CHAPTER 13: SERAPHINE’S MASK

The corridor outside Armand’s room was cold stone and echoing silence. Seraphine Duskveil walked it with her chin lifted and her steps measured, the picture of composed elegance. Her violet eyes gave nothing to the wardens she passed, nothing to the younger students who glanced at her and quickly looked away.

The mask was back in place. No one watching would have guessed that moments earlier, her composure had cracked, her voice had faltered, her skin had gone pale. No one would believe that Armand Valcrey—of all people—had spoken words sharp enough to pierce her calm.

She did not let her pace change until she reached the landing between stairwells. There, with no witnesses, she paused. Her gloved fingers tightened around the iron railing until her knuckles whitened.

’He said no.’

The words hissed in her mind, incredulous, as if repeating them might make them sound less absurd.

Armand Valcrey had never told her no. Not once in four years of careful weaving. He had argued, he had pouted, he had stormed, but always, always he had come back. Because he needed her. Because she had taught him to need her.

And yet—today, in that quiet room with sunlight on the bed and dust in the air, he had looked her in the eye and declared the engagement broken. Declared he would not be used by her again.

Again.

The word had burned sharper than the rejection itself.

Seraphine drew a slow breath and forced her grip to loosen. She smoothed her coat, checked the fall of her white hair against her shoulders, and resumed her measured stride up the stairwell. Anyone she met would see only the picture she allowed them: serene, untouchable, the Duskveil heiress.

But inside, her thoughts were fire.

Armand had changed. Something in him was different. The same face, the same voice, but steadier. Older, somehow. When he spoke, it was with a calm weight she hadn’t heard before. The boy who had once flared with arrogance at every slight now sat still as stone, unshaken by her provocations.

’What happened to you?’

She reached her chambers and closed the door with care, leaning against the wood for one brief heartbeat. The mask slipped, just enough for her to press two fingers to her temple.

’The dungeon should have broken you. A fall like that was supposed to humble, to scar, to make you cling to me all the tighter. Instead, you came back different. Not cowed, but sharpened in another direction. Not the boy I shaped.’

For a moment—only a moment—fear brushed her thoughts. ’What if I’ve lost you for good? What if the work of years, the slow shaping of a proud but reckless heir into the partner I need, unraveled in a single afternoon?’

Her jaw set. No. She would not lose him.

Seraphine crossed the room, her skirts swaying as she paced. Her chamber was a mirror of his in shape but dressed differently: violet silks folded neatly on the bed, shelves lined with carefully chosen books, a vanity with a silver-edged mirror polished bright. Every piece was curated, calculated to present the image she wanted the world to see.

She stood before the mirror now and studied her reflection. White hair gleamed like snow under lamplight. Violet eyes stared back, cool and cutting. The girl who looked out was not afraid. The girl in the mirror did not lose.

’Armand thinks he can walk away. He thinks he doesn’t need me.’ Her lips curved in a cold, amused smile. ’Then I will remind him.’

The truth was simple: her family needed this engagement. House Duskveil had been bleeding influence for a decade. Their mines no longer yielded enough silver. Their estates were sold in quiet pieces to cover debts. Whispers had begun that the Duskveil name would vanish within a generation. She would not allow it.

Her father was a relic. Her mother, bitter and resigned. The house’s vassals scattered to stronger banners. Only Seraphine still fought, still believed the Duskveils could climb back to where they belonged. And for that climb, she needed a foothold.

Armand Valcrey had been that foothold.

He was powerful, arrogant, malleable. Easy to flatter, easy to direct. She had built him into a weapon, one that struck where she pointed. His name gave her protection, his pride gave her cover, and his devotion gave her freedom. Together, they were supposed to drag both houses back into prominence.

Now he thought to break the chain.

Her violet eyes narrowed at the mirror. Very well. ’If you won’t remember why you need me, I’ll make you remember. If you think you’ve changed, I’ll remind you that change can be broken.’

Already, plans began to thread themselves through her mind.

First, the academy. Rumors were currency here, and no one traded better than she did. A whisper placed in the right ear, a smile offered in the right corridor—suddenly the story of Armand’s dungeon survival might not sound so clean. Questions of what kind of power he had used. Whispers of necromancy. Whispers that the Saints watched him not with approval, but with suspicion.

Second, his sister. Ariadne Valcrey was already furious with him, already wounded by his cruelty. It would not take much to fan that fire into something brighter. A word here, a seed of doubt there, and Ariadne might become the loudest voice condemning her own twin.

And Cael Veyron. The common-born prodigy who had stood against Armand in the courtyard. The boy who already drew eyes. If Cael was to be the academy’s golden hero, then Seraphine would see to it that Armand was his shadow—always one step behind, always compared unfavorably, until the academy itself pushed him back toward her for shelter.

She smiled faintly, cold and precise. Yes. That would do.

But beneath the steel of her plotting, a smaller voice lingered. A voice she despised but could not silence.

’What if Armand truly is different? What if he’s found a strength that no longer bends to me?’

Her hand lifted, fingertips brushing the glass where her reflection’s lips curved. She remembered the way he had looked at her in the room—steady, unshaken, his gray eyes carrying a weight older than the boy she knew. For a fleeting, unwelcome moment, she had felt the same flutter she had once stirred in him. A dangerous feeling.

She pushed it aside. She had no room for sentiment.

Still, as she turned from the mirror and began to plan which allies she would speak to first, she carried the echo of that gaze with her. Cold, certain, unbending. A new Armand Valcrey.

’Very well. If you want to be new, then I will break the new as I broke the old.’