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Corin’s mouth pulls into the faintest smile. “I’ve had worse origins than paperwork.”

I reach for the genealogy.

Vaerith’s attention snaps back to me. “Do not.”

I take the parchment in both hands and tear it in half.

The sound cracks through the hall like a slap.

Several clerks gasp. Lord Peskan makes a strangled noise. Syrenya’s smile blooms so wide it should be illegal.

Vaerith goes utterly still.

I tear it again, slower this time, until my mother’s name separates from the branch where he tried to pin her to a program. Then I let the pieces fall onto the table.

“My bloodline ends as a tool here,” I say.

Vaerith’s voice drops to a whisper. “You foolish girl.”

Corin shifts half a step closer, and the bond warms with controlled warning.

Vaerith lifts one hand.

His guards move.

Lady Merrow steps forward immediately. “State grounds for escalation.”

Vaerith’s guards halt at the formal command.

Lord Peskan, pale but committed now, joins her. “Under neutral witness protocol, any seizure of Lady Dareth requires documented immediate threat.”

Syrenya glides beside them, fan tucked away, eyes bright and predatory. “And do remember that every clerk in this hall has been writing.”

Vaerith’s gaze moves over them all.

The legal route closes in front of him.

I see the moment he abandons it.

There is a kind of freedom in a man like Vaerith giving up pretense. It clarifies the air. His face empties of argument. His hand lowers to the table, palm pressing against a carved seam I did not notice before.

Rhazek’s head lifts sharply. “Move.”

The floor ignites beneath us.

Hidden summoning runes blaze through the estate hall stone, red lines racing outward from Vaerith’s table in a complex spiral buried under marble, contract seals, and generations of legal ceremony. The air drops cold, then turns blistering hot in the space of a breath. Infernal wind rips through the hall, tearing papers from the table and whipping the shredded genealogy into the air like dead leaves.

Clerks scream.

Witness lamps burst.

The walls groan as the final ritual underneath the estate answers its master.

Corin grabs my hand. “Beside me.”

“Always.”

The floor fractures between the runes.