Chapter 490: Chapter 489- What a Pervert?!

Not the same question.

Harder. .

The question of a man revising his read of the situation. 𝕗𝕣𝐞𝐞𝘄𝐞𝚋𝚗𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗹.𝚌𝕠𝚖

Celestia looked up.

Coughed.

The , composed, entirely-managed cough of a woman clearing a throat that needs no clearing.

"What I told you is true," she said.

Her voice was even.

She met her father’s eyes.

"I have seen it myself. The dead child has the power." She set her fork down. Folded her hands. The practiced composure of a woman who has been in diplomatic rooms and has learned that the body must follow the mind’s instructions regardless of what it’s doing. "He can see forward. The accuracy is not luck or coincidence. It is systemic. Reliable." A breath. "We should move the plan forward."

The table absorbed her words.

The way the walls absorbed sound — completely, without echo.

The silence lasted three seconds.

Then everyone was talking.

"Forward? Now? With Leo’s faction already—"

"If we commit to the Queen we lose the northern alliance—"

"The dead child is a boy in a county town, Celestia, you went all the way to Millbrook to tell us to bet the house on a—"

"Prince Leo has the military—"

"The Queen has the succession legitimacy—"

"If we move forward and Leo wins, the Ktorian name is—"

The voices overlapping, building, the , combustive energy of eight powerful people with , conflicting investments in the question of which faction controlled the kingdom’s next decade all arriving at their positions simultaneously.

Celestia sat.

Said nothing.

Watched them.

Her thighs, under the table, still pressed together.

She thought about his eyes.

The purple ones.

The ones that had looked at her the way —

She stopped thinking about the purple ones.

The room went quiet.

Not because anyone finished.

Because Vareth looked up.

The eyes.

Silver-gray. Burning. The full, unobstructed force of a man who has been waiting for the conversation to exhaust itself and is now applying the , simple pressure of sixty-three years of absolute authority in a room full of people who have never, in their lives, successfully argued with him past the point where he chose to end it.

He did not speak.

He looked.

At each of them.

One by one.

The , individual, ’direct’ landing of his gaze on each face in the room — the weight of it sitting on each person’s chest for exactly the second it took to communicate what needed communicating.

Heads dropped.

One by one.

Aldric’s first, despite himself — the fury still in his jaw but his eyes finding the table with the , involuntary submission of a man whose body has made a decision his pride is still arguing with.

The sons. The other nephews. Each one.

The room reached the silence of eight people who have decided, simultaneously, to stop.

Vareth breathed.

His chest rising and falling with the slow, unhurried rhythm of a man who has never once raised his voice in this room because he has never needed to.

"Send a letter to the Queen," he said.

The voice of a man issuing instructions to the air, the walls, the servants behind the side door, the universe in general.

"We will support her." A pause. "Against Prince Leo."

The silence that followed was a different kind of silence.

Not the silence of people stopped mid-argument.

The silence of people who have just heard something that will change the direction of the kingdom and are computing what that means for them personally.

Aldric’s mouth was open.

He closed it.

One of the sons started to say something — the reflexive, beginning of an objection — and felt Vareth’s eyes find him.

Stopped.

The question arrived in the room like weather — the , atmospheric weight of a man who has made a decision and is now asking, in the language of sixty-three years and an unbroken chain of being correct, whether anyone in this room believes their objection to be worth the cost of raising it.

"Any doubts," Vareth said.

His voice was not loud.

It didn’t need to be.

The silver-gray eyes moved across every face at the table — slow, patient, the full, burning assessment of a man who knows every person in this room better than they know themselves and is waiting for any of them to surprise him.

The fire in them.

The , concentrated, ’ancient’ fire of a bloodline that had been sitting at tables like this for two hundred years and had survived every regime, every war, every succession crisis, every internal fracture by virtue of one consistent quality: ’knowing when to move.’

No one spoke.

The air in the room held.

"No sir," said Aldric.

Quiet. Genuine.

The voice fell around the table — ’no sir, no sir, no sir’ — one after another, in the soft, complete, entirely-meant tone of people who have looked at the fire and made a reasonable decision.

"No sir."

"Hmm... Now, focus in capital city and also, make sure to hide truth of how brillant that Child is." Head of the family, said his aura magnifying itself throughout the mansion, as he simply slowly stood, using the napkin to clean his mouth, butlers helping him, as he turned, before turned towards Celestia and asked, "By the way, where is that young man?"

The head of the family’s question hung in the air like a blade held just above the table.

Celestia’s fork paused again. She set it down with deliberate care.

"I don’t know," she muttered. "No."

The single word slipped out quieter than she intended. She closed her eyes for a moment, the weight of the dining hall pressing against her eyelids.

’I know he would probably be inside of some woman’s pussy.’

Knowing how perverted her nephew was, the thought arrived unbidden, sharp and vivid. Viktor’s hunger had never been subtle. Not with her. Not with anyone who caught that purple gaze. She rubbed her forehead, the cool press of her fingers against skin that still felt too warm, then drew a slow breath. She tried to stand.

Before she could push her chair back, one of the younger cousins—Rendrel, the quiet one with the ledger-keeper’s mind—spoke up.

"He is currently in the Hartfeld county."

Celestia blinked. She lifted her head, silver-gray eyes sharpening as she looked across the table at him. Hartfeld. The name landed like a stone in still water. She had been the one who cut off the Viscount’s head herself, a clean stroke on the execution scaffold six weeks earlier after his quiet treason had been proven beyond doubt. The county was still raw, leaderless, its new widow left to manage the remnants.

Confusion creased her brow. Why there? Of all places.

Vareth paused mid-turn, napkin still in hand. The butlers froze behind him. A slow, thoughtful sound left the patriarch’s throat.

"Hmm. That makes sense." He gave a low chuckle, the sound rich with approval. "Indeed, I have heard the wife of the Hartfield was a sorcerer from the magic tower. Maybe that boy sensed some kind of future prediction regarding that woman. Given she lost her husband and how he introduced her daughter to the Academy... most probably."

Another laugh, deeper this time, the kind that carried genuine delight. "Hn. What a genius."

The head of the family’s aura swelled, filling the mansion like warm smoke, pride radiating from him as he stood straighter.

He clearly pictured Viktor as some far-seeing prodigy, already weaving alliances and prophecies into the family’s advantage.

Celestia’s mask twitched.

The composed expression she had worn since entering the hall fractured for half a second. She clasped her face with one hand, fingers pressing against her eyes as realization settled in her gut like molten lead. Of course. The widow. The sorceress. A woman suddenly alone, powerful, vulnerable in new ways. Viktor wouldn’t need prophecy for that.

’What. a. PERVERT!’