The Queen's chamber was a cathedral of silk and shadow. Velvet curtains the color of crushed wine hung from the vaulted ceiling, and the chandelier above burned with a hundred trembling candles. Mirrors, tall as men, lined the walls — their polished glass reflecting warped fragments of the room.
Kai had never liked this place. It was a theater dressed as a throne, a cage disguised as luxury. Every shimmer of light seemed designed to reveal and conceal at once, the way the Queen herself did.
But what chilled him now wasn't the chamber. It was the figure stepping from the corner where shadow clung deepest.
The intruder.
He wasn't cloaked like an assassin or masked like a thief. No. He walked forward with the poise of a man who believed he belonged here, firelight licking across sharp cheekbones and hollowed eyes. His hair, once black, was streaked with silver — but the grin, that cruel, jagged grin, was unmistakable.
Kai's blood turned to ice. "No… It can't be."
