We brought Aeric back to the palace under heavy guard, though he offered no resistance beyond his usual unsettling calm, watching the city pass through the transport cart's small window with the detached interest of a man observing a place he no longer expected to walk freely through again.
I said nothing to him during the journey. Everything I might have said felt simultaneously too small and too large for what had actually happened — eighteen months of terror justified, in his mind, as an elaborate test of my capacity to rule, delivered with the same patient, teacherly satisfaction he'd once used to explain the Rite's theological structure.
Darius broke the silence only once, leaning close enough that only I could hear. "Whatever he claims, whatever twisted logic he's built around this, you don't owe him understanding. You don't owe him anything beyond whatever justice actually requires."
