They didn't come for me immediately.
That was the first sign.
After the retaliation failed, Empyreal Heaven grew polite. Messages arrived wrapped in courtesy. Invitations were phrased as concern. Elders who had not spoken to our family in centuries suddenly remembered old friendships.
Consensus was forming.
I felt it before anyone said it aloud.
Spirit pressure changed when I walked the halls now. Not fear—calculation. Wherever I stood, the world felt subtly weighed, as though my existence required justification.
Father noticed too.
"They are aligning," he said one night.
Mother's expression didn't change. "They always do before erasure."
Aurelia slept between us, her spirit warm and steady. I watched her chest rise and fall and committed the rhythm to memory.
"They won't touch her," I said.
Mother nodded. "They won't dare."
"But they'll touch you," Father finished.
I didn't argue.
I had lived long enough to recognize inevitability.
The summons came three days later.
A joint decree of the Heavenly Concord, signed with immaculate legality.
Cassian Aetherion is to present himself for final evaluation under heaven's authority.
No accusation.
No crime listed.
Just evaluation.
Father crushed the decree in his hand.
"I can break this," he said quietly. "Once."
Mother placed her hand over his.
"And then they erase everything," she said. "The bloodline. The domain. Aurelia."
Silence followed.
I stepped forward.
"I'll go," I said.
Mother looked at me.
Not as a sovereign.
Not as a matriarch.
As my mother.
She embraced me tightly — once. No hesitation. No regret.
"You were never wrong," she said into my shoulder.
Father placed his forehead against mine.
"You surpassed heaven without cultivation," he said. "That alone was unforgivable."
I smiled faintly.
"That's on them."