"Or do you take his side?"
The question split the moment open like a cracked gem.
The crowd stirred.
Even Selphine blinked.
Aurelian tensed, his hands half-raised at his sides like he was bracing for a blast that hadn't yet come.
The boy—
This time, he said nothing.
No smirk. No clever retort. He merely watched.
And Priscilla…
Her eyes slid toward the heir.
Not cold.
Not cruel.
But exhausted.
The kind of exhaustion that didn't come from the hour—but from years.
She had known this was coming.
That their cordial ties, thin and political as they were, would fray eventually. The Cranes had always resented her standing. Her mother's blood. Her refusal to be paraded like a lesser pawn. Her silence in court that never yielded loyalty.
He, especially—this boy who had once offered her a rose at a summit for appearance's sake, then boasted later that the flower was "charity."
Their falling out was inevitable.
This night had merely chosen to light the fuse.
