The sun had risen well past its peak, casting Khyronia in a dome of pale gold, a deceptive warmth that masked the unease threading through the ancient city. In the guest wing of the Blackwood Manor, all stood quiet save for the whisper of heavy brocade brushing over polished floors. The silence wasn't peace—it was breath held before a plunge.
August stood in front of the tall looking-glass framed in carved obsidian. The mirror reflected a man sculpted in silence, clothed in restraint. His long platinum hair had been combed and tied back with dark velvet, and he was no longer the pale fevered silhouette of the day before. His grey eyes, though rimmed faintly in fatigue, were clear. He had chosen his armor carefully: not steel, but silk—layer upon layer of fabric to hide the tremors beneath his skin.
Today, he wore more than usual. A high-necked undershirt of slate grey hugged his neck like a collar, chased by a double-breasted vest of sapphire brushed wool, buttons gleaming like muted stars. A long coat of forest black, finely embroidered with silver vines, folded around him like a midnight embrace. He adjusted his gloves with surgical precision, as if every inch of skin hidden was a reassurance, a fortification.
A knock came, soft but certain.
"Enter," August said, voice as cool as the tiled air around him.
It was Giles, his butler, who stepped in with the deference of shadow. The older man carried a silver tray with a folded note and a steaming porcelain cup.
"Your tonic, sir. And this was delivered to the manor an hour ago. It bears the Khyronian seal."
August took the letter but did not read it immediately. He stared at the seal for a moment, letting the pressure of its presence settle in. Something about it disturbed the calm he was cloaked in. He placed it aside and sipped from the cup, wincing at the bitter tinge that still lingered from the medicine. His thoughts drifted back to earlier—cold water, flinching muscles, Elias's arms, and then the silence that followed. He had dressed without asking for help.
Giles did not move. He studied August with the gaze of someone who had watched a boy grow into a blade.
"Will you be attending the masquerade, sir?"
August's gaze lingered on his reflection. "Yes."
"And the dresses?"
August motioned toward the box on the table, unopened.
"You may leave .I'll choose later."
Giles gave a slight bow, hesitating only slightly before retreating with practiced grace. When the door closed, the silence felt more deliberate.
August reached for the letter, breaking the seal. The parchment inside was thick, faintly scented with lavender and ink. The handwriting was ornate but precise. It did not name the Eclipse Elite directly, but its phrases hinted at veiled truths and whispered histories. It invited him not to answers, but to seek.
He folded it once more and slid it into the inner pocket of his coat.
There was a knock again, this time lighter. A maid peeked in.
"The garden is ready, my lord. They await your presence."
"Tell them I'll arrive shortly."
The door clicked shut. August allowed himself a single, weighted breath. Then he turned on his heel and walked forward, every step calculated, every fold in his coat settling like a final word.
The masquerade was coming.
And August would meet it not in costume but in armor.
The garden sprawled in concentric terraces behind Blackwood Manor, designed in deliberate harmony with the geometry of old estate's ideals—order shaping wilderness. Marble paths cut through hedges in perfect symmetry, bordered by pools that mirrored the sky so cleanly they seemed like shards of glass laid on the earth.
August stepped onto the gravel without hesitation, his boots crunching lightly as his gaze swept over the gathered lords, scribes, and emissaries arranged like chess pieces around the stone table set in the middle of the lower terrace. An ornate canopy shielded them from the sun, trailing blue and white silk down like a waterfall frozen in place.
Baron Arlenn of Wintmere was already speaking when August arrived.
August moved to his seat without announcing himself. His presence did that for him. Voices softened as he took the chair positioned beside a heavy-browed noble draped in burgundy. That was Lord Severian, a sharp-tongued veteran of court politics. Across from him sat Lady Moira of Rellan, her fan twitching as though swatting invisible doubts.
"I see we are all committed to pretense today," August said lightly. "Even in a garden."
Several brows lifted.
Lord Severian smirked. "What would diplomacy be, Lord August, without the sweet illusion of courtesy?"
August leaned back slightly, folding gloved hands on the table. "Perhaps something closer to honesty."
"Honesty," Lady Moira murmured, "is best left for private salons. We are here to discuss wheat tariffs, not confessions."
"Wheat," Baron Arlenn scoffed, "is the excuse. What we truly balance here are knives."
The conversation danced across topics like silk across polished floors. Reports of unrest in the Eastern Reaches. Disputes over noble inheritance lines. The quiet but undeniable movements of Eclipse-related rumors. August said little, but what he did say steered the currents.
He noted the subtleties: the glance between Moira and the Everin envoy when border patrols were mentioned. The flicker in Arlenn's eye when the topic of naval dock leases surfaced. He filed them away in his mind, not unlike storing tools for later dissection.
Between discussions, glasses of cordial were passed by silent-footed maids. A trio of songbirds fluttered in the upper branches above them, a moment of nature unbothered by the webs humans spun below.
As the sun tilted further, Lord Severian leaned toward August.
"You've been quiet. Planning your next cut?"
August tilted his head. "Just studying the board."
Severian chuckled. "Khyronia needs its blades sharp. But even sharper—its masks."
Another hour passed in thinly veiled threats, agreements masked as riddles, and ceremonial phrasing. The meeting adjourned with bows, and a few courtesies exchanged through teeth that did not smile.
August remained seated for a moment after the others left. His gaze lingered on a butterfly that had landed beside his glove.
Delicate. Unaware. Unworried.
It flew off before he could reach for it.
As he stood, Giles appeared from a side path.
