In the days that followed, Lucimia and Rexi combed the Royal Capital from gate to gate, taking in a splendor that flowed like a river of lanterns.

The sight only deepened Lucimia’s sighs; if not for Ment’s incursion, this bloom would be real, not silk flowers pinned to a dead bough.

After a few days, she noticed the puppets walked by rules, like gears in a clock that never dares skip a tooth.

The snow-sweeper fell at the same hour each day, like a sparrow tripping on the same twig.

The uncle slurping hot soup choked every time, steam puffing like a startled ghost.

The little girl on the street cried on cue, tears beading like rain on a window.

Everything looped and looped, a wind-up city of hollow drums, because they were false—Ment’s puppets on invisible strings.

A thriving city had been remade into a stage, its laughter dubbed over by Ment’s hollow echo.

Lucimia stood in the plaza and looked up; the palace towered at the city’s heart, its gilded roof blazing like a winter sun caught on ice.

Around the palace, guards in silver stood with spears upright, as motionless as frost-bitten statues.

This too was a golden shell over emptiness, a lacquered mask hiding a wooden face.

Those soldiers were Ment’s marionettes, and the people in the palace were likely strung the same.

She sighed, breath blooming white like a brief cloud; Ment stayed quiet, Nirael stayed still, and the pond of time refused to ripple.

She could only wait for the rat swarm, a tide of claws she could hear but not see.

“Lucimia.” Rexi’s voice popped beside her like a pebble flicked across a lake.

“What is it?” Lucimia turned, catching the sea-glass sheen of the girl’s light green hair.

After days together, she’d sketched a picture of Rexi: a bright, blunt, maybe too-friendly girl, like sunshine that forgets to knock.

“Are you cold?” Rexi asked, gaze dipping to Lucimia’s legs like a curious bird.

Cold…

Lucimia followed that gaze down; her legs were slim and smooth, a clean arc like drawn ink, bare without tights and without winter’s armor.

No wonder Rexi asked.

She’d kept her Devouring Authority flowing; the cold slid off her like rain off oiled paper.

“I’m not cold,” Lucimia said, voice flat as still water.

“Eh… how about I take you shopping for clothes!” Rexi reached for her hand, tugging toward the market street like a kite tugging its string.

“I just said I’m not cold.”

“Sure, but your legs look great. It’s a shame not to wear stockings or tights—they’d trace your curves like a brush on silk.”

Lucimia stared, speech stalled like a bell with no wind. She exhaled. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t like tights in winter, and I like them even less in summer.”

“Why?”

“Because… the quality isn’t there.”

“Eh?” Rexi blinked, confusion blooming like a question mark. “How do you know they’re bad? The Royal Capital should have quality.”

It wasn’t the capital; it was this world’s thread, fraying at the touch.

But she couldn’t say that.

She thought, then said, “In winter, if you wear tights long, poor fabric and static cling pull dust and little fibers to the surface. Flick it, and dust flies like gnats. Try it.”

Rexi grabbed the hem with two fingers and gave it a tiny snap; a veil of dust rose like morning fog, and her eyes went wide.

“Wow, you’re right—that’s kinda fun.” She flicked again, and again, like a child chasing dandelion fluff.

Lucimia watched her play, the way a cat watches a ribbon, then let the string of her thoughts coil back to weight.

Where was Ment?

She and Rexi had been in the Empire for days, the rats crept closer like a storm you smell before you see, and still no move from Nirael—that made sense; she needed the swarm’s energy—but Ment’s silence rang wrong, like a drum with a split skin.

His plan was to seize Nirael; he should strike first, then drive Nirael at Lucimia like a blade in the dark.

Or did his method require the swarm to arrive before the net could tighten?

Curses? She had Devouring and a severing edge; curses broke on her like black waves smashed on rock.

Unless he had already seized her—but again, she had Devouring and the cut; strings burned when they touched her.

Strangest of all, the Deceiver had slipped into the Sanctum Fog Domain and snapped Ment’s Cross like a knife through silk, then walked away without a single shadow chasing her.

Wasn’t that wrong?

Without the Cross, Ment needed ritual and mediums to curse; it wouldn’t be a word-spell where a whisper turns into venom on the wind.

Wasn’t that like cutting off his own arm?

What was this game?

She couldn’t see the pattern; a bad omen pooled in her chest like cold ink, and it stung that the board might not be hers to flip.

She’d scattered Fuzzy Orbs across the Royal Capital; through their eyes, dandelion seeds turned to scouts, she found no strange ripples.

“Too weird.”

“Too well-behaved? I am very well-behaved,” Rexi said, popping her head in like a fox from the brush.

Lucimia gave her a sideways look. “Don’t fool around. Doesn’t this feel off to you?”

“Off?”

Lucimia laid out her doubts, pebble by pebble; Rexi listened, then nodded, thought a moment, and her eyes lit like a struck match.

“I’ve got a way!”

“You?” Lucimia blinked at her, surprise like a snowflake on her lashes.

“Mm-hm.” Rexi nodded hard. “If we can’t find the flaw, let’s make him skip steps. Force Ment to show himself.”

“Make him show himself? Your ability can do that?”

“Yep.”

Lucimia frowned, thoughts branching like frost. If Rexi’s power was hypnosis, would she plant the thought that the swarm had arrived, that it was time to act, and drag him into the open?

Or straight-up hypnotize Ment: tell him his plan worked, that Nirael was under control, when she wasn’t?

In theory, yes. But could she really hypnotize him? It required that Nirael wasn’t already taken. What if she was?

And this was his home field; where there’s fog, there’s curse, and fields tilt like a board under his hand.

Wait. Fog?

Lucimia’s heart lurched like a bird spooked from a branch. She snapped back, scanned the streets, then linked to her Fuzzy Orbs and swept the city and the Sanctum Fog Domain.

One sweep, and a key piece clicked.

Where was the fog?

Not a wisp of veil remained; the Sanctum’s fog, wrecked by the Deceiver, had blown away like smoke in a high wind.

No fog meant no domain, and no domain meant no home field—just bare earth and naked sky.

“Something’s wrong…” Her face sank like the sun behind storm clouds, and a bold, terrible guess sprouted in her mind like black thorns.