"Because you are brilliant."

Liam’s expression went flat. "Try again."

Arik let out a vibrant laugh, his eyes visibly wet with tears from the laughter. "It’s true, though." He reached for the new napkin Sella had replaced a minute ago and wiped his eyes. "Now that George has agreed to you being my fiancée, you and Gabriel can meet later."

"That becomes true only if George survives Felix today." Liam said with a sigh.

"So you agreed."

Liam stopped moving.

Then his eyes narrowed with the slow, precise violence of a man watching a machine misread an input and produce treason.

"No," he said. "I agreed to a temporary tactical arrangement built around Felix’s destruction, George’s stupidity, and your need to explain why you keep appearing near my illegal infrastructure."

"I said, ’As you wish,’" Arik replayed with a grin.

Liam lost himself for one second and threw the roll of bread in his hand at Arik’s head.

The alpha caught it like it was nothing.

"You are gaslighting me," Liam snapped. "You referred to Gabriel as ’father’ while talking about this madness, and now you switched to ’mother.’ You let me believe this was temporary."

"Why would I dispose of my consorts for something temporary?" Arik asked, biting into the roll.

Liam stared at him.

The room fell silent in a very specific way when one person said something outrageous and everyone else had to decide whether the furniture would survive the response.

Sella, who had just placed another small dish near the table, became suddenly and impressively invisible.

Liam slowly set his fork down.

"You," he said, "are eating the bread I threw at your head."

"It entered my custody."

"Bread custody is not a legal principle."

"It is now."

Liam’s eyes narrowed. "I am going to poison you with butter."

Arik smiled around the bite. "The butter is excellent."

"Explain the father-mother part and your omission before savoring poison."

Arik finished chewing.

Liam’s eyes narrowed further.

"You are doing that on purpose."

"Yes."

"Wonderful. Poison remains on the table."

Arik set the roll down with care, as if he had, at least temporarily, decided that bread was not worth escalating diplomatic violence.

"My mother is Gabriel," he said. "He carried me."

"I know that part now."

"You asked."

"I asked why you changed it."

Arik leaned back slightly, the humor in his face still there, but quieter now. "Because in George’s palace, I did not want that room thinking of Gabriel as my mother."

Liam paused, still suspicious but willing to listen.

That answer was not what he had expected.

Arik’s gold eyes stayed on him. "George sees what is convenient. Felix hears what is useful. Half of Wrohan’s court thinks Gabriel Lyon is beautiful, decorative, and dangerous only because Damian chose him. Calling him father in that room made the conversation less intimate and less useful to them."

Liam’s fingers stilled around his cup.

Arik continued, "Calling him ’mother’ belongs to my family. To Agaron. To rooms where the word will not be turned into a court joke, a crude assumption, or a political handle."

That was, horribly, reasonable.

Liam disliked when Arik became reasonable. It made throwing bread feel less noble.

"So you protected the title," Liam said. "Fine, understandable. Now, about the omission part."

"I needed you out of George’s palace. You would have refused to accept the trade with all your might if I said no. Plus it was what you wanted to hear." Arik said.

Liam stared at him.

Then he smiled.

It was not a kind smile.

It was the kind of smile that engineers gave a machine right before they took it apart because it had the nerve to break down in front of people.

"You," Liam said softly, "are admitting you manipulated the phrasing because it was useful."

"Yes."

"You are not even ashamed."

"No."

"Not a flicker? Not a polite, decorative regret?"

"I regret that you noticed before dessert."

Liam closed his eyes for one second.

When he opened them, Arik was still there. Unfortunately. Beautifully dressed, gold-eyed, eating stolen bread, and apparently incapable of understanding that honesty did not become less criminal just because it arrived calmly.

"You are impossible," Liam said.

"I am thorough."

"You are a walking diplomatic incident."

"Also thorough."

Liam leaned forward. "I agreed because I thought this was temporary."

Arik’s gaze did not move from his face. "I know."

Something in Liam’s chest tightened.

That was worse than denial. Denial could be fought. Denial could be insulted. Arik, knowing exactly what he had done and still sitting there with the confidence of a man who had already calculated the price of Liam’s fury, was much harder to stab with cutlery.

"I didn’t lie in the Sun Room," Arik said, and the humor in his voice dropped away. "I do like you."

Liam went still.

Arik’s mouth curved faintly, but there was nothing mocking in it now. "You are brilliant. You are also wasted here. Wrohan has spent years teaching you how to build around chains instead of giving you a country worth building for."

Liam’s expression hardened. "Careful."

"I am."

"No. You are being an imperial menace."

"Yes."

Liam’s fingers tightened around his cup. "I don’t care if Wrohan deserves its rulers. The people don’t. The outer districts don’t. The hospitals that lose power first don’t. The children freezing while Alexandria lights three avenues for nobles don’t. I built the Vanguard because someone had to care about the innocent."

"I know," Arik said.

Liam hated how immediate the answer was.

Arik leaned forward slightly. "Agaron intends to take Wrohan through the treaty George is desperate to sign."

Liam froze.

"Not by marching troops through the capital," Arik continued. "That would be wasteful and loud. George will accept energy cooperation, infrastructure oversight, distribution audits, and Agaronian administrators embedded inside the grid because he wants our storage technology badly enough to mistake a leash for a gift."

Liam’s mind moved before his mouth could.

Energy. Audits. Administrators. Distribution rights.

"A protectorate," he said slowly.

"One of the cleaner words."

"One of the criminal words."

"Also accurate."

Liam stared at him.

The dessert arrived in the middle of that sentence, because apparently even assassination schedules were expected to make room for wine pairings.

Sella placed a delicate plate of something pale, glossy, and expensive in front of Liam with the perfect composure of a woman who had heard the Crown Prince of Agaron discuss murder over lunch before and had decided it was not worth delaying the custard.

Liam looked at the dessert.

Then at Arik.

Then back to the dessert.

"I am sorry," he said. "Did you just say Felix before George, or has the wine already begun rewriting reality?"

"Felix before George," Arik said. "George is useful long enough to sign the treaty and become the legal bridge. Felix is useful only as an example."

"A legal bridge."

"Yes."

"To quiet annexation."

"Administrative correction."

"You are not allowed to rename crimes until they sound like paperwork."

"That is how most governments survive."

Liam closed his eyes for one second.

When he opened them, Arik was calmly cutting into his dessert with the precision of a man who had never once allowed morality to interfere with table manners.

"You have personal beef with Felix," Liam repeated.

Arik’s gold eyes lifted.

The humor was still there, faint and sharp, but underneath it was something older.

"He put his hand on you."

Liam’s breath caught before he could stop it.

Arik set the fork down.

"I would have killed him for what he did to Wrohan eventually," he said. "For what he did to the grid. For what he stole. For what he buried forty years ago in Agaron." His mouth curved without warmth. "But now it is personal for you too."

Liam looked away as suddenly the room felt too bright.

"You barely know me."

"I know enough."

"That is not comforting."

"It was not meant to comfort you."

"Then what was it meant to do?"

Arik leaned back, eyes steady. "Clarify the order of operations."

Liam stared at him for one long second.

Then he picked up his dessert spoon.

"I am going to eat this," he said. "Then I am going to decide whether your murder schedule needs peer review."

Arik smiled.

"Excellent."

"Do not look pleased."

Arik lifted his wine glass. "Intent matters."

Liam narrowed his eyes.

"It matters more in murder."