The halls of Vale House didn't sound the same without him.
For years, Nitron's footsteps had set the rhythm: measured, heavy, each one carrying the threat of summons or punishment. Now the silence stretched so far that even the servants didn't know how to fill it. The air felt thin.
Elma walked those halls with Calista at her side, not as prisoners but as survivors. The cracked windows let in gray light. Ash still clung to the drapes. Somewhere down the corridor, two maids whispered while sweeping rubble into piles. Their eyes flicked to Elma, then quickly away, as if staring too long might burn them.
Elma hated it.
She caught her reflection in a broken mirror as they passed—soot on her cheek, streaks of dried blood down her neck, veins still faintly glowing where the shard rested under her skin. She didn't look like a savior. She looked like something dangerous, something half-broken.
Calista noticed her hesitation. She slowed, touched Elma's wrist lightly. "They'll look, no matter what you do. You've become the story they tell each other when the lamps go out."
"I don't want to be a story," Elma muttered.
Calista's smile was faint, but her tone left no room for pity. "Too late."
They reached the east wing—Calista's wing now. No guards barred their path. No sigils bled from the walls. Vale House wasn't resisting them anymore. It only sagged, old bones groaning after a master had been torn from it.
Inside, the chamber they had claimed was warmer than the rest of the house. A fire burned low in the hearth, wood crackling. Someone had left bread and wine on the table, unsure if it was welcome.
Elma sat, pulling off the torn boots that had carried her through the Tower fight. Her feet ached. Her body still hummed with restless energy, but exhaustion pressed down harder with each breath.
Calista poured wine for them both, moving with that same steady grace she always carried—even when blood still stained her cuffs. She handed a cup to Elma, then leaned against the table, studying her.
"You look like you're waiting for the leash to snap back on," Calista said.
Elma's fingers tightened on the cup. "Because it always did."
"It won't this time." Calista reached, brushing back a strand of soot-clumped hair from Elma's face. The touch lingered, gentle but firm. "He's gone."
Elma wanted to believe it. She closed her eyes and let the warmth of Calista's hand sink in. For a moment, it felt true.
Later, when the fire had burned lower and the wine was half gone, Elma found herself stretched across the couch with Calista beside her. No shouting, no sigils crawling the walls, no commands barked from behind a locked door. Just the crackle of the fire, the rise and fall of Calista's breath.
Elma turned her head toward her, words slipping out before she could bite them back. "What if I don't know how to live like this? Without running, without fighting?"
Calista shifted, resting her chin on her hand. "Then we learn. Together."
Her tone was so simple, so certain, that it silenced Elma's doubts for a while.
Calista leaned closer, lips brushing the corner of Elma's mouth. Not hungry, not rushed—just a kiss that felt like a promise. Elma let herself sink into it, slow and steady, tasting wine and warmth instead of ash.
For once, the shard didn't surge in protest. It only hummed, quiet and low, as if it too had been waiting for this kind of stillness.
By dawn, the manor would stir with whispers of rebellion. By dusk, messengers would carry word of Nitron's fall into the city. But for this one night, they had something Vale House had never known: quiet.
Elma curled against Calista's side, her hand caught in the folds of silk, and for the first time in years, she let sleep come without fear.