The corridors of Thornleigh Palace fell silent as Duke Alexandrino passed, his cloak trailing like the shadow of a storm not yet broken. He walked with the composure of a man accustomed to power, though his eyes betrayed a tempest gathering behind the calm façade. Step by measured step, he descended into the hidden heart of the palace, where no candle burned without his command, and no ear dared intrude.
The secret chamber lay beneath the eastern wing, behind doors veiled in carved oak and symbols long forgotten—sigils of crescent moons intertwined with jagged arcs of lightning, the ancient crest of Thornleigh's sovereign line. Here, beneath vaulted stone and the hush of damp air, the Duke convened with his confidants. The chamber was a sanctum of whispers: walls adorned with faded maps, tapestries dulled by time, and shelves burdened with ledgers whose spines had outlived generations. A single lantern swung from a chain, its wavering light rendering the men's faces both spectral and grave.
They gathered about the long table of ebony wood, polished to a sheen that reflected their expressions like a blackened mirror. The Duke sat at its head, his fingers drumming against the surface with a cadence both restless and deliberate, as though he sought to summon truth from silence. Around him were lords and advisers, each cloaked in their own ambitions, yet bound together by necessity.
"Two murders," Alexandrino said, his voice low. "Both hidden by the same shadow. And every shadow comes from something — or someone."
Murmurs rose and fell like the rustle of unseen wings. The men spoke in circles—suspicions layered upon suspicions, names uttered and discarded like coins thrown into a well that swallowed all. Yet always the same name returned to their lips: Caldris. His presence was as smoke—visible, suffocating, yet never caught in the hand. He had ties, undeniably, to the Eclipse Elite. Yet when confronted, he denied it with the calmness of a saint kneeling at prayer.
"It makes no sense," muttered a gray-bearded one, his voice rough with age. "The last victim was one of the Elite. If Caldris serves them, why would he strike down on his own then?"
The chamber darkened as the lantern's flame sputtered. Shadows leapt across the stone, painting the men's faces with dread. The Duke's gaze sharpened, piercing the veil of confusion.
"Only one guild could hide its tracks like this," he said.
"The Eclipse Elite.
They strike like shadows, silent as midnight rain. You can't accuse them without proof, and they never leave any. Still, they don't kill without purpose—their reasons are just riddles we haven't solved."
The silence that followed was not empty, but heavy, like the hush before thunder rends the heavens. Each man felt the weight of it pressing into his marrow, the unspoken truth that to name the Elite as foe was to invite ruin upon Thornleigh itself. And yet, around the table, in the wavering half-light, the Duke's eyes gleamed—not with fear, but with resolve. He would not allow his palace, his dominion, his legacy, to fall prey to unseen daggers.
Above them, the world continued in blissful ignorance—servants polishing silver, nobles weaving words of courtesy in gilded halls, and the courtyards blooming beneath the summer sun. Yet in that secret chamber, among oaken walls steeped in the breath of centuries, the first stirrings of war began to take root, fragile and dangerous as fire coaxed to flame.
Lady Katherine descended the dais with the quiet dignity of a swan folding its wings. The chamber, though emptied of argument, still trembled with the residue of voices, as if the marble itself remembered the disputes it had endured. She did not linger. The matters were postponed, their fate suspended upon the scales of further investigation. For now, her silence was her verdict.
Caldris rheyne stood to one side of her path, unmoved as a shadow rooted to stone. His gaze was not offered to her—indeed, he did not glance at her at all. He seemed a statue carved from some cold ore of indifference, his presence both unyielding and inscrutable.
At her side, Seraphin advanced to meet her, parting the cluster of nobles with the effortless sweep of a tide. He extended his arm, gloved and steady, the gesture both formal and familiar. To the court he was the image of severity: tall, straight-backed, his features locked in aristocratic reserve, his pale eyes glimmering like diluted moonlight. His hair, brown and weighted with a burnished hue, lent him an earthlier grace, though he seldom allowed that warmth to soften his face within these walls.
Yet Katherine knew, as did a precious few, that beneath this cold marble surface lay a spirit of unusual generosity, and at times—when no judging eyes of court or crown remained upon them—a sudden playfulness that disarmed her guarded poise. It was not the mischief of an unruly man, but the teasing of one who knew the value of light in dark places. And sometimes—though rare as a comet's blaze—he let August glimpse this hidden nature too.
Katherine accepted his arm without a flicker of expression, her face a mask carved from porcelain, smooth and untouched by the stirrings within. They walked together, their steps in rhythm, like paired notes struck from a single chord.
Yet as she passed, something tugged her gaze back, like a silken thread drawn taut. She turned, not with haste, but with the still deliberation of one who weighs the worth of a final glance.
Caldris Rheyne remained where he had been, wrapped in thought as in a cloak too heavy for his frame. His eyes did not rise to meet hers; they were fixed upon some invisible horizon, far beyond the gilded borders of the court. He looked a man lost, though not in place—lost, rather, in his own inward ocean. By his side towered his servant, tall as a winter tree stripped of leaves, silent in stature, a sentinel carved of flesh and patience.
