FUCKS GIVEN BY LUX NASH: Plenty, actually, which should terrify everyone.

MISSION STATUS: FAILED.

FIELD STATUS: All protocols abandoned.

WITNESSES: Estimated five hundred present at the Unity Gala.

RESPONSIBLE PARTIES: The Dragon King, Kael Ashenvale, & the Lunaris Princess.

In eight hours, every protocol established in this briefing will become irrelevant. The events that follow are classified. The signs were visible, but no one was watching.

But before we get there, let’s rewind to where it started.

Lux Nash had three rules. One: never lie about a prognosis. Two: never soften a diagnosis for the comfort of people who can’t handle it. Three: always bring wine, because delivering bad news sober was a waste of everyone’s time.

She stood at the head of the war room table in a kingdom that had once tried to arrest her, now leading a meeting with a piece of chalk in one hand and a glass of wine in the other. She had been up for three days with Jaxon trying to crack this.

She had drawn two circles on the table, one inside the other, with a question mark at the center.

"This," she said, tapping the outer circle with her chalk, "is your king’s brain."

Griffin leaned forward. "That’s a circle."

"Correct." She didn’t look at him. "Outer ring equals primary block. It’s gone. Buried it in a ditch and pissed on the grave. You’re welcome."

Jaxon pinched the bridge of his nose.

She tapped the inner circle.

"This is the secondary structure. The one I’ve been mapping for the last seventy-two hours. And I want everyone in this room to hear me clearly when I say this." She paused. Sipped her wine. Set it down. "It is the most sophisticated piece of dark magic I have ever encountered. In any text. On any continent. In any language I read, and I read eleven."

Griffin mouthed "eleven" to Ryker. Ryker did not mouth anything back.

"Twelve if you count bullshit," Lux continued. "There is no documented method for cracking this. I am still hunting. But I want the expectations in this room calibrated to reality instead of wishful thinking, because wishful thinking kills kings and I didn’t come here to lose a patient."

Sterling’s arms had been crossed so long that blood flow was now a theoretical concept.

"Define ’hunting.’"

"Reading," she answered flatly like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Now, that being said, the pattern I personally believe it’s following is called a Mirrorlock. Everything that I am about to tell you is based off my theory. Take it or leave it."

She pointed at the question mark.

"Mirrorlocks are a spell inside a spell inside a spell, each layer guarding something at the center. We don’t know what it is until we get there. Crack a single layer on its own, it grows two more layers. So you crack all of them at once or you don’t crack it at all."

The room absorbed that.

"Mirrorlocks are solvable," she added. "Not easy but possible. But, Mirrorlocks always have a failsafe that is designed to protect the true goal of the caster. A puzzle at the center of the Mirrorlock that I can’t see but could activate if the goal is threatened. If it activates, then we have a mousetrap-glued-to-a-landmine-duct-taped-to-your-king’s-prefrontal-cortex. Touch the cheese, lose the king."

Griffin raised his hand.

Ryker closed his eyes.

"Is it like a bomb?"

"Yes, Griffin. It is like a bomb. A very complicated, invisible bomb inside the skull of the most important man on this continent. Thank you for making that accessible for the group."

Griffin lowered his hand, satisfied.

Blair, seated beside Guinevere, crossed one leg over the other. "What does the failsafe do?"

"That is the question I can’t answer yet, and that is the question that should keep every person in this room awake tonight." Lux picked up her wine again. "Right now, it’s blocking three weeks of memory and a matebond. We aren’t sure if it’s because the matebond was activated in those three weeks, or if that is a coincidence."

Jaxon spoke for the first time. "The primary structure was designed for him to be hostile towards her, which would indicate that being the overarching goal of the dark magic."

"Or," Kael commented. "That is a clever little decoy, intentionally pulling us from what it’s actually trying to accomplish. You said the primary and secondary were cast by different casters, correct?"

"Correct," Lux confirmed. "It’s plausible that it is a decoy. Or that these two spells were unrelated and a bad case of timing. The first caster could’ve had a different goal than the second caster. We can’t know for sure until we crack it."

Kael let out a breath. "Either way, we mitigate risk. Her exposure to him is a variable we can manage."

Ryker looked at the ceiling. The ceiling had no answers.

Lux snapped the chalk in half. She placed one half on the left side of the circle and one on the right.

"Left side. We stay cautious. We feed him the story we’ve been feeding him, that we’re working on unblocking the memories, that the cause is still under investigation."

"Right side." She tapped the other half. "We tell him everything. It may or may not trigger the failsafe."

