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Chapter Text

Bound by Pursuit

by m7udo

The cry rang out across the cobbled streets of London. "Seize him!" bellowed a man astride a white destrier, his voice cutting through the night like a blade. He was draped in a rich maroon justaucorps, his pantaloons of the same hue tucked neatly into white stockings, which were fastened at the knees with black bows. A black jerkin hugged his frame, secured at the throat by a cravat, its knot adorned with a blood-red gemstone that gleamed in the flickering torchlight. He yanked the reins, causing his steed to rear with a shrill whinny, but his storm-grey eyes remained locked on his quarry—a figure slipping like a shadow through the labyrinthine streets.

The rogue was a sight to behold. His deep blue coat billowed as he ran, a dark pink bow tied loosely at his throat, and a black mask obscuring his eyes, lending him the air of a jester who mocked the law itself. His dark hair jutted out in wild, gravity-defying spikes, each lock standing with rebellious defiance, as though even his very hair refused to be tamed. The jagged peaks framed his masked face, lending him an almost mythical quality—like a trickster spirit conjured from a minstrel’s tale. Even under the dim torchlight, his windswept strands remained untouched by sweat or disorder, a fitting crown for a rogue who thrived in the chaos of the chase.

Gold trim flashed at the tops of his fine black boots, and tucked beneath his coat were treasures plucked from the very coffers of the King himself. But most curious of all was his weapon of choice—not blade nor bow, but playing cards, which he wielded like a sorcerer’s charms to confound those who pursued him.

A cry of pursuit echoed through the streets as knights, clad in steel and bearing the crest of England, stormed after him. The thief twisted through the maze of alleyways, his boots barely touching the ground, until at last he reached a dead end.

Yet, as the knights drew their swords, the rogue merely chuckled. "Shall we have a bit of sport, gentlemen?" he taunted, flicking a deck of cards between nimble fingers. He extended his hand, fanning the cards before them. "Come, pick one."

The foremost knight hesitated, but seeing no escape for the scoundrel, he allowed himself the indulgence. He plucked a card from the deck, eyeing the masked man warily.

"Keep it hidden," the thief instructed, amusement lacing his voice.

The knight scoffed. "Enough of this folly! You are under arrest!"

The rogue only smirked. "Then perhaps you should check your hand."

The knight glanced down—and his card had vanished. His grip on his sword faltered for the briefest moment, his eyes widening in stunned disbelief. That was all the thief needed.

With a swift, brutal strike, his fist connected with the knight’s jaw, sending him sprawling backward. He crashed into his comrades, the steel of their armor clattering like church bells in disarray.

From the mouth of the alleyway came the sharp clatter of hooves on stone. The King’s personal knight—the Esquire of the Body—had arrived. His silver hair gleamed under the moonlight, and his storm-grey eyes burned with fury as he reined in his steed, a living shadow of royal authority and wrath.

The thief wasted no time. Darting toward the wall, he found footholds in the crumbling mortar, using jagged stones and window ledges to hoist himself upward. He reached the rooftop in seconds, pivoting once to glance down at his pursuers. With two fingers pressed to his forehead, he flicked them outward in a mocking salute.

"Until next time, Lord Edgeworth!" he called, laughter dancing in his voice before he turned and vanished into the night.

Edgeworth’s hands clenched into fists, his grip on the reins turning white-knuckled as he ground his teeth. "Imbeciles!" he barked at his men, watching as some scrambled over the wall while others sprinted from the alleyway in vain pursuit. He turned his horse sharply, the sting of failure sinking deep.

This was not the first time he had chased that wretched rogue—nor would it be the last. And now, the scoundrel had dared to steal from the King himself—King Manfred the Ironfist.

Edgeworth swore under his breath. Next time, there would be no escape.

The rogue—known by the law as a phantom, but by the poor as a savior—bore the name Phoenix Wright.

By night, he was a specter in blue, a thief who pilfered from coffers fat with royal excess; by day, he walked humbler streets, blending into the common folk with the ease of a practiced charlatan. His deeds echoed the tales of Robin Hood, though whispered with greater reverence among the Slums of Southbank—a tangled sprawl of crumbling stone and timber huddled along the southern bank of the Thames, where the air always smelled faintly of soot and saltwater, and hope clung to the alleys like ivy on brick.

Southbank was the forgotten limb of London, cut off from the riches of Whitehall and the judgment of its gilded halls. Its people built with what the city discarded: patchwork roofs, leaning shanties, makeshift markets of spoiled produce and stolen goods. Here, children played in gutters, and mothers bartered bread for candle wax. But they had each other. And they had him.

He was no myth—he was flesh and blood, and he gave where the Crown only took.

With the moon glinting on the slate rooftops, Phoenix bounded across the crooked spine of the city, slipping from tile to tile with a dancer’s grace. Ropes strung between chimneys and timbered beams bore his weight as he crossed them like a tightrope walker. Smoke curled from hearths below, and the laughter of drunkards and merchants echoed faintly from the taverns. But he moved unheard, unseen, until at last, he reached the place he called home.

Sliding down the weathered side of a crumbling tenement, Phoenix landed lightly in the narrow alley behind the slum’s chapel—its cross half-crooked, its bell long since rusted silent. He tugged the black mask from his face and tucked it into the folds of his coat, just as two small figures came darting out from the shadows.

“Oh, Nick! Thank the saints you’re safe!” cried Maya, her voice bright with relief. She wore a simple homespun dress of rough-woven canvas and faded purple dye—dyed with berries more than coin. Her bare feet slapped softly against the cobblestones as she rushed toward him.

“Mr. Nick!” piped a younger voice, full of innocent joy. Pearl, garbed in a similar dress tinged with rose-madder hues, threw her arms around Phoenix’s waist and clung to him like a child greeting a father returning from war.

Phoenix let out a quiet chuckle, ruffling the girl’s dark hair with affection. “I’m quite alright, Pearls,” he murmured, his voice warm despite the chill in the air. “The night gave me a bit of trouble, but I gave it trouble back.”

Maya grinned, stepping closer as the tension in her shoulders eased. For a brief moment, silence fell among them, broken only by the distant barking of dogs and the creak of wooden shutters.

Phoenix’s gaze wandered down the alleyway, where the huddled silhouettes of neighbors and kin waited in quiet hope. Their eyes were sunken, their bellies empty, but they had not yet surrendered to despair. Not while he still ran free.

“I trust you’ve all an appetite,” he said at last, his lips curling into a mischievous smile. With a flourish, he pulled a small brown satchel from beneath his coat. The faint jingle of gold and the glint of jeweled finery spilled faintly through the opening.

Maya’s eyes widened. “You didn’t—”

“From the King’s own vault,” Phoenix confirmed with a wink. “Tonight, we dine as though we were nobles ourselves.”

The two girls beamed, and behind them, in the shadows of the alley, heads began to turn—hope rekindled.

And though the weight of the King’s vengeance would soon bear down on him, for now, Phoenix Wright—the dark blue rogue—had won another night for the people who had nothing.

The firelight crackled softly within the slums as Phoenix crouched beside a makeshift table, his satchel of stolen treasure resting within reach. Maya and Pearl sat nearby, eyes wide with awe as they helped count the gleaming coins and jewels. The scent of freshly baked barley bread wafted from a nearby stall, already heating in anticipation of a rare, hearty meal.

Though Phoenix wore a smile for their sake, the lines of old memory weighed behind his eyes.

He had grown up here—in the mud and smoke of London’s forgotten quarters. An orphan, with no known family nor noble name, he had learned quickly the cost of kindness and the price of survival. Yet even then, Phoenix had never hardened. There had always been a fire in him, a belief—perhaps foolish, perhaps holy—that people were worth saving. That even a thief could be righteous if his cause was just.

It was not always so bleak. Once, there had been light.

A boy with silver-threaded hair and storm-grey eyes had brought it. Miles Edgeworth. The noble’s son who, despite bearing the silks of privilege, would slip past the castle guards just to kneel in the dirt with the rest of them—play chess on crates, chase crows, fall in the mud without flinching.

Phoenix remembered those days with the ache of old summers. He remembered Edgeworth's laughter—rare, but honest—and the stories his father told, seated amongst the children like a bard in a court of paupers. Lord Gregory Edgeworth, Esquire of the Body, the King's personal knight and one of the few noblemen who dared step into the slums without a sword drawn or nose wrinkled.

But then, one day, both vanished.

No trumpet heralded their departure. No bells tolled in mourning. The palace did not speak of their absence. The poor only noticed the bread that stopped arriving, the silver that no longer filled begging palms. Whispers slithered through the alleys like mist: the old knight was gone—and so was his boy.

Phoenix waited. Days blurred into weeks, then months. Still, he waited. Each twilight, he hoped to see Miles crest the hill beyond the orphanage, boots muddied, hair tousled by play. But the path remained empty.

Years passed. Phoenix hardened. His limbs grew long and lean from flight, his fingers clever from sleight. He learned the ways of shadows and silence, of taking without being seen. But he never forgot the boy with grey eyes and a noble heart.

And then—on a chill morning, heavy with frost—he saw him again.

Miles Edgeworth returned not as a boy, but as a man mounted upon a snow-white destrier. His crimson justaucorps gleamed with golden embroidery; his black jerkin fit his tall frame like armor of silk. A pristine white cravat encircled his neck, knotted with soldierly precision and fastened with a red gemstone that caught the morning sun like fresh-spilled blood.

But it was the hair that made Phoenix’s breath catch.

That familiar shock of silver-grey swept back in sharp, winged angles, defiant as ever. Each strand was sculpted to perfection, a style no commoner would dare mimic, no courtier could match. It framed a face grown colder, leaner—sculpted from marble and command.

His once-warm eyes now mirrored iron skies, stormy and hard, stripped of wonder. There was no recognition in them as he passed the slums where he’d once played, no hesitation as peasants bowed their heads and melted into shadows. Phoenix watched, unseen beneath the cowl of his ragged cloak, heart pounding like the hooves that struck the cobbles.

This was no longer Miles.

He was Esquire Edgeworth now—the King’s sword, his voice in court, his hand in war. The personal knight sworn to King Manfred the Ironfist, who drained the slums dry to gild his throne.

And yet Phoenix could still see the ghost of that boy—the one who once knelt in the mud beside him, vowing to build a better kingdom.

“Nick?” Maya’s voice broke gently through his reverie. She had appeared at his side, a basket of torn bread slung over her arm. “Are you alright?”

Phoenix blinked, realizing his hand had tightened around the small wooden token until his knuckles turned white. Etched with a lion and quill, its edges were worn smooth from days of turning it over in his palm. He set it down gently, shaking his head. “I’m fine,” he murmured. “Just… thinking.” He looked toward the rooftops again, where the sky dimmed into velvet dusk. Somewhere out there, Edgeworth would be tightening the reins of his white destrier, rallying knights, sharpening his pursuit.

And still, Phoenix could not forget the boy in the dirt. The one who once dreamed of a better kingdom.

He rose to his feet. “Tonight, we eat. Tomorrow…” His voice lowered, the firelight flickering in his eyes. “Tomorrow, we steal again.”

•••

The great stone walls of the throne chamber stood tall and cold as tombs, carved with the rose and lion of the realm, flanked by high stained-glass windows through which the dying sun poured crimson light upon the floor like blood. Braziers burned low along the marbled gallery, casting long shadows across pillars of blackened oak. The air hung thick with incense and iron—smoke, sweat, and the sharp scent of oiled steel.

This was the heart of Whitehall Palace, the seat of royal power and the cold jewel of the Crown. Built upon the ashes of an older fortress, it sprawled across the northern bank of the Thames like a coiled serpent—stone upon stone, wall upon wall, with towers that pierced the fog-choked sky. Its great gates were wrought iron and watched day and night by guards in crimson livery. Within its labyrinthine halls, the King’s will was law, and secrets passed between tapestries like ghosts.

Whitehall was no place of warmth. Though gold trimmed its ceilings and velvet draped its windows, the palace bore the chill of ambition and bloodshed. The courtiers walked in whispers. The servants moved in silence. And in the throne room, beneath banners heavy with the dust of conquest, the King ruled with a gaze as unyielding as the mortar in its walls.

Here, even the air bowed.

Lord Miles Edgeworth stood alone in the center of the hall.

His boots clicked softly against the checkered floor as he knelt, one leg folded, one arm across his chest in formal salute, his head bowed. His white cravat—creased but unsullied—caught a flicker of gold from the firelight. Beneath his heavy maroon justaucorps, his back ached from hours in saddle and the sharp sting of failure.

The heralds had said nothing when he arrived—only opened the doors to the throne chamber in complete silence. The King was already waiting.

Upon the raised dais, beneath a canopy of black and crimson velvet, sat King Manfred the Ironfist—a man carved of stone and fire. His crown sat heavy upon thinning white hair, his fur-lined mantle spilling over his throne like a wolf’s pelt. Though not broad, he radiated a cruel strength, the sort of wiry, sinewed danger found in wolves and executioners. His eyes, pale as frostbitten sky, bore into Edgeworth as though they might pierce the bone.

A hush fell. Then: “You return alone.” His voice slithered from the throne like smoke.

Edgeworth remained kneeling. “The rogue escaped, Your Majesty.”

Silence.

Manfred rose slowly, his robes hissing over the stones. He descended the dais, step by step, each footfall deliberate—measured. A hawk descending toward the rabbit.

Edgeworth did not move.

CRACK.

The first blow came fast—a riding crop, tipped with silver, snapping across Edgeworth’s back with a force that rang through the hall. The knights flanking the columns did not stir. The servants did not gasp. All watched without breathing, without blinking, as the King lashed his most loyal knight.

CRACK.

The second strike came harder. Edgeworth’s jaw tightened. His black gloves curled faintly, his knuckles flexing—then still.

Manfred circled him now, slow and wrathful. “I gave you power. Status. My trust. And in return, you let a filthy street-rat slip through your fingers?” He struck again, the lash cutting across Edgeworth’s shoulder. “He stole from my coffers. Made fools of my knights. And you—my Esquire of the Body—you knelt in dung-strewn alleys while he danced on rooftops!”

The fourth blow struck across Edgeworth’s ribs. Still, he did not speak. Did not flinch. He stared ahead, the flickering torchlight reflected faintly in his storm-grey eyes. They were narrowed, unreadable.

“Your silence offends me, boy,” the King hissed.

Edgeworth’s voice, when it came, was quiet and unwavering. “I offer no excuse. Only my sword.”

King Manfred stood in front of him now, breathing heavily through his nose. He raised the crop again—but paused. Then, he leaned in close. His voice dropped to a serpent’s whisper. “Your father wore the same face, you know. Silent. Proud. Loyal to a fault.” He brushed a finger beneath Edgeworth’s chin, lifting it ever so slightly. “And look where it brought him.”

Edgeworth’s breath stilled. But he did not speak.

Manfred withdrew his hand, sneering. “Pray you do not follow him into the earth so soon.” He turned, tossing the crop to a waiting steward.

“You have until the fortnight’s end to catch the thief. I care not for his name—only that his body hangs from London Bridge before the new moon.” He waved a ring-laden hand dismissively. “Go. And mind yourself, Esquire. Fail me again, and I shall teach you what loyalty truly costs.”

Edgeworth rose stiffly, a red bloom spreading beneath his coat where the strikes had landed. He bowed, every movement precise. “As you command, Your Majesty.” He turned and walked from the chamber, the heavy doors groaning shut behind him.

In the hall beyond, the palace was hushed—carved marble, hushed tapestries, silent courtiers who dared not meet his eyes. His boots echoed down the corridor, and only once he reached the solitude of his private antechamber did he stop.

With a quiet breath, he unfastened the clasps of his coat, every movement slow. His fingers, normally deft with sword or pen, trembled only once.

The linen beneath was soaked red.

He stood before the hearth, letting the warmth of the fire touch the skin beneath the fresh welts. No physician would be summoned. There was no one to ask. He had long since learned to bind his own wounds—first in silence, then in shadow.

But even as he dabbed at the blood, he saw it again: the masked rogue, leaping from rooftop to rooftop, laughing like a fox with fire on its heels.

That grin. That voice.

Something in it stirred a memory. A ghost.

But he shook it off.

The rogue would fall. He would see to it. The King had made his will known.

And Miles Edgeworth—Esquire of the Body—was bound to obey.

•••

By the time the bell tolled Prime, casting long shadows across the cobbled courtyard, Phoenix Wright stood among the lowest ranks of King Manfred’s knightly order—just another body clad in tarnished steel.

He moved differently than the others. Not in the way he walked or stood, but in how his weight shifted—silent, measured. There was a grace to him that the others chalked up to fast learning, uncanny instinct. In truth, it was a lifetime lived in silence and shadow. A thief’s instincts, disguised in a squire’s garb.

His helm remained on, always. Polished to a dull sheen, its visor drawn low, obscuring the face beneath. He dared not remove it. The hair alone would give him away—those unruly, dark spikes that sprang from his scalp like the thorns of a wild briar. It was his mark, the calling card of the rogue who leapt across London’s rooftops by moonlight. If even one soldier recognized it, the gallows would follow. No trial. No confession. Only the creak of rope and the hush of a crowd.

He had not joined the order out of honor. He had not sought glory nor praise. He had joined for two reasons—and neither bore the King's sigil.

One was Miles Edgeworth.

The other was gold.

The Knight's Order granted access to rooms few commoners ever dreamed of entering. Armories, vault ledgers, supply chests, and—most importantly—the treasury. Phoenix had seen it with his own eyes: chests of gold, untouched and gleaming in the torchlight, locked behind gates guarded by men who barely looked twice at a knight with a humble seal and bowed head. From the inside, the Crown’s riches were all too easy to pluck. One coin here, another there. A sealed pouch smuggled beneath a pauldron.

Disguised.

Hidden.

Delivered back to the slums by dawn.

The bread they ate, the medicine they found on their doorsteps, the clean linens suddenly draped in the poorhouses—that was his work. Every copper piece a quiet rebellion.

He had become a knight not to serve—but to steal.

And to get closer to him.

Miles Edgeworth.

Phoenix’s chest tightened at the name, even in thought.

Edgeworth—the boy who once knelt in the chapel courtyard, handing out bread with his father, swearing that justice should not depend on one’s bloodline. The boy who once played beside him in the dirt, who looked at Phoenix not as a wretch, but as a friend.

Now, Phoenix had to look upon the man. A stranger clad in maroon velvet and golden filigree, his eyes colder than the stone he walked upon. He did not look toward the slums anymore. He did not speak of change. He stood beside the tyrant king with a sword at his hip and silence on his tongue.

And Phoenix—now Sir Nicholas Wright—had burrowed into the serpent’s nest to find him. The name, Nicholas, was close enough to the nickname Maya had always called him—Nick—a small piece of himself hidden in plain sight. Forged papers, a coin slipped into the right hands, a talent for swordplay honed in tavern brawls and back-alley scrapes—it was all he needed to climb through the lower ranks. His hands were quick. His mind quicker. And no one questioned a knight who kept his mouth shut and his helm on.

“Again!” barked the drill master, snapping his leather whip against the training post.

Phoenix ducked low, deflecting a practice blade aimed for his shoulder, only to miss the follow-up strike. The wooden edge struck him clean across the ribs, making him stagger back with a grunt. Laughter rang from a few idle knights at the sidelines.

“Keep your guard up, greenling!” one called.

Phoenix clenched his jaw beneath his helm. He wanted to shout back, to bury the man’s blade in the dirt. But he swallowed the urge and stepped back into position.

Then—silence. Not the silence of pause or fatigue. This was something colder. He turned, breath short, to find the knights around him standing at attention, backs straight, eyes forward. Even the birds seemed to stop singing.

The King had entered.

King Manfred the Ironfist descended the carved stone steps of the east wing, flanked by guards in crimson-plated armor, and behind him…

Phoenix’s breath caught in his throat.

Miles Edgeworth walked with the king, as he always did, a shadow stitched in golden and scarlet. And that hair. Immaculate, unmistakable. Swept back in sharp wings of grey, it caught the morning light like a polished blade.

His stride was even, but Phoenix noticed the stiffness in his posture, the slight favoring of one side. Manfred’s fury had left its mark. No one else seemed to see it—but Phoenix had known Edgeworth too long, too well.

It made something curl in his stomach.

Anger.

Sorrow.

Guilt.

He couldn’t name it.

“All training shall cease!” The captain’s voice rang across the courtyard like a bell tolling doom. Swords dropped. Boots stilled. Knights—young and old—fell to one knee in unison. Among them knelt Phoenix Wright, head bowed, heart hammering against the confines of his armor.

He clenched his gloved hands, forcing stillness into them. From the arched gallery above, flanked by red-liveried guards, descended King Manfred. The Ironfist.

He walked with the slow, deliberate tread of one who expected the world to part before him. His crimson cloak, lined with black ermine, swept behind him like spilled blood across stone. And his crown, twisted and cruel, glinted beneath the grey morning sky—each gold spire shaped like a blade.

“My knights,” the King intoned, voice low and lethal, “my swordarms. My faithful hounds.” He stopped atop the final stair and gazed down upon them with contempt, as if beholding a field of crops gone fallow. “I have been... disappointed.”

Silence fell like a guillotine.

“There is a pestilence in my city,” he continued, his tone sharpening. “A vermin who scuttles beneath moonlight, robbing my vaults, mocking your oaths, dishonoring your blades. A masked cur. A thief. And still” —his voice rose— “still, you bring me no head, no name, no justice!”

