The silence that followed Theo's outburst wasn't empty; it was heavy, pressurized, like the air before a cataclysmic storm. Every eye in the hall swiveled toward the shadows where the young noble stood.
The celebratory hum died instantly, replaced by a tension so sharp it felt as though a single wrong movement would draw blood.
Theo stepped into the flickering torchlight. His face was pale, but his eyes burned with a desperate, poisonous conviction.
He didn't look like a grieving prince; he looked like a man standing on the edge of an abyss, determined to push himself in rather than watch someone else cross it.
"Mother," Theo began.
His voice lacked its usual aristocratic cadence; instead, it possessed that brittle, strained quality of someone who has rehearsed a martyrdom in his mind a thousand times. "The household's acting positions require the household's endorsement."
"The unit's confidence in the director."
