Back in the sanctuary of the safe house, the fire in the hearth seemed to offer little warmth against the chill that had settled deep in Lia's bones. She recounted the meeting in the Solar to Julian, her voice a low, clinical monotone as she detailed the Emperor's questions, the trap he had laid, and the terrifying, painful resonance of the Soul-Tether.
"He was sensing you," Julian said, his expression grim. He poured them both a brandy, the clink of the glass decanter the only sound in the tense silence. "This isn't just a political game anymore, Lia. He's fighting you on a level I don't understand."
"It's a connection," she explained, the words feeling alien on her tongue. "From my past life. He forged a link between our souls. It's how he controlled me. Now, it's a weakness. It's a beacon that alerts him to my presence."
"Then we can no longer afford to be in his presence," Julian stated, his voice flat and final. "The direct approach is a failure. The risk of you being discovered is too high."
He was right. Her greatest weapon—her intimate knowledge of the Emperor—was nullified by the very magic that bound them. She needed a new vector of attack, an indirect approach.
"We need to consolidate our power base," she said, her strategic mind taking over, pushing the lingering fear into a locked compartment. "House Reid was the first limb of the beast. But there are others. We need allies. And we need to give our enemies a new target to focus on, someone other than me."
Her gaze fell on the unlit corner of the room, a flicker of an idea taking shape. "Seraphina," she said, the name a soft, dangerous whisper. "The Emperor is watching me. Kaelen is wavering. Seraphina is ambitious, jealous, and she already sees me as a threat. She is the perfect distraction."
Julian's eyes lit up with a predatory gleam. He understood immediately. "We turn them against each other. We feed Seraphina's ambition, her paranoia. We make her believe you are her primary rival for the Emperor's favor, for the title of Empress."
"Exactly," Lia confirmed. "While they are busy playing their courtly games, we will be dismantling the true source of the Emperor's power: his finances."
It was a classic Shadow Hand strategy: create a loud, dramatic conflict on one front to mask a quiet, lethal attack on another.
As if on cue, a soft knock came at the study door. It was the old woman, her face impassive. "A visitor, my lady. He says the Shadow Hand sent him."
It was Kaelen.
He was shown into the study, and the change in him was profound. The weary, conflicted scholar was gone, replaced by a man whose eyes burned with a cold, righteous fury. He clutched a worn, leather-bound journal in his hand.
"You were right," he said to Lia, his voice raw. "Everything. The retired Inquisitor… he kept a secret journal. He knew my father was innocent. He recorded the entire conspiracy."
He placed the journal on the table. "But it's worse than I imagined. My father wasn't silenced because of a political plot. He was silenced because he discovered what the Emperor was doing. What he was becoming."
He opened the journal to a marked page. The old Inquisitor's script was cramped, filled with a horrified, desperate urgency.
"He found evidence of a forbidden ritual," Kaelen explained, his voice trembling with a mixture of grief and rage. "A dark magic that sustains the Emperor, that grants him his unnatural charisma, his terrifying power. My father believed he was using a grimoire, an ancient, cursed artifact, to draw power from… from the very soul of the empire."
The room fell silent. The air grew thick, heavy. Lia stared at the journal, and a hundred fragmented memories, a hundred half-understood mysteries from her past life, suddenly slammed into focus. The Emperor's ageless appearance. His flashes of impossible insight. The way his will could feel like a physical force.
It wasn't just tyranny. It was sorcery.
[CRITICAL INFORMATION ACQUIRED. NEW OMEGA-LEVEL OBJECTIVE GENERATED.] [OBJECTIVE: LOCATE AND NEUTRALIZE THE SOURCE OF THE EMPEROR'S POWER.] [REWARD: UNKNOWN.]
The Ledger's notification was stark, its implications terrifying. Their war had just changed. They were no longer fighting a man. They were fighting a monster.