Phoenix’s spine stiffened.

“I grow weary of failure,” the King said, voice cold and thunderous. “So let failure become spectacle. Let it become sport.” He opened his arms like a bishop at the altar. “I declare the opening of the Court of Steel—a tournament of arms, where any knight may enter, be he noble-born or no. Let skill speak where blood fails. The victor shall be granted coin, elevation of station…” He paused. A murmur stirred the kneeling ranks. “…and a place at this year’s Carivales Nocturne.”

The name swept across the court like wind through a forest. Phoenix’s eyes widened behind his helmet.

The Carivales Nocturne. A sacred revel held once a year in the highest halls of court. A masquerade of velvet and gold, masks and shadow. No servants. No squires. No low-born knight had ever passed its gates.

But now…

If he won—if he gained entrance—he would walk unseen among nobles and ministers. He could speak with those who whispered at the King’s table, those who controlled the tide of coin and cruelty alike. Perhaps even Edgeworth would be there. Phoenix could look him in the eye—not from the shadows, but from across a hall of chandeliers, beneath a black mask of his own choosing. Perhaps he might even speak to him. Perhaps, at last, Edgeworth would see him.

And if he won the tourney, he would no longer be nameless.

In a court where name meant power, meant notice, it might be enough.

By night, Phoenix was still the ghost of the alleyways—the black-masked thief who slipped past locks and shadows, his spiked hair unmistakable beneath moonlight. A face known only in whispered warnings, never caught, never named.

By day, he was a nameless sword among hundreds. When he’d pledged his fealty and taken up arms, it had been with purpose—not to serve, but to infiltrate. It gave him access. Proximity. The keys to the vaults. It made the King’s gold easier to bleed back into the slums, coin by coin, mouth by mouth.

But it came at a price.

He kept his helmet always fastened, hiding the unmistakable crown of hair that would betray his double life in an instant. No one could ever know. Not the guards. Not the servants. Not Edgeworth.

To be discovered was to die.

But if he won, he would be more than a whisper. More than a mask in the night.

He would have a title. A place. A path.

He lowered his head further, hiding the flicker in his eyes.

Let the Court of Steel begin.

He would win. He would enter the Carivales.

And beneath the chandeliers of the palace, he would steal again.

•••

The slums of Southbank lay quiet beneath the ink of night, only the flickering of oil lanterns casting trembling halos along the narrow, muck-slicked streets. Chimneys wept smoke into the fog, and the river’s stink curled in through cracked shutters and doorways too thin to keep out the damp. In one such hovel, a crooked timber shack pressed against a crumbling stone wall, a girl stirred from the hearth, brow knit with worry.

Three knocks. A pause. Two.

Maya was at the door in a flash, hand on the old blade hidden behind a stack of firewood. Only when she heard the creak of familiar boots did her shoulders loosen. She pulled open the door with a scowl. “You’re late,” she hissed, stepping aside. “And don’t tell me you’ve been thieving this close to dawn.”

Phoenix slipped inside, hood drawn low, mud clinging to his hems. Beneath the cloak, his gambeson bore fresh bruises, one of which throbbed like a drumbeat in his side. “No jobs tonight,” he murmured, unbuckling the sword at his hip and setting it beside the hearth. “I was at the yard. Training.”

Maya narrowed her eyes. “Again? What, they flog the green ranks 'til the moon’s down now?”

“Wouldn’t be the worst thing they’ve done,” he muttered, easing onto the bench near the fire. The movement sent a jolt of pain down his ribs.

“You’re bleeding.” She snatched up a cloth from the basin, kneeling before him. “Hold still.”

He winced but obeyed, letting her press the cloth to the wound beneath his tunic. Silence settled between them, broken only by the fire’s hiss and the far-off squawk of a gull.

“What happened?” Maya asked, voice quieter now.

“There’s to be a tournament,” Phoenix said. “By the King’s order.”

Her head snapped up. “A tournament?”

He nodded once. “Any knight may enter. No matter their name or standing.”

Maya leaned back on her heels, brows drawn. “You plan to fight?”

“I plan to win.”

She stared at him, stunned into silence. Then, as if something snapped, she rose and threw the bloody cloth into the basin with a splash. “You’ve gone mad, Nick.”

“It’s a chance—”

“It’s a death sentence,” she spat. “If they discover who you really are—if they see your face, your hair—”

“I won’t enter as a knight,” he cut in, voice low. “That’s not the plan.”

Maya paused, frowning. “Then what?”

“I’ll decline the invitation. Let Sir Nicholas Wright disappear from the list.” He looked toward the soot-streaked window where the distant towers of Whitehall loomed through the fog. “But the Carivales… I’ll be there. As myself. Or rather, the other self they fear so much.”

Realization dawned, and Maya’s face twisted with alarm. “The thief?”

He said nothing.

“The Carivales is for the King’s closest. Nobles. Lords. You won’t wear a helm to hide your face there. You’ll be caught the moment the mask slips!”

“Then it won’t slip,” he said flatly.

She crossed her arms. “You hate the nobles. You’ve always said so. They’re the ones who let the slums rot while they drink sweet wine behind gold gates.”

“I do hate them.”

“Then why go among them?” Her voice cracked now, eyes shining. “Why put yourself at their mercy?”

Phoenix looked at the hearth. At the little cracked bowl of barley gruel Maya had been scraping together for Pearl. “It’s not just the coin,” he said.

“Then what?” she pressed, stepping closer. “What’s this all for, Nick? You’re not chasing some title—hell, you won’t even keep the rank you earned. You sneak into the barracks, you bleed for training, and for what? Just to throw it all away at a masquerade?”

He didn’t speak. Didn’t meet her gaze.

Maya’s voice dropped to a whisper. “There’s someone there. Someone you haven’t told me about.”

Phoenix’s eyes flinched, but still, he said nothing.

“You’ve never said it aloud, but I see how you watch the castle when the mist lifts. Like something’s waiting for you behind those gates.”

He clenched his jaw.

“You’ve been hiding something from me, Nick. I don’t know what it is. But I know it’s not just about feeding the slums anymore.”

From behind the faded curtain, a small voice broke the stillness. “Maya…?”

Both turned.

Pearl padded into the glow of the firelight, her little feet bare on the cold floor. “Why are you shouting?” she mumbled, rubbing sleep from her eyes.

Maya dropped into a crouch at once, arms open. “We’re not shouting, Pearly. Just talking too loud.”

Phoenix knelt beside them, brushing a hand over Pearl’s tangled hair. “Everything’s fine,” he said gently.

Pearl leaned against him, hugging his neck. “You’re always gone…”

“I know,” he murmured. “But soon, that might change.” He stood slowly, carrying her back behind the curtain and settling her beneath the patchwork blanket.

When he returned to the hearth, Maya was standing by the window, watching the fog roll over Whitehall’s distant ramparts. “You’re playing a dangerous game, Nick,” she said softly, without turning.

“I never intended to play it safe,” Phoenix replied.

And in the silence that followed, the fire cracked, and the storm outside crept closer.

•••

The marbled antechamber of Whitehall Palace glowed with the flickering light of wrought-iron sconces. The air was scented faintly with beeswax and smoke, and beneath the archways, nobles murmured like doves waiting for the next court decree.

Yet all fell silent as Princess Franziska’s voice rang out like a whip crack. “A low-born knight? In the Carivales?” she hissed, her heeled steps echoing sharply on the polished stone floor. “What madness has seized this court?”

She stood at the center of the chamber in a gown of deep midnight, embroidered with silver thread that shimmered like frost beneath candlelight. Her hair was braided into an intricate crown, her posture as rigid as a blade unsheathed.

Across from her stood Lord Miles Edgeworth, the King’s Esquire of the Body, hands clasped behind his back, his maroon justaucorps pristine as ever. His expression bore no scorn nor humor—merely that same unreadable calm.

“The tournament was opened to all,” he replied in his low, measured tone. “The victor earns entrance through skill alone, not title.”

Franziska scoffed. “Skill? Please. If a man from the gutter waves a sword with flair, we bow and offer him a place beside dukes and earls now?”

Edgeworth did not respond.

She stepped closer, her voice dropping to a sharp whisper. “You lost the thief, and now His Majesty covers your failure with spectacle. And we’re to reward it? Shall we invite the rats of the slums next?”

Before she could continue, the great oaken doors swung wide. King Manfred entered with the clank of boots behind him, his dark mantle sweeping across the marble tiles. His face was hard as flint beneath his gilded circlet.

“Still prattling on, Franziska?” the King growled, stopping between them. “A princess ought to know when to bite her tongue.”

“I speak only because I see weakness, Your Majesty,” she said, managing a graceful curtsy. “If I had a sword—”

“You do not,” he snapped. “You are a daughter of this realm, not a soldier. Leave swordplay to men. There is little beauty in a woman wielding a blade.”

Franziska stiffened. “And yet I have trained in secret. I am no less skilled than Lord Edgeworth.”

“That is not the point,” the King said, tone cutting. “A princess exists to be seen. Heard only when summoned. You are a pearl in a velvet box—not an arrow in the quiver.”

Franziska’s mouth twitched, but she said nothing more.

The King’s voice grew colder. “You will attend the Carivales. You will smile, and you will speak only when spoken to. You will not embarrass this court with talk of war or steel. Is that understood?”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” Franziska bit out.

With a grunt of finality, Manfred turned and strode from the hall, the clatter of his guards echoing after him.

When the doors closed behind them, silence stretched once more.

Franziska’s hands trembled at her sides. “I could catch the thief,” she muttered through clenched teeth. “I could match Edgeworth blow for blow and still hold back enough not to wound him.” Her eyes snapped to Edgeworth. “Say something. Say I’m wrong.”

But Edgeworth’s face was still, his gaze unreadable.

She stepped closer. “You know I’m right.”

He regarded her for a moment, and though his lips did not move, there was something in his gaze—a quiet, unspoken truth. He did not believe as the King did. He never had.

Still, he said nothing.

Franziska turned from him with a scoff, her voice low and bitter. “Silent again. Like always.”

And with that, she swept away down the corridor, the silver threads of her gown glinting like blades in the firelight.

•••

The clang of swords rang through the crisp morning air, echoing off the stone walls that surrounded the training grounds just beyond Whitehall Palace. The grass was worn down from countless bouts, damp with dew and churned earth beneath armored boots. Knights-in-training formed a loose ring around the two combatants at the center, their voices rising now and again in cheers or jeers.

Phoenix moved like no one else there.

His steps were swift and sure, weaving between strikes with the kind of instinct that couldn’t be taught in royal halls. He fought with a practiced unpredictability—ducking low, shifting his balance, striking when no one expected it. His blade arced through the air in gleaming, elegant curves. It was not the polished swordplay of nobility, but something leaner. Sharper.

He didn’t fight like a knight. He fought like someone who had survived.

High above, from a narrow stone balcony overlooking the practice fields, Lord Miles Edgeworth stood still, his gloved hands clasped behind his back. The air was cold, but he did not shiver. His focus was absolute.

His eyes followed one man.

Sir Nicholas Wright, newly knighted. Unknown blood. Promoted swiftly through the ranks, though few could name a patron. No title. No lands. Just a helm, a sword, and silence.

And yet, Edgeworth narrowed his gaze as Phoenix parried a heavy blow from his opponent, then ducked beneath the next with a movement too refined, too fluid, to have come from royal drills alone. He twisted, pivoted—countered in a way that made Edgeworth's breath catch. The opponent’s sword clattered to the ground. A few onlookers gasped.

Edgeworth didn’t.

He knew that move.

His hand slowly unclasped behind his back.

It was not a maneuver taught in the palace courts or even among the elite guard. It was rare—elegant in its simplicity, devastating in its precision. And Edgeworth had not seen it in years.

Because it had been taught only to him.

By his father.

Lord Gregory Edgeworth.

Edgeworth's jaw tensed.

The memory came unbidden: a boy of seven, panting in the courtyard under his father’s calm instruction, repeating the same motion again and again until his arms ached and his fingers blistered.

That technique was not meant to be passed on.

And yet, here it was—in the hands of a nameless knight who should have had no claim to it.

Below, the match continued. Another challenger stepped forward, a brute of a man with a battered helm. Phoenix moved to meet him, but took a hard strike to the chest—enough to stagger him.

He stumbled, catching himself—but the blow knocked his helmet askew. It was his mistake, he knew; he hadn’t worn chainmail beneath his surcoat, counting on speed over caution. Foolish. Chainmail would have softened the blow, held the helm steadier. But haste—and pride—had made him careless.

A gauntleted hand reached up to adjust it.

Too late.

A sharp, spiked tuft of dark hair slipped free from beneath the rim, catching the morning sun.

Edgeworth’s eyes sharpened.

It was only a glimpse.

But for a man like Edgeworth, a glimpse was enough to draw blood from water.

That shape—those unmistakable spikes—he had seen them before, flickering beneath the moonlight as a thief darted across the rooftops of the capital, just ahead of the guards.

That same silhouette had haunted the treasury, eluded every patrol. The faceless rogue who mocked the court with every coin stolen.

Could it be?

Edgeworth’s brow furrowed deeply. He would not jump to conclusions—not yet. It could be coincidence. It should be coincidence.

But Edgeworth did not believe in coincidences.

Not when the man in question moved like a shadow, fought like a ghost—and now wielded his father’s technique.

He took one final glance down at the figure, now sparring once more with measured caution. The helmet was back in place. No trace of the hair remained.

But the doubt had been planted. And with it, a mission.

Edgeworth turned sharply on his heel, the heels of his boots striking the stone as he walked back through the corridor toward the palace interior. His face was unreadable—save for the flicker of something cold and sharp behind his eyes.

Whoever this Nicholas Wright was… He intended to find out.

And before long, that helmet would come off. One way or another.

Chapter Text

Beneath the veil of twilight, when the fog curled low along the cobblestones and the lamps of noble estates flickered like watchful eyes, the rogue struck.

He was a myth to some, a shadow to others. Known in the slums as “Phoenix,” a name whispered among those who had seen his deeds firsthand, his very presence was enough to stir the air with a sense of rebellion. He had many other names—ghost, devil, trickster—but none spoke his true nature as well as the one his closest friends called him. Few dared speak it aloud, save for those who could claim him as a friend, like Maya and Pearl, who knew the heart of the man behind the mask.

His coat was a deep, stormy blue, long and sweeping like the night itself, its high collar hooked close to his neck. The edges of the coat fell in a subtle inverted V, traced with black frilled trim that danced faintly with every movement. It wasn’t the garb of a noble, but neither was it that of a common thief—it was a coat designed to vanish into shadows and strike like smoke.

Around his throat was a strange flourish: not quite a tie, nor fully a bow, but a combination of both—a dark ribboned knot, sharp and elegant, as though stolen from a courtier’s wardrobe and twisted into rebellion. It gave his figure a flash of charm that felt almost mocking.

He wore black hose that fit close to his legs and tall black boots laced with fine golden cord, shining faintly with each step. Black gloves encased his hands, nimble and sure. And on one of his collar hooks, a livery badge of gold—a phoenix mid-rise—glimmered like a secret he dared the world to ask about.

His mask, smooth and black, obscured his face from the eyes down. But above it, his hair jutted skyward in fierce, windblown spikes, like a wild crown shaped by defiance. No wind dared muss it. No chase could catch it.

Tonight, he had his eye on Lord Richard Wellington, a noble draped in silks and arrogance, whose fortune was as gaudy as it was ill-earned. Phoenix had tailed him from a jeweled parlor to a tavern entrance, unseen among the shadows, his deck of cards tucked at his hip, worn smooth by use. Not a weapon, not quite—but deadly in his hands all the same.

“Fancy a game, milord?” came the rogue’s voice from a nearby alcove, the cards in his hands flashing like silverfish. “I hear you never lose. Shall we test that?”

Lord Wellington turned, disdain etched across his powdered face. “You!” he spat, reaching for a blade—but it was already too late.

A card—a king of hearts—sliced through the air, pinning the noble’s feathered hat to the wooden tavern sign. Gasps rang out, but the rogue was already moving, springing to the rooftop with ease, a whirlwind of color and grin.

Only later would Lord Wellington discover his coin purse missing, a card left in its place tied with black ribbon—a calling card from the jester of the streets.

But Phoenix Wright—masked or not—was no stranger to the people. He was known in every crumbling alley of the East End, where chimney smoke mixed with hunger and cold. The children called him the “card rogue” and chased after him with cheers when he passed. And in the heart of the slums, Maya—a clever herbalist with laughter like church bells—called him friend. She patched his wounds and kept his secrets, sometimes scolding him for taking too many risks, always insisting he eat before vanishing again.

He’d learned the craft of misdirection in the gutter, where taverns offered bread to clever boys and a game of cards could earn a meal—or a lesson. There, among broken teeth and spilled ale, he had honed his skill: to read faces, to bluff, to steal without a touch.

He stole not for greed, but for justice. The coins he lifted from the cruel fattened bellies of nobility found their way to the starved, the sick, the silenced.

He was a phantom, a whisper, a laugh on the wind. The rogue who never stayed. The thief who never missed.

And as he stood atop the slate-tiled rooftops, looking down upon the city like a deity of misrule, Phoenix flicked a card between his fingers.

The queen of spades.

He smirked beneath his mask. “Let’s play again.”

Before Phoenix Wright became the rogue whispered of in the shadowed alleys of the Southbank—Nick, the phantom thief with a noble’s stride—he had lived another life, gentler and dimmer, beneath the high-arched stone vaults of St. Mary’s Abbey. He had been left as a babe on the abbey’s steps, swaddled in a threadbare blanket and baptized in candlelight. The sisters of the order raised him not with blood, but with bread and scripture. He was never theirs, but they made him feel as though he belonged.

It was Sister Mia who shaped him most. Not his mother, but Maya’s elder sister and Pearl’s cousin—wise beyond her years, sharp in word and warm in heart. She taught him to read by the light of oil lamps, tucked beneath the Abbey’s choir loft. She patched his scrapes and gently cuffed his ear when he came back late from the city streets. He wandered often—into the Southbank slums, where hunger and smoke wove through every breath—and Mia never forbade it. Instead, she gave him what she could: a crust of bread to share, an old cloak to lend, a whispered prayer. “If God made us all,” she would say, tucking his hair behind his ear, “then the gutter holds saints too.”

She had taught him to give. And after the Abbey burned, he never stopped.

It was during the great upheaval of the Reformation, when Church and Crown warred beneath the guise of faith, and noblemen fattened on the chaos. Lord Redd White—a courtier known more for his vanity than virtue—had made his rise on the back of such fires. Ostensibly a man of reform, he saw abbeys not as houses of God but as obstacles to ambition. It was whispered that he paid for the torching of St. Mary’s with coin wrapped in the Crown’s favor, under the veil of piety.

The fire came in the dark hours, silent at first. Phoenix remembered waking to the scent of smoke, thick and heavy. Mia had roused him and the girls—Maya’s hand in one of hers, Pearl curled against her side. She had pushed them out through the vestry gate as the roof began to groan and buckle. “Run,” she’d said, shoving Phoenix forward. “Protect them.” Her voice had cracked—not with fear, but with urgency, love sharpened to steel.

They had obeyed. And Mia had vanished into the flames.

The Abbey was ash by dawn. No bell tolled for her. No noble was held to account. The Church turned its face, as it often did in those days, and found no sin worth avenging.

Phoenix never forgot. And from that night forward, he became something colder.

But not cruel. He did not steal for revenge alone. He stole for the hungry, for the sick, for those Sister Mia would have cared for with her hands and her prayers. Her compassion lived on in him, now tempered with a thief’s cunning. Every coin lifted from a noble’s purse, every mask he wore to unearth corruption—it was all in her memory. A tribute, and a promise.

He bore no crest, no title, no house. But in the slums they called him “Phoenix,” and they knew the sound of his boots on the roof tiles meant food would be on the table by morning. Maya stood beside him—furious and fearless, her grief masked in bitter jests and stubborn grace. She hated the nobles as much as he did, though her war was fought in potions and sharp words.

Pearl was too young to remember the fire. To her, the Abbey was a dream of warm hands and the smell of bread. She did not know why Maya bristled when silk passed by in the market, or why Phoenix never bowed his head in a church. But she followed them both, always—raised by shadow, memory, and the warmth of a woman lost to smoke.

Phoenix Wright did not forget. And he did not forgive. But in every act, in every coin tossed quietly into an open palm, he ensured that Mia’s light had not gone out. Not entirely.

The slums of Southbank were quieter than usual that morning, hushed beneath a low fog that clung to crooked timbers and sagging rooftops. Children crouched near chimneys for warmth, mothers stirred thin stews over meager hearths, and old men coughed into their sleeves as they watched for guards who might come knocking—not to help, but to collect.

Phoenix, small and scrappy, sat on the edge of a broken cart wheel, chewing the last crust of yesterday’s bread. He was ten at the time, not quite old enough to be ignored, not quite young enough to be pitied. He’d wandered from the Abbey, as he often did, drawn to the rhythm of the streets—the language of barter, the smell of fire and damp stone. Here, Sister Mia had once handed out bread wrapped in linen and patched wounds with her bare hands. Here, he had learned how easily the world forgot the poor.

He glanced up only when the clatter of hooves echoed sharply down the muddied lane—not the brash thunder of the King’s men, but a deliberate, measured trot.

A rider approached, and the street seemed to still around him.

