"You think I wanted the rite," he said. "You think I wanted children brought into that chamber."

"No," I replied. "I think you wanted an answer badly enough that you accepted whatever method someone put in front of you."

His jaw tightened. A direct hit.

"You have no idea what it’s like," he said softly, "to watch a child die while every physician, mage, priest, and scholar tells you nothing can be done."

I thought of Spiro bleeding in my arms in the desert, his small body shaking under the clash of aura and mana, Abi asking me whether I wanted to save him. My fingers stilled against the armrest, and for one breath I said nothing at all.

Then I looked at Marcellus. "No," I said. "I do."

The room went quiet. Abi didn’t speak. Neither did William. Marcellus’s expression shifted, not into trust, not into forgiveness, only surprise. I didn’t explain myself. Some things people didn’t deserve to know simply because they’d happened to ask the right question.

"Desperation doesn’t make the rite clean," I continued. "It doesn’t make the missing children acceptable. It doesn’t erase the people who kept using its remnants long after the Empress ordered it stopped."

Marcellus looked down. "The Empress didn’t know."

"About the Choir?"

"No."

"About the children?"

"She knew children were involved in the first rite."

The words landed with ugly weight.

"Then she knew enough."

"She knew enough to regret it every day since."

"That isn’t the same as making it right."

"No," he said quietly. "It isn’t."

For the first time, I believed him. Not enough to loosen the guards, not enough to trust him with a spoon, but enough to understand his regret was real. Regret wasn’t absolution. It only proved a person hadn’t gone entirely hollow.

"How did the Choir continue?" I asked.

Marcellus closed his eyes. "After the first rite failed to fully stabilize the prince, the lower temple faction claimed they could repair what was incomplete. They said the first hymn had created a path, and the second hymn would send an answer through it."

"From where?"

"I don’t know."

"That’s a lie."

"I don’t know exactly."

"Better."

His mouth tightened. "The old records called it the lower voice. The thing beneath the sealed dawn. The temple faction believed it could be controlled through prayer, names, and resonance."

Abi’s fingers curled against the window frame, and the wood beneath them groaned softly. Marcellus noticed, his eyes flicking toward him.

"It cannot," Abi said, quiet, and yet the words seemed to change the air in the room.

Marcellus stared at him. "No," he said after a moment. "It cannot."

Then Caldus’s voice came from the adjoining room. "The second hymn isn’t for the prince."

Everyone went still. I rose. "Continue."

Caldus swallowed loudly. "It’s for the answer."

"What answer?"

"The one that comes when the first vessel is disturbed."

Perrin’s message returned to me all at once. The first hymn has been disturbed. Begin the second.

"How does it begin?" I asked.

No answer. The black seal beneath his jaw pulsed, and Abi sent violet light through the partition to curl around the priest’s throat. Caldus gasped, then spoke.

"At dusk," he whispered. "When the coronation bells begin their evening blessing. The Choir will sing beneath Saint Orison’s. The sound will travel through the aqueduct and the old ward lines."

"Who will be there?"

"I don’t know."

"Who is the answer meant for?"

He hesitated, and Marcellus answered from the blue sitting room instead.

"The Crown Prince."

The room went cold. I turned toward him. He looked older suddenly, not weakened, just stripped of the careful polish he’d worn for years.

"The first hymn created an incomplete tether," Marcellus said. "The second is meant to force a response through him. If it succeeds, the thing beneath the palace will have a clearer path."

"And if it fails?"

His silence answered that well enough.

Caldus whispered from behind the partition, "The prince dies."

How troublesome. I had already intended to poison the Crown Prince myself, and now a cult had decided to attempt it first. The audacity. The lack of originality. And worst of all, the timing.

My hand moved unconsciously to the ring on my finger, to the vial of Vita’s Tears resting in its hidden compartment. The deadliest poison in the empire. A fine investment, all things considered. Perhaps the Crown Prince’s irritating tendency to become relevant was finally reaching unacceptable levels.

I would decide what happened to him. Not a choir, not a temple, not a buried thing beneath the Capital, and certainly not some old men with ledgers and stained hands.

