CHAPTER 253: EVIDENCE

(Dear reader, watch now as the tide begins to turn. Though whether it ebbs or flows toward justice, even I cannot yet say.)

Duke Elian Stormwatch’s fist slammed down on the obsidian table with force enough to crack the ancient stone. The sound rang through the chamber like a war drum.

"Enough!"

His voice cut through the chaos, through the murmurs and accusations and carefully orchestrated outrage. Every head turned toward the young duke with battle-scarred hands and loyalty written in every line of his face.

"I was there." He stood now, leaning forward over the table, eyes blazing. "At the attack. Fighting beside His Majesty while you—" he gestured sharply at Viktor, at Daemon, at the assembled accusers, "—sat safe in your estates counting gold and composing speeches."

The insult landed like a slap.

"I watched Lady Eris save Nevarian lives. Watched her float into the air with wings of divine fire and banish every single demon back to hell. Alone. While barely able to stand."

He looked around the chamber, challenging anyone to contradict him.

"Where were you when demons burned children? Where was your concern then? Your protection?"

Silence answered him. Uncomfortable, guilty silence.

Duke Konstantin Vael stood next, slower, his merchant’s mind already working through the logic like counting coins on a ledger.

When he spoke, his voice was measured, reasonable, the tone of someone pointing out mathematical errors in accounting.

"A question for the accusers, if I may."

Everyone listened. Konstantin commanded attention not through volume but through the weight of practical sense.

"If Lady Eris wanted to harm us, why save us?" He spread his hands, the gesture simple, obvious.

"Why risk herself banishing demons if she summoned them? It makes no sense financially or logically. The story doesn’t balance."

He paused, letting that sink in.

"I’ve built my fortune on understanding human behavior, on predicting actions based on motivation. And this?" He gestured vaguely at the accusations hanging in the air.

"This narrative has gaps large enough to drive cargo wagons through. You’re asking us to believe she orchestrated an attack that nearly killed her, that destroyed property she had no reason to destroy, that endangered the very man she’s about to marry." He shook his head. "The mathematics of motive don’t work."

General Aldrik Winterbane stepped forward then, medals gleaming on his chest, his weathered face grave but certain.

"I’ve fought beside His Majesty for fifteen years." He looked directly at Soren, respect clear in his expression. "Guarded him through secession attempts, two border wars, and more political schemes than I can count."

He turned to address the chamber fully.

"I’ve never seen him enchanted. Never seen him mind-controlled or spelled or influenced by anything except his own formidable will." A pause, then with a slight smile, "Sometimes annoyingly so."

Light laughter rippled through some quarters of the room, breaking tension like cracks in ice.

"If Emperor Soren chose this woman, it’s because she’s worthy. Not because she spelled him. Not because he’s thinking with anything other than the strategic mind that’s kept this empire stable through chaos."

His voice hardened. "And suggesting otherwise insults not just him, but every soldier who’s followed his commands, trusted his judgment, and stayed alive because of his decisions."

The accusers shifted uncomfortably. Some looked away. Others doubled down with hardened expressions.

Then Eris spoke for the first time.

She hadn’t stood yet. Remained seated in that position of future empress, voice carrying across the chamber with the clarity of someone who’d spent years commanding courts and silencing rooms.

"May I address some of these concerns?"

Not a question, really. A statement of intention wrapped in courtesy’s thinnest veneer.

Soren nodded once. "The floor is yours."

She rose slowly, and reader, you should have seen how every eye tracked her movement.

The crimson gown caught light like living flame, black accents sharp as blade edges, fire opals at her throat glowing with captured heat. She looked like blood, like fire, like war given human form.

"Lord Daemon mentions my altercation with Lady Isolde." Her gaze found him across the table, unflinching, direct. "He’s correct. I struck his sister."

Murmurs erupted. Some shocked, some satisfied at the admission.

"She disrespected me. Publicly. Deliberately. Spread vicious rumors designed to undermine my position before I’d even arrived at court. Spoke to me with contempt that would have gotten her executed in my former kingdom." Eris’s smile was small, cold, precise. "A single slap seemed remarkably restrained."

Gasps from the gallery. Isolde’s face went white as fresh snow.

"Considering I could have burned her to ash where she stood." The words fell like stones in still water. "But I didn’t. Because I have control over my power. Over my temper. Over my actions."

Eris let emphasis fall heavy on that word—control. "Perhaps more control than those currently accusing me of recklessness possess themselves."

The counterattack was surgical, turning their accusations into proof of her restraint.

But Vetra, reader, Vetra was not finished.

She raised one hand, the gesture graceful, commanding. "Your Majesty, Lady Eris’s words are... enlightening. But I have something more concrete to present."

She gestured toward the chamber doors.

They opened on cue, perfectly timed, perfectly rehearsed, revealing guards wheeling in a large covered object on an ornate table. Black cloth draped over whatever lay beneath, stamped with an official seal that read in silver script: Neutral Investigation.

The room fell silent. That particular kind of silence that comes before revelation, before everything changes.

All eyes fixed on the covered object as guards positioned it at the chamber’s center.

"I took the liberty," Vetra said, walking toward it with deliberate steps, "of ordering an investigation by neutral parties." She looked directly at Soren, and reader, the insult in her next words was diamond-sharp. "Since Your Majesty might be... compromised in his judgment regarding this matter."

The implication hung poison-thick in the air. That Soren couldn’t be trusted. That his feelings for Eris clouded his imperial authority. That he ruled by heart instead of head.

It was the kind of public challenge that demanded response, demanded consequence.

Soren’s eyes flashed ice-white, cold enough to freeze blood in veins. Frost crept across the table’s surface beneath his hands. The temperature dropped until courtiers in the gallery pulled their cloaks tighter.

But he stayed seated.

Waiting. Watching. Giving Vetra rope to hang with.

She reached for the black cloth with theatrical precision, fingers closing on expensive fabric.

"What I’m about to reveal," she said, voice carrying to every corner, every ear, "was discovered in the ruins of the eastern district. In the exact location where the demons first emerged."

She pulled the cloth away.

The collective gasp that followed sounded like wind through a graveyard.

Beneath the cloth sat a large wooden board, perhaps six feet across, detailed and precise. A perfect replica of a summoning circle, symbols drawn in black charcoal that had been burned into the wood’s surface.

Some sections were smeared with what looked sickeningly like dried blood, dark and rust-brown. Other areas were scorched, blackened, as though exposed to tremendous heat.

"This," Vetra said softly, voice heavy with horrified authority, "is a demon summoning circle. Found at the attack’s origin point. Still warm when our investigators arrived."

She let silence stretch, let horror sink into noble minds like poison into flesh.

"And these symbols..." she gestured to specific marks along the circle’s edge, "...are written in Old Flame-tongue. The language of Pyronox himself. The language only fire mages of exceptional power would know."

Every eye turned to Eris.

Standing there in crimson and black like judgment itself, fire opals glowing at her throat.

The trap had sprung.

And reader, the jaws were closing fast.