The morning sun bled through the high windows, pale gold spilling across the polished floors of the palace corridors. Lucian walked with unhurried grace, every step measured, every breath quiet, his robes whispering against the marble tiles. Servants dipped their heads as he passed, yet their eyes lingered a heartbeat too long. They whispered when they thought he was gone. The tutor who smiled too easily. The man who belonged nowhere, yet somehow stood at the center of everything.
He ignored them.
His mind was already three steps ahead, calculating the risk of the moment. If he was to secure a place at the hunt, it would not come through patience. Alaric had withheld the invitation deliberately, stripping him of access as though he were a nuisance, a tool to be discarded once used. Lucian knew better. Each day with the princes and General mattered. Each day kept him alive. Each day tightened the snare he wove.
And so, to the study he went.