The man wore no armor, but his bearing was unmistakably noble—shoulders square in a crimson cloak trimmed with sable, a doublet of fine velvet. Dust clung to his boots from the road—boots that had clearly walked among more than just palace marble. At his side, a boy rode a smaller, coal-black horse, quiet and wide-eyed beneath a curtain of silver hair.

Phoenix stood slowly, wary. Nobles did not come here. Not unless they were lost, or looking to take.

But the man dismounted. He handed his reins to his retainer and knelt before an old woman sitting on the stoop of a collapsed chapel.

“I come not for gold,” he said, his voice warm and clear, “but to offer it.”

From his satchel, he produced bread, apples, cloth. More than that—coin. Real coin, stamped with the King’s seal. He handed it to the woman with both hands, as though her worth had never been in question.

“Tell the others,” he murmured. “This is not charity. It is justice delayed.”

He moved from person to person, speaking names when he knew them, asking gently when he did not. There was no fanfare, no guards barking at his flanks. Only care.

When he reached the broken cart, he paused before Phoenix, studying him with a thoughtful gaze.

“You’ve a sharp look,” he said, crouching. “What is your name?”

“Phoenix,” the boy replied, cautious, though something in him leaned forward like a wick to a flame.

“A bold name,” the man said with a soft smile. “I am Lord Gregory Edgeworth. This is my son, Miles.”

The boy beside him dismounted in silence. He didn’t speak—his mouth a line too serious for his age—but gave a nod, precise and polite. He looked clean, disciplined, as if he belonged to another world entirely.

Gregory’s voice lowered. “I know what they say of nobles—that we dine in gold and let the poor starve beneath us. But not all of us serve the Crown’s blindness.”

Phoenix blinked, caught off guard. He had never heard a noble speak that way. Not even Sister Mia, kind as she was, had dared to hope aloud for such things.

“One day,” Gregory continued, “this kingdom will answer for how it treats its poorest. And if not by mercy—then by reckoning. There must be those brave enough to speak for them. Even if they wear a lord’s cloak.”

He placed a firm hand on Phoenix’s shoulder. “You remember this, Phoenix. The world is built by those who rise from the ashes.” From his coat, he drew out a small wooden token etched with a lion and a quill—his family’s crest. He placed it into Phoenix’s palm with care, not ceremony. But he did not mount again.

Instead, he turned to his son. “Help me unload the rest.”

Miles hesitated only briefly before nodding. His hands moved with the awkwardness of a child who had never carried burdens but was willing to learn.

Phoenix watched them both, uncertain.

Then Gregory looked back to him once more. “You may help too, if you like. You seem capable.”

Phoenix stared down at the token, then at the cart. And slowly, quietly, he stepped forward.

They spent the morning together, emptying the saddlebags of food and cloth, speaking little but working side by side. It was the first time Phoenix saw a noble reach for something other than power. He never forgot it.

The sun had risen higher, burning through the damp morning mist that clung to the narrow streets of Southbank. Though the alley’s shadows still stretched long, there was a quiet warmth in the air. Lord Gregory Edgeworth stood a short distance away, arms folded loosely as he watched over the last of the food being handed out. A few grateful murmurs drifted from the villagers, but his gaze wasn’t on them—it lingered on the two boys near the crumbling fence.

Phoenix, a scrappy lad with sun-browned skin and quick hands, had not left Miles’s side. And to Gregory’s mild surprise, his son had allowed it.

“You don’t talk much, do you?” Phoenix asked, his voice bright and teasing.

Miles didn’t look at him directly. “I speak when necessary.”

“That sounds awfully lonely,” Phoenix grinned, undeterred. “You’ve got that soldier’s look. Serious and stiff.”

Miles glanced at him, unamused.

Phoenix continued, undaunted. “So... what’s it like, living near the King?”

Miles blinked. “It is where my father serves. At Whitehall.”

“Right, your father.” Phoenix squinted in the morning light. “He’s different. Most lords wouldn’t even glance at us, but he spoke like we mattered.”

Miles nodded. “He remembers what others forget.”

Phoenix’s brows lifted. “You look up to him.”

“Of course I do.” The words left Miles’s mouth easily, without pause or self-consciousness. “He is the Esquire of the Body. The King’s closest protector and most trusted advisor. He serves with honor. Strength. Mercy.”

Phoenix stared for a beat, then let out a low whistle. “That’s a mouthful.”

Miles stood straighter. “It is the truth.”

“And you wanna be like him?”

“I train every morning,” Miles said. “Swordsmanship, Latin, courtly conduct, the code of knighthood… I must be prepared. One day, I hope to inherit his title.”

Phoenix tilted his head, curiosity blooming. “You train with a real sword?”

“I do,” Miles said.

Phoenix’s eyes sparked. “Show me something.”

“There is no sword,” Miles replied.

Phoenix grinned, already bounding toward a nearby ditch. “Then we’ll use sticks!”

He rummaged for a moment before pulling out two branches, one slightly curved and the other stiff and straight. He tossed the straighter one toward Miles, who caught it easily. With a practiced grip, Miles raised it in front of him, posture shifting, shoulders squaring.

Phoenix tried to mimic him, feet wide, knees bent. He adjusted the stick like a child playing at soldier, eyes darting between Miles’s stance and his own.

“You must turn your back foot,” Miles said, stepping forward. He nudged Phoenix’s heel with his toe. “Like that.”

Phoenix adjusted, overcorrected, wobbled, then laughed. “This is harder than it looks.”

Miles didn’t smile, but there was a flicker of something in his expression—interest, maybe even amusement. Then, without a word, he swung.

Their sticks clacked together in the air, sharp and clean. Phoenix stumbled back a step, then grinned and swung again. This time Miles blocked, pivoting lightly on his heel. The boy’s form was striking—controlled, fluid, far beyond his years.

They circled each other like cats on cobblestone, their wooden weapons cracking against each other in rhythm. Phoenix moved with raw instinct, quick and unpredictable. Miles, by contrast, fought with elegance and precision, every step purposeful.

“You’re fast,” Miles said, breath quickening. “And reckless.”

Phoenix ducked, twisted, and flicked his stick in a low arc that nearly caught Miles at the knee. “Reckless wins.”

“No,” Miles corrected, stepping aside and raising his stick to Phoenix’s chest. “Skill wins.”

They held still for a moment, sticks crossed between them. Then both broke into laughter—Phoenix’s full and open, Miles’s softer, a thing seldom heard.

Not far away, Lord Gregory stood watching them. He had remained still the entire time, but now he allowed a faint smile to touch the corner of his lips. His son had always been solitary, cautious, shaped by the burden of lineage and the court’s cruel expectations.

But here, sparring with a boy from the streets, Miles had laughed. Just then, footsteps hurried across the cobbles.

“Phoenix Wright!” came a familiar voice, sharp and maternal. Sister Mia’s habit fluttered behind her as she approached, her hands already lifting to her hips. “What do you think you’re doing? You’ll knock that poor boy senseless!”

Phoenix lowered his stick quickly, grinning sheepishly. “We were just—uh—practicing. He’s really good.”

Miles stepped back with the practiced poise of someone already used to courtly reprimands, but his cheeks were faintly flushed.

Mia turned, ready to scold them both—but Gregory raised a hand, a quiet but commanding gesture.

“He is not harmed,” Gregory said gently. “In fact, I’d wager he’s learned more in five minutes than most boys do in a week.”

Mia blinked, caught off-guard.

Gregory’s tone softened further. “Let them be, Sister. They are only boys. And boys, if they are to grow into better men, must be allowed their own measure of wildness.”

She exhaled, her sternness faltering into a quiet sigh. “So long as they do not break bones.”

“Agreed,” Gregory said with a nod.

Phoenix cast a sideways look at Miles, then at Mia, then back at Gregory. A strange warmth had settled in his chest—something that felt like belonging, even if it would not last.

And Lord Gregory, eyes now on both boys, felt it too.

Perhaps fate had plans for them after all. And for now, he would let the moment unfold.

•••

The hall outside the King’s solar was quiet, thick with tapestries and the scent of burning sage. Morning light filtered through the narrow stained glass windows, painting fractured saints upon the cold stone floor. Within, the air held tension sharper than any sword.

Princess Franziska stood before the high-backed throne, her shoulders squared, arms behind her like a soldier before a commander. Her gown was of deep sea-blue velvet, cinched at the waist with silver cord, though she wore it like armor rather than ornament. A fine circlet of pearls crowned her pale brow, but she had not touched the coals to her cheeks as a proper lady might. Her gloves were off. Her sword hand was bare.

King Manfred lounged upon the throne, draped in sable-trimmed crimson. His fingers toyed with the heavy signet at his throat as he regarded her like a falcon sizing up a misbehaving hound.

“You are of age,” he said coolly, voice echoing faintly beneath the stone arch. “And your bloodline—such as it is—must be tied to something useful. Lord Atmey of Kent has offered twice your weight in gold for your hand.”

“I’d rather die in the field than be bartered like meat,” Franziska answered, her tone clipped and level.

Manfred scoffed, rising from his seat. “Then you think too much of yourself, girl. Your duty is to bind kingdoms, not tear through them with steel.” He stepped forward, slow and deliberate. “You’ve had your amusements—parading about with a blade, playing captain to your guardsmen. But a womb bears heirs, not swords.”

Franziska did not flinch, though her jaw tensed. “And if a man had said what I just did? You’d have knighted him. Given him command and sent him to the front lines.”

“Aye,” Manfred said without pause. “Because a man is born to blood and iron. A woman, to obedience. You were granted the courtesy of a sword when you were small. Do not mistake it for a right.”

“I’ve bested more of your knights than I’ve danced with suitors,” she snapped.

“And yet, you shall do both,” he growled. “You will go to the chapel at St. Cuthbert’s this morn. Pay your respects. Make your prayers. Let the people see their princess as pious, as proper. And when you return, we shall speak again—when your tongue is cooled and your head bowed.”

Franziska’s eyes burned, but she bowed—just low enough to avoid a lash of words worse than any whip. She turned on her heel, skirts whispering like wind through reeds, and strode from the chamber with the grace of a soldier forced to dance.

The guards at the chamber doors stepped aside.

Let them watch. Let them talk. Let them say she wore her steel too proud and her crown too sharp.

Let them say she bowed to no man but the Lord.

And even then, only because He did not ask her to wed.

The bells of Saint Cuthber tolled low and solemn, each chime shuddering through the stones like a warning long overdue. Fog clung to the chapel’s outer walls, as if reluctant to part with the sins whispered within. Inside, the nave lay dim and still, save for the soft murmur of prayer and the distant creak of age-old beams. Candlelight flickered weakly, as though wary of what it might reveal.

Kneeling near the altar was a girl cloaked not in silks, but simplicity.

Maya knelt alone in the hush of the chapel, her slender form wrapped in a plain dress of rough canvas, dyed a dull, uneven purple—more berry-stained than properly colored. It hung awkwardly about her, stitched by hand, the seams worn soft by years of wear and rain. Barefoot, she rested on the cold stone floor, her toes curling slightly against the chill.

In her hands, she held a silver matäb—a cross necklace dulled by time, its fine links softened with handling. It had belonged to her sister, Sister Mia, once the light of St. Mary’s. Now it was the only relic Maya had left of her. The chain trembled slightly with each breath, each whispered prayer—not to God, but to the woman whose absence filled the silence more than any hymn ever could.

Her lips moved in soft reverence. But it was not a psalm she recited. It was memory. She did not speak to God. She never had. Her prayers, if they were such things, were always for Mia. “You would have known what to say,” she murmured, head bowed. “Not just what to believe.” She closed her eyes and drew a breath. The incense curled in the air like a ghost.

Behind her, the great doors opened.

Princess Franziska strode into Saint Cuthber’s with the air of a storm given flesh. Though her gown was fit for courtly observance—a soft silver-blue laced with finework—it hung on her like armor chafing its bearer. Her steps echoed against the stone as she walked the length of the nave, chin high, refusing to kneel, refusing even to slow. A princess by name, yes—but not by submission.

The nuns glanced up with quick, darting eyes. Some crossed themselves. One offered a hushed, “Your Grace.”

Franziska did not answer. Her gaze swept over the sanctuary—cold, assessing, bored—and then settled, however briefly, on the barefoot girl by the altar. Her mouth pressed into a harder line. She turned away.

And that was when the doors slammed open behind her—not with grace, but with violence.

Men poured in, cloaks torn, eyes wild, armed with rusted steel and the glint of fanatic conviction. Protestants—zealots warped by the fire of reform, come to strike down the heart of papist tradition. They howled scripture like war chants, blades drawn not for honor, but for vengeance.

Panic erupted. A censer crashed to the floor, coals scattering like fallen stars. One nun screamed and fled. Others ducked behind pews or clutched their rosaries. Smoke from outside crept in, curling like unclean breath through the sacred air.

Maya turned in terror. She stumbled to her feet, the matäb swinging from her fingers as her breath caught. Her lips parted in a silent plea—not to God, but to her sister.

Franziska did not flinch.

With a snarl, she seized the lower half of her gown and tore it clean through, silk and silver stitch splitting like parchment beneath her grip. The long skirts fell in limp ruin about her feet, revealing high-laced boots, breeches of dark leather, steel bracers strapped to her calves—armor, hidden and waiting.

From within her bodice she drew a blade. Its hilt gleamed like judgment, its length smooth and clean. A knight’s weapon, not a courtly toy. “You dare bring this heresy to holy ground?” Her voice cracked like a whip, slicing through smoke and fear alike. “Then come. Let us see if your god delivers you from me.”

The men paused—first in surprise, then in laughter. One spat on the flagstone. “The King sends skirts to defend his church?”

“She’s naught but a chit in ribbons,” sneered another, raising his sword. “Let her bleed like any whore in velvet.”

They surged toward her.

And she met them like a lioness uncaged.

Steel clanged, flesh fell. Franziska’s sword cut low and arced high, severing sleeves and slicing through arrogance. The first man fell clutching his gut, gurgling prayers that came too late. Another lunged, expecting hesitation—he was met with a parry so swift his own blade clattered from his hands.

They had come expecting nuns, not a soldier. And certainly not a woman who moved like fury itself.

“Fight me properly, you cowards!” she bellowed. “Or die on your knees like the cowards you are!”

Blood sprayed across the altar steps. Maya stood frozen behind the rail, her matäb clutched tightly to her chest, breath shallow, eyes wide. She had seen violence before—in the alleys of the poor, in the deaths left behind by soldiers and sin—but never like this.

Never with such grace. Such wrath. Such terrible beauty.

Franziska fought with her whole body—each swing a statement, each pivot a defiance. She was not merely a woman; she was judgement.

One zealot veered toward Maya.

Franziska was there in a breath. She smashed her pommel into his temple, sending him sprawling. The crack of it echoed through the nave like a church bell struck too hard. She spun to Maya, sword drawn, stance wide, protective. “Behind me,” she barked. “Stay low.”

Maya obeyed, dropping to the cold stone, heart slamming against her ribs. But her eyes, they could not look away.

Franziska’s braid had come undone, pale strands clinging to her cheek like threads of silver spun in sweat and soot. Her sleeves hung in tatters, one shoulder bared, her arm streaked with blood and ash. A cut marked her face—not deep, and not her own, she thought, but borrowed from another's fury. Her jaw was set. Her stance, unyielding. And though the golden crucifix still stood behind her upon the altar, it was Franziska who looked like judgment made flesh.

In the wavering glow of torch and firelight, she was no longer garbed in courtly silk but in fury, in fire, in fearless defiance.

And Maya’s heart… it fluttered.

Not with gratitude.

Not with awe.

But with longing.

The thought struck like stone to glass. Maya turned her face away, shutting her eyes fast, as though darkness might drive the feeling from her. Her cheeks burned—not from the blaze, but from the shape of Franziska’s lips, the curve of her spine, the power in her voice.

’Tis but fear, she told herself. The moment, the smoke, the danger.

But she had looked upon a noble with awe.

A noble.

And Maya—whose sister had been martyred by noble silence, whose people were mocked in their prayers and crushed beneath boot and gold—was not meant to feel awe when faced with one of them. She was meant to feel fury. Disdain. Hatred.

Yet how could she, when this noble had drawn steel to defend them? When she had cast off the trappings of privilege and stood like a flame in the haze?

Maya’s chest clenched. She could not tell if it was shame… or something far crueler.

She was meant to despise them. And yet—she could not look away.

But no danger had ever twisted her heart so. Not when soldiers stormed the alleys, nor when her sister’s body was laid cold beneath the light of prayer candles. Not even when the church burned with holy writ and mortal wrath.

Only now. Only here.

She clutched her sister’s matäb close, the silver cross cold against the heat rising in her skin. She held it tight, tighter still, as though it might draw out the thoughts she dared not speak. She whispered Mia’s name like penance, not prayer.

For in that moment—in the smoke-laced hush of Saint Cuthber’s nave—Maya felt what she had never dared before. And she was ashamed.

Not of Franziska.

Of herself.

Ashamed that her soul leapt not toward heaven, but toward a girl forged of fury and flame. That her hands did not tremble with faith—but with longing.

She had been raised to know holiness from heresy. To know which desires were sacred—and which would damn her. And this—this burning ache within her breast, this dangerous curiosity, this forbidden yearning—was no path to grace. It was a fissure in her devotion. A betrayal of all she had been taught, all that Mia had once held dear.

Maya folded in on herself, lips trembling, guilt swelling like stone in her throat.

Franziska moved again—another blade turned aside, another foe felled—and Maya did not dare to raise her eyes.

Not now. Not yet.

She feared what her heart might say if she did.

•••

The morning mist had not yet lifted from the stone courtyards of Whitehall, but already Lord Miles Edgeworth was at work. He stood in the royal library, surrounded by shelves of leather-bound volumes and scrolls sealed with wax, though his interest today was not in ink or parchment. His gloved fingers rested lightly on the hilt of his rapier, eyes narrowed in thought as a knight beside him spoke.

“He goes by Sir Nicholas Wright, m'lord,” said Sir Richard Gumshoe, a burly man with the bulk of a smith but the bearing of a soldier. His armor clinked as he shifted on his feet, clearly uncomfortable under Edgeworth’s steady gaze. “Rose from naught, they say. No coin to his name, no noble ties. From the Southbank slums, I hear.”

Edgeworth’s expression did not change, but his gaze sharpened. “And yet he holds a knight’s title?”

“Aye, sir,” Gumshoe replied with a slight nod. “Earned on the field, not bought. Fought in the border skirmishes last winter. Took down six men in a single push, defended a squire while wounded. Captain saw it himself, knighted him on the spot.”

Edgeworth turned from the window where the low sun crept across the stone sill, casting long beams across the tiled floor. “And since then?”

“He trains harder than most. Good with the squires,” Gumshoe answered, scratching the back of his neck beneath his gorget. “Odd thing, though. I’ve seen the way he moves. His swordplay’s not like ours. Not the standard King’s Yard style. Something quicker… clever. And it’s been said he’s defeated Sir Winston Payne himself.”

Edgeworth raised an eyebrow. “Payne?”

“Aye, sir. Payne’s no slouch, especially for a new knight. But Wright—he bested him with ease during a sparring match. Payne, for all his strength and confidence, couldn’t land a blow. Though the others tried their best, none could touch him. It caused quite a stir, I’m told.”

Edgeworth smirked slightly. Sir Winston Payne was known to be somewhat clumsy, despite his good intentions. He had the strength and tenacity, but often lacked the agility and finesse that made the truly skilled knights stand out. His lack of precision often led to his missteps, making him an easy target for someone quick-witted.

“Winston Payne,” Edgeworth mused. “Not known for his grace, I gather?”

“Not at all, m'lord,” Gumshoe chuckled. “The poor fellow’s more likely to trip over his own feet than strike a blow half the time. But Wright, well... he’s got a different way about him. No brute force. Just speed and precision.”

Edgeworth’s thoughts stirred. Payne’s clumsiness was no secret, but to hear that Wright had beaten him so easily... That confirmed what Edgeworth had suspected since their last encounter: this knight—this Sir Nicholas Wright—was no ordinary warrior.

Gumshoe continued, “There’s talk among the barracks that Payne was humiliated by the defeat. Can’t seem to stop talking about it, though he won’t admit it outright.”

Edgeworth turned from the window, a thoughtful frown crossing his face. “And this knight, Wright… What else do you know of him?”

“He’s a quiet sort,” Gumshoe replied, “keeps to himself mostly. But I’ve noticed he has a bit of a reputation already. The squires admire him for his skill, and even some of the older knights can’t help but respect him.”

Edgeworth’s thoughts stirred again. He had not yet forgotten the sparring match days prior—the elegance in Wright’s footwork, the precision of that rare parry his father had once taught him. And then… the flicker of spiked hair beneath the loosened helmet.

A faceless knight with no pedigree, trained in secret, gifted in war. A mask over something more. Suspicion brewed low in his chest, tempered with something stranger—familiarity.

Gumshoe cleared his throat, noticing the shift in Edgeworth's posture. “Ah, sir. If I may, the Gumshoe family has served your house for many years, as you know. My kin have worked in your service for decades. You can count on me.”

Edgeworth gave a subtle nod of appreciation, acknowledging the loyalty that had been a constant through the years. The Gumshoe family had been stalwart servants to the Edgeworths, steadfast even when many had faltered. Sir Richard was no different.

“I want his record,” Edgeworth said at last. “Every posting. Every victory. And see to it no one informs him I’ve asked.”

“Yes, m’lord.” Gumshoe saluted, then hesitated. “Beg pardon, but… if I may ask, why the interest?”

