The silence in that ruined chamber didn’t just settle—it congealed, thick as syrup, heavy enough to drown in. Quentin and Iskanda still knelt, bracing for the fatal blow of judgment. Their shoulders squared and their breaths locked as though they were awaiting the report of a firing squad.
I held my breath without realizing it, my heart thudding against my ribs with a maddening rhythm that seemed far too loud in the absence of anything else.
The frost coating the ground crackled faintly beneath the weight of all that unspoken fear, and the broken marble slabs glimmered like the shards of some giant’s shattered jaw.
The air itself buzzed with tension.
Even Tora, delicate as a porcelain figurine and twice as lovely, seemed to draw in on himself in anticipation of whatever decrees were about to be carved onto our fates.
And then, with a simple exhale that sounded suspiciously bored, Director Thalen... pushed forward.
He didn’t deliver judgment. He didn’t shout. He didn’t condemn.
He walked.
Calmly. Casually. As though the threat of consigning both of them to some eldritch nightmare dimension called the Labyrinth was something he toyed with the way a cat might toy with a dying rat—amusing for a second, then simply forgotten.
His boots crunched over frost and debris as though they were petals on a garden path. Quentin peeked upward, confused. Iskanda blinked once, the barest crack in her carefully maintained stoicism. I wanted to gulp, but my throat was desert-dry.
Thalen strode right past them, hands clasped neatly atop his cane, the wrinkles at his eyes deepening with something that could only be described as mischievous delight.
Then he stopped...right in front of me and Elvina.
He pointed his cane at our faces with languid ease, a smile gracing his lips. A small one—barely there—but enough to set off every alarm bell in my skull.
"Well," he said, voice a deep, rumbling warmth that failed to match the carnage around us, "since the root of this entire catastrophe stands directly before me, it seems only fitting that the two of you take responsibility."
Elvina recoiled so fast she nearly tripped over her own self-importance. "We—what—no, sir, I—"
Thalen lifted his brow.
Her protest died instantly. It didn’t fade, didn’t falter—it flatlined. One brow. That’s all it took. Saints have mercy.
"I have heard—quite thoroughly—how this absurd farce began," Thalen murmured, tapping the head of his cane lightly against her sternum. It wasn’t hard, but the way she flinched made it look like he’d jabbed a spear straight through her pride.
Elvina huffed like a cat who’d just had her tail stepped on, crossing her arms and lifting her chin in defiance. "He started it!"
"I did not!" I snapped back, "You’re the one who—"
"Enough."
The word was mild. Soft. Almost lazy.
I’d never shut up faster in my life. My jaw simply... clicked closed, like I’d been magically muzzled. Elvina looked equally strangled.
Thalen nodded in satisfaction. "Good. Now, the point is simple: you two created this mess. Therefore, the two of you will be the ones to resolve it."
I blinked once. Twice. A third time slower, trying to see if maybe, possibly, reality would rearrange itself into something sane.
"I... I’m sorry?" I managed, with all the dignity of a flattened pastry.
Elvina’s jaw dropped so wide I swear I heard her ego crack. "Sir, with respect, that is absolutely absurd—"
"Is it?" Thalen asked pleasantly.
And that was the worst part—his pleasantness. His voice had the tone of a man politely offering tea while preparing to drop someone into a pit of crocodiles.
"This chamber is in ruins because of your feud," he said, cane drifting lazily through the air like a conductor’s baton. "The staff have been dragged into administrative purgatory because of your feud. And my evening—my quiet, peaceful, elderly evening—has been personally defiled because of your feud."
He leaned in slowly, and I swear the air changed temperature. His eyes gleamed—ancient, amused, terrifyingly sharp.
"Therefore," he whispered, "the solution is simple."
A silence fell so thick Quentin actually raised his head out of reflex, like a beaten possum sensing incoming doom.
Thalen straightened, planted the cane firmly on the ground, and delivered the verdict in a voice that echoed like divine judgment.
"You will settle this. Formally. With a match."
Elvina immediately tried to snap back—her mouth opened, her breath sharp, the beginning of a shriek already vibrating in her throat—but Thalen cut her down with another glance.
Not a shout, not a gesture, not even a tilt of the head. Just a glare, one so thin and lethal it felt like he’d flicked a razor across the air between them.
Her voice died instantly, strangled mid-birth, and she clamped her lips shut with the fury of someone who had never once been denied the opportunity to argue.
