Part 10 — The Prince Who Chose Himself

The High Court convened before the blood on Queen Lenora's gown had dried.

Physicians bound her wound behind the royal bench. They ordered me to bed as well, but I took my place before the Council with one hand over the life inside me.

The dragon-glass box sat between the accused and the throne.

Celeste wore iron cuffs lined with salt. Cassian stood separately beneath the broken standard of the Crown Prince. Malrec had agreed to testify in exchange for confinement rather than execution.

He described how Celeste found him through a list provided by the Favor Engine. She paid him with jewels taken from the Ten Marches chest and promised protection under Cassian's household seal.

"Did the Engine compel you?" the chief justice asked.

"No," Malrec said. "It showed me what I wanted and told me where to take it."

The answer unsettled Cassian more than any accusation.

The charges filled twelve pages.

Celeste answered them with one sentence.

"The Favor Engine controlled me."

Cassian seized the same defense.

"It twisted my devotion into obsession. I was deceived."

I placed his signed summons on the evidence table.

"This was written before our child was conceived. Read the final line."

The court clerk obeyed.

"I, Cassian Ashbourne, understand the draught I swallowed will end my line at dawn. I summon Elara Veyne freely and accept responsibility for any heir conceived tonight."

The black wax still held his private signet.

"The Engine did not move your hand," I said. "It did not make Celeste tell you the draught lasted one year. You learned the truth and made another choice. Then you spent months pretending I had tricked you because the truth displeased your wife."

One by one, the evidence followed.

The apothecary ledger showed Celeste buying permanent silver-hemlock.

The forged star charts and original duty rolls proved Gideon's records had been replaced.

The search warrant showed Cassian removing neutral witnesses.

The assassin's payment led to Malrec.

The rune impressions matched the rite witnessed by the king and Council.

The physician's report proved Celeste ordered her pain transferred to me.

The chief physician testified that Cassian had been present and had authorized "whatever was necessary." The guards from the first chapel identified Malrec. The recovered leather case contained Elias's blood and the stolen rune impression.

Celeste challenged every witness separately. Together, they formed a chain she could not break.

Finally, the silver-rose guard described Cassian lowering the Great Seal after Malrec stated plainly that I would die.

"I loved her," Cassian said.

"Love did not sign these orders," the chief justice replied. "You did."

Cassian turned toward Celeste as if expecting her to defend him.

She stared only at the dragon-glass box.

"If you restore my bond with the Engine," she said, "I can repair the wards."

"You mean you can return what you stole," I answered.

"Does the difference matter if the kingdom survives?"

"It matters to every person you intend to rob the next time you need leverage."

King Edmund rose from the throne.

"And I feared a prophecy," he said. "Fear made me hear treason where a loyal man offered warning. I condemned Gideon Veyne without demanding the original records. My crown made that failure more dangerous, not less mine."

He removed the king's chain from his shoulders and laid it on the bench.

"Judge my son by the law. Do not spare him because he carries my blood."

The Council withdrew.

While we waited, Cassian turned to me.

"Whatever they decide, Rowan is my son. I can still protect you both."

"You tried to kill me yesterday."

"To preserve his lawful future."

Even now, he did not ask forgiveness. He offered ownership.

"If the Council strips my command," he continued, "let me retain my place in the succession. Marry me after the annulment. Celeste will be gone, and everything can return to what it was."

The dragon-glass box began to tremble.

The Favor Engine recognized its favorite meal: a man asking the people he had harmed to erase the cost.

"Nothing will return," I said. "That is what consequences mean."

The Council returned with a unanimous judgment.

Each peer placed a seal beside the verdict. The border lords voted first, followed by the judges, the treasury keeper, and finally Queen Lenora. King Edmund did not vote. By his own demand, the Crown could neither save nor condemn its heir in a case involving royal abuse.

Cassian was stripped of the title Crown Prince, removed from the succession, and sentenced to lifelong confinement in the Black Tower for abuse of the Great Seal and conspiracy against the Crownmarked Heir.

Celeste was convicted of treason, forbidden magic, attempted murder, and theft of royal identity. She would spend her life in a warded prison where no magic could answer her.

Malrec's testimony spared his life, but not his freedom.

Every decree issued through Cassian's private favor was suspended for review. Gideon's conviction was annulled, his estates restored, and his name entered into the court record as a servant wronged by the Crown.

The clerk struck Cassian's name from the succession roll.

The dragon-glass box split.

Gray smoke burst upward, but it found no royal oath left to feed upon.

Rowan rose inside me like a flame answering wind.

Golden fire poured from my body and formed the head of a dragon above the court. Its jaws closed around the Favor Engine.

Celeste screamed. "No! It chose me!"

The dragon swallowed.

Light raced through Crownspire Palace, then outward along every road and river of Valedorn. The ward towers awakened. Frozen gates opened. The western rivers broke through their ice.

The stolen Crownfire had begun to come home.

Four months passed.

The kingdom healed in pieces. So did Queen Lenora. Cassian entered the Black Tower. Celeste disappeared behind the salt walls of Saint Orra's Keep. Gideon returned to the Observatory only long enough to open every forbidden archive to independent review.

The frozen western gates reopened within a week. It took a month for the eastern beacons to burn steadily, and longer for villages to trust that the light would remain. Every suspended appointment was reviewed in public. Some officials were removed; others proved they had served the kingdom despite Cassian's favor.

I attended those hearings until the physicians threatened to lock me in my rooms.

I carried Rowan into my seventh month.

On the night the last missing Crownfire returned, every dragonstone bell in the capital rang without a hand touching it.

Fire swept through my body.

Then my waters broke.