"A messenger from the northern district, sir. Shall I send him away?"
August shook his head. "No. Have him wait in the solarium."
"Yes, my lord."
August took one final look at the empty table.
The masquerade might still be far ahead in the week's turning, but the real masks had already begun to shift.
Blackwood Manor, ever composed in its silence, now harbored a pulse beneath its ribs—a stir of movement that fluttered at the edges of every hallway. Servants passed in careful steps, voices hushed but brisk with purpose.
Far from the polished mirrors and garden meetings, Elias lay in his room, the curtains drawn but not tightly enough to blot out the blade of sunlight slanting across the hardwood floor. His forearm pressed against his forehead, fingers tangled in his dark hair as he leaned against the bedframe with the posture of a man carrying too many things.
His head throbbed.
It had started as a dull, throbbing pull at the base of his skull the moment he woke, but now it rippled with every breath. It wasn't just a headache—it was the cold. The freezing bath from the night before, the worry etched into his spine as he watched over August, the tension that had coiled through every nerve as assassins loomed and secrets thickened. Now his body reminded him that even he had limits.
Still, Elias didn't care.
He hadn't even bothered to remove the tunic he had slipped on in the early hours. The cloth clung slightly to his skin, damp from the fever that had begun to settle like smoke over embers. He cursed under his breath and pressed the heel of his hand into his eye.
There was a knock at the door—then no waiting. A maid slipped in, clearly startled to see him still seated on the edge of the bed, shoulders hunched like a soldier too proud to fall.
"Master Elias," she breathed, balancing a ceramic tray in her hands. "I've brought a tonic—the apothecary said it would help with the chills and the ache."
He glanced at her, not moving for a long moment. Then finally, with a grunt, he leaned back against the headboard, eyes half-lidded.
"Leave it," he murmured. "I'll drink it later."
"Sir, you really should take it now—your fever—"
"I said leave it."
The firmness in his tone was not unkind, but it brooked no argument. The maid hesitated only a second longer before setting the tray gently on the bedside table. She gave a quick curtsy and turned, clutching her apron as she stepped from the room.
She didn't expect to nearly collide with August.
---
The corridor outside Elias' room was faintly scented with lilac oil, recently polished. August had taken the longer route back from the gardens, following instinct more than purpose. The morning had stretched him thin—his patience even thinner—and the lingering echo of the letter weighed in his coat pocket like a pact left unsigned.
He didn't mean to eavesdrop, but he caught the maid's anxious whisper, the tone of her voice rather than her words. When she turned the corner too quickly, her apron brushing against his coat, she startled with a gasp and made to bow.
August's hand steadied her shoulder, and his eyes dropped to the tray in her hands—a half-empty cup of warm toner, still steaming faintly.
"Why the rush?" he asked.
The maid's mouth opened, then shut. She seemed unsure how much to say.
"The tonic is for Master Elias," she said finally, and her voice had no guile. "He has fallen ill."
A single breath passed between them, heavier than a clock chime.
August's face didn't change, not truly. But his shoulders locked, and the pause in his throat was barely a blink—and somehow louder than any gasp.
"Ill?"
The maid nodded, her fingers twisting in her apron now. "He caught a chill, sir. From last night. The cold water and the late hours… He wouldn't say anything, but he's fevered."
August said nothing. Not to her.
He turned without another word and opened the door to Elias' room with the kind of force that made no noise but carried intent. The kind of motion that sounded only in the sudden stillness afterward.
Elias didn't look up.
"I told you to leave it," he muttered, assuming the maid had returned. His eyes were closed, his breath shallow.
"And if I were her?"
The voice was unmistakable.
Elias slowly opened his eyes and tilted his head just enough to see August standing at the door, one gloved hand still resting against the wood as if he'd only stepped in out of reflex. His expression was unreadable—perhaps not even hardened, just very, very still.
Elias exhaled slowly.
"Don't start."
"You're ill."
"It's nothing."
"Don't insult me."
August crossed the room with measured grace, stopping beside the untouched tray. He eyed the cup for a long moment before picking it up and holding it out.
Elias eyed him. "You're not my keeper."
August said nothing.
"I was trying to keep you alive last night," Elias said, voice sharpening slightly. "Excuse me for not drying off properly after you nearly collapsed into the sea."
There it was.
The echo of guilt flickered through August's expression. The hard lines softened by a fraction. He turned his face away for a moment, gaze fixed on the drapery as if it offered distraction.
"Drink it," he said finally.
Elias looked at the cup. Then at August. Then he reached forward and took it without another word.
The silence between them stretched as Elias sipped.
August settled into the nearby chair with precise, deliberate posture. His gloves flexed slightly at the knuckles.
"Why didn't you say anything?" he asked, quietly.
Elias leaned his head back against the frame.
"Because you already had enough to carry."
"That isn't your choice to make."
A pause.
Then Elias gave a breath of a laugh. "That's rich, coming from you."
August didn't answer.
The sunlight shifted slightly over the wood floors as the morning wore on. It was still early. The garden meeting had ended, the letters delivered, the world outside pressing forward with its usual demands. But inside the quiet of that room, time folded in layers.
August glanced toward the fireless hearth. Then back at Elias.
"Rest. There's still time before the masquerade."
"You still planning to attend?"
August nodded once.
Elias gave a faint sound that might have been approval or dismissal. He leaned further back and closed his eyes again, the cup now empty on the tray.
"Wake me if the world ends," he murmured.
August said nothing, but he did not rise.
He stayed a while longer.
And for once, the silence between them was not something to shatter, but something shared.