"Captain Arthur," I said.

He appeared at the doorway almost at once. "Yes, Your Excellency."

"Seal Saint Orison’s perimeter. No temple bells ring at dusk unless I permit it."

His eyes sharpened. "Understood."

"Don’t enter the lower chapel until Bernard maps every access point. I want exits, ward anchors, side passages, rooftops, drains, and any hole a rat could crawl through."

"Yes, Your Excellency."

"Send word to the Crown Prince. He isn’t to leave the palace. He isn’t to answer any voice calling him by name. He isn’t to listen to music, temple bells, prayers, or advisors who suddenly claim urgency."

Arthur paused. "Shall I phrase that exactly, Your Excellency?"

"No. Use diplomatic language. Make it sound less like the Capital is about to be cursed by bad music."

"Yes, Your Excellency."

"Bernard."

"Yes, Your Excellency."

"Send a secure message to the Empress. Tell her the second hymn begins at dusk, and that Marcellus has confirmed the Crown Prince is the intended answer."

Bernard’s face paled. "Should I include Father Caldus’s testimony?"

"Include enough that she understands I’m not speculating."

"Yes."

"William."

"Yes, Your Excellency."

"Move Mil and the other children farther from the city center. No visible convoy. Use the western route."

William nodded at once, then asked, "And Spiro?"

My expression hardened. "Spiro remains at the estate."

Abi turned toward me. "Brother."

"The estate has the strongest wards. He stays under your protection."

"You intend to go beneath Saint Orison’s yourself."

"Yes."

"You may need him."

"I said no."

Abi stared at me, and for once he didn’t joke. I didn’t look away either. Spiro was my son. He’d seen enough. He’d carried enough. Whatever strange knowledge he held behind that small, careful face, whatever past he was hiding from, I would not use him as an answer to someone else’s ritual. Not while I was still breathing.

For a moment neither of us spoke, and the room held that same heavy quiet it had held after Marcellus admitted the Empress had known enough to regret it every day since. William didn’t move. Bernard kept his eyes on the floor. Even Caldus, still hidden behind the partition, said nothing at all.

"Understood," Abi said at last, his voice quiet and serious in a way that made something in my chest feel unnecessarily tight. I ignored that too. There were too many things left to organize, too many people left to protect, too many rituals left to ruin, and dusk was already waiting somewhere with a knife behind its back.

A knock came from the main hall. One of the house guards entered, bowed, and held out a strip of desert treated paper. "Your Excellency. A message from the eastern gate."

I took it. The seal belonged to my father, and I opened it.

My dear son,

We arrived earlier than expected. Your mother says this is because you’ve inherited your habit of making other people wait, and the world is correcting you. Please send someone to meet us at the gate. Also, your mother saw the extra carriages and would like an explanation.

Your loving father

I stared at the paper, then folded it slowly.

Abi watched me. "What happened?"

"My parents are here."

His face brightened immediately. "Wonderful."

"No."

"You said they’d arrive before sunset."

"Yes."

"So they arrived before sunset."

"Abi."

"You do have a talent for getting exactly what you ask for."

I looked up toward the ceiling. Somewhere above us, the estate was still quiet, Spiro likely working on a letter or pretending not to worry. The children at the safehouse would be preparing to leave. The Empress would soon have my message in hand. The Crown Prince might already be wondering why a Grand Duke had suddenly ordered him not to listen to bells. And at the eastern gate, my mother had arrived to find her son’s household full of guards, hidden children, a Jinn brother, an imprisoned Lord Keeper, a captured priest, and enough secrets to collapse a minor kingdom.

How troublesome.

I turned to Arthur. "Delay the Saint Orison operation by one hour."

He blinked. "Your Excellency?"

"I need to greet my mother."

From the blue sitting room, Marcellus made a faint sound that might have been disbelief. Abi started laughing outright.

I let myself smile. "Don’t look so shocked, Lord Keeper. There are priorities in this world."

Then I adjusted my cuffs and walked toward the main hall, because even a villain lord knew better than to keep Lady Konstantin waiting at the gate.