Edgeworth did not answer. He only turned back to the window, jaw set. Whatever secrets Sir Nicholas Wright carried, he would uncover them. And that helmet—Edgeworth would see it removed with his own hands.

•••

The Black Boar Tavern rang with coarse laughter and the clatter of tankards, its low rafters fogged by pipe smoke and the scent of roast hare left too long upon the spit. The floorboards, slick with old ale and boot-mud, creaked beneath the weight of cloaks and secrets. Firelight sputtered low in the hearth, more smoke than flame, casting flickering shadows that danced like gossip between drinkers.

In the dimmest corner, near a wall blackened by years of hearth-smoke, sat a solitary figure cloaked in rough wool. His hood was drawn low, his face little more than a suggestion beneath shadow. A chipped cup of watered wine sat untouched before him, gathering no more attention than a rat underfoot.

Phoenix listened.

He had made himself a part of the tavern’s bones, quiet and unmoving, allowing the ceaseless murmur of tongues to drift over him. Traders and soldiers, barmaids and beggars—all spoke freely here, lulled by drink and smoke. Names slipped like pebbles into water: debts, lovers, whispers of the King’s cruelty, the rising cost of grain. He caught what he could, sorting the mundane from the meaningful.

But then—like a knife hidden in bread—came a name that pricked the air.

“Sir Richard’s in again,” came a low voice, not far off. “That’s thrice this week. Drinks like a man chased by ghosts.”

“Aye,” said another, dry and amused. “Lord Edgeworth’s ghost, I’d wager. Says his lordship’s been prowling the palace like a caged hawk—ink-stained hands and storm in his eyes. Not spoken a kind word in days.”

Phoenix didn’t move, but his gaze lifted.

There, at a battered table not far from the fire, sat Sir Richard Gumshoe. His surcoat was rumpled, his belt loose, and his helm conspicuously absent—likely forgotten at whatever guard post he’d last manned. A dull sheen clung to his breastplate, the mark of rain not dried, and his tankard sat half-drained before him.

Everyone in the kingdom knew of Gumshoe’s loyalty. It wasn’t whispered or debated—it was legend. More than a knight, he was Lord Edgeworth’s hound, bound not by leash but by fierce, unshakable devotion. If Lord Edgeworth so much as lifted a hand, Gumshoe was already moving. Some jested that he would leap into fire if Edgeworth asked. Others didn’t jest at all.

And yet—despite that iron loyalty—Sir Richard Gumshoe was kind. Kind in a way most men forgot how to be. He bowed to princesses and offered bread to beggars with the same open hands. He helped a fallen washerwoman to her feet as readily as he would salute a bishop. His voice, though gruff, was patient with the stammer of the poor and the sobs of orphaned children.

He belonged to Edgeworth, yes—but he belonged to the people, too.

Phoenix narrowed his eyes.

Gumshoe looked like a knight unhorsed. The sort of man who bore loyalty like a chain around his neck—and now that chain had grown heavy.

Phoenix’s instinct stirred.

He could leave now. He had a whisper of Edgeworth’s unrest, and that alone might have been enough. But the voice of Mia came unbidden—clear as a bell struck in memory. Or perhaps it was younger still, the echo of a boy’s laugh in a field thick with summer dust, back when names like ‘Edgeworth’ and ‘Wright’ meant little more than bruised knuckles and stolen apples.

He stood. The cloak hung close to his body like a shadow as he moved through the tavern, weaving between stools and muddy boots. His fingers brushed past the purse of a merchant, the ring of a sleeping drunk, but he took nothing. Not tonight.

Gumshoe did not look up as the stranger sat beside him.

The fire crackled.

Sir Richard squinted into the flame as if searching for answers in the coals, his fingers curled around his tankard. “Y’ever seen a man carry silence like it were armor?” he muttered, not to the cloaked figure, but to the fire. “Like it’s heavier than mail.”

The hooded man gave a pause. “Depends,” he said at length. “What is he not saying?”

Gumshoe didn’t turn his head. “My lord. Lord Edgeworth. He’s troubled, but speaks it not. Walks the palace with a gaze sharp as a blade. Frowns like he’s scenting fire—but finds no smoke.”

“Perhaps there is no fire,” the voice offered evenly.

“There’s always fire,” Gumshoe said, quieter now. “He’s sniffing about, searching through parchment and guard lists. He’s got his eyes on a knight. One of ours.”

“Which knight?” The question was soft, almost careless.

“Sir Nicholas Wright,” Gumshoe replied, lifting his tankard once more. “Dunno why. Good lad. Bit green, sure, but steady on his feet. Polite. Quiet. Helps with the squires. Wouldn’t even squish a beetle ‘less it were in his boot. But Edgeworth—he’s watching him. Like a hawk over a rabbit.”

The figure did not move. Did not speak.

Gumshoe glanced sideways at last, and narrowed his eyes. “Y’know…” he said, voice slurred with the weight of ale and care, “you’ve the shape of someone I’ve been tryin’ to catch.”

The hood tilted, just slightly.

“The thief,” Gumshoe muttered. “The one that’s been slippin’ past our nets. Slippery as smoke, they say. Steals like a whisper. Folk swear he’s more ghost than man. And you—” he pointed vaguely, “you smell like trouble.”

The figure reached into his cloak.

Gumshoe tensed.

From the folds, the man drew a squashed tomato. He held it solemnly, like a relic. “This,” he said gravely, “is my curse.”

“…Beg pardon?”

“I was born,” the man said, “with the face of a tomato. Cursed by a midwife with a crooked heart. All my life, people have mistaken me. For bakers. For brigands. For blacksmith’s nephews. I walk into a town, and am accused before I’ve said a word. ‘Tis the curse of resemblance.”

A silence.

Then Gumshoe slowly nodded. “Tomato-face,” he said, with great sympathy. “That’s rough. Rotten sorcery, that.”

“Indeed. I am forever mistaken.”

Gumshoe raised his tankard. “May the gods peel her soul and boil her bones.”

“And may your helm always be where you left it,” the stranger replied with a bow of his head.

He rose, turned, and disappeared through the back door, boots silent on old stone.

Outside, in the chill of night, the cloaked figure paused in a narrow alley. Then, with a flick of his hand, he cast the cloak aside.

The rogue beneath emerged sharp-edged and shadow-slick: coat of storm-blue, boots laced in gold, gloves meant for silence. And gleaming at his collar, the small golden badge of a phoenix rising.

He walked fast, jaw tight, heart burning—not from fear, but from the heat of something else. Edgeworth was asking questions about Sir Nicholas Wright. And that meant the man was watching him more closely than ever before.

How Edgeworth had grown suspicious, Phoenix couldn’t say. He had been meticulous. Always. Never stole from a chamber he hadn’t surveyed thrice. Never left prints where none should tread. His spiked hair stayed hidden beneath a knight’s helm. He spoke little in court, nodded when spoken to, and kept his gaze away from Miles Edgeworth’s eyes.

And yet, somehow… the man had begun to look. Truly look.

Maybe it had been the hesitation—just a breath too long—when Edgeworth passed him that morning near the training yard. Or the way the lord’s hand lingered near his sword’s hilt as they crossed paths in the corridor. Perhaps it was the night Phoenix had left the tower window unlatched, forgetting how the wind might disturb the parchment left behind.

Whatever it was, it meant danger. Not because Phoenix feared confrontation. He didn’t. He had faced worse under harsher moons.

No—this was about the balance. The line he walked between shadow and daylight. Between the rogue and the knight. Between the man Edgeworth hated and the one he once knew.

If Edgeworth saw too clearly—if he put the pieces together—it wouldn’t be a sword Phoenix had to worry about.

It would be the way Miles Edgeworth said his name.

He ducked down a narrow passage between two buildings, boots skimming over frost-slick cobbles. The cold bit through his coat, but his mind burned with calculation.

He wasn’t afraid of being caught.

He was afraid of what would follow.

Chapter Text

Today was the Court of Steel, and Phoenix could not afford to falter. He had donned his armor in silence, helmet already lowered into place before the sun had even crested the tower roofs. He wore no crest but bore the name Nicholas Wright like a blade sheathed in cloth—quiet, sharp, and hiding everything that could damn him. The helm shadowed his face, but within, his jaw was set. Lord Edgeworth was investigating him, of that he was certain. And still, Phoenix stepped onto the field.

He could not let Maya see the strain in his eyes. She had remained quiet at supper the eve before, gently spooning broth to Pearl, her own bowl untouched. There was a heaviness to her—some worry she wouldn’t speak aloud. Phoenix didn’t ask. She had enough burdens without his.

The tiltyard stretched wide before him, raked earth flanked by pavilions and cheering crowds. Bright streamers hung limp in the sunless morning wind, and the breath of the crowd coiled pale in the cold air. Each knight who stepped forward carried steel bright and banners brighter. Horses pawed the ground, pennants fluttering like battle prayers.

Trumpets screamed their call.

From high above, where the crimson-draped dais loomed over the common ground, the King surveyed the combat with the gaze of a hawk. King Manfred—crowned in iron and draped in fur—sat like judgment carved from stone. Beside him, Princess Franziska watched without emotion, her lips pressed to a thin line, her gloved hand resting on the carved arm of her seat.

And at her other side—tall, unmoving, unmistakable—stood Lord Miles Edgeworth. No cape hung from his shoulders, no needless ornament adorned him. He stood severe and still as iron: black jerkin fitted tight, gloved hands behind his back, boots polished like obsidian. Though he made no move, Phoenix felt the weight of his gaze like a drawn sword—measured, relentless, unblinking.

The field of honor was not where secrets could hide. And Phoenix had never felt more seen.

Yet still he walked forward.

Below them, Sir Nicholas Wright fought.

And won.

Again, and again.

He moved with a grace that mocked the clumsy force of his opponents. His blade, plain but sure, flashed like silver rain beneath the pale spring sun. Each clash ended the same: a deft sidestep, a disarm, a firm, unyielding touch to the opponent’s breastplate to signal defeat. There were no flourishes, no boasts shouted to the crowd. Only the cold, practiced precision of a man who fought not for glory—but to survive.

The crowd roared for it. The court lords leaned forward in their seats, and even the commoners lining the railings found themselves breathless. They loved a swift match, and Sir Nicholas gave them what they hungered for—clean victories, one after another, with the ease of a man cutting wheat from the field.

One by one the knights fell—Sir Alard of Durham, tall and thunderous, crumpled beneath a feint and pivot. Sir Riven of Gloucester, known for his brute strength, dropped his sword before he even knew it was gone. Even young Sir Geoffrey of Bath, called the Silver Hope for his polished armor and noble lineage, yielded under Phoenix's unrelenting advance. The lad blinked up from the dust, astonished, as though he had dreamt the match.

Phoenix dispatched them all, and not a scratch marked his battered surcoat. The dull grey wool clung damp with sweat, but the man within never faltered. His helm stayed firmly on—the simple steel mask of an unremarkable knight. And yet… there was no mistaking it to those who truly watched: there was power beneath the plainness, a fire unspoken but fierce.

From the dais, Lord Edgeworth did not shift, but a slight narrowing of his eyes betrayed a flicker of thought. The way Phoenix shifted his stance before a blow—how he anticipated, not reacted. The grounded balance of his footwork. Suspicion curled like smoke in his chest. It was not just the way the man fought—it was the confidence, the deliberateness, the restraint.

Whoever he was, Sir Nicholas Wright was no common knight.

King Manfred leaned back in his gilded chair, stroking the jewel at his thumb with idle satisfaction. “A clever dog, this Wright,” the King mused aloud, voice thick with amusement. “Lean as a cur and twice as quick. I would take a dozen of his kind over one fat lordling of the court.”

Franziska said nothing, arms crossed tightly over her chest, though her mouth twitched at the corners—as if she might snarl rather than speak.

Edgeworth inclined his head slightly but kept his gaze pinned to the tiltyard. “He fights as though the blade were part of his own arm, Your Grace,” Edgeworth said, voice low. “Swift, but not reckless. Cunning, but not disloyal.”

Manfred chuckled, low and sharp, like the grinding of a whetstone. “Disloyalty has yet to be proven. And if it is, he shall find the axe swift as well.” He waved a gloved hand lazily. “But for now... let him dance. The Court of Steel grows duller by the year.”

Another trumpet blast cut through the murmuring crowds. Phoenix raised his blade in salute—proper, perfunctory—before settling into his stance once more, as the next opponent clanked into the ring.

Edgeworth’s gaze narrowed.

It was not merely Sir Nicholas’s skill that caught him. It was something deeper. Something that unsettled him in a way he could neither name nor dismiss.

The way Phoenix shifted his weight before a strike. The way he lured his opponent into committing with a faint slackness of stance—and then snapped the trap shut without hesitation.

These were not the habits of the self-taught nor the brutish flourishes of the field-trained. These were the rare, deliberate teachings of a master swordsman.

And Edgeworth had seen them before.

He was not remembering. He was witnessing.

The movements unfolding below were too precise, too familiar. They echoed the rigid drills and measured strikes that had once been pounded into his own limbs in the cold, stone-walled courtyard of his youth. They were not common to court or campaign. They were singular—disciplined, exact. Techniques known only to a chosen few.

Edgeworth had never passed them on.

Nor had any other he knew.

And yet here they lived, ghosting through every action of the man below—Sir Nicholas Wright, a name Edgeworth now doubted was truth.

His brow remained smooth, his posture unbent, but beneath the polished exterior, tension coiled tight. His hands clasped behind his back did not tremble—but the worn leather of his gloves groaned faintly beneath the pressure of his grip.

This was no mere tourney knight. No minor noble’s second son with a sword and a dream.

Sir Nicholas Wright was hiding something. Something grave.

Something dangerous.

Edgeworth's mind turned like a whetted blade. And he would see it uncovered—one layer at a time, if need be, until the truth stood bare as steel in sun.

The final opponent fell hard upon the trampled earth, sword flying from his hand with a clatter. Phoenix had not even needed to strike him down—only sidestepped the man’s lumbering charge and delivered a deft blow to the back of his knee, sending him sprawling.

The trumpets blared their shrill announcement of victory. The crowd roared, the sound swelling like the sea crashing against stone cliffs.

On the dais, King Manfred rose to his feet, a wolfish smile slashing across his face. His cloak of black and crimson swept behind him like a shadow as he lifted a hand to demand silence.

The crowd obeyed, falling into a hush thick with expectation.

Manfred’s voice rang out, cutting the cooling air like a blade. “Sir Nicholas Wright!” he bellowed, gesturing grandly to the lone figure standing amid the scattered bodies of the defeated. “You have entertained your King well this day!”

Another cheer went up—half genuine admiration, half the desperate devotion of those who knew their lives could be weighed on a single moment’s whim.

Phoenix bowed stiffly, helm still in place, sword resting against his shoulder. His heart drummed against his ribs, but outwardly he showed no sign. The game was not yet over.

King Manfred’s eyes glittered with a fevered delight. He turned, sweeping an arm toward the man standing at his right hand.

“But what is a tournament if not a proving ground for the greatest of our Court?” he cried. “It is not enough to best our rabble of knights—no! Let us see this new champion face the finest blade in my realm!” His hand dropped sharply, pointing—commanding. “To Lord Miles Edgeworth, Esquire of the Body!”

A collective gasp rose from the gathered nobles and commoners alike. Even Franziska’s composed mask fractured, her mouth parting slightly in shock. Somewhere across the field, a banner slipped from nerveless fingers.

Only Edgeworth stood motionless.

Beneath the weight of countless eyes, he inclined his head in a courtly bow—so slight it was nearly imperceptible—but when he straightened, his grey eyes were alive with a steely light.

He had not expected this. No one had. Yet if the King commanded it, he would obey.

And truth be told... there was something in him that hungered for it.

Without a word, he stepped forward from the dais. In the din, the crowd began to chant his name—Edgeworth! Edgeworth!—their voices rising into a thunder that shook the rafters of the tiltyard.

He moved down the stairs with measured grace, each step deliberate, unhurried. The silver at his temples caught the waning sunlight, his sword glinting coldly at his hip. The crowd parted for him like reeds before a blade.

Phoenix watched, still and silent.

The cheers battered at his ears, but he heard only the blood rushing through his own veins.

This was no simple match now.

This was Edgeworth.

Not just the King’s favored knight.

Not just the man he had once known.

But the greatest danger he had yet faced—the only one who might, with a single touch of steel, cut through every careful lie Phoenix had built around himself.

And not merely the lie of the rogue's mask, nor the knight’s borrowed name.

No—deeper still was the shame he dared not name, the sin he had buried in the dark places of his heart.

The longing he had carried in silence, as a man might carry a brand beneath his tunic, burning unseen.

For years it had lived within him: the reckless, aching love he bore for Miles Edgeworth. It had haunted him in boyhood, nameless and fierce, and followed him into manhood, heavier now with the full weight of guilt.

He had never spoken of it—never could.

Not in a world where such desires were whispered of with scorn, condemned from the pulpit, punished by whip and rope. Not when the Church itself called it an abomination, and men were taught to crush such feelings beneath prayer and penance.

So he had hidden it away, even from himself. Wrapped it in silence, starved it with shame. And yet here it was, breathing anew, summoned at the mere sight of Edgeworth stepping into the field of battle.

Still, he did not waver.

He could not.

The thread between them stretched taut, invisible yet unbreakable, and Phoenix knew: If he faltered now, if he let his heart betray him—It would not be the King's justice he would fear.

It would be Edgeworth’s eyes, seeing too much.

The King’s voice rang out once more, cruel and exultant. “Let the Court of Steel bear witness!” he crowed. “Let all England see: today, one name shall rise above the rest!”

Edgeworth came to stand opposite Phoenix, their swords yet sheathed, the space between them taut with unsaid history, unknown truths.

For a moment, the world seemed to narrow to a single thread stretched tight between them.

Phoenix adjusted his stance, fingers curling once around the hilt of his sword.

Edgeworth’s gaze met his, unflinching, searching.

The trumpet sang, long and shrill.

The duel had begun.

Phoenix and Edgeworth closed the distance between them, boots grinding over the packed earth. Their swords met with a clash that sang through the air like struck iron.

Phoenix pushed forward, testing Edgeworth’s guard with quick, precise strikes—meant to probe, not yet to break.

But Edgeworth was no fool. He answered with the precision of a man forged by a lifetime of discipline, every parry neat, merciless, exact. Steel slid against steel, a scream of metal and heat between them.

"You move like a man twice-trained," Edgeworth said under his breath, low enough that only Phoenix could hear as their swords locked together, pressed hilt to hilt. His grey eyes, cold as a winter sea, narrowed. "Yet no master of this court has claimed you. Tell me—"

With a twist, he shoved Phoenix back a pace—And in the same motion, Edgeworth's blade came slashing up, feinting for the helm.

Phoenix dodged, barely. The steel kissed the side of his helmet, sending a hollow clang through the air.

The crowd gasped.

"Shall I remove that mask of yours, Sir Nicholas?" Edgeworth hissed, circling. His tone was a whip of cold iron. "Shall I tear the truth from you?"

Phoenix steadied his breath, tightened his grip on the sword. He could not let Edgeworth see the tremor that ran down his spine—though it was not fear of discovery alone that set him trembling.

It was him.

The sound of Edgeworth’s voice, shaped by the same tongue he remembered from boyhood but sharpened now to something crueler. The way he moved—measured, graceful, merciless. Every line of him honed to a blade's edge, and Phoenix could not look away.

"My lord speaks in riddles," Phoenix said evenly, voice pitched lower to mask the thundering ache beneath it. "I am but a knight, nothing more."

A lie.

One of too many he had told himself.

For in truth, he had never been ‘nothing more’ when it came to Edgeworth.

He had been a boy chasing a boy with a lion carved into his heart.

He had been a thief stealing from the rich but guarding, always, the memory of a hand once outstretched to him. And he had carried that memory like a flame pressed close to the chest—small, hidden, burning him slowly all these years.

Their blades clashed again. This time Phoenix struck harder, the emotion bleeding through—sharp, swift—A particular maneuver, a pivot and low sweep Edgeworth had not seen in years.

Only one man had taught it to him.

Only one man had moved that way.

Lord Gregory Edgeworth.

Edgeworth faltered, just half a breath, but Phoenix felt it—like a crack in the cold armor that had grown around him.

"You dare," Edgeworth growled, locking their swords once more, the force of it rattling down Phoenix’s arms. His voice was raw, furious, confused. "You dare to steal even his memory—"

Phoenix’s heart thundered against his ribs. His own mask slipped—just a little.

"You remember your father, then," Phoenix said, his voice rougher than he meant it. "Tell me, my lord—what happened to you?"

Edgeworth stiffened.

"What happened," Phoenix pressed, parrying another strike, their swords flashing in the morning sun, "that turned the boy I once knew into the King's chained blade?"

The words slipped out before he could leash them, fueled by the ache he had buried for too long. He had never spoken of it—never dared. And now it flooded him: the grief, the longing, the furious sorrow of seeing the boy he had admired, had loved in ways he had no name for, now standing against him like a stranger.

A hush fell across the spectators. The duel had become something else now—something dangerous, almost profane.

Swordplay for blood and truth, not for honor.

Edgeworth said nothing. He only attacked again, faster, harder.

Phoenix met him blow for blow.

Their blades sparked, feet sliding over the churned earth, the air between them charged so heavy it was near suffocating.

Neither fought like knights vying for favor now. They fought like men with old wounds too deep for words.