The sight was fleeting, no more than a moment's sketch upon her mind. And yet, in that stillness, Katherine thought she glimpsed an omen unspoken—Caldris swallowed whole by his own meditations, his servant casting a shadow long enough to cross into her path. She released the glance, as one lets go of smoke, and turned again to Seraphin's arm.
Their procession carried them toward the court's doors, where silence waited with open hands, eager to close around the echoes left behind.
The court was dispersing like a tide that had been momentarily arrested by the gravity of its own spectacle. Whispers broke into rivulets, then into streams, the nobility drifting from dais to corridor, their silks and velvets drawing restless currents through the hall. The chandeliers above, heavy with crystal, trembled with the movement of air, sending fractured light upon marble floors polished to a mirror's stillness.
Amidst this gilded confusion, a woman remained as if anchored by invisible chains. Her gown, black as a raven's wing at dusk, gathered about her like an ink-spill upon snow. Lady Rhea stood not in the centre but at the margin of the chamber, her figure half-veiled by the press of bodies, yet her gaze did not falter. It sought only one—Lady Katherine.
Katherine descended the dais with the measured grace of one who had long understood the peril of being watched. Her hand, pale and finely wrought, rested upon the offered arm of Seraphin, her husband, who carried himself with noble austerity, though within him, all who knew whispered, dwelt the warmth of genial fire. Together they cut a path through the restless court, his brow a mask of calm severity, hers a portrait of marble reserve.
But Rhea—Rhea's eyes followed her as if no other form in that cavernous hall could command her vision. Within her, panic stirred like a bird flung suddenly into a storm-cage. The hour was unkind: the palace trembled with disquiet, nobles bristled with indignation, murmurs coiled into venomous knots. To approach Katherine now would have been akin to stepping barefoot into flame. And yet—how the heart betrayed itself. For every step Katherine took toward the outer doors was a thread pulled taut within Rhea's chest.
The tall doors at the chamber's end loomed open, spilling a breath of cold corridor-air that smelled faintly of rain on stone. Beyond, guards in silvered livery kept their stations, impassive, the gleam of halberds catching the light like winter stars. Their presence made the gulf between Rhea and Katherine seem all the more insurmountable, for the palace in chaos was a palace more heavily watched.
Around her, nobles gathered in huddles, their whispers like dry leaves rustling underfoot. One lady toyed with her fan so furiously that its painted feathers threatened to split; another lord dabbed his brow with a handkerchief embroidered in gold, as if the heat of scandal had drawn sweat upon his face. The courtiers spoke of investigation, of postponement, of honor bruised yet not broken, their words colliding and collapsing like waves that knew not their shore.
Still Rhea did not move. Her slippered feet remained upon the cold veined marble, her gloved hands clasped so tightly at her waist that her knuckles burned beneath the fabric. Only her eyes moved, tracing Katherine's retreating figure—Katherine, who did not turn, who did not even allow her gaze to brush the woman standing shadowed among shadows.
And yet—there had been, Rhea thought with the desperation of one who seizes at smoke—a flicker. A glance, perhaps? A fragment of recognition, so fleeting that it might have been no more than a trick of mirrored light. But Rhea felt it nonetheless, a tremor down her spine, a whisper urging her onward.
But how could she? To step into that throng would be to bare herself before serpents already tasting scandal upon their tongues. To call Katherine's name would be to summon questions she had no shield to answer. Thus she remained still, the image of composure betrayed by the storm in her heart, her eyes fastened upon the vanishing figure of the woman in ivory silk who walked arm in arm with a husband of marble poise.
The court roared around her, but Lady Rhea heard nothing—only the silence of her own unspoken words.
Lady Katherine descended the marble steps of Thornleigh Palace with her husband, Seraphin, their figures framed by the lingering hush that followed the tumult within. The palace doors closed behind them like the shutting of a heavy tome, leaving the murmur of nobles sealed away in shadow. Before them, the courtyard unfurled—a vast stone square where the light of afternoon spilled like liquid gold, washing the ground with a radiance that softened even the stern faces of the guards.
Beyond the courtyard, the gardens stretched wide, serene and disciplined, yet filled with secret poetry. Winding paths curved like strokes of a calligrapher's hand, guiding the eye toward fountains whose waters leapt in fragile arcs, falling back with silver laughter. Rosebushes climbed upon trellises, their blossoms bending beneath the weight of sunlight. Laurel and yew stood in solemn ranks, guardians of old earth, while lilies and violets wove themselves into patterns of pale enchantment. The fragrance of lilac floated on the breeze, mingling with the resinous breath of cypress, and the whole garden seemed to tremble with the quiet grandeur of eternity.
Yet for Katherine, this beauty was but a painted veil. Her mind wandered elsewhere, to a figure far more delicate than the roses at her feet—her nephew, August. The boy's pallor haunted her thoughts, his fragility a whispered refrain that no music of fountains could silence. The court's disputes, postponed yet unresolved, seemed trifling against the tender urgency of kinship. She felt the weight of time pressing upon her shoulders, urging her onward, compelling her to see him once more.
As she placed her hand upon the carriage door, a prickle stirred at the nape of her neck. Katherine turned, her gaze sweeping the bright expanse. For an instant, she felt it—eyes upon her, watching, unblinking, hidden somewhere within that golden calm.