Seraphina began her interrogation, her questions designed to extract information about every aspect of Adrian’s betrayal. She wanted nas, dates, locations of etings, details about what intelligence he had passed to the dark elves, and most importantly, what he knew about their plans regarding the mysterious shopkeeper.
But Adrian, who had supposedly been prepared through hours of careful physical and magical coercion, did not budge under her questioning. His body bore the marks of torture, yet sothing in his spirit had hardened rather than broken. For the first ti in his life, and especially before his formidable aunt, he remained absolutely firm in his convictions.
"What you are doing is wrong, Aunt Seraphina," Adrian said through swollen lips, his voice hoarse but unwavering. "All elves are elves. Skin colour doesn’t define us. Elent affinity doesn’t determine our worth. These artificial divisions serve nothing but perpetual conflict."
Seraphina’s expression remained cold as she listened, though sothing flickered in her eyes at his unexpected defiance.
Adrian continued despite his obvious pain, drawing on reserves of courage he hadn’t known he possessed before the queen. "We co-existed peacefully before this endless war; this is known in the ancient scribes’ docunt that you hid; it is clear for anyone reading it without prejudice. The dark elves and light elves both descended from the sa source—the twin founders Ingwë and Alboin. We are one people divided by personal vendettas and pride."
The queen’s supernatural beauty seed to sharpen into sothing more dangerous, her presence becoming oppressive rather than rely overwhelming. But Adrian pushed forward, sensing he might never have another opportunity to speak these truths.
"You’ve built your entire reign on maintaining this division, on convincing our people that the dark elves represent existential threats rather than simply different branches of the sa family tree. But the secret you’ve been hiding will co out eventually. The truth about our shared ancestry, about the artificial nature of this conflict, about the machinations that keep us at war—"
"Enough!" Seraphina’s voice cracked like thunder through the chamber, her composure shattering for the first ti in a long ti inside her own kingdom.
Genuine rage consud the queen’s carefully maintained control. Her eyes blazed with fury. Adrian’s words were clearly touching sothing far more personal and dangerous.
"Insolent!" she spat, her supernatural charisma transforming from attractive to terrifying as her anger manifested physically.
The air around her shimred with mana, and light started to radiate from her body; she beca like a miniature sun in a closed room.
Adrian’s eyes couldn’t stare at the display; his eyes lowered to the ground, but he maintained his defiant gaze, apparently having decided that he had nothing left to lose by speaking truths that everyone carefully avoided acknowledging.
"You dare lecture about history and morality?" Seraphina continued, her voice low and deadly. "You, who betrayed your own people, your own blood, for what? So naive idealism about unity that ignores decades of conflict and incompatible interests?"
She moved closer to her bound nephew, her presence now actively hostile rather than rely intimidating. "The ancient scribes you reference so reverently also docunt the reasons for our separation. The philosophical differences made coexistence impossible. The betrayals that created wounds too deep to heal through simple platitudes about shared ancestry."
Adrian’s defiance seed to grow rather than diminish in the face of her fury. "Those betrayals were orchestrated by leaders like you who benefit from eternal conflict. The common people on both sides suffer while the powerful maintain their positions through manufactured fear and hatred."
Seraphina’s hand moved with blinding speed, striking Adrian across the face with force that would have killed a master-level awakener. His head snapped to the side, blood spraying from his split lip, but he slowly turned back to face her with that sa infuriating determination still burning in his eyes.
"You know nothing of what leadership requires," Seraphina whispered with deadly calm, her initial explosive rage settling into sothing colder and more dangerous.
"I might not know what leadership requires," Adrian said quietly, his voice carrying a hidden trauma that transcended his physical suffering, "but I know what it prohibits. You are killing your own people for your own interests, sacrificing elven lives on both sides to maintain a war that serves nothing but your personal vendetta."
He paused, gathering courage for what he was about to say next. The words themselves seed to cause him physical pain beyond what the torture had inflicted.
"I know why you are doing this. Really, truly know. You hate the dark elves because..."
He stopped abruptly, the mory of the event having clear and devastating effect on him. His defiant expression cracked slightly, revealing the grief that still haunted him despite the years that had passed.
The queen looked at him in genuine shock, her rage montarily displaced by surprise that he would dare speak of that particular tragedy.
"You want them exterminated because they killed your beloved little sister," Adrian finished, his voice breaking slightly.
"My mother."
As he spoke those words, lancholy and profound sadness erupted in his heart despite his attempts to maintain composure. His mother’s death had taken an enormous toll on him, and the wound remained open even after all this ti. She had been everything to him, and to their entire people.
His mother had been the saint of the light elven tribe, beloved by everyone who knew her. Her kindness, wisdom, and genuine care for all people had made her a unifying figure whose loss had devastated the entire kingdom in ways that went beyond simple consequences.
Yet on what should have been an uneventful day, her extraordinary beauty had attracted dangerous attention from a group of grandmaster-rank dark elves who had wanted to harass her. When she refused their advances, the situation had escalated with horrifying speed. In the violent confrontation that followed, both his mother and father had died defending each other alongside their guards.
From that mont forward, Queen Seraphina had wanted every dark elf dead.
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