And Phoenix fought, not just to protect his secret—But because some buried, reckless part of him wanted Edgeworth to see him. To recognize him, even now. Even after everything.

The air crackled with tension as their swords clashed again, and this time, Phoenix felt a dangerous heat rise in Edgeworth's strikes. There was no longer the meticulous guard of a knight—there was the raw fury of a man who could no longer hold his suspicions in check.

The crowd had gone quiet, watching as the duel began to unfold with an almost reckless intensity.

Phoenix barely had time to react before Edgeworth’s blade cut through the air, targeting his helm with a deliberate strike. He didn’t parry in time.

The clang of metal echoed, and the force of Edgeworth’s strike sent Phoenix stumbling back. In an instant, Edgeworth closed the distance between them, moving like a beast unleashed.

Before Phoenix could regain his footing, Edgeworth’s sword cleaved downward again, knocking his helm from his head, sending it clattering across the dirt. The cheers of the crowd turned into murmurs, but Phoenix’s attention was fixed on Edgeworth’s narrowed gaze.

And then, before Phoenix could react, Edgeworth’s gloved hand reached up, catching the edge of his chainmail. The chain coiled tight around Phoenix’s neck and hair—deliberate, methodical, a movement that spoke of Edgeworth’s growing resolve.

Edgeworth’s teeth gritted as he pulled.

The cool chain slid from Phoenix’s neck, dragging the delicate strands of his hair along with it. Edgeworth’s hand paused for a moment, fingers gripping the last traces of the chainmail, eyes scanning Phoenix’s face intently.

But when the chainmail finally fell away—and the truth began to unfurl—Edgeworth froze. His fingers loosened, dropping the chain into the dirt, and his breath caught.

Phoenix’s hair, once confined beneath layers of cloth and armor, spilled free in waves. A tumble of black locks that caught the morning light in dark, slick strands.

A trickle of sugar water had done its work earlier, allowing the strands to remain subdued, soft, and seemingly unyielding. Phoenix could feel the faint stiffness where the sweet mixture had dried, binding the normally wild tufts close to his scalp. It was a crude trick, born from whispered secrets passed between mouths over ale-stained tables. He had first heard of it in the darker corners of the tavern—a place where the thieves, beggars, and vagrants of the city shared knowledge as precious as any king’s decree. There, amidst the smoke and slurred songs, Phoenix had learned that sugar water, if worked carefully through the hair, could tame even the most stubborn locks, as if by witchcraft. An old washerwoman had sworn by it, claiming it could ‘turn a lion’s mane into a lamb’s fleece,’ and Phoenix, desperate not to risk discovery, had listened well.

Now, under the searing gaze of Lord Edgeworth and the watchful eyes of the entire court, that lowborn sorcery served him well. Edgeworth’s suspicion had been close to the truth—the rogue he had so tirelessly pursued was indeed this knight, the one who stood before him with a nameless past and a careful disguise. And yet, the sugar-watered hair—lying flat and obedient—had misled even Edgeworth’s keen eye.

For now.

But Phoenix knew well: such tricks would not hold forever.

As he moved, the chain around his neck shifted, revealing a small wooden token that swung briefly into view—etched with the image of a lion and quill, its edges smoothed with age, the hole at its top carved to string it like a necklace. The token struck against his chest with the faintest clack.

Edgeworth's gaze flicked to it. Just for a second. Recognition bloomed. His breath caught—not enough to betray him to the court, but enough to fracture his thoughts. That symbol. It was unmistakable. The crest of House Edgeworth. The lion and quill—his father's seal, carved into wax a hundred times during a hundred decrees. It was not a sigil easily forgotten.

That token had no business being here.

Edgeworth stood, sword still raised, his mind running through every moment, every memory of the rogue who had made him chase in the first place. And yet, nothing about Phoenix fit. “Who are you?” Edgeworth demanded again, his voice sharp, still edged with frustration. His grey eyes were now alive with something more than just suspicion—an emotion he refused to name.

Phoenix’s gaze, however, was cool, deceptively calm as he met Edgeworth’s stare. Despite the pounding of his heart, despite the unbearable tension between them, he held firm. He could not, would not let this moment slip.

He did not want Edgeworth to know the truth.

Not yet.

Not like this.

“Lord Edgeworth,” Phoenix said, voice low but steady, “I’ve already told you. I am nothing more than a knight. I am Nicholas Wright. I have no reason to lie.”

Edgeworth’s eyes burned into his, watching every subtle flicker of expression on his face. He stepped closer, the sword now resting loosely at his side, his presence like a storm gathering force. “I’ve seen you fight, Wright. I’ve seen you move.” His voice was quiet, dangerous. “And you fight like a man with secrets.”

Phoenix didn’t waver. He never had. But a flicker of something—something wild, uncontrollable—passed through his chest as he met Edgeworth’s unwavering gaze.

Edgeworth took a step closer still. There was no denying the tension that crackled between them now, like the moment before a tempest. “You move like him,” Edgeworth said, voice cold, distant, his gaze flickering to Phoenix’s face for just a second longer. “Like Lord Gregory.”

Phoenix’s heart skipped a beat. The mention of Gregory Edgeworth's name—Edgeworth’s father—struck deeper than any blow. He tried not to let it show, but the surge of emotion was undeniable. Memories of the past, buried under the weight of years, stirred to life once more.

Edgeworth paused, his sharp eyes narrowing further. For a brief moment, his face shifted, as though something was tugging at his memory, something long-forgotten, suddenly found.

But before either could speak again, the crowd shifted. The distant hum of murmurs grew louder.

Phoenix quickly shifted his stance, falling back into his fighting position, ready for whatever was coming next. His eyes never left Edgeworth’s. “What happened to you, Edgeworth?” Phoenix asked, his voice raw, almost a whisper—but loud enough for Edgeworth to hear. “What happened to the boy I knew?”

The question hung heavy between them, charged with meaning neither could fully articulate. The crowd fell silent, awaiting the next strike.

Edgeworth blinked, his face hardening once again. The question had cut deeper than Phoenix intended. But the fight was still there—still blazing in his chest.

Still, they stood facing each other, swords at the ready, breathing the same charged air.

And neither knew how this fight would end.

Their swords clashed again, a furious storm of steel and will. The sun caught the blades with every strike, sparks flying like the scattering of stars. Phoenix pressed forward now, relentless, driving Edgeworth back step by step across the torn earth of the tourney yard.

Edgeworth fought like a man possessed—sharp, precise, unyielding. Yet Phoenix moved with something more. Something that had been carved into his very bones.

Memory.

Love.

Loss.

And a loyalty that Edgeworth, for all his coldness, had once inspired in him long ago.

Each parry and feint was a conversation unspoken between them.

And Phoenix knew Edgeworth’s rhythm as if it were his own heartbeat.

With a final, deft maneuver—a slip of the blade along the inside of Edgeworth’s guard, a sudden twist learned years ago from a man both of them once trusted—Phoenix struck.

Edgeworth’s sword flew from his grasp, landing with a dull thud in the dust.

The crowd gasped, a sound that swept the tourney grounds like a shudder. Then—silence.

Phoenix stood there, breathing heavily, his sword lowered but ready, watching as Edgeworth dropped to one knee, his chest heaving beneath the fine cut of his armor. The sunlight gleamed cruelly off the steel.

For a moment, no one moved. The tension snapped taut in the air, ready to break.

Edgeworth looked up, his expression unreadable. His mouth was a tight line, and yet there was no hatred in his eyes—only something colder. Older. A law that had ruled him longer than mercy ever had.

In a voice that carried, he said, “I have been bested in the King’s tournament. My honor demands my blood be spilt. Slay me, Sir Nicholas, and wash this shame clean.”

A horrified murmur rolled through the gathered spectators—even King Manfred, seated high on his gilded dais, leaned forward as if relishing the spectacle.

Phoenix’s stomach twisted, but his hand did not waver. Slowly, he lowered his sword entirely and stepped forward. And then, against all custom, all law of combat, he did the unthinkable. He extended his hand. Palm upward, offering—not judgment, not death—but mercy.

Edgeworth stared at it, stunned, as if it were something he had not seen in many, many years. His gauntleted fists remained clenched against the earth, refusing to take what was offered.

But Phoenix didn’t falter.

In his heart, a hundred things warred—fear, admiration, love, grief for the boy he once knew and for the man now kneeling before him. Feelings he had buried deep, chained away under duty, shame, and a lifetime of silence. Yet here they were, plain for no one to see but himself.

He could not slay Edgeworth.

He never could.

Edgeworth, breathing hard, finally lifted his gaze to meet Phoenix’s. And in that moment—a beat suspended beyond time—something in the frozen walls around Edgeworth’s heart gave the faintest crack. He hesitated.

And then, slowly, as if the movement pained him more than any wound, he reached up and took Phoenix’s hand.

Phoenix hauled him to his feet, firm and steady.

The crowd erupted in a mix of shock and uncertain cheers, but Phoenix barely heard it. His heart pounded not from victory, but from the unbearable nearness of the man he had spent so long chasing—in dreams, in regrets, and now, in battle.

Their eyes locked, and for a breathless instant, the world shrank to just the two of them.

Neither spoke.

Neither needed to.

Edgeworth’s hand, still encased in his gauntlet, lingered for a moment longer than necessary in Phoenix’s grip before he pulled away, the cold mask slipping back over his features—but not before Phoenix caught the flicker of something almost human in those storm-grey eyes.

Warmth, reluctant but real, had touched Lord Edgeworth’s heart.

And Phoenix Wright—Sir Nicholas Wright—had been the one to do it.

Chapter Text

Lord Miles Edgeworth knelt upon one knee, posture rigid even beneath the weight of the blow. The thick scent of hay mingled with sweat and blood in the air. Torchlight flickered against the wooden beams of the stable walls, casting warped shadows over the small gathering of royal guards who bore witness. None dared speak.

A second lash cracked through the silence, the leather biting through crimson velvet and into the flesh beneath. Edgeworth made no sound.

King Manfred paced behind him, gloved fingers coiled tightly round the silver-handled crop—an instrument far beneath the dignity of his office, yet wielded with intimate cruelty.

"You bore my colors upon your chest," the King spat, voice low and shaking with rage. "And yet you let a nameless knight strike you down before the court. Before my court!"

Edgeworth’s breath came in slow, quiet measures. He remained bowed, his right hand pressed into the straw-covered earth to brace himself, though blood had begun to bead at his fingertips.

"I ought to strip you of your title this very hour. Let the hounds wear your cloak and see if they fare better." He stopped pacing. "But I will not. No, Lord Edgeworth... you are still useful to me."

The third strike did not come. Instead, the King walked around to face him, the crop resting loosely in one hand. His lip curled with contempt. "You shall bring me the rogue's head—not by the fortnight, as once commanded, but by masquerade’s end—the eve of the Carivales Nocturne."

Edgeworth lifted his head, grey eyes steeled behind blood-matted strands of hair. “As you command, Your Majesty.”

The King leaned in, his voice barely above a whisper, yet laced with venom. “He will be there. I feel it in my bones—like vermin drawn to spilled wine and silks. He will come to steal. And you—” He struck the tip of the crop against Edgeworth’s chin, lifting it. “—will not fail me again.”

A long pause passed between them.

“Should you embarrass me before the court a second time, I will see to it you are flayed beneath the palace arches, and your title passed to a swineherd with better spine.”

The crop fell from his hand with a thud against the straw. With a swirl of his heavy robes, King Manfred turned and departed, his guards falling into step behind him, leaving Edgeworth alone with the sting of blood and silence.

The Esquire of the Body remained motionless for a moment longer, his breath shallow. Then he rose, stiff and slow, his hand pressed to the bleeding welt across his back.

He did not cry out. Not then. Not ever.

Only one thought echoed beneath the pain:

By night’s end, the rogue must fall.

•••

The stone halls whispered with echoes—boots on marble, the swish of velvet robes, the distant clatter of steel striking floor. King Manfred strode with a measured fury, the crop still slick with blood dangling from his fingers like a viper’s tail. He had only just come from the chamber where Lord Edgeworth knelt bloodied, humbled for his failure. And now, another disgrace awaited him.

The guards threw open the door to the Queen’s Solar. Though once meant for gentler company, it now served as the King’s private hall of rebuke. The fire burned low. Lavender lingered in the air—a fragile scent at odds with the wrath about to unfold.

Inside stood Princess Franziska, her spine rigid, her chin held high, despite the chill that followed her father’s entrance.

“Leave us,” the King said.

The chamber emptied. Only the crackle of fire and the rustle of layered skirts and brocade remained.

Manfred did not sit. “So. The tale is true,” he muttered, his voice like ice dragged across iron. He turned his gaze upon her—those black eyes, sharp and depthless, darker still beneath the weight of his crown. “I scarce finished bleeding the shame from Edgeworth’s back, and now I find you’ve sought to shame me in your own manner.”

He stepped forward, the crop dragging across the floor with a slow, deliberate hiss. “My fool—Yanni Yogi, that cackling knave—brought me word. I thought it a jest, the madness of wine and whimsy.” His eyes narrowed. “But no. I am told you—my own daughter—drew steel within a house of God. Saint Cuthber’s, no less.”

He drew nearer, his boots landing like judgment. “That you, a maiden of noble birth, cast aside your guards and struck with blade, as though you were some back-alley soldier.”

Franziska did not flinch. “The church was overrun. The guards had fallen. Had I done nothing—”

“Enough!” His voice cracked through the air like a whip. “You forget your station. A princess does not draw arms. She prays. She flees. She remains unmarred—untainted—for alliances, not warfare!”

He turned from her, as if the sight stung his eyes. “Do you seek to ruin your name? To have whispers follow you through the court, calling you wild, unfit, unmarriageable? Do you fancy yourself a knight?”

A long pause.

“The men who saw you will speak. They already murmur. The court hides its laughter in goblets, the clergy its dismay in folded hands. A daughter of the throne, wielding steel like some mercenary wench from the Eastcheap docks.”

Franziska’s jaw tightened. Her fingers curled into fists. “Would you rather I died kneeling?” she asked, low and steady.

Manfred spun, his voice rising. “I would rather you not disgrace me!”

The fire behind him flared. Servants beyond the doors held their breath.

“What if the rogue had been there? Would you have faced him too? A man who outwits my Esquire, who slips through the city like smoke?” He stepped close, voice like venom. “You think bravery makes you righteous. But in a woman, what is bravery but recklessness dressed in steel?”

Franziska held her ground. But her breath caught faintly at her throat.

Manfred exhaled hard, then fell into his chair with the exhaustion only kings could afford to show. He waved a hand, as if she were a troublesome thought. “You will bear arms no longer. Your sword is for ceremony alone. You are confined to the east wing—attend your masses, embroider, learn to be pleasant.”

He shot her a final glance, cold as the grave. “And pray this disgrace be not spoken of during the Carivales Nocturne. I will not have whispers of a wayward daughter ruin what little peace remains.”

The room was silent. Franziska bowed her head—more from custom than obedience—and turned to leave, her spine as straight as ever. She refused to show him the depth of her anger, though it churned within her like a storm at sea.

King Manfred's voice, cruel as ever, cut through the quiet. “A daughter with a sword. I might as well have begotten a son… and buried him.”

He stepped closer, his voice lowering, wrapping around her with venom. “Edgeworth—now there’s a man I could be proud of. A son in spirit, if not blood. He wields steel with purpose, yet knows when to sheath it. He understands what it is to stand by me, to build a legacy, not squander it with childish impulses. But you…” His voice dropped into a sneer. “You are more concerned with bleeding the floor than you are with what matters.”

Franziska’s breath hitched, though she kept her gaze straight ahead, refusing to show weakness. She had long despised being compared to Lord Edgeworth. In her father’s eyes, the knight who carried his title and duty was always to be more cherished, more worthy of admiration—even though Edgeworth was not his true son. To be compared to him felt like an insult, as though her gender alone rendered her incapable of standing in his shadow.

The weight of his words pressed upon her, heavy and suffocating. She had never been allowed the same freedom as Lord Edgeworth, the freedom to be more than just a pretty face or an ornament to be married off. The sword she had wielded was not a tool of defense, but a defiance against her father’s expectations—that a woman’s only true purpose was to be gentle, elegant, and docile. Instead, here she stood, at odds with everything Manfred had dreamed of in a daughter.

She could feel the heat rise in her chest, her pulse quickening, but she held it steady. This time, the tears would not come.

“Leave me,” the King commanded coldly, his voice devoid of warmth or love.

With a final glance that held no tenderness, Franziska turned, walking towards the door.

Behind her, King Manfred muttered to himself, his voice tinged with frustration and spite: “A warrior’s heart, lost on a woman who would have been better suited to courtly manners and the embroidery frame.”

•••

The day had waned to a softer gold, the sun casting long shadows over the fields beyond Whitehall, where few dared tread without cause. The sound of hooves was distant, the capital quiet in its breathing—this was why she had chosen this place.

Clad in a suit of modest, weather-darkened plate, the knight moved alone through the overgrown yard of the abandoned training grounds. The sigils upon the armor had been dulled with soot and grime to conceal any trace of heraldry. No livery marked her, no color of crown nor house. The figure moved with practiced swiftness, sword in hand, striking at the air with silent fury. Each swing was precise, honed through years of repetition denied to her under the eye of her father.

She had ridden out at dawn and spoken no word to the guards. They had assumed she was an escort for some lordling training abroad. Let them believe it. They would not guess it was Princess Franziska beneath helm and steel.

The only sound about her now was the clang of blade meeting phantom foe and the sharp breath drawn in exertion.

But then— "Nick? Is that—?"

The voice startled her. She turned at once, sword at the ready, feet grounding themselves with the instinct of a soldier—not a princess. But the girl who approached was no threat.

Maya, garbed in humble wool and linen, stood with a basket crooked in her arm, the soft bulge of fruit nestled within. Her brow was lifted in curiosity, not fear. “Forgive me,” Maya said, blinking. “I saw the armor and—I thought—well, you looked rather like Sir Nicholas from afar. But you’re—” She stopped herself.

Now close enough, the figure’s stature told her plainly this was no Phoenix. Shorter in frame, her posture sharper—tighter. Maya tilted her head, confused, until the armored figure reached up with a gloved hand and loosed the latches of her helm.

A cascade of silver-blue hair fell from beneath the iron crown, swept back from a face Maya had not forgotten.

Princess Franziska.

The same Franziska who had stood blade-bare in the shadowed light of Saint Cuthber’s nave, defending the church with all the fury of Saint Joan herself. The same who had been pulled away by guards before Maya could speak a single word of thanks.

A noble.

Maya hated nobles.

She had every right to. They had razed her village, bled her people dry, and turned their backs on the starving children who came begging at their gates. They had called her prayers pagan, her sister's wisdom heresy. And yet—there Franziska had stood, sword in hand, blood on her gown, refusing to leave even as flames licked the doorposts.

She had saved her.

Maya’s heart warred against itself. One part wanted to spit at Franziska’s name, to dismiss her as just another privileged tyrant with a blade. But another—the quieter part, the honest part—remembered the way Franziska had looked at her before being seized. Fierce. Unyielding. Almost… gentle.

And Maya hadn’t thanked her.

She’d only stared, paralyzed by the weight of a truth she didn’t want: that a noble had saved her life.

Maya’s breath caught, and her cheeks flushed warm beneath the sun. “I—” Her voice cracked slightly. She looked down at her basket, then scrambled, flustered, and lifted the reddest apple from within. “Here! This—it’s for you! My lady, I—I mean, Your—” And she dropped to a bow, nearly losing her grip on the fruit in the process.

Franziska blinked, brow raised. Then, with a grace befitting neither court nor throne, she stepped forward and extended a hand to stay her. “Rise,” Franziska said gently. “I am no lady here.”

Maya looked up, hesitating, then slowly stood, the apple still in her hands.

Franziska took it, a touch of surprise on her face, and then something softer—something rare. “Thank you.”

The words were plain, yet in Franziska’s voice they held the weight of a knight’s vow. Maya could only nod, suddenly wishing she had worn something finer than a secondhand bodice and a wool cloak still damp from morning mist.

They stood there for a breathless moment, the princess in borrowed steel, the peasant girl with the soft brown eyes. Around them, no courtly gaze intruded, no guard, no bishop, no crown.

Only the wind carried witness.

Franziska turned the apple slowly in her hand, the sheen of it catching the sunlight, red as blood on a battlefield. For a long moment, she said nothing. Then, her eyes narrowed—not in anger, but in inquiry. “You don’t seem alarmed,” she said at last, voice even, “to see a princess clad in such garb, playing at war like a boy.”

Her tone was laced with something half-defiant, half-weary. It was not the first time she’d been looked upon with disdain for donning steel instead of silk, and it would not be the last. A princess with a sword was a jest in most courts—something to be corrected, or punished.

But Maya didn’t laugh. She looked at Franziska not with mockery, but with awe. “Why should I be alarmed?” Maya asked, stepping a little closer now, her fingers nervously fidgeting with the handle of her basket. “I only wish more women had your strength.”

Franziska blinked.

“The world says we’re meant to sew, to pray, to smile and say little. But what you do—it tells them all they’re wrong. That a woman’s worth is not measured by the softness of her hands nor the quiet of her voice.” Maya smiled, then added, more gently, “Especially when that woman is a princess. You don’t only wield a sword—you wield defiance.”

The words struck something deep within Franziska. Her grip tightened ever so slightly on the apple. She looked down and then away, turning her face toward the breeze as if it might cool the warmth blooming fast beneath her cheeks. “Flattery ill becomes a stranger,” she murmured.

