Duke Archimedes Hawthorne's recovery arrived without ceremony, as though his body refused to acknowledge the drama of nearly dying. The medics declared him stable, then cautious, then "recovered for the most part," which was the kind of phrase that pleased no one and reassured everyone. He could stand unaided for minutes at a time, speak without losing breath, and eat full meals without nausea returning like a tide. Yet his hands still trembled when he was tired, and pain lived behind his ribs like a quiet reminder that House Mordred had come close.
The palace adjusted to his return the way a fortress adjusts to a new kind of siege. Hawthorne guards kept their doubled rotations, and SCORPIO maintained their quiet lattice of surveillance that no one could fully map. Servants moved with more purpose, speaking in lower voices, and even laughter sounded more careful when it appeared. Tobias noticed all of it, because the city had taught him to notice the smallest shift before it became a collapse.
On the morning Archimedes resumed attending briefings in person, Tobias found himself unexpectedly tense. He had commanded in the Duke's absence with a kind of steady urgency, and that urgency had become a habit he did not know how to set down. Now the man who had always defined the final authority was returning, and Tobias feared the strange emptiness that might follow. He did not fear losing power, but losing purpose, because purpose had become the only quiet place inside him.
Archimedes arrived at the war chamber with a cane and a posture that refused to apologize for needing it. He greeted Duchess Satine with a glance and a nod, then acknowledged Trace, Cassian, and Kvasir in the way a Duke acknowledged competent tools he did not need to flatter. His eyes lingered on Tobias the longest, not coldly, but carefully, as if he were memorizing what his son had become while he slept. Tobias returned the look without flinching, though his heart beat harder than it did in battle.
After the briefing ended, Archimedes asked Tobias to walk with him beyond the palace grounds. He did not frame it as a private request or a father's invitation, but as a simple statement of intent, which made it harder to refuse and easier to accept. Tobias followed, and the two of them moved through the eastern corridors without an escort, though Tobias knew guards trailed at a respectful distance. Somewhere nearby, SCORPIO's unseen attention hovered, and Tobias felt the familiar blur at the edge of his prescience like mist over a lens.
They descended toward the sea along the floating causeway that led to the restored Merwyn district. The air grew cooler as salt replaced stone, and the sound of the ocean rose to meet them with patient rhythm. No'aar's sky held a pale blue clarity that made distance feel honest, and the reef line in the distance shimmered with living light. Tobias had watched this district rebuild over weeks, yet walking beside his father made it feel newly real.
Merwyn architecture greeted them like a memory returned to flesh. Coral spires rose in spiraled geometry, grown rather than constructed, their surfaces textured with living patterns that shifted in subtle response to current and sun. Bioluminescent pathways glowed beneath translucent decking, and Merwyn children crossed them in small groups, laughing in a language shaped more by water than air. Tobias saw Hawthorne engineers working alongside Merwyn artisans, and the sight eased something in him that war never had.
Archimedes paused at a viewing platform and rested both hands on the railing, cane angled beside him like a quiet standard. He stared out across the reef-city without speaking for several long seconds, as if letting the place tell him what words could not. His breathing remained steady, but Tobias caught the faint stiffness at his shoulder when the wind pushed against him. The Duke did not show pain, but the body did not always obey pride.
"This," Archimedes said finally, "is the only victory I care to see repeated." He angled his gaze toward the reef line where Merwyn elders guided younger ones through a reopened tide-temple. "Not trophies and ceremonies, but people returned to what was stolen from them." Tobias nodded slowly, because he understood the distinction now, and because it was rare to hear Archimedes speak of compassion as a strategic objective.
"You held this together," Archimedes continued, and Tobias felt the words land with surprising weight. "You managed the refinery schedules, the security lattice, the Merwyn negotiations, and the temper of our own soldiers." The Duke turned his head toward Tobias, and the wind carried his next words closer. "You did it while I lay in a bed and could not raise a hand to stop what was happening."
Tobias kept his expression controlled, but something tight in his chest loosened and then tightened again. "I did what was required," he said, because that sentence had become a shield he could raise without thinking. He had spoken it to soldiers, to Satine, to Trace, and to himself on nights when sleep refused to come. Saying it now felt smaller than it used to, as if the words could no longer contain the truth they were meant to hide.
Archimedes' mouth quirked into a brief, tired smile that was more genuine than Tobias had seen in years. "I know that phrase," he said, voice quiet but firm. "It is what men say when they cannot accept praise without fearing they have stolen it." Tobias' fingers tightened on the railing, and he looked out at the water to avoid meeting his father's eyes too long. The sea did not judge, and that made it easier.
Archimedes shifted his weight, then placed a hand on Tobias' shoulder, steadying himself and anchoring his son at once. "You are my son," he said, the words stripped of politics and rumor and anything that could soften them into safety. "Not a mistake, not an embarrassment, not an heir I pretend does not exist." Tobias drew in a slow breath, and his throat tightened in a way that threatened composure, but he did not pull away.
"You are Hawthorne," Archimedes continued, "and you are also Regius." The Duke's voice lowered slightly, and the sea wind seemed to hush to listen. "That means people will measure you for what they fear you might become, and they will try to steer you toward futures that suit them." Tobias felt prescience stir, not into vision, but into the warning sensation of being placed on a board others had been moving long before he arrived.
