The children finished breakfast in the way small storms always finished things: quickly, loudly, and with syrup in places syrup should never have reached.
Kaelith abandoned the table first, announcing that if they did not go outside immediately, the dragon fort would "lose morale."
Neris followed a second later, more quietly but with far less hesitation than he would have shown only yesterday.
He even took the last strawberry from the serving plate before leaving, which Lara counted as growth.
"Don't climb anything higher than your own bad judgment," she called after them.
Kaelith waved without turning around. "That means nothing!"
"It means no roofs," Elysia said smoothly.
"Boring," Kaelith answered, already disappearing down the corridor with Neris at her side.
The room went quieter after that.
Not silent. Never silent in this castle. There was still the clink of dishes, the soft scrape of chairs, the rustle of servants clearing the table. But the air changed.
Lara sat back with a cup of coffee she had not really tasted, her gaze fixed on the doorway the children had just vanished through.
It still caught her off guard, how quickly Neris had slipped into the rhythm of the castle. Not fully, not without those pauses where he clearly did not know what was expected of him, but enough that Lara had begun to feel the shape of him in the household already.
That scared her almost as much as it softened her.
Malvoria leaned one elbow on the table. "All right. Serious face time."
Lara snorted. "You saying that makes me take it less seriously."
"Rude," Malvoria said, though there was no heat in it.
Elysia set down her cup and folded her hands. "One of Malvoria's clones went to Raveth and Veylira earlier. They've taken the traces of magic from the laboratory."
Lara looked up properly at that.
Malvoria nodded. "Mother's handling the analysis. If anyone can make sense of rotting, layered magic residue and figure out whether it's bloodline work, experimental gestation, or some other deeply illegal nightmare, it's her."
Lara's mouth tightened. "How long?"
That killed the room's last hint of ease.
Malvoria and Elysia exchanged a glance.
"A while," Elysia admitted.
Lara laughed once under her breath. Not because it was funny. Because sometimes that was better than punching walls.
"A while," she repeated.
Veylira was brilliant. Raveth was relentless. Malvoria's clones were already searching the palace from ceiling to cellar, slipping through cracks and wards and servant passages.
Elysia was in contact with Sarisa and moving things on that side with as much subtlety as possible.
And it still might not be enough.
Four weeks.
That was all.
Four weeks until the wedding.
Four weeks until Sarisa would be walked toward a future Lara could not bear to imagine without wanting to set entire governments on fire.
The coffee suddenly tasted bitter.
Lara set the cup down and dragged a hand over her face. "The research could take too long."
No one contradicted her.
That was somehow worse.
Malvoria rose and began pacing again, because movement was the physical form of her irritation. "We don't know that."
"We don't know that it won't," Lara shot back. "And that's the problem."
She pushed back her chair and stood too, unable to stay seated with all that pressure in her ribs.
The morning light through the high windows suddenly felt too bright. The room too small. The time too short.
"She gets married in four weeks," Lara said, pacing now herself.
"Four weeks. While we wait for traces and records and white-coated freaks to reveal themselves out of some hidden chamber under a palace. Four weeks while her mother tightens everything around her."
Elysia watched her carefully. "Sarisa is still resisting."
"I know she is." Lara stopped and turned. "That doesn't mean they won't get her to the altar anyway."
The thought alone made her blood run hotter.
Sarisa in white.
Sarisa with that dead-eyed royal calm she wore when survival required performance.
Sarisa saying vows she did not mean because the room had left her no space not to.
No.
Lara's jaw locked.
Malvoria, who knew her well enough to hear where the silence was heading, narrowed her eyes. "What are you thinking?"
Lara exhaled through her nose. "Something stupid."
"That narrows it down absolutely not at all."
Lara looked at her, then at Elysia, and decided there was no point pretending this thought had only just arrived.
It had been there already, in pieces, ever since Sarisa said if the day ever comes when I can run, you had better ask me again.
Maybe, Lara thought grimly, that day would have to be made.
"Malvoria," she said, voice rougher than she intended, "I know you're my little sister, but please, if we don't get this done before the wedding…"
She paused, not because she doubted the words, but because speaking them aloud made them real. "I think I will go and take Sarisa with me."
The room went still.
Lara kept going, because stopping now would only make her sound less serious than she was.
"Could you deal with the damage?" she asked. "Because if it comes to that, I'll mate with Sarisa so no one will take her from me. Is that all right?"
Malvoria stopped pacing.
Elysia blinked once.
There was a long, exquisite silence.
Then Elysia said, in a tone of calm disbelief, "So you are planning on kidnapping her."
Lara folded her arms. "I'm planning on liberating her."
"That is not the same word."
"It is if I love her enough."
Elysia stared at her.
Malvoria, meanwhile, had gone from stillness to something far more dangerous: fascination.
Lara could practically see the moment the idea settled into her sister's mind and began decorating itself with routes, wards, possible explosions, decoys, and how best to emotionally scar the queen in the process.
That should have worried Lara.
Instead it made her feel, for the first time that morning, almost sane.
"I'm serious," Lara said, because the silence had gone on long enough that it needed breaking cleanly.
"If we expose the lab before the wedding, good. We tear down the queen's version of this and drag Sarisa out of it properly. But if we don't…" She swallowed once, hard.
"I'm not leaving her there to be married off like some sacrifice while we're still chasing evidence."
Elysia's expression softened first. Not because she approved of the plan, exactly. Because she understood what sort of desperation gave birth to it.
"I know," she said.
Lara looked away toward the window. "Do you?"
"Yes."
That single word carried no judgment. Only recognition.
Malvoria came back to the table slowly, one hand braced on the chair she had abandoned. "You'd really do it."
Lara laughed once, humorless. "I asked her last night if she'd run away with me."
That got both their attention.
"She said if she could, she would," Lara continued. "And she told me if the day ever comes when she can run, I'd better ask again."
Her eyes burned now, not with tears but with the strain of wanting too much and being forced to pretend it was patience. "So if no one saves her in time, I will."
Again the room fell quiet.
Elysia lowered her gaze briefly, thinking. Malvoria's mouth twitched once, not in mockery, but in something almost admiring.
Then, together, and with far too little hesitation for two women who were supposed to be the sane ones in the room, they said:
"No problem. We'll help you."
Lara actually barked out a startled laugh.
"Gods," she said. "You're both terrible."
Malvoria grinned. "You only just realized?"
Elysia sighed like a woman enduring fate she had already chosen. "For the record, this is still a terrible plan."
"But you'll help," Lara said.
"Yes."
Malvoria lifted one hand. "I'm already seeing the route. Timing, distractions, clone coverage, where to place the first dramatic fire—"
"No dramatic fire unless absolutely necessary," Elysia cut in.
Malvoria looked offended. "Then why am I even invited?"
Lara leaned against the table and let out a long breath that tasted like relief and fear in equal measure.
The plan was insane. Dangerous. Reckless enough to get all of them killed, imprisoned, or turned into diplomatic curses.
And yet.
If the alternative was letting Sarisa walk into that wedding while Lara waited politely for fate to be reasonable, then yes. Insanity suddenly had its charms.
Outside, from somewhere deep in the gardens, Kaelith's laughter rang bright through the castle.
Four weeks.
Maybe less.
Lara looked at her sister and at Elysia and thought, with grim affection, that if the world wanted to force her hand, it was about to regret the shape of her love.
"Fine," she said. "Then let's make sure the queen never has a peaceful morning again."