“Then forgive me, Your Highness, for I speak only truth,” Maya replied.

Franziska drew a breath as though to reply, but the moment swelled too full with the sudden pounding of her heart. Her chest rose and fell beneath the weight of her breastplate. She, who had fought men twice her size and won, felt unsteady beneath the gaze of this peasant girl with windblown hair and eyes like earth after rain.

Maya looked down at the training dummy that leaned, battered and torn, not far from where Franziska had been sparring. “Your strikes,” she said softly, “are like thunder. Precise. Commanding. I’ve never seen a noble move with such fury—and such grace.”

Franziska dared not meet her gaze. She stared at the apple still in her hand as if it were some precious token, too fragile to hold. “You speak boldly.”

“I do.” Maya's voice trembled, but only a little. “But then—I saw you in the church. You saved us. I remember thinking... I’ve never seen someone so fierce, or so beautiful, all at once.” That last word slipped out before she could think better of it. Maya bit her lip, eyes widening. “Forgive me, that was—”

But Franziska raised her hand, silencing her gently. “Don’t take back what was given freely.”

A silence settled between them again—quiet, but not empty. Birdsong stirred in the trees. Far away, a bell tolled, faint beneath the wind.

Franziska glanced back at her sword, then at Maya, and for the first time in weeks, she let her lips soften into something like a smile. “Stay, if you wish. I’ve not yet finished my drills. And it seems you carry keen eyes as well as sweet fruit.”

Maya’s breath caught. “If I’m not intruding…”

“You are not.”

And so, beneath the open sky, a princess and a commoner lingered, neither bound by duty in that hour—only the quiet hush of admiration, the clink of steel, and the promise of something unspoken.

•••

The halls of Whitehall Palace burned with gold and crimson. Tapestries stirred in the evening’s draft, candlelight dancing upon marble floors like spirits freed from their tombs. The great ballroom was filled with the hush and hum of nobles—mirth muffled behind silk masks, secrets exchanged beneath chandeliers of iron and flame. Perfumed lords and painted ladies whirled in time with the harps and viols, the revelry gilded in the false innocence of a masquerade.

But Lord Miles Edgeworth did not dance.

Clad in a justaucorps of deepest maroon, the fabric rich with brocade and threaded with gold as fine as spider’s silk, Lord Edgeworth stood at the fringe of the great hall, still as a statue amid the swell of music and masks. Black velvet trimmed the cuffs, glinting faintly where the torchlight struck, and over it he wore a close-fitted jerkin of midnight hue—cut not for festivity, but for command.

At his throat bloomed a cravat of winter-white linen, crisp and elegant, fastened with a brooch of dark garnet that shimmered like a bead of fresh blood. A half-mask of beaten gold adorned his face, concealing his right eye and cheek. Its surface was etched with curling ivy and the proud head of a lion—quiet heralds of House Edgeworth, known to those who bothered to look.

From beneath it, his lone visible eye watched—not the dancers, nor the glittering nobles with their painted smiles—but the corners where shadows clung to the arches, and the tall windows that flickered with passing movement beyond.

He was the King’s blade tonight—not a guest. And he had not forgotten the charge laid upon him.

“You shall bring me the rogue's head—not by the fortnight, as once commanded,” Manfred had hissed, voice thick with disdain. “But by masquerade’s end—the eve of the Carivales Nocturne.”

Edgeworth’s fingers, gloved in black velvet, curled around the gilded hilt at his side. It wasn’t the revelers he watched—it was the exits. The thresholds. The darknesses between light. But it wasn’t just duty that drew his focus tonight. It was words—sharp, treacherous, and impossible to forget.

“You remember your father, then. Tell me, my lord—what happened to you?”

“What happened that turned the boy I once knew into the King's chained blade?”

The voice of Sir Nicholas—so sure, so aching with something Edgeworth didn’t dare name—echoed still in the hollows of his mind. He hadn't flinched on the battlefield, nor under the lash, but those words, they had struck deeper than steel.

He shouldn’t have cared. Should have dismissed them as a stranger’s manipulation. But the way they had been spoken—the way the man had looked at him—stirred questions Edgeworth had buried long ago.

How could a stranger speak of his father with such reverence?

How could he know?

What else did he know?

He found himself watching the shadows not for threat, but for that familiar figure. That stance. That presence that unsettled him more than blades ever had. He hated that he was searching for him.

And yet… He was.

“My lord?” came a voice behind him.

Edgeworth did not turn. “Sir Richard.”

Sir Richard Gumshoe, broad-shouldered and loyally dogged even beneath his fine surcoat and plumed mask, stepped beside his master with unease writ across his brow. “All's quiet. Save for the wine and the warbling,” he said, nodding toward a pair of drunken minstrels who were stumbling through the tail end of a verse. “No sign of the knave. But if he's here… we'll catch him, yeah?”

Edgeworth’s gaze swept across the ballroom like a falcon in flight. His eyes moved past a duchess dressed as a swan, her powdered face framed by ivory feathers; past a young viscount in a fool’s garb, laughing too loud with a goblet sloshing in hand; past masked twins adorned as the sun and moon, their gold-threaded gowns shimmering with every turn.

Above them, the waltz had begun again—slow, haunting, regal. The strings dragged like velvet over old wounds, and the dancers glided as though bewitched beneath the chandeliers’ molten glow. Laughter and secrets mingled like perfume in the air, and every smile felt sharpened at the edges.

Edgeworth’s expression did not soften. He was not there for revels. “He will be here,” Edgeworth murmured, more to himself than to Gumshoe. “He is too bold not to be.”

His eyes skimmed every velvet mask and painted smile. The rooms were thick with silk and deception, plumes nodding above heads like specters. He had studied every guest list, every expected lord and lady—he knew these halls as he knew the inside of his own glove.

Gumshoe shifted beside him, voice hushed beneath the swell of the waltz. “D’you reckon Sir Nicholas Wright’s comin’ tonight?” he asked, scratching at the edge of his mask. “Winner of the Court of Steel and all—folk’ll expect him to show. Knight like that draws attention.”

Edgeworth did not answer at once. His jaw tensed. “He may yet appear,” he said, coldly. “He has a taste for spectacle.”

Gumshoe hesitated, then glanced at Edgeworth sidelong, lowering his voice further. “My lord… if I may speak plain—”

“You usually do.”

“Right, well—it’s just—do you not find him odd? Sir Nicholas, I mean. The way he fights, the way he keeps to himself. And… he only showed up this past year. You had me look into him for good reason.”

Edgeworth’s eyes did not move from the ballroom. “I find many things odd, Sir Richard,” he said, his voice flat as hammered steel. “But I do not rely on oddities. I rely on proof.”

“Right. Just… feels like there’s more to the lad than a bright helm and a lucky swing, is all.”

Edgeworth narrowed his eyes, scanning again—through the peacock masks and painted jesters, the lords robed in stars and the ladies who trailed lace like spider’s webs. The masquerade was a theatre of masks. But he was not here to applaud.

He was here to unmask.

Then—he saw it. A shadow passed behind one of the arched windows high above the hall. Cloaked, fleet-footed, vanishing like breath on glass.

Edgeworth’s spine straightened. “Remain here,” he ordered, already moving.

“My lord—?”

But Edgeworth was already gone, the rich folds of his maroon coat trailing behind him as he slipped into the marbled hush of the stairwell, gold mask catching one last glint of torchlight before the shadows swallowed him whole.

Then, at the far end of the upper corridor—there.

A figure stood against the moonlit panes of glass, half turned, limned in silver. A coat like midnight wrapped his frame, long and flowing, its high collar fastened close at the neck. The fabric cut away in a subtle V, black frilled trim shifting like smoke with each quiet movement. Not the garb of a courtier, nor of a beggar. Something between—a specter stitched from both rebellion and grace.

The stranger’s throat bore a strange knot, dark and ribboned—a mockery of noble fashion, twisted with flair into something sharper. Boots to the knee, laced with glinting gold cord, caught stray beams of moonlight. Black gloves fitted like second skin, hands resting at his sides with the ease of one unafraid.

And upon one collar hook, like a challenge, a golden badge: a phoenix in mid-rise.

His mask was smooth, black, and featureless from the nose down—above it, his hair rose in defiant spikes, silhouetted wild against the window’s glow. Like a crown worn by no king and every rogue.

Edgeworth drew his sword in one clean, fluid motion. The sound of steel was quiet—but absolute. "Turn," he commanded, his voice low and cold. “Slowly.”

The rogue did not flinch. He turned as told, smooth and unhurried, as though he’d expected this dance. His eyes, dark and unreadable behind the mask’s upper edge, met Edgeworth’s own without fear.

A beat passed.

Then another.

"You’ve made a grave error coming here," Edgeworth said. “The King has called for your head.”

The rogue tilted his own ever so slightly. “Then it is fortunate I did not come to give it.”

His voice—there was something in it. Familiar. Maddeningly so. But distorted just enough by distance, by the cavernous hush of the corridor, by the mask itself.

Edgeworth’s eyes narrowed. His blade did not lower.

“What is thy name?” he demanded.

The rogue smiled—though only his eyes gave it away. “I have many,” he said. “Tonight, I borrow only one.”

Edgeworth stepped forward, blade still poised between them like a drawn line of judgment. His cloak stirred with the draft from the corridor’s arched windows, the golden embroidery at his cuffs catching the torchlight like fire on a reliquary.

But his eyes never left the rogue. “No sword?” he said, voice sharp as flint struck on steel. “You come into the lion’s den with nothing but pride?”

The rogue’s gloved hands moved—slowly, deliberately—and from beneath his coat he drew not steel, but something far less expected: a deck of playing cards, their edges worn, bound with a ribbon of deep crimson.

He gave them a lazy flick, fanning them out between his fingers with the ease of long practice.

“I don’t endorse violence,” he replied, his voice steady but edged with mirth. “Steel is for those who can’t talk fast enough to live.”

Edgeworth’s sword did not waver, though his brow twitched. “And what will you do,” he said coolly, “when your cards fail you?”

The rogue shrugged, tucking the deck away again—save for one. He spun it across his knuckles, then let it vanish in a motion half shadow, half jest. “Then I suppose I’ll be caught,” he said, smiling behind the mask. “But not before leaving behind a bit of wonder.”

Edgeworth’s eye narrowed. “This is no theatre, knave.”

“No,” the rogue murmured. “It’s a masquerade.”

Their eyes locked. The air between them shimmered with silence, drawn taut like a bowstring.

And yet, neither moved.

Not yet.

The rogue cocked his head, the low strains of a waltz still drifting faintly from the great hall below. “Care for a dance, my lord?” he asked, voice laced with mockery and charm. “It is a masquerade, after all.”

Edgeworth’s gaze did not waver, but something within it shifted—like ice cracking beneath weight. “I did not come to waltz,” he said coldly. “I came to face you.” He lowered his blade—not in surrender, but in principle. “I will not strike a man unarmed,” he added, voice low but firm. “Even rogues deserve the dignity of defense.”

The rogue blinked, caught—just briefly—off guard. “Chivalry? How quaint.”

Edgeworth did not answer. He turned sharply, his boots echoing on the stone, and strode to the far wall where a suit of ornamental armor stood sentinel beneath a hanging tapestry. From its gauntleted grasp he drew a second sword—not ceremonial, but well-balanced, a real blade forged for more than show.

He turned back and hurled it. The sword spun once in the air, catching torchlight along its edge before landing at the rogue’s feet with a metallic clang.

No more words passed between them.

Edgeworth advanced without pause, blade rising like judgment cast in steel. The rogue barely had time to snatch up the weapon, his gloved hand closing round the hilt just as Edgeworth struck.

Steel rang against steel—first contact, sharp and bright.

The rogue staggered back, deflecting with a grace that belied his earlier jest. Edgeworth pressed the assault, his form honed like the blade itself, all precision and purpose.

“I thought you did not endorse violence,” Edgeworth said, striking again.

“I still don’t,” the rogue grunted, parrying with effort. “But I do endorse not dying.”

Their blades clashed again, echoing through the empty corridor like a bell calling sinners to confession.

Edgeworth’s eyes burned with cold intent, his motions swift, exacting.

The rogue, for all his improvised stance and stolen charm, moved like water around a knife—slipping, turning, answering strength with misdirection.

And yet, Edgeworth drove him back, step by measured step.

He hadn’t come for a duel.

He hadn’t come for this.

Phoenix's boots slid slightly against the wood as he ducked under another strike, Edgeworth’s blade singing past his ear like a cold whisper of death. His own sword—borrowed, unwanted—felt foreign in his grasp, too honest a thing for the tricks he lived by. He deflected again, barely, his arm jarred to the bone.

This was supposed to be simple. Slip through the Carivales Nocturne under cloak and mask, filch a ledger from the treasury wing, maybe lift a trinket from some smug noble's neck. He hadn’t expected the King to demand blood. His blood.

And he certainly hadn’t expected Edgeworth to be the blade sent to draw it.

Phoenix pivoted, parried, teeth gritted. Every blow from the Esquire of the Body came with the weight of royal wrath behind it—measured, merciless, deliberate. And yet, beneath the sharp edge of steel, Phoenix saw it: hesitation. Conflict. Something human buried beneath the lion's gold and garnet.

If he didn’t let Edgeworth win, he realized grimly, Edgeworth might pay the price. Manfred wouldn’t tolerate another failure.

Their swords met again—harder this time. Sparks flared from the collision, echo cracking off stone and silence alike. They stepped back in tandem, chests rising and falling with harsh breath.

Phoenix’s shoulders ached. His lungs burned. The mask clung to his face with sweat. And yet he laughed—quiet, breathless, sharp-edged.
“Tell me, my lord,” he said, voice dry as old parchment, “are you obsessed with me?”

Edgeworth’s visible eye narrowed.

“Because for a man who claims to serve the law,” Phoenix went on, adjusting his grip on the sword, “you chase me like a hound with no other scent.”

Their eyes locked in the dark above the revel below—steel in one, wildfire in the other. The masquerade played on, distant and dreamlike. But here, high in the hush of torchlight and shadow, the game had turned real. And neither of them could pretend otherwise anymore.

Edgeworth did not answer at once.

He stood tall, sword angled slightly downward, breath steadying with visible effort. The firelight from the sconces cast his golden half-mask in glints of fury and restraint, his mouth a tight line beneath it. That one visible eye—the eye Phoenix remembered from long ago, though colder now—burned not with hatred, but something far more dangerous. “You think this is a game,” Edgeworth said at last, his voice low, deliberate. “A jest spun with cards and riddles. But the King does not laugh, and I—” He stopped himself, jaw clenching. “I do not have the luxury of obsession.”

Phoenix tilted his head, the faintest smirk tugging beneath his black mask. “Could’ve fooled me.” He took a step forward, boots scraping faintly on stone. “Is this what your justice looks like now?” he asked. “Striking down a man with no title, no shield, who feeds the mouths your King refuses to see? Who gives warmth to the children your gold forgets? Is that what makes me your enemy, my lord?”

Edgeworth flinched—just barely—but Phoenix saw it.

“You serve a throne that would burn the slums to stoke its own fire,” Phoenix said, voice sharpening. “And you call me the traitor.” Phoenix tilted his head, letting the question hang like smoke. The torchlight licked along the edges of his storm-blue coat, dancing in the black trim like flame caught in lace.

Edgeworth stepped forward once—no sword raised, just his voice, clipped and trembling at the edge. “You’ve haunted these halls in shadows. Mocked our laws. Made a mockery of me.” His boots echoed softly against the stone as he drew nearer, face still half-veiled by the golden mask. “And yet, each time I draw close… you vanish. Is that your trick? Or are you simply a coward in finer cloth?”

The word coward struck the air like a thrown gauntlet. Phoenix’s fingers twitched at his side—close to his sword, but not quite. “A coward?” he echoed, voice low. “For choosing not to kill? For stepping into your lion’s den with cards and wit instead of blood and steel?”

Edgeworth’s eye flared, jaw tightening. “You steal from nobles and call it mercy. You challenge the crown and call it courage. You hide behind riddles and names that are not your own.”

Phoenix gave a bitter smile beneath the mask. “I hide because I must. Because men like your King make honesty a death sentence.”

“And what of men like me?” Edgeworth shot back, taking another step. “What am I to you? Another tyrant in silk? Another enemy with a title?”

Phoenix didn’t answer at first. He stared at Edgeworth through the mask, through years of silence and distance and pain. Then, softly, he said, “You were never my enemy, Miles.”

Edgeworth blinked. The name caught in the space between them like a blade balanced on a thread.

“I became a shadow because the world left no room for anything else,” Phoenix went on. “But I never once forgot you. I never wanted to fight you.”

The wind stirred the long coat around his legs. Somewhere below, the masquerade continued—music floating up like an echo from another life.

Edgeworth’s grip tightened on the hilt, his breath trembling now—not from exhaustion, but from something darker. Older. “You protect the slums,” he said, voice tight as a drawn wire. “You skulk through alleyways, giving coin to beggars and bread to thieves, as though that absolves them.”

The rogue said nothing.

Edgeworth stepped closer, eyes glinting cold beneath the gold of his mask.

“Do you know what the slums gave me?” he hissed. “A corpse. My father’s corpse. Left bleeding in the filth by one of them. A nameless wretch from the gutters you hold so dear.”

Phoenix’s fingers flexed around the borrowed sword, his mouth parting, but no sound came.

“I saw the blade in his back,” Edgeworth continued, voice rising now—raw and bitter. “I was but a boy. He was the Esquire of the Body. A knight of the realm. And they butchered him like he was nothing.”

The rogue stepped back once, instinctively.

“And now,” Edgeworth growled, “I find you—this masked specter—tossing bread to those same rats? Dancing above their graves with sleight of hand and arrogance?”

With a sudden cry—a sharp, pained thing from somewhere deep—Edgeworth lunged, blade flashing in the firelight.

The clash of steel rang again through the stone corridor as the rogue parried just in time, their swords sparking from the blow’s force.

But Edgeworth pressed on, fury breaking through every stroke, as if by cutting down this masked man, he could carve away the grief that still lived in his bones.

Steel crashed against steel again, and again—Edgeworth striking like a tempest unloosed. Gone was the measured duelist, the cold tactician. What remained was raw, relentless fury.

Phoenix grit his teeth, deflecting each hit, barely holding his ground. The air between them sang with violence.

"My father died for this kingdom," Edgeworth hissed. "He died protecting it—from men like you. And what did he get? A knife in the back and silence from the crown!"

Another savage strike, this one glancing off Phoenix’s shoulder and sending him stumbling into the wall. Edgeworth did not relent.

"He taught me honor. He taught me mercy. And they left him in the mud like a beast!" He swung again—Phoenix parried with both hands, the force of it ringing down his arms. "I swore I would never be weak again," Edgeworth growled, his mask catching firelight like a second face. "I would be steel. I would be justice."

Their swords locked at the hilts. Edgeworth leaned in, his voice a rasped accusation. "And still you mock it. With tricks. With cards. With your damned mask and your smirk."

Phoenix’s breath came fast. He met Edgeworth’s eye, and for a moment, there was nothing between them but breath and grief and heat.

But Edgeworth wrenched away and swung again—one clean, brutal arc fueled not by duty, but by a boy’s unanswered cry in the dark.

And Phoenix, heart pounding, parried—still silent.

He couldn’t fight back. Not truly.

Not when he knew Edgeworth’s pain better than Edgeworth knew him.

Their blades clashed once more, the echo ringing out like a scream of iron in the hush above the masquerade. But this time, Phoenix didn’t fall back. He held the lock, trembling beneath the weight of it—not just steel on steel, but memory on muscle, grief against fury.

And then, through clenched teeth, he spoke. “No one from the slums ever did that.”

Edgeworth flinched—just for a breath. His balance faltered, the pressure of the parry slipping.

Phoenix surged forward, voice fierce and aching. “We don’t kill men like your father.” He shoved Edgeworth back—not to strike, but just to breathe. To speak. “We remembered him. We loved him. Your father was the only noble who ever walked into the slums without a sword at his hip.” He stepped into the space between them, tone quieter but harder. “He gave us bread when the King gave us chains. He knelt to speak to children no one else saw.”

Edgeworth’s sword dipped—not from intent, but instinct. His brows drew together, his breath catching in his chest. Confusion warred with anger, disbelief with something softer, more dangerous.

Phoenix pressed on. “My people still speak his name. With reverence. With grief.” His voice cracked, barely. “They would never harm him.”

The torchlight flickered between them, shadows twitching along the floor like phantoms.

“You’ve been lied to, Edgeworth.”

The silence that followed was not quiet.

It roared.

Edgeworth’s lips parted—his jaw working, as if to speak, to spit, to strike again—but no words came.

For the first time, Phoenix saw it: the cracks. Spiderwebbing beneath the surface of the man before him. They ran through the narrowed eyes, the trembling hand, the line of his sword no longer sure.

“No,” Edgeworth said at last, hoarsely, almost to himself. “The King told me it was a man from the slums. A vagrant. His blood on—” He stopped, as if choking on the words. As if they tasted wrong now. The sword in his hand hung mid-air, trembling—not from fatigue, but from something far older. Something far deeper.

He stared at the masked man across from him, breath unsteady. “That voice…” he murmured, low and brittle. “The way you speak of my father…” His eyes sharpened, searching—not for the rogue, but for something long lost. “The way you fight. That stance—I’ve seen it before. I’ve felt it before.”

