Lyra didn't go home.
The carriage had barely stopped at the iron gates of the Ancestral Seravel Estate when she was already stepping down, ignoring the protocol of prior announcement.
"Lady Lyra?" the butler looked surprised, but stepped aside. "Your grandparents— I mean, Lord and Lady Seravel—are in the winter garden."
She found the couple having tea. Her grandmother was embroidering. Her grandfather read a newspaper through a gold-rimmed magnifying glass.
The reception was warm—almost excessively so. Lady Seravel seemed delighted by her granddaughter's audacity in arriving unannounced, something she secretly admired.
"Sorry for the interruption," Lyra said, accepting the cup the maid handed her, her hands trembling slightly. "But I need to speak with the Magistrate. It's urgent."
Valerius lowered the newspaper. He noted the tension in her shoulders, the panic flickering in her eyes.
He smiled at his wife.
"My dear, I believe our granddaughter wants to talk politics."
The grandmother sighed, setting her embroidery aside.
"Men and their paper wars. Don't ruin her, Valerius."
She kissed Lyra's forehead and left, abandoning them among ferns and orchids.
The moment the door closed, Lyra crumbled.
"I made a mistake, Grandfather. I went to Nussion's Department. They… they asked me questions. And now they're going to use my answers to destroy Aurelian."
She told him everything. The logical trap. The structure of the law. Nussion's plan to use the children's case to strip the General of Northern Command.
"I need to retract what I said. I need to explain that Aurelian didn't—"
Valerius raised a hand, stopping her.
He didn't look worried.
He looked… amused.
"Sit down, child. And drink your tea. It's getting cold."
Lyra sat, frustrated.
"You don't understand. They're going to accuse him of slave trafficking based on my words!"
"I understand perfectly," Valerius replied calmly. "And their argument is as weak as wet straw."
"Weak? They said it was irrefutable."
"They are ambitious fools, Lyra." Valerius added more sugar to his cup. "The law you proposed—the punishment of the buyer—doesn't exist yet. They want to use it as a moral argument, not a legal one. Aurelian bought the children before any amendment to the code. No law can be applied retroactively unless you're dealing with tyranny."
He met her eyes.
"Aurelian knows how to defend himself against bureaucrats, child. He eats men like Caelus for breakfast. At most, the Military Court can force him to formally free the children and pay a symbolic fine."
Lyra blinked.
"That's it?"
"That's it. And that's good." Valerius leaned back. "Stay quiet, Lyra. Don't contradict yourself. This is good for you."
"Good for me? How?"
"They're in such a hurry to get a weapon against Aurelian that they'll rush your proposal into law without reading the fine print." Valerius smiled—the smile of an old shark. "Power makes them blind to what's right in front of them. You're going to push through one of the most rigid abolitionist laws in this kingdom's history, using their hatred for my grandson as fuel."
Lyra opened her mouth.
It was Machiavellian.
And it was brilliant.
"So… I should let them attack him?"
"Aurelian has thick skin. He can take a few scratches in the name of legal progress." Valerius winked. "Besides, he'll find it amusing when he realizes he was the unwitting tool of liberation."
The old man leaned forward.
"Mark these fools well, Lyra. Caelus. Nussion. Remember the names. They think they used you—but you can use them later. They're easy to manipulate because they underestimate two things: women and non-humans. You are both."
"Later?" she asked. "I don't plan on going back there."
Valerius laughed—a dry, rasping sound.
"Oh, my dear. Once politics touches you once, it never lets go. The stain remains. And so does the taste."
He stood and walked to a shelf of ancient books. He pulled out a heavy volume bound in red leather.
"Come see me twice a week. Tuesdays and Thursdays. I'll teach you a few tricks from an old man who survived three kings and twelve coups."
Lyra looked at the book in his hands.
She had come asking for help to undo a mistake.
She was leaving with an offer of training.
"I accept," she said.
In the weeks that followed, the household routine changed.
Lyra spent her afternoons in her grandparents' library.
Elion, though he never forbade it, grew uneasy. "They'll harden your heart, Lyra," he would say at night.
And Aurelian…
Aurelian knew.
He knew she was frequenting his grandfather's house. He knew she spent hours debating history and strategy with the old Magistrate.
And though he pretended indifference, it unsettled him deeply.
Because he knew Valerius never taught anyone to be kind.
He taught them how to win.
And the idea of Lyra armed with Valerius's knowledge was, at once, the most terrifying—and the most fascinating—thing Aurelian could imagine.