She stood there, trembling with indignation like a kettle seconds before boiling over, but she did not speak. She wouldn’t dare. Even I felt my spine straighten like a scolded child.
Thalen eased his weight onto his cane, the wooden tap echoing in the ruined chamber, and continued with a tone that felt almost conversational.
"Whoever wins this match," he said, eyes flicking over his shoulder toward Quentin—who still knelt partially folded in on himself—and Iskanda, who stood stone-still, jaw clenched tight enough to crack teeth, "will spare one of them from punishment."
Quentin’s head jerked up so fast I sweat I heard his neck pop. He glanced at Elvina with pure, unfiltered, primal desperation—eyes wide, glistening, silently screaming pick me, pick me, for the love of saints, save me.
It was the kind of look usually reserved for plague victims hoping a healer might lie and tell them it wasn’t fatal.
Elvina stared right back at him—and slowly, ever so slowly, a smirk unfurled across her mouth like a stain blooming across silk.
"Oh, don’t look at me like that," she cooed, voice sugary in a way that made me want to stab her with a spoon. "I’d rather die than save you."
She threw her head back and laughed—an ugly, shrill, self-satisfied sound that echoed off the broken walls like a flock of dying birds. Quentin deflated beside her, visibly, like someone poked a hole in him.
Iskanda glanced at me then, only briefly, her expression unreadable. There was no smirk, no grimace, no warning—just a brief tightening at the corner of her eye. A flicker of thought. And yet it was enough to send a ripple through my nerves. She trusted me—or she was silently begging me not to embarrass her. Hard to say.
Thalen gave a small, approving nod, clearly amused by the pettiness and cruelty we were already displaying.
"Excellent," he murmured. "Now, let us raise the stakes, shall we?" His cane clicked once on the frozen stone as he took a single step closer. The motion felt theatrical, deliberate. "The winner," he announced, "will receive my personal assistance throughout their journey in the Velvet Chambers."
The words hit me like a sledgehammer to the chest.
My breath snagged. His... assistance? His
Opportunity. Saints above. Opportunity.
Elvina’s eyes shot wide too, pupils dilating like spilled ink racing to swallow every last trace of color from her irises. For a moment we were mirrors—two animals scenting blood and power on the air, muscles coiled, ambition trembling under the skin.
But then, in the space of a heartbeat, her expression faltered. A flicker of doubt. Fear? Maybe. Something vulnerable. Something she clearly wasn’t used to feeling.
Thalen’s gaze sharpened instantly. The old man could smell weakness the way a vulture smells rot. "Oh?" he murmured. "A hesitation? How unlike you..." He leaned slightly on his cane, eyes narrowing. "In that case, allow me to add another clause..."
I felt the air tighten around us.
"If you win," he said softly, "He’ll be stripped of his right to ascend in rank. Permanently."
My stomach twisted. Elvina sucked in a breath—sharp, excited, hungry. Her lips parted with a soft, delighted noise that she tried quickly to smother.
"And if he wins..." Thalen continued, pointing at me now.
Elvina snapped her attention toward him, tension bursting like sparks.
"I will strip you of your patronage," he said, glancing back at Elvina.
The silence cracked.
That did it. That sealed everything. Elvina’s eyes lit up—feral, sparkling, vicious with intent—before she forced herself into a pout, arms crossing dramatically as she tried to look disinterested, bored, even offended by the offer that had clearly set her veins on fire. "Fine," she sniffed, lifting her chin. "If I must."
I watched her posture, watched her hunger, watched the way she trembled with anticipation beneath her mask of arrogance, and for a moment, I almost admired it. Thalen knew exactly where to strike—right at the foundations of our hatred, right where it would hurt the most, ensuring we’d both leap headfirst into the trap smiling like idiots.
I glanced sidelong at Iskanda. She didn’t speak. She didn’t move. But she gave the tiniest imaginable nod—so faint it might have been a trick of the light. A whisper of support. Permission. Trust.
It was enough.
I straightened my spine, lifted my chin, and said, "I agree to this match as well."
Thalen’s face split into the widest grin yet—sharp, ancient, delighted.
And then he burst into laughter. Wild, roaring, gleeful laughter that echoed through the chamber like someone had unleashed a drunken god into the room. It went on far too long, rising, trembling, bubbling—
Until he suddenly doubled over, hacking violently, spraying coughs into the air with the force of a collapsing mine tunnel.
A spatter of blood hit the floor at his feet.