"If the failsafe is tied to the matebond," Jaxon added. "Then revealing it would trigger a cascade. Worst case, it spreads."

"Spreads where?" Blair’s voice was sharp.

"Into adjacent neural architecture," Jaxon replied. "Motor function. Decision-making. Identity. The dark magic is already sitting inside the structures that house memory and emotional processing. If the failsafe fires, it could eat into everything next to it."

Griffin raised his hand. Ryker preemptively closed his eyes. Griffin lowered his hand. The system was working.

"It could lobotomize him," Lux translated, because she liked her horror plain and without garnish. "Congratulations. You’re all now co-conspirators in gaslighting the Dragon King. Sleep tight."

The room froze.

"We also don’t know," Lux continued, holding up a finger, "how much exposure he can safely have with her before the failsafe trips on its own. I don’t have to touch the Mirrorlock for it to go off. Every interaction between them is a roll of dice we can’t see with odds we can’t calculate."

Blair leaned back in her chair, arms crossed. "What if he figures it out himself?"

"Until I finish mapping the center of this structure, all we can do is mitigate risk," Lux replied.

Ryker’s eyebrow went up. "Thanks for that, Lux. Now that we’re finished scaring the piss out of everyone. My turn to make it worse."

He stood. Flipped his coin. Caught it.

"Here’s where we are." Ryker’s voice dropped into the register he used when jokes stopped and orders started. "Best course of action: we inform a few elders and continue as we have been. The Drakencrest rumor mill operates with the efficiency of a military intelligence network and the accuracy of Griffin’s self-reported body count."

Sterling uncrossed his arms for the first time in twenty minutes. "Which elders are we informing?"

"A select few." Ryker looked at Sterling. "You pick them. You’re better at knowing who can keep their mouth closed."

"An elder who can keep their mouth closed," Kael repeated. "You’d have better luck with Brennan doing something right on the first attempt."

"Appreciate that, Kael. Really sets the tone," Ryker said flatly. "The crown functions as normal. Every person in this room sells it."

Kael’s boots came off the table. "And Gwen?"

"She continues," Ryker replied, eyes on her, "exactly as she has been. Visible. Present. And she does not approach him."

The words landed in the center of Guinevere’s chest. She didn’t flinch.

"Until we rule out the failsafe," Ryker continued, "she keeps her distance. If he approaches her, she keeps it surface-level and gets out. No emotional disclosures. Nothing that could give the structure inside his skull a reason to activate."

"Understood." Guinevere’s voice was steady. She had been keeping her distance. The briefing was just making it official. Somehow, official hurt more.

Griffin’s fists hit the table, causing Guinevere and Blair to both jump.

"So we just let her orbit him like fucking bait? She’s not a goddamn chess piece."

His jaw was set, his eyes were on Guinevere, and the usual joke was absent from his face in a way that made him look like a completely different person.

"I need more wine," Lux said, ignoring the outburst. "Your Master Mage needs a cold shower, and your wolf princess needs everyone in this room to stop looking at her like she’s dying, because she isn’t."

She looked at Guinevere. Guinevere looked back. Something passed between them that had no words and required none.

"I’d tell you all to sleep well," Lux added. "But I’d rather you didn’t. Anxiety sharpens the mind. Ask any genius. We’re all miserable."

She left, taking Jaxon and her wine glass with her.

Sterling noticed.

The plan was perfect on paper. The plan was unanimous. The plan had the full support of high-ranking officers, the best healer on two continents, and a Master Mage who hadn’t slept in three days.

Airtight. Bulletproof. Locked.

Guinevere was staring at the chalk circle and didn’t realize the chamber had emptied until Blair’s voice hit her from the doorway.

"Gwen. You coming?"

She blinked. Stood. Squared her shoulders.

Walked to the door to meet Blair just as Maddox Drakencrest filled the frame.

His eyes swept the room, landed on Guinevere, then cut to Blair’s hand on her arm mid-pull.

"Just giving her a tour," Blair said brightly as she steered Guinevere through the gap between his body and the doorframe.

"Of my war room," Maddox snapped. There was nothing kind about his tone.

Sadness flickered behind Guinevere’s eyes. She looked forward so no one would see.

Blair kept walking. "It’s a table and some chairs, Maddox. The tour was short. She gave it three stars."

They made it halfway down the corridor when Maddox called after them.

"Wait."

They stopped and turned slowly.

His jaw worked once. "My war room is off limits, Lunaris."

"Yes, Commander. My apologies." She kept her face neutral.

Then she dipped and moved, not waiting for Blair.

Blair shot Maddox a look with enough voltage to power the Keep, then followed after Guinevere.