POV: Dorian
She had seen his face.
That was the first thought he had when he got back to his study, mask back in place, door closed behind him. One second — maybe less — but her eyes had been open and she had been looking directly at him and there was nothing he could do about that now.
He sat down.
He waited for the feeling he always got when someone saw the scars without warning. The familiar tightening. The cold, quiet anger he had learned to keep very still inside his chest so it did not become something worse.
It did not come.
What came instead was the memory of her expression. He had caught it in the fraction of a second before he turned away — and she had not flinched. Had not gasped. Had not done any of the things people did, the things he had stopped being surprised by years ago because at least surprised reactions were honest.
She had looked at him like she was trying to understand something.
Like the scars were a puzzle and she was already working on it.
He put that away. He had more important things.
Corvin knocked and entered without waiting, which meant the news was urgent. Dorian had trained him that way — do not knock twice, do not hesitate, time matters more than manners.
"The baron is talking," Corvin said, and set a folded paper on the desk.
Dorian read it. It was a summary of what Aldous Calloway had been saying at three separate gatherings in the capital over the last four days. The words changed slightly each time but the meaning stayed the same: his daughter was fragile. Sensitive. Possibly unstable, the way her poor mother had been unstable. He worried about her constantly. He hoped the duke would be patient with her difficulties.
Dorian set the paper down.
He leaned back in his chair and looked at the ceiling and thought.
A man only destroyed a reputation before it was needed if he was afraid of what that reputation might become. Aldous was not telling these stories because they were true. He was telling them because he needed powerful people to believe them before Verity had the chance to prove otherwise. He was building a wall around her credibility while she was still far enough away that she could not defend herself.
The same thing had been done to her mother.
Declared unstable. Confined. Erased.
And it had worked on Rosalind because Rosalind had been alone, with no money, no allies, and a husband who controlled everything around her.
Verity was not alone anymore.
Dorian was not sure when he had decided that. But he had.
He sat forward. "I need you to go back to the capital."
Corvin pulled out a small notebook. He was already writing.
"I want everything on Rosalind Calloway. The physician Aldous used to have her declared unfit — find out who he was, who paid him, whether he is still practicing. The two witnesses from the marriage ceremony — I need their names and current locations. And the solicitor's office — Aldren and Moss — I need to know if they have received any interference on the Harwick inheritance filing."
Corvin wrote without looking up. "Anything else?"
"Harwick's spy in this castle. The butler — Harwick. I want to know exactly when Aldous hired him and what his instructions are."
"You are certain it is him?"
"He searched her bag the first night. He has been intercepting her mail." Dorian paused. "Do not move on him yet. A spy you know about is more useful than one you have just removed."
Corvin nodded, closed the notebook, and headed for the door.
"Corvin."
He stopped.
"The tea," Dorian said. "Last night. Someone warned her not to drink it. Was it you?"
Corvin turned around slowly. His expression shifted into something careful and precise. "No. I did not know about any tea."
The room went quiet.
"Then someone else in this castle is helping her," Dorian said. "Someone who is not our spy and is not one of ours. Find out who."
Corvin left.
Dorian sat at his desk and told himself, very firmly, that everything he was doing was strategic. The Harwick inheritance gave him legal grounds against Aldous. Aldous gave him evidence against Isolde. Isolde was the real target — had always been the real target — and Verity was simply the path to her.
This was not about caring.
This was architecture. He was building a case.
He was still telling himself that twenty minutes later when he heard a knock at his study door — not Corvin's knock, not Petra's — and opened it.
Verity was standing there. Eyes steady. Chin up.
"We need to talk," she said. "And I think you already know why."
She held up her left hand.
The scar on her palm faced him directly. And in the morning light coming through the corridor window, for the first time, he could see it clearly.
It was not just a scar.
It was glowing.