Tobias nodded once, because denying it would be childish, and he was done being childish. "SCORPIO watches me," he admitted, and the words tasted bitter despite being true. "They move around my mind like fog, and my sight blurs when they're near." Archimedes' gaze sharpened, and for a moment Tobias saw the soldier beneath the Duke. "Then the Emperor is thinking farther ahead than most," Archimedes said quietly, "because SCORPIO does not adapt without reason."
They returned to the palace as the light began to tilt toward afternoon, and the war chamber had been prepared again. This time, the hololith was dimmed, and the tables had been cleared of tactical debris, leaving the room too clean to be accidental. Duchess Satine stood at the far end in formal attire, not extravagant, but deliberate, her posture regal and unyielding. Trace, Cassian, and Kvasir waited as witnesses rather than advisors, and Tobias felt SCORPIO's presence like a soft pressure beyond sight.
Archimedes entered and did not sit, though the effort showed in the tightening at his jaw. He stood behind the command table with the cane planted beside him, as if the cane were not support but a marker of endurance. His eyes swept the room, and everyone straightened without being told to do so. Tobias felt the moment gather into inevitability, and he understood that whatever happened next would not be undone by regret.
"House Hawthorne endures by continuity," Archimedes said, voice carrying cleanly through the chamber. "Continuity is not hope, and it is not tradition, and it is not pride." He paused, letting each word settle in the air like stone. "Continuity is the refusal to let a single wound become a mortal one."
He turned toward Tobias, and Tobias held still, refusing to let anticipation bend him. "By my authority as Duke of Castellan," Archimedes declared, "I designate Lord Tobias Hawthorne as acting commander of House Hawthorne operations on No'aar." The words were precise and broad, and Tobias felt the scope of them expand across his mind. "This designation includes military, industrial, and diplomatic theaters until such time as I am fully restored."
Silence followed, and it was not awkward, but consequential. Cassian's posture snapped into formal respect, and Tobias saw pride there without flattery. Trace's gaze tightened, recalculating priorities and contingencies with the speed of habit. Kvasir recorded the declaration with a calm that looked pleasant to outsiders and predatory to anyone who understood House Cocytus.
Tobias stepped forward and bowed, careful to keep it respectful rather than submissive. "I accept," he said, and the words felt heavier than any oath he had spoken before. He did not add flourish, because this was not a performance. He simply let acceptance be what it was: a choice to carry weight, regardless of whether the weight was fair.
Duchess Satine approached him afterward, her expression composed, her eyes sharp with a quiet warmth. "You have earned this," she said softly, and Tobias believed her because she had watched him work when there was no audience. She placed a hand briefly on his forearm, then withdrew before anyone could mistake support for favoritism. Tobias inclined his head, grateful for the steadiness she offered without claiming him as her own.
The ceremony ended, but the palace did not relax, because war did not pause for family moments. Tobias returned to the war chamber later with Cassian, Trace, and Kvasir to translate the designation into immediate operational orders. Patrol routes were refined and refinery security further hardened. Tobias issued commands with calm precision, and he noticed, with quiet unease, how natural command now felt in his mouth.
That night, Archimedes waited on the eastern terrace, the sea below dark and slow beneath moonlight. His cane leaned against the stone, and he stood with both hands on the railing, shoulders squared as if will alone could restore him fully. Tobias approached without announcing himself, because the palace had taught him to move quietly. The ocean wind carried salt and distant storm, and the stars overhead felt too bright for how heavy the world had become.
"I didn't want it to happen like this," Tobias said, voice low, because honesty was easier when the sea could swallow it. "I wanted time to grow into it." Archimedes did not turn immediately, and Tobias watched the line of his father's profile against the night. "So did I," Archimedes replied, and the admission sounded like defeat only if one expected life to be fair.
Tobias took a slow breath and let the next words leave him before he could reconsider. "I'm afraid of failing," he said, and the confession felt more dangerous than any battlefield charge. "Not of dying, not of House Mordred, but of leading badly enough that people pay for my pride." He stared out at the water, because looking directly at his father felt too raw. "SCORPIO measures me like a weapon that might misfire, and I can feel the Emperor's interest like a hand at my throat."
Archimedes turned then, and moonlight revealed the fatigue in his face with unkind clarity. "You will fail," he said softly, and Tobias stiffened at the bluntness. "Not catastrophically, not always, but in small ways, because all leaders do." He lifted a hand before Tobias could protest, and his voice remained steady. "The difference is whether failure teaches you or hardens you into cruelty."
Tobias exhaled slowly, and the tightness in his chest eased by a fraction. Archimedes stepped closer and placed both hands on Tobias' shoulders, firm despite the tremor that lived in his fingers when he was tired. "You held when I could not," Archimedes said, voice low and absolute. "You chose restraint when the easy path was brutality, and you chose allies when the easy path was domination." Tobias met his eyes, and for the first time he understood that his father's approval was not a prize. It was a responsibility, given with full awareness of what it would cost.
"You do not need to become me," Archimedes continued, and the words landed like a release Tobias had not realized he needed. "You need to become the Duke No'aar demands, and the House deserves." The sea wind rose, and the palace arches behind them whispered with it. Tobias swallowed and nodded once, because anything else would have been a lie.
When Tobias returned to his chambers, he felt the future press close again. Kvasir's discovery still echoed in his mind, and the off-world corridor from his vision remained vivid and wrong in a way dreams were not supposed to be. He understood now that inheritance was not merely a title waiting in the distance, but a mantle that could be thrown onto a man's shoulders without warning. Tobias lay awake beneath the quiet ceiling and accepted, with a calm that surprised him, that if the future demanded a Duke, he would be ready to answer.