering them back toward the tunnel chambers. The sound of children's laughter, so recently echoing through the hollow, died out in fits and stutters as they disappeared down the passage.
But the circle around them did not break completely. Some stayed. Watching. Waiting.
Keiser's gaze flicked toward the onlookers, then back to the sword. His hand pressed firmer against the flat of the blade, his expression tightening into something caught between exasperation and warning.
"You're making a scene," he said lowly.
Yona's eyes narrowed further, her grip unshaken. "Good. Then answer me before I decide to make an example of you."
"You really do have a habit of drawing your sword every time something barely worth flinching at happens, Princess." Keiser shifted just enough to let the short blade miss, his calm infuriatingly unshaken. Yona's shoulders trembled, her teeth gritting hard.
"A year," she spat, her voice cracking under the weight of everything she'd held back. "I've struggled for a year. You question me again and again--my choices, my action--and now you dare whisper in front of me after all that? If this isn't judgment, or something worse, I wouldn't be standing here with my blade drawn. But I can't simply trust you."
The sword flashed again. Keiser had seen it coming, had read the tension in her grip and the flicker of her muscles. He moved, confident in his foresight, but forgot---Muzio's body was not his own. He lacked the reflex he expected. The edge hissed past his face, so close he swore his nose would be lopped off. Strands of his hair fluttered down, shorn clean, the faint sting of a near miss ghosting across his skin.
For a single heartbeat, his chest tightened so hard he thought his heart would claw its way out---but his face remained composed, unreadable.
"You've done what you could," Keiser said, steady, his voice pitched low enough that only she could clearly hear. "What you thought was best. But tell me, why did you never ask for help?"
He tipped his chin subtly toward the chambers, to the people hidden just beyond the stone walls---the ones Yona had carried the burden of protecting all alone.
Yona's eyes flickered, her breath catching, though her sword remained raised.
Lenko, meanwhile, had finally managed to herd the last of the stragglers out of earshot. He wiped his brow with the back of his sleeve, looking at the two of them as though they were a pair of wild dogs about to tear each other apart. His forced grin had long since died, all that remained was a weary grimace.
"By the gods, you two…" he muttered under his breath, dragging his palms down his face. "If you don't kill each other, you're going to drive me into an early grave."
But still, no one else dared draw closer. It was only the three of them now---tension sharp enough to cut, and words far heavier than steel.
The princess only frowned, her grip tightening on her blade.
"Why would I ask them?" she said coldly. "When they can't even help themselves." She swept her hand toward the tunnels, toward the stone-carved chambers where the hidden folk lingered in silence. "This---this haven---was all I gave them. A place to hide, to not be found, to not return---"
"To prolong your lie," Keiser cut across her, his voice low but firm.
Her lips curled into a sneer. "You've heard my reasons."
Keiser exhaled, weary, his expression unreadable.
But before either could say more, Lenko's voice rang out, sharp and uncharacteristically cutting. "Then why did you not just let these people go?"
Keiser's head turned slightly, eyes flicking toward the chambers where fearful faces peeked from the shadows. Yona's eyes, however, snapped onto Lenko as though he had insulted her.
"You're saying I'm the one who kept them here?" Her voice trembled, not with doubt, but with fury at being questioned.
Lenko immediately raised both hands, shaking his head so fast his curls bounced. "That's not what I meant! I only asked---why won't you let them return to their homes? They're not from Hinnom, are they? They could just… go back."
The words hung like a blade over the silence.
Keiser's gaze slid back to the princess just in time to catch the brief blanch in her cheeks before her mask reasserted itself.
"And let them walk straight into Hinnom's villagers?" she snapped. "And have them found---only to unravel everything I've worked for? My plans would burn to ash the moment they stepped out."
Lenko's brow furrowed, his jaw tightening. " You said you're not keeping them here, that doesn't---"
Keiser lifted his hand, a quiet gesture, and Lenko's words died in his throat. The younger man glanced at him, frustration clear in his eyes, but obeyed.
The silence that followed was suffocating. The air thickened with what wasn't being said---doubts unspoken, truths buried, and the brittle thread keeping the three of them from tearing each other apart.
"You said you don't plan to stay here," Keiser began, his tone edged with calm reproach as he started up the stone steps out of the underground settlement. "And yet, here you are. A whole year spent merely patching the wound, never once searching for the cause of the bleeding."
The princess followed immediately---as he expected. She would never allow him the last word.
"I did look for it," she snapped at his back. "Remember the ward---the strange one that keeps driving the beasts off their path!"
Lenko hurried to catch up, blinking at them both. "What? There's a ward… on a beasts' route?" His confusion was obvious. He'd spent most of his time in the settlement playing with children or helping with meals, and he hadn't been there when the princess explained the situation or the problem of Hinnom.
Keiser cast him a sidelong glance, then gave him the barebones of it. "Over a year ago---long before the princess become a pickpocket---the villagers were already dealing with the problem. Beasts from the forest of Sheol straying onto the roads that lead to Hinnom. Merchants, travelers, locals---all attacked. Trade collapsed. Isolation loomed. Their solution? They tried baiting the creatures back into Sheol, sacrificing what they had to keep the road clear."
Lenko's head bobbed as he took it in, while the princess shifted as though to interrupt. Keiser lifted a hand without looking at her. "You speak in spirals. Let me be the one to explain to him the situatiion." His finger flicked toward Lenko, who only looked helplessly between them.
"So now…?" Lenko asked slowly, uncertainty tugging at his tone.
The princess turned her face away, lips pressed into a thin line. Keiser gave Lenko a look that all but said, You really haven't caught up yet?
And then something clicked. Lenko's eyes widened. "The ward. We just have to… find it and dispel it, right?"
Both Keiser and the princess turned to look at him.
Lenko, caught between them, adjusted the heavy satchel on his shoulder. The metal clasps and tools inside clinked and clattered with every step, filling the silence that neither of them seemed eager to break.
"Lenko…" Keiser said at last, his voice low, almost pitying.
Lenko frowned, confused by the weight in his highness's expression.
The princess, however, let steel rasp as she sheathed her sword. "If it could be easily dispelled," she said coldly, "then it would not have been a problem that lasted for a year."
Lenko blinked, then bobbed his head in belated agreement. "Right…" His brows knit together, and this time he pressed himself to think, really think, the gears in his mind turning visibly on his face.
Keiser studied him, certain the boy still hadn't connected the question he once asked about how long he and Muzio had lived in the forest of Sheol.
Then Lenko lifted his head. "I think it's already dispelled."
The words struck like flint. Both the princess and Keiser turned sharply toward him.
For a heartbeat, Keiser thought it was unfair that he'd take the brunt of the fallout if they found out Muzio was likely behind all this.
He could only hope Lenko wasn't stupid enough to blabber---though he highly doubted it.