Chapter 1020 – Admiration
She studied Lux more carefully, as if that could undo whatever strange reaction had just happened.
He was not in his best dress, not wearing his polished political armor.
He looked like a walking scandal. A vacation playboy. His robe was too loose at the collar. His damp hair refused full discipline. He had shadows under his eyes that no noble portrait would dare preserve.
And yet beneath all that, he looked more dangerous than before.
Because power that only ruled through coldness could be challenged.
Power that had people willing to drag it back from self-destruction?
That was harder to break.
Cyrinne's fingers curled slightly under the table.
Envy stirred again.
Not Vira's kind, the kind that wanted to tear down what shone because she could not become it.
This was older. Closer to admiration.
Ah.
Cyrinne almost laughed at herself.
How poetic.
Her mother would have mocked her for it.
Sira noticed.