Phoenix didn’t move. He didn’t need to. His silence was confirmation enough.

“There is no Sir Nicholas Wright,” Edgeworth said, and the name dropped from his lips like a splinter. “There never was. Just a mask.”

He stepped forward. One pace. And in that step, his whole bearing shifted—not the poised, cold Esquire of the Body, but the boy Phoenix once knew. The one who had vanished without goodbye. “…Are you Phoenix Wright?”

The question hovered like a blade—sharp, hesitant, familiar.

Phoenix said nothing. Instead, he reached up. His fingers curled beneath the edge of the mask, and with one slow motion, he lifted it away. Torchlight struck his face. Shadow fell from his eyes. And there he was.

Defiant.

Pained.

Known.

“I waited for you,” Phoenix said quietly.

Edgeworth’s breath caught.

“You vanished without a word. I didn’t know why. I didn’t even know your father had died, Miles. One day, you were just… gone.” Phoenix’s voice held no accusation—only memory. “I waited. For weeks. Months. Then years.”

The corridor felt suddenly too large and too small all at once, filled with a silence that pressed like snowfall.

Edgeworth could not speak.

“I see what you became now,” Phoenix whispered. “What they made you. But I never stopped remembering the boy who believed the poor were worth protecting.”

Edgeworth’s hand loosened.

The sword slipped from his grasp and clattered to the stone.

A thunderous crash split the air as the grand double doors at the corridor's end exploded open. Guards poured in, steel and torchlight clattering like war drums. Their halberds gleamed, armor flashing beneath the chandeliers, boots thundering in practiced rhythm.

And behind them, cutting through the chaos like a blade through silk, came King Manfred.

His royal mantle swept behind him like a trail of blood. Jewels at his collar caught the firelight with a venomous gleam. But it was his face that stilled the breath in Edgeworth’s lungs—contorted with wrath, voice thundering like divine judgment. “There they are!” he roared, eyes fixed on them like a predator's. “Lord Miles Edgeworth—by royal decree, you stand accused of treason! Caught consorting with the rogue who has defied this crown at every turn!”

Edgeworth reeled backward as if struck, the word treason burning a hole through his chest. “What—?” he breathed, a ghost of sound.

A hand caught his wrist.

Phoenix.

“Trust me,” he said—quiet, unshaken. The calm in his voice sliced through Edgeworth’s panic like a dagger through fog.

Edgeworth froze. For a second. Then Phoenix pulled.

“Wha—Let go! Wright—!”

But the rogue didn’t let go. He dragged Edgeworth bodily through a side arch hidden in the stone wall—one Edgeworth had passed a hundred times and never noticed. Behind them, shouts rang out, blades unsheathed with metallic screams.

They pounded up a narrow servant's stair, rough-hewn and half-crumbling, torchlight from below slashing at the dark like fire licking their heels.

“This is madness!” Edgeworth hissed, stumbling as his cloak snagged. “They think I’m with you—!”

Phoenix didn’t answer.

Not with words.

He shoved open a wooden hatch at the top of the stair, revealing open sky and a razor-thin edge of roofline. Night wind howled down to meet them, cold and sharp as steel.

“Wright!” Edgeworth’s voice cracked between fury and fear. “We’ll fall to our deaths!”

But Phoenix was already climbing out, boots finding steady purchase on slate tiles slick with dew and shadow. His silhouette cut against the moonlight like a ghost who belonged to this place. “Keep your weight low,” Phoenix called over his shoulder. “And don’t look down.”

“This isn’t a path,” Edgeworth growled, voice strangled. “It’s suicide!”

“It’s a path if you don’t want your head on a spike!”

Edgeworth cursed—viciously, creatively—but he climbed. Because down below, the King's men were rising. And because Phoenix's hand hadn't let go. Because that voice—damn it, that voice—was steady, sure. And Edgeworth, for reasons he couldn't begin to justify, followed it.

His heart slammed in his chest, thunderous and ragged. His polished boots scraped the roof’s edge as he tried to keep pace, his breath turning white in the cold. Behind them, the cries of pursuit faded beneath the wind. “You dragged me into this,” Edgeworth snapped, cloak snapping at his heels. “Dragged me out like some criminal—!”

“Welcome to my world, my lord,” Phoenix called back, the grin on his face wild and bright, haloed in moonlight.

They leapt the gap between rooftops—Phoenix first, landing in a crouch like he’d done it a hundred times. Edgeworth hesitated for half a second too long before flinging himself after, hitting the tiles with a clatter and a curse.

He rolled, breath knocked from his lungs—but Phoenix was there again. That damn hand. Pulling him up. Refusing to let him fall. “Let me go,” Edgeworth snapped, shoving at Phoenix’s arm. “You don’t understand—I can still explain this—”

“No, you can’t,” Phoenix said, voice low, rough. “Not to him. Not when you’re already sentenced in his eyes.”

Edgeworth wrenched his arm free—forcefully this time, dragging in air like he might scream. “You think I’ll run with you? Hide in shadows and filth, live like a criminal?”

“You’d rather die a pawn?” Phoenix shot back, suddenly close—too close. “Because that’s what he made you. A blade in his hand. You think your honor will save you?”

Edgeworth’s breath trembled.

Phoenix’s chest rose and fell beside him, warm despite the cold. “You’re not the man I left behind,” Phoenix murmured, softer now, eyes boring into him. “But maybe… maybe you still could be.”

Edgeworth’s heart clenched in his ribs. It was absurd. Insane. Phoenix was his enemy. A rogue. A liar. A ghost with too many truths and not enough caution.

And yet—As Phoenix grabbed his wrist again, hauling him over the next ledge into shadow, Edgeworth felt something sharp and terrible flicker in his chest.

A flutter.

He was being saved.

And not by a loyal knight or dutiful friend, but by the very man he was meant to destroy. The man who had haunted his nights with fire and fury, and now—Now, with their cloaks snapping in the wind, their breath white and shared, Phoenix Wright was dragging him not to ruin.

But to freedom.

Chapter Text

The ballroom of Whitehall, once radiant with golden torchlight and the dulcet notes of lutes and viols, now pulsed with tension. Silk and velvet swept the marble as nobles whispered behind fans and masks, eyes casting furtive glances toward the throne.

King Manfred the Ironfist sat unmoved, his posture regal, though the fingers upon his cane twitched with simmering fury. The music had long since ceased. The revelry soured into silence.

Sir Richard Gumshoe stepped forward, his red lion mask pushed atop his brow, revealing a face pale with disbelief. He dropped to one knee before the throne. “Your Majesty, I beg pardon,” he said, his voice low yet firm. “Lord Edgeworth is no traitor. He hath served you faithfully—as his father did before him. I would stake my honor on it.”

The king’s voice cut like a blade. “Would you now?” Manfred’s gaze bored into the kneeling knight. “Then mayhap your honor shall hang beside his, should I find even a whisper of falsehood in your plea.”

Gumshoe stiffened, his jaw clenched. “He is your Esquire of the Body—”

“Was,” Manfred corrected, rising from his throne. The court recoiled as he stepped forward, the polished end of his cane striking stone with each step. “He was my Esquire. Now he is a fugitive. A knight turned fox, slipping into the dark with the rogue who bested him before the court’s very eyes.”

The crowd murmured, a tide of silk and suspicion.

“I will have his head,” the king growled, “and the head of the cur he vanished with—whoever he may be beneath that helm. No man slights the crown and lives.”

From the shadows beside the dais, a feminine voice rang clear. “He would not,” said Princess Franziska, stepping forward with steel in her eyes. Her mask—an ornate piece of silver filigree—still clung to her face, but her voice bore the thunder of royalty. “Lord Edgeworth would not betray the realm. He is cold, yes, proud—but his loyalty lies with the throne.”

Manfred turned toward her, lips curling in disdain. “You presume to speak for him?”

“I know him,” she snapped. “He is not my brother by blood, but I have fought beside him. He is a knight of discipline, not deceit.”

A strange laugh echoed through the hall then, thin and rusted like wind through old iron. All heads turned.

Yanni Yogi, the king’s fool, emerged from the crowd in his motley of bells and patched velvets. His mask—a jester’s face with one eye eternally weeping—tilted as he bowed low, arms spread like wings. “Oh, Your Majesties, so many shadows we chase,” he said with mock sorrow. “But I, poor fool, did see what others did not.” He tapped his temple, the bells of his hat jingling like laughter in a crypt. “Lord Edgeworth spoke in secret on the roof before his duel. I heard whispers—names, plots, and a vow to escape with the rogue knight. ‘The court is blind,’ he said. ‘I shall make my own justice.’” Yogi’s grin widened. “He hath turned traitor, sure as winter follows fall.”

“You lie!” Franziska shouted, taking a step forward, one gloved hand reaching for the sword still belted to her gown. “You sniveling worm, he would never say such words!”

“Careful, daughter,” Manfred warned, not turning to her. “Even a princess may find herself in chains.”

At the king’s signal, the heralds banged staves to the floor. “Let none leave these halls until they are searched,” Manfred ordered. “Close the gates of Whitehall. And you, Sir Gumshoe—find your master. Drag him back by his heels if you must. Or pray you do not join him in disgrace.”

The nobles gasped and scattered, masks vanishing like leaves in a gale. Guards poured into the corridors. The Carivales Nocturne was ended—its music replaced by steel and suspicion.

Above them all, the king’s shadow stretched long across the stone.

•••

The flickering glow of tallow candles threw dancing shadows across the painted saints and martyrs adorning the long gallery, leading back toward the throne room. The heavy air reeked of beeswax, smoke, and something fouler—like rot hiding beneath perfumed silk. It was the scent of velvet masks torn away, of secrets peeled raw.

The Carivales Nocturne had ended in chaos. Nobles stripped of their silks and pride had been herded from the great hall like cattle. The search for Lord Edgeworth and the rogue had begun at once, blades drawn, dogs unleashed. Now, the throne room stood hushed—save for the murmur of candle flames licking at the dark.

Upon the raised dais, beneath the looming golden canopy, King Manfred sat brooding, draped in royal crimson, one gloved hand clenched on the pommel of his sword. He stared through the gloom, unblinking.

At his feet, sprawled like a desecrated idol, lay Yanni Yogi, the King’s jester. His bells jingled softly as he twisted himself upright, seated now cross-legged on the marble tiles, his painted smile never wavering. “So strange,” Yogi mused, tilting his head, “that both Edgeworths fell from grace, each under the veil of night. One vanished in silence. The other—” he gestured with a lazy twirl of the hand, “—leapt into the dark with a masked rogue.”

Manfred’s jaw tensed. “Lord Gregory was loyal until the day he died. His son’s betrayal is a poison from the slums, not the bloodline.”

Yogi gave a low hum, resting his cheek in one hand as though listening to a lullaby. “Oh yes. Quite the loyal dog.” Yogi twirled a gold coin between his fingers, letting it glint like an eye in the firelight. “Though funny, is it not? That no one ever found the real heir to the old Duke of Kent? And yet... not a soul ever glimpsed Lord Gregory Edgeworth after he stepped within the hallowed halls of Saint Olwen on that fateful eve.”

Manfred rose slightly, his hand gripping the sword hilt. “Tread carefully, jester.”

Yogi giggled, cartwheeling once before flopping against a pillar, upside-down. His painted grin hung inverted in the dark. “But I always tread carefully, Majesty. I listen. I watch. That is what you pay me for.” He traced a finger through the air as if sketching the blade that had pierced Gregory's back years ago. “Still… the Edgeworths do have a knack for disappearing. Perhaps the father went looking for the truth... and the son found it.”

Manfred’s face twitched, just once. “What are you implying?”

Yogi’s voice dropped low—still amused, but quieter now, more venom than silk. “Only that your enemies seem to return... wearing familiar faces.”

A silence passed between them. The king’s knuckles were bone-white on his sword. “The boy is still out there,” the King said. “Edgeworth will be found. The rogue he fled with will be hanged by dawn.”

“Mm,” Yogi murmured, turning toward the great gilded throne, “But tell me, Majesty… when they find him, will you see the father in the son?”

The King’s eyes twitched.

Yogi did not wait for an answer. He turned away, skipping lightly down the marble steps. “But sleep well,” he called behind him, voice echoing off the chamber’s ribbed stone, “There’s only one Edgeworth left to bury.”

With a flourish of his cape and a jingle of bells, Yanni Yogi vanished into the shadows, leaving Manfred staring into the dancing flames—his reflection wavering on the steel of his sword, distorted and crowned.

•••

Lord Gregory Edgeworth came slowly unto suspicion—not by sword nor open treachery, but by what was left unspoken in the hush between royal breaths. It began subtly, like mist gathering over a moor.

Proclamations sealed with the royal crest passed without his sight. Councils convened behind oaken doors long after the wax of Whitehall’s candles had guttered low. Strange lords from the further reaches of the realm arrived unannounced—veiled in foreign speech and escorted by men-at-arms whose coats bore no heraldry. When Gregory pressed the matter, the King gave only that thin, mirthless smile and said, “Statecraft moveth through shadow, my lord. Let it pass unseen.”

And so Gregory did—for a season. But the shadow did not pass. It pooled.

He noted the absences first. Stewards of noble blood—young men of promise and Latin learning—gone without name or notice, replaced by blank-eyed brutes who spoke in flatteries and bore no crest. A baroness of ancient Plantagenet line taken from her manor by nightfall, her holdings quietly gifted to a cousin of the Queen. Gregory inquired and was told the lady had ‘fallen to sickness.’ A fortnight thence, her boy—once heir to five counties—was seen begging bread by the gallows on Fleet Street.

Then came the death of Archbishop Langmere, a man learned and just, and once confessor to both Gregory and the crown. Langmere had murmured his unease to Gregory but dared speak no names. “We drift towards unblessed waters,” he had whispered. He was found broken upon the stones beneath Saint Olwen’s belfry three days later. The scribes named it divine misstep.

Gregory, ever a man of crown and creed, felt his soul begin to falter. He watched as prayers at court grew brief and hollow, more gesture than reverence. A trusted friar was sent to Calais without summons or farewell. Missives left court bearing the royal seal, yet none had passed through his hands. Thus did Gregory Edgeworth, Esquire of the Body, take up his inquiries—not as a knight, but as a pilgrim of truth.

He donned the garb of piety and rode to the abbeys under pretence of tithe. There he questioned abbots and infirmarers, requested copies of the Liber Regius, that great tome wherein royal births and coronations were recorded. What he found was defaced. A page torn—not by age, but by intent. The ink surrounding the void smudged thick with soot. One name, once inscribed in golden hand, now vanished beneath the ruin. He lingered over that page too long.

The young clerk beside him, Master Elric of Worcester, was found three nights hence face-down in the Thames, tongue severed and fingers broken—marked as ‘thieves’ vengeance’ by the city guard.

Gregory said naught. But he prayed. And began again. He rode cloaked in duty, smuggling scrolls beneath his doublet and secreting rubbings of tomb etchings from crypts long sealed. In the depths of Saint Olwen’s he found it—a letter from the Queen’s own physician, written in a faltering hand: “The boy lives. Hidden. The King knows not.”

The name was writ there in full.

Baldwinus.

Prince Baldwinus, trueborn son of Queen Rosamund, heir in both blood and sacrament, long thought perished of fever. A drawing, crude but tender, tucked into a psalter in the monk’s quarters, bore the words: Baldwinus Rex. The date marked it three winters past his supposed death.

The wetnurse had been paid for years after. Her household vanished come spring. Gregory’s heart turned to iron. This was no mere stratagem. This was usurpation.

Returning from Kent, his cloak heavy with salt and wind, a black carriage rode hard against his steed—no livery upon its doors. He was thrown from the saddle, his wrist shattering upon the road. A blade flashed from the window and struck his ribs before vanishing into the fog. The court deemed it highwaymen.

When Gregory staggered into Whitehall on the morrow, blood crusted in the hem of his surcoat, King Manfred regarded him with that same thin smile and said, “The southern roads grow wild. You would do well to keep to safer paths, my lord.”

No inquiry followed. No rider was dispatched.

That eve, beneath the shadow of his crucifix, Gregory set quill to parchment with a trembling hand. In his journal, bound in lambskin and sealed with red wax, he wrote: “If the crown must be won by the murder of a child, then it is a crown already cursed. And cursed, too, shall be he who guards it.” He pressed the lion crest of House Edgeworth into the wax. And knelt. He feared what must come.

And more than that, he feared what should befall his son if he failed.

The wind that whistled through the draughty cloisters bore with it the smell of ash and tallow—the kitchens had long since banked their fires, yet the scent clung like memory. Lord Gregory Edgeworth passed beneath a crooked arch, his cloak trailing over the uneven stone floor, each footfall measured, heavy with thought. Beneath his fur-lined mantle, his hand rested upon the pommel of his sword—not out of fear, but resolve.

In recent days, the air of court had grown strange, as if the very stones held their breath. The fool’s laughter broke the hush. Sharp. Shrill. Like bells cracked from misuse. It rang out in the gallery above the chapel court, where the shadows gathered thickest. Lord Gregory halted, glancing up beneath the torchlight. There he was—the jester. Yanni Yogi. Painted cheeks like wilted roses, lips stretched into a permanent sneer that mocked both crown and collar. His motley, once gaudy with jest, now seemed moth-eaten and sinister in the gloom.

Lord Gregory had never liked the man. He did not trust those who dealt in riddles while standing at the King’s right hand.

It was after the Archbishop’s untimely fall that Gregory had come across him again. Yanni Yogi had been waiting, as if he knew the path Gregory would take—his painted face reflecting nothing but mischief as he loitered near the royal chapel. “Lord Edgeworth,” Yogi’s voice slithered out from behind a curtain. “You look like a man lost in thought. Or perhaps you are merely lost in the shadows of your own mind.”

Gregory, already fatigued by the burden of his own suspicions, scowled but said nothing, choosing instead to continue his walk toward the royal chambers. He had no time for Yogi’s games.

But Yogi wasn’t one to be ignored. He flitted before him with an exaggerated bow, his bells chiming. “Your Excellency," the jester’s grin stretched wider. "Have you ever thought, just thought, that truth is a fleeting thing? That sometimes the best of us must cast aside our doubts for fear of losing what we hold dear?”

Gregory stiffened. He had heard the jester’s cryptic mutterings before, but something in the air seemed more sinister this time. “I am not a fool, Yogi,” Gregory said sharply. “And I am certainly not one to play in shadows. Leave me.”

Yogi, however, stepped forward, his face now serious, though his lips still curled with that twisted smile. “Ah, but you are wrong, my Lord,” Yogi crooned, his voice dipping low. “For the truth you seek is not far from your reach. All you must do is ask. After all, what is a king without his court, and what is a court without its shadows?”

Gregory stopped in his tracks, his gaze narrowing on the jester. He felt the familiar weight of suspicion settle in his chest. “What are you implying?” Gregory’s voice dropped to a dangerous low.

Yogi’s grin remained as sharp as ever, but there was something else—something darker—lurking beneath the surface. “Only that you are not the only one with questions, my Lord,” Yogi continued, lowering his voice as if imparting a secret. “King Manfred is a man burdened by weight, a man who sees enemies at every corner. Perhaps you are wondering, as I have, whether his crown was truly earned or whether it was forged in the fires of blood and deceit.”

Gregory’s heart skipped a beat. He could feel his pulse quicken, but he forced himself to remain calm. This was not the first time someone had spoken of the King’s rise in whispers. But Yogi’s words struck deeper than usual. He had been to the archives. He had seen the torn pages, the name blotted out in ink. The name of the boy who should have been King. “Enough of your riddles, Yogi,” Gregory snapped, his patience wearing thin. “You are a jester, not a prophet. I have no time for your games.”

Yogi, however, was undeterred. He stepped closer, his breath warm against Gregory’s ear. “No, my Lord,” Yogi whispered, leaning in. “But perhaps I am more than a jester. Perhaps I am the mirror in which you might see your own reflection. And I wonder, Gregory Edgeworth, what you would do if you were to discover that everything you thought you knew about loyalty and power was but a veil, ready to fall at your touch?”

Gregory’s hand twitched at his side, instinctively reaching for the hilt of his sword, but Yogi was already backing away with a theatrical bow.

“I do not know what you suspect, my Lord,” Yogi continued, his voice rising once more to its usual mockery, “but I do know this: a man who fears the shadows will never know what lies beyond them.” With a final cackle, Yogi danced off down the hall, his bells ringing louder than ever.

Gregory stood there for a moment, his mind racing. He had always known that King Manfred’s rise had been... unnatural. But this? This was something far more insidious. And now, Yogi—this twisted fool who had no place in the halls of power—was pushing him to confront what he had long feared. Was it really as Yogi suggested? Was the truth hidden just beyond his reach?

And if it was, what would he do once he saw it?

Gregory clenched his fists. He had a duty to the crown, to the realm, to the truth. He could not let the King continue down this path of blood and lies. But the road ahead was fraught with danger—Yogi knew more than he should, and yet Gregory could not trust him.

Still, Yogi’s words gnawed at him. The King’s crown was cursed. And if Gregory did not act soon, that curse would spread to all of England.

And what of his son, Miles? What would become of him if Gregory failed now? The thought made his heart burn with urgency. The time had come. The King would have to face the truth. And Gregory would be the one to show him.

The chapel of Saint Olwen stood in unnerving silence, its doors barred to the court and its torches snuffed low. Only the moonlight spilled through the stained glass, casting long shadows in shades of crimson, gold, and violet. The cold stone bore the weight of forgotten prayers, crowned victories, and secrets long buried.

