"Princess Elara." Her voice was soft. Almost gentle. That made it worse sohow. "Sit."
There was no second chair.
Elara remained standing. "My Lady. You summoned ."
"I did." The First Consort studied her with those unsettling eyes. "You’re leaving soon. Port Crestfall. Taking your entire household. All twenty-five beast knights. Very ambitious for soone who couldn’t walk two weeks ago."
It wasn’t a question. Just observation delivered like a scalpel.
"The preservation magic requires on-site supervision," Elara said carefully. "The rchants—"
"The rchants are convenient cover." The First Consort waved a hand. "Don’t insult with the performance you give the Emperor. I know why you’re leaving. Soone tried to kill you. You’re running."
Elara’s jaw tightened. "Strategic withdrawal."
"Call it what you like." The First Consort stood. She was tall—taller than Elara by several inches, and the resemblance to Eleana beca even more pronounced. "You’re the first one."
"First one?"
"First daughter to actually ’leave’." Sothing flickered across her face. Not quite a smile. "The others sche and poison and sabotage each other within these walls. Circle like sharks in a pool. But you—you’re swimming for open water."
Elara said nothing. Couldn’t tell if this was approval or threat. And the fact that this was Eleana’s mother made everything more dangerous. Was this a warning? A threat on behalf of her daughter? An attempt to manipulate?
The First Consort walked to the window, looking out over the palace grounds. "Do you know how long I’ve been First Consort?"
"Twenty-eight years, my Lady."
"Twenty-eight years watching daughters destroy each other for a throne that will likely kill whoever claims it." She turned. "The Emperor has a talent for creating vipers and throwing them into the sa pit to see which one survives."
The bluntness shocked Elara into silence.
"You think your sisters are the danger," the First Consort continued. "Eleana with her knives. Sera with her convenient framing. The others with their smaller poisons. But you’re wrong."
"Then who—"
"The Emperor himself." The words dropped like stones into still water. "He’s not protecting you. He’s watching which daughter is clever enough to escape the trap. Which one will survive not through palace intrigue but through ’intelligence’."
Elara’s heart hamred. "Why are you telling this? You’re Eleana’s mother. If anyone should want dead—"
"You think I’m here on my daughter’s behalf?" The First Consort’s smile was sharp and bitter. "You don’t understand palace politics at all, do you?"
"Then explain it."
"Eleana is mine. My blood. My daughter." The First Consort’s voice stayed soft, but sothing deadly moved beneath it. "And she will very likely die trying to claim that throne. Just like the others. Just like the daughter I had before her."
Past tense. Another daughter.
"What happened?" Elara asked quietly.
"The Emperor happened." The First Consort’s expression shifted—sothing old and painful crossing her features. "My first daughter. Before Eleana. She was brilliant. Creative. Gentle. She didn’t play his gas correctly. Made the mistake of being too visible, too talented, too much of a potential threat. She died of a sudden illness when she was sixteen."
The silence stretched.
"Poison?" Elara whispered.
"Does it matter? She’s gone." The First Consort walked closer. "And I’ve spent twenty-eight years watching him do the sa thing to his other daughters. Including mine. Creating impossible tests. Pitting them against each other. Waiting to see who’s worthy."
"Worthy of what?"
"Surviving him." The First Consort stopped an arm’s length away. "Eleana thinks she’s playing to win. She’s not. She’s playing to survive long enough to be useful to him. They all are."
"But you want... what? For to escape so your daughter has less competition?"
"No." The word was sharp. "I want you to escape because you’re the first one who might actually succeed. And if you do—if you can build power outside his reach, outside this palace, outside his gas—then maybe Eleana can too. Eventually."
Elara stared at her. "You’re betting on to prove it’s possible."
"Yes." The First Consort’s ice-blue eyes bored into her. "You think leaving solves the problem. It doesn’t. It just changes the battlefield. But it’s a start. Your rchant contracts will make you valuable enough that he can’t simply kill you. Your beast knights—still sworn to him, rember—provide protection but also surveillance. Everything you’re building is still ’his’ by imperial law. But it’s further from his imdiate reach."
"And if I succeed?"
"Then you prove there’s a way out. And I can show my daughter that path when the ti cos." The First Consort’s voice dropped. "I’ve already lost one daughter to his gas. I won’t lose another if there’s any alternative."
"You’re using as a test case. For Eleana’s sake."
"Yes. But I’m also warning you." She walked back to her chair. "The Emperor doesn’t create tests he expects his children to pass. He creates tests designed to break them. The ones who break in interesting ways beco useful tools. The ones who break in boring ways disappear. And the ones who refuse to break..."
She trailed off.
"What happens to them?" Elara asked.
"I don’t know yet." The First Consort’s smile was sharp and cold as winter. "You’ll be the first to find out."
Elara stood frozen, mind racing. Eleana’s mother was betting on her. Not against her daughter, but ’for’ a future where her daughter might not have to die in palace gas.
"You’re dismissed," the First Consort said. "Your beast knight is probably climbing the walls with worry. Go."
Elara turned to leave, then stopped at the door. "My Lady... did Eleana send those assassins?"
The First Consort’s expression was unreadable. "Does it matter? Whether she did or whether soone frad her—the result is the sa. You’re leaving. That’s what matters."
"It matters to ."
"Then you’ll have to figure that out yourself." The First Consort looked away. "I’m a mother trying to save her daughter. You’re a princess trying to save yourself. Our goals align. For now. Don’t waste that."
The door opened. The fox knight stood on the other side, tension radiating off him.
Elara walked past without explaining.
As they descended the stairs, her mind raced.
The First Consort. Eleana’s mother. A woman who’d lost one daughter already and was desperate to save another—desperate enough to warn her daughter’s competition, to give away the Emperor’s gas, to gamble on a half-dead princess as proof that escape was possible.
Three days until departure.
Three days to figure out if she’d just gained an unlikely ally or walked straight into the most sophisticated trap yet.
She didn’t look back at the tower.
Didn’t want to see if the First Consort was watching.
But she felt those ice-blue eyes—so like Eleana’s, yet so different—on her back all the way down.
.
.
.
Two days before departure, Elara set her trap.
She’d spent the previous night thinking through the sabotage. Soone had gotten into her room while she was at dinner. Soone who knew exactly what to tamper with—the preservation anchors, the contracts, the clothes. Soone who understood her work well enough to substitute a failing anchor for a working one.
But also soone who’d left physical traces. Who’d moved her trunks slightly. Who’d fastened buckles wrong.
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