Elma realized something had changed the moment her father entered the nursery in full battle regalia. The golden armor caught the chandelier light in sharp, blinding flashes—an announcement of authority, and a warning of the force he intended to wield.
"Today, little jewel, we meet the jackals," Valerius boomed, strapping Elma into a new, smaller, more armored carrier. The cradle now smelled sharply of polished steel and blood oil. "They hate that we are strong. So we remind them precisely how strong we are."
The venue was the High Council chamber, a vast, echoing space designed to dwarf its occupants. Elma was positioned, on a cushion set between her father and Lady Kresnik, who presided with a stoic, slate-gray severity that made her seem carved from granite.
The air was thick with barely contained resentment. Three other powerful lords sat around the crescent table, their eyes sharp, their own House colors dull beside Valerius's blinding gold.
The meeting commenced with a tense discussion of military patrols. Elma, was growing skilled at maintaining her outward composure—a wide-eyed, quiet observer.
Suddenly, Lord Teyrn, a gaunt man in burgundy, stopped speaking and turned his gaze directly onto Elma.
"Forgive me, Lord Altheris, Lady Kresnik," Teyrn said, his voice laced with pointed neutrality. "But for generations, it has been tacitly understood that children do not attend these council meetings. Why is the child here?"
A beat of tense silence passed.
Lord Valerius Altheris threw back his head, and the laughter erupted—louder than ever, clashing against the severe chamber walls.
"HA HA HA! Teyrn, my old friend! You ask me why the future is present at a discussion of the future?" He leaned over and gripped Elma's shoulder, the golden armor cold beneath his hand. "This little one, Elma, is the future of the alliance—the formal formation of the greatest, most powerful House this realm has ever seen. She must be treated as such. She must learn to breathe the air of power, not the stale air of a nursery."
Before the lords could respond, Lord Vane, a severe man known for his moralistic pronouncements, stood abruptly, his chair scraping loudly across the stone floor.
"I find her presence disgusting!" Vane spat, his voice trembling not with fear, but moral outrage.
"Especially after what you did to House Varr! It is unforgivable, Altheris, to erase a Great House from existence simply for political leverage!"
The room went silent, save for Valerius's heavy breathing. Vane had dared to cross the line.
Valerius Altheris slowly looked up, his cold crimson eyes locking onto the man. He did not raise his voice; the laughter was gone, replaced by a deadly calm that was far more terrifying.
"Unforgivable?" Valerius asked softly. He leaned back. "House Varr was already dying, Lord Vane. They chose weakness. They chose sentiment over Power. I merely gave them the honor of dying like the great house they used to be, rather than having their land ravaged by common peasants once their protection failed."
He then fixed his gaze on Elma, his hand still on her shoulder, and the pride returned—cold and monumental.
"And besides," he concluded, his voice ringing with absolute certainty. "It is only fitting that the child who secures the alliance receives such a House as her birth sacrifice."
Elma, wide-eyed, sat motionless between the political titan and the implacable matriarch.
Birth sacrifice.
She didn't understand the words, but she understood the sound: the finality of the Varr name. The crushing weight of her own importance. The casual declaration that her entire existence was bought with an ocean of blood.
A chilling silence hung over the High Council chamber after Valerius's final, arrogant declaration. Lord Vane, the moralist, stood isolated, his face pale with fury and fear.
Then, Lord Thorn cleared his throat — an ancient, sharp-eyed man. He did not look at Valerius but stared at the sprawling map of the unified territories pinned to the far wall.
"I believe we all quietly agree that House Varr had lost its way," Thorn said, his voice measured and low. "Orren's sentimental decree about the old rites ensured their decline. A weak House is a disease in the body of the realm, and sometimes, a surgeon's blade is necessary."
He paused, and his eyes, cold and calculating, finally flickered to the golden sheen of Valerius's armor, and then momentarily, to Elma.
"The only question, Lord Altheris," Thorn continued, "is how we ensure the surgeon knows when to put the blade away."
The silence returned, now sharper, heavier. Thorn hadn't just agreed to the slaughter; he had expressed the core fear shared by every other Lord: Which one of us will be next on Valerius's ambitious operating table?
Valerius's dangerous calm vanished. His jaw tightened, and he was already leaning forward, a sharp, annihilating retort forming on his lips—a response that would have shattered the fragile peace.
But before he could speak, Lady Kresnik intervened.
Her voice, usually a dry, steady whisper, cut through the tension with the force of steel on glass. She didn't shout; she simply spoke with absolute, unwavering authority.
"The question is already answered, Lord Thorn," Lady Kresnik stated, not looking at her son-in-law, but addressing the assembled Lords. "What happened to House Varr was not a random act of savagery. It was the consequence of their own deviation from our ancient traditions. They let their blood weaken. They abandoned the foundation of our power."
She moved her severe slate-gray sleeve, resting a hand briefly on the table, asserting her House's seniority.
"We maintain our strength. We maintain our traditions. We ensure our children are fit for the highest mantles of Pattern mastery," she declared. "If all the Houses honor this, everything will be good."
Kresnik smoothly shifted the discourse from Valerius's aggressive ambition to the necessity of their shared noble system. She offered a cold comfort—stay strong, and Valerius won't touch you.
Then came the tactical olive branch.
"As a gesture of good faith from the unified alliance to the Council," she continued, her voice softening just enough to imply generosity, "House Kresnik will oversee the distribution of the Varr land, ensuring a proper balance. We are prepared to offer the three loyal Houses present half of the Varr territories as compensation for assisting in the pacification."
The other Lords instantly quieted, their fear giving way to greed. Land, wealth, and power—the currency Valerius had used to crush Varr was now being used by Kresnik to buy their loyalty.
Valerius, his face rigid with suppressed fury at being cut off, gave a tight, almost imperceptible nod. He had wanted to threaten them; Kresnik had simply shown them the price of obedience.
Elma, pressed between the warring wills of her father and grandmother, felt the true nature of her political prison. Her father was the unpredictable blade; her grandmother was the precise hand guiding the cuts. And the entire world was maintained by a delicate balance of cruelty and bribery.