Lord Gregory Edgeworth entered alone, his boots resounding against the marble like the rhythm of a funeral march. He passed the pews where once knights and lords had knelt, now vacant and barren. In his gloved hand, he clutched a letter—creased, worn, as though the weight of its truth had slowly worn it down. His jaw was tight, his resolve unbroken despite the burden that pressed upon him.

At the altar stood King Manfred, tall as ever and austere in his bearing, his robes trailing behind him like the dark shroud of a specter. The golden circlet upon his brow gleamed beneath the moon but carried no warmth. His hands were clasped in what might have been prayer, though the air was thick with incense and deceit.

“I have served you faithfully,” Gregory’s voice cut through the silence, rough with both fury and sorrow. “Through battle. Through plague. Through bloodshed. I have shed my own for this crown. But I will not serve a lie.”

Manfred did not turn at once, as if savoring the weight of the words. Finally, he did, his gaze sharp and knowing. “You speak of lies, Lord Edgeworth?” His voice was low, steady—almost amused. “Or of truths that carry too much danger to bear their name?”

Gregory stepped forward, the hem of his cloak brushing the cold stone. The air between them thickened, but he did not flinch. “The prince. Baldwin. He lived.” He unfurled the parchment slowly, the ink smudged from age and trembling hands. “This proves it. The physician’s words. The royal stipend continued long after the boy’s death. I found the wetnurse. She hid in Wiltshire. And a drawing—his hand, his name—‘Baldwinus Rex.’ He was but ten when you claimed him dead.”

Manfred’s lips curved into a thin, cruel smile. “You were always the noble one, Gregory,” he said, his voice dripping with mockery. “But nobility, like iron, bends—or it breaks. And too much of it? It rots the soul.”

Gregory’s fists clenched, but his voice held steady. “You murdered a child to steal a crown. You destroyed the line of a queen whose loss you feigned to mourn. I should have seen it. But I see it now.”

A long silence stretched between them, heavy as the tension before a blade is drawn.

Then, in a sudden, treacherous motion, a blade slid through Gregory’s back, sharp as a serpent’s strike. The steel drove up beneath his ribs, and the force took the breath from his lungs in one ragged gasp. Blood rose in his throat, his chest constricting before he could cry out. His body arched, then fell heavily into the King’s waiting arms. Manfred held him with a mock tenderness, one hand still gripping the dagger’s hilt, the other pressed against his chest in false solace.

“Some secrets,” the King murmured, his voice a whisper meant only for Gregory’s ear, “are not kept for the good of the realm… but for my own.”

Gregory’s knees buckled. He crumpled onto the cold marble floor, the warmth of his blood spreading swiftly, staining the stone beneath him. The parchment fell from his hand, fluttering like a dying leaf before it settled near the altar. Its ink, now red with his own blood, spread in a grotesque bloom.

His breath came in ragged gasps, his hand trembling as it scraped against the stone. “Mi…les…”

Manfred knelt beside him, watching the life fade from his former companion’s eyes with an almost clinical interest. He brushed a strand of graying hair from Gregory’s forehead, his touch feigned gentleness. “Do not worry,” he said, almost soothingly. “I shall raise the boy myself. He will learn well.”

Gregory’s lips moved again, though no sound came at first. His body trembled, fighting to speak. Finally, the words broke free, raw and desperate: “Don’t… let him become… you…”

His eyes fluttered closed, and his hand, once a pillar of strength, fell limply to the stone. Then, stillness. A single drop of blood rolled across the floor, tracing a path through the dust and holy oil, joining the expanding pool beneath Gregory. The moon now high above cast pale light into the chapel, bathing it in a serene, unforgiving silence. No witness remained but the stones that had long held their secrets, and the smoke curling upwards from the extinguished torches.

Above the altar, the saints in the glass wept in their painted silence.

The bells tolled from Saint Olwen’s spire—low, ponderous, and heavy as mourning veils. Through the choking winter fog that clung to London’s narrow lanes, their sound rolled over rooftops, across steeples, and down the fetid alleys of the slums like a judgment from on high.

Atop Whitehall’s great tower, black banners hung limp in the windless air. The court had declared a day of grief, but within the walls of the palace, there was no grief—only pageant.

In the throne hall, lined with lords in sable doublets and ladies with tearless eyes veiled in silk, the King presided. Crowned and robed in mourning colors—a dark crimson trimmed with ermine—King Manfred sat rigid upon the throne. His gaze was fixed not on the casket set upon the bier before him, nor upon the nobles gathered in solemn pretense. His eyes, cold and unblinking, rested on the man kneeling at the base of the dais.

The accused was no man of court. His hose were torn, his jerkin mottled with dried blood and sweat. Mud caked his boots and wrists, though chains bound him fast. His face was streaked with tears, his lip split and crusted. When he raised his head, one could see the desperation in his eyes—the knowledge that he had already been sentenced.

“I beg you, Your Majesty,” he croaked, his voice raw from beatings and pleas. “I ne’er saw the noble lord that night. I be no killer. I be a tailor’s boy, naught but—”

“Enough.” The King’s voice carried like steel unsheathed. “This is a house of law and loyalty, not guttered protest. You shame yourself further.”

Sir Zachs stepped forward at a nod from the King and struck the prisoner across the mouth with the flat of his mailed hand. Blood bloomed anew. The man fell to his elbows, sobbing.

Young Miles Edgeworth stood stiff as a halberd’s shaft beside the throne, garbed in black from boots to collar. Ten winters had he seen, and though his eyes were still rimmed with the red of grief, his jaw had hardened in recent days. His gaze never left the accused.

King Manfred rose slowly, his presence towering though he wore no crown atop his white hair. “Hear me, peers of the realm,” he said. “Let it be writ and spoken: Lord Gregory Edgeworth, my most steadfast knight, was slain not in fair combat, nor by foreign sword, but by treachery from within our own city’s belly. This man—this spawn of soot and sedition—struck him down, cowardly and cruel.”

A ripple of outrage swept through the chamber. Some nobles wept into their kerchiefs; others murmured prayers or clenched fists.

“This is what festers when we grant leniency to the ungraced. The slums breed vermin, and now they rise to bite the hand that feeds them.” He cast his gaze down to the kneeling man. “He shall be hanged at gallows’ peak at sundown. May his soul serve as warning.”

The condemned wept openly now. “I’ve a son, Your Grace! Just a boy—he’s done naught—”

“And he shall carry the burden of your name,” the King said, turning away. “Let him serve your penance.” Then, he turned to the boy at his right. “Young Lord Edgeworth.”

Miles stepped forward, expression unreadable. A hush fell.

“Your father served the Crown with honor and unflinching loyalty,” Manfred said. “Will you now pledge the same? Will you take up his mantle, and swear fealty not only to the throne, but to justice, that no villainy such as this might pass unanswered?”

The boy paused. For a heartbeat, his breath caught. He saw the casket again. He saw the blood on his father’s coat. He remembered a voice—warm, wise, steady—teaching him how to polish a sword, how to read from the Gospels, how to kneel in prayer with dignity. And he remembered another boy. Barefoot. Laughing. Smudged with ash and berry juice. A boy from the alleys near Saint Mary’s who had once called him ‘Miles’ without fear.

That name now felt like blasphemy.

Miles bowed his head and spoke clearly, his voice tight as the chainmail beneath his mourning doublet. “I swear it, Your Majesty.”

The court exhaled. Some even applauded, but Miles did not move. He watched as the guards seized the condemned once more, dragging him bodily across the stones.

By day’s end, the man’s body swayed from the Tyburn gallows.

But the punishment did not end there.

That very night, the flames came to the slums.

King Manfred’s men were not alone. The nobles, emboldened by their king’s decree, had taken part in the cruel reckoning. Among them, Lord Redd White, known for his merciless heart and insidious influence, had long whispered of Saint Mary’s—a sanctuary where the nuns tended to the orphaned and destitute children cast aside by the streets. He had been aware for some time that these same nuns had been caring for the children of the slums, even hiding them from the guards sent to round up those branded as traitors.

It was Redd White who had been the first to call for the destruction of Saint Mary’s. The very sight of those children, those ‘illegitimate’ souls of the poor, enraged him. A symbol of rebellion against the crown, he’d claimed. A tool for the spread of heretical ideas under the guise of charity. And in the heat of the growing Protestant Reformation, where suspicion and paranoia were as rife as the smoke in the streets, such a place could not be allowed to stand.

So, the order was given.

Saint Mary’s—once a refuge of bread, prayer, and sanctuary—was set ablaze in the dead of night. The nuns who had sheltered the children scattered like leaves caught in a tempest. The flames consumed the wooden beams, the stone walls crackled with the inferno’s rage. As the fire climbed to the heavens, it carried with it not only the scent of burning cloth and flesh, but the very essence of faith itself. The flames reached to heaven, demanding an answer, an expiation.

The nobles watched as the poor fled in terror, their cries swallowed by the roar of the blaze. Yet, it was not only the King's men who raided the slums. The lords who had long seen the poor as vermin joined in the pillaging. Homes were sacked, their owners dragged from the warmth of their hearths. Loaves of bread—scarce enough as it was—were stolen from the hands of starving mothers. Children were seized in the night, hauled away like cattle for questioning, to be accused of whatever crime their captors could invent.

Fields were salted, crops destroyed, baptisms undone, erasing the very souls of those whose existence was nothing but suffering. The streets grew silent in the wake of the raids, save for the crackling of the fire that burned brightly in the distance, marking the end of a world that had already been forgotten by those who held power.

From the high towers of Whitehall, young Lord Edgeworth stood silent, staring out at the hellish glow on the horizon. His eyes were empty, his heart hollow. In that moment, he knew—what he had sworn on that day, in the presence of his king and his father's death, would bind him for years to come—not to justice, but to the throne's version of it.

The truth of what had truly happened, of the lies that had been woven around his father’s death, would remain buried, deep in the ashes of the slums, and alongside the body of Lord Gregory Edgeworth. A truth that no fire, no punishment, no decree could ever extinguish.

But it would remain cold, and silent—for now.

•••

They moved through the narrow wynds and crooked passages like phantoms, their footfalls swallowed by the night. Behind them, the revels of the Carivales Nocturne drifted faintly on the wind—mirthful cries, the lilt of viols and shawms, the rhythmic stamping of dancers’ slippers on marble floors—all of it distant now, as if it belonged to another world.

Here, the air turned close and foul, thick with chimney smoke, stale ale, and the stench of gutters left untended. Lanterns flickered dim behind sooty panes; the noble light of Whitehall faded behind rooftops like a dying star. This was the city as it lived and festered—lower London, unbowed and unwashed.

Phoenix led them through twisting lanes no guardsman would bother to patrol, until they reached a squat timbered building half-swallowed by the fog. Its door was of old oak, swollen with damp and patched with iron bands gone red with rust. He raised a fist and knocked.

Three times.

A pause.

Then two more.

Silence.

Then, at last, the groan of a bolt being drawn back, and the door cracked open by inches. Maya’s face appeared in the shadows, her hair loose around her shoulders, a single candle trembling in her hand. “Saints preserve us—Nick?” Her voice was hushed, hoarse with disbelief. Her eyes, already narrowed, shifted past him—and froze. “Who in God’s name—?”

“I need your trust,” Phoenix said, urgent but low. “He’s wounded.”

Her brow drew tight. “That’s a lord.”

“Yes,” he said, weariness creeping into his voice. “And it seems they bleed no different than the rest of us.”

Her gaze lingered on Edgeworth—on the torn fine fabric, the blood dark at his side, the bearing still noble despite it all. Her lips parted as if to speak—but the words failed her. She saw more than just a nobleman, then. She saw the way Phoenix stood beside him. Not in deference, nor fear—but in quiet defiance. In protection. Something shifted in her expression. A memory stirred. The flash of steel in her hand. Franziska’s voice in the darkness, laced with fury and trembling with something else.

Maya stepped back. “Get him inside,” she murmured. “Before someone sees.”

The chamber within was narrow and close, lit only by a dying hearth and the flicker of a single tallow candle. Smoke clung low in the rafters, and the damp chill of the slums pressed in from the stone walls. Pearl lay sleeping on a cot beneath the window, curled small beneath a threadbare blanket, her wooden doll clasped tight in her arms.

Edgeworth stood just within the threshold, straight-backed and silent, though Phoenix could see the effort it cost him. His breath was shallow, his gaze shifting warily across each shadow, as though every corner might rise to denounce him. Then—barely a twitch—he winced.

Phoenix saw it. “What ails you?”

“I am well,” Edgeworth replied, voice tight as a tourniquet.

Phoenix arched a brow. “Yes, and I am the Archbishop of Canterbury.” He stepped forward. “Let me look.”

“I said I—” The protest died in Edgeworth’s throat as pain bent him forward, his hand bracing against the table.

Phoenix was already moving. He caught the noble’s shoulder gently, fingers brushing damp velvet. The back of the jerkin was darkened with blood—soaked clean through.

“God’s wounds—Maya!” Phoenix called, low but urgent. “Fetch the cloth, and the salves I stole from that surgeon near Saint Cuthber’s.”

Maya, already reaching for a shawl, spared no questions. She disappeared through the curtained door to the other chamber.

Phoenix turned back. His voice softened. “You must shed your coat. And the jerkin.”

Edgeworth hesitated. For a heartbeat, pride stiffened his spine. The mask he wore in court—of composure, of distance—lingered about him still. But Phoenix’s gaze held steady, not commanding, only present. That was what undid him.

He moved at last, slow and grimacing. He unfastened the heavy maroon coat, its embroidery dulled by shadow, and slid it off his shoulders. Beneath it, the black jerkin clung with dampness. He unlaced it with trembling fingers. His cravat, loosened since the flight from Whitehall, fell away unnoticed. Lastly, with reluctant hands, he reached for the half-mask of beaten gold still tied at his temple. His fingertips lingered at the ties. Then he set it aside upon the table with care, saying nothing.

Phoenix, silent as well, drew off his own blue coat—the rogue’s garb of the night—and let it fall across the back of the nearest chair. It left him in his linen shirt, clinging with sweat, and his dark breeches. The cold gnawed at them both now, but neither spoke of it.

When Edgeworth turned slightly, the candlelight caught his back—and Phoenix saw.

Crimson welts striped his flesh, clean and cruel. Some had reopened, staining the skin anew. The lashes were deliberate, elegant in their precision—a signature of the court’s justice, of Manfred’s quiet wrath. Not meant to kill. Merely to mark.

Phoenix stared. His jaw clenched. “The king did this.”

Edgeworth did not answer.

Maya returned, setting the stolen bandages and vials upon the table. Her eyes flicked once toward the noble’s wounds—her face paled—but she said nothing. “Call if you’ve need,” she murmured, her voice steadier than it should have been. She looked at Phoenix. And in her eyes was a quiet, reluctant trust. Then she, too, was gone.

Phoenix took a cloth, dipped it in the cleanest bowl of water they had, wrung it out. He knelt behind Edgeworth. “This will bite.”

Edgeworth did not flinch at the warning, but when the cloth met skin, he stiffened—air hissing between his teeth. He made no sound beyond that.

Phoenix worked with care. Every pass of the cloth revealed more of the ruin. Each line of blood and bruising spoke of power wielded without mercy. Of punishment meted out not for justice, but for control. “You ought to have told me,” Phoenix said quietly.

Edgeworth’s voice, when it came, was rough. “Would it have altered your path?”

Phoenix paused. “No. But I wouldn’t have made you flee across rooftops like a cutpurse with half your back torn open.”

There was the faintest sound—a breath caught between scoff and laugh. “A fair point.”

They fell to silence again. The kind shared between men bound by old wounds and unspoken things. The fire cracked softly behind them. Outside, the city held its breath.

Phoenix rinsed the linen cloth once more, the basin's water now tinged a pale, sickly rose. He wrung it gently, careful not to splash, and turned again to the nobleman’s back. The next lash was deeper than the rest, still seeping. He dabbed the edges with care.

Edgeworth bore it in silence, but Phoenix could feel the tension strung through him like wire drawn taut. Not pain alone—but pride. Shame. Fury, perhaps, though at what Phoenix could only guess.

The chamber held its breath, save for the soft scrape of cloth against skin and the faint crackle of the fire.

Then, Edgeworth spoke—low, tight. “So this is how you’ve lived. All these years. With a name not your own. Cloaked in shadows. Among thieves and knaves, risking your neck night by night.”

A pause.

“…To what end? The king’s coin? To mock his court? Or was it merely to ask after me?” He turned his head, though his eyes did not meet Phoenix’s.

Phoenix said nothing at first. He laid the cloth aside, reached for the tin of salve, and dipped two fingers into the cool balm. His hands were steady—far more gentle than any lord might expect from a common rogue. “I never intended to stay,” he said at last, quiet as the hearth’s whisper. “At first, I only wished to know. Why you vanished. Whether you still drew breath. Whether you were still… you.”

Edgeworth’s gaze dropped.

“As for the name,” Phoenix continued, “it was but a ruse, nothing more. Sir Nicholas Wright—has a noble ring to it, whispered through steel. I meant only to slip in, learn the truth, and be gone before anyone noticed.”

A faint smile ghosted across his lips, wry and worn. “But I stayed. I watched. And the more I saw… the harder it became to look away.”

Edgeworth turned to face him then, slowly. His voice was scarcely more than breath. “You risked your life. Exposure. The noose.” He faltered. “All for answers?”

Phoenix met his eyes. “For you.”

Edgeworth stilled.

“You were my friend,” Phoenix said. “You and your father were the only ones in fine clothes who ever looked at me as though I mattered. And then you vanished—without word, without trace. As if the world had cast me off again.” He shook his head. “So I went looking.”

For a moment, Edgeworth said nothing. His jaw tightened, then slackened, and he let out a breath that trembled faintly at the edges—as though something long-caged within had finally stirred. “I did not think…” His voice cracked. “I did not think anyone would come searching.”

Phoenix’s reply was soft. “I never stopped.”

Edgeworth turned away again, just slightly, his spine held taut not with disdain, but with something more brittle.

Phoenix reached for the balm once more, pressing it to a fresh welt high on Edgeworth’s shoulder. The noble flinched—not from pain, but perhaps from the gentleness.

Then, after a silence: “No surgeon has ever tended these.”

Phoenix’s hand stilled.

Edgeworth’s tone was flat. Not bitter. Merely true. “I dressed them myself. When I could. With spirits. Rags. Or naught.”

Phoenix said nothing, but resumed his work, slower now. His fingers steady, his touch precise.

Edgeworth went on. “It was not permitted. Not for lashes. Not for correction.” He breathed out a dry sound that might have been a laugh. “King Manfred made that much clear.”

Phoenix pressed the balm in silence.

“It hurt more,” Edgeworth said, “when I wrapped them myself. Could never reach the worst of it. But pride is a strange master.”

No reply came this time—only the soft whisper of cloth, the scent of balm and smoke, and the quiet, careful care of one man tending another. And then stillness. Heavier than before—but warmer too. Like a woolen cloak drawn about shoulders grown too used to cold. Edgeworth’s shoulders eased, almost imperceptibly, beneath Phoenix’s careful touch.

“You should rest,” Phoenix said, breaking the silence. “You’ll reopen those wounds if you stay upright.”

Edgeworth gave a slight nod, though his posture remained tense. After a pause, he spoke with the faintest trace of irony. “I’m not accustomed to being told what to do within my own chambers.”

Phoenix raised an eyebrow. “This isn’t a chamber, my lord. This is a shack.”

Edgeworth’s lips twitched—almost a smile, the kind of rare, fleeting expression Phoenix hadn’t seen in years. It was strange—like a distant memory stirring—but it was the first time in a long while that the distance between them didn’t feel so insurmountable.

Phoenix took a step closer, carefully helping Edgeworth to his feet. The nobleman winced from the effort, his breath shallow as the weight of his wounds threatened to pull him back to the floor. Phoenix steadied him, trying not to show his concern. Edgeworth’s pride was a fortress, but the exhaustion radiating from him was undeniable.

As they crossed the small room, Phoenix’s eyes flicked to the bed—a modest cot, nothing like the fine feather beds Edgeworth would be used to in his lofty chambers. Phoenix glanced at the nobleman, now pale and drawn, blood still staining his back.

“You’ll have to take my bed,” Phoenix said quietly, his voice strained by the awkwardness of the offer. "It's not much, but it’s all I have."

Edgeworth didn’t object, though his pride was evident in the tightness of his jaw. Without a word, he let Phoenix guide him to the cot. The moment Edgeworth lowered himself onto the mattress, he winced visibly, a sharp hiss escaping his lips. The marks of the king’s cruelty were stark against his pale skin—bruises, cuts, the angry welts still raised from the whipping. Each movement seemed to remind him of the agony that never fully left.

Phoenix couldn’t help but watch, his hands lingering, unsure, before he stepped back. He’d seen the harsh punishments of nobles before—punishments that left scars deeper than flesh—but seeing it on Edgeworth… that was something different.

Phoenix turned, his gaze sweeping the small room until it landed on a spare shirt—coarse linen, plain and unadorned. Far from the fine silks Edgeworth would be accustomed to at court. His fingers gripped the fabric tightly as he crossed the room, his pulse thrumming in his ears. The air was thick with the scent of blood, healing salve, and the cool night breeze. And beneath it all—faint, but undeniable—was Edgeworth.

When Phoenix returned, he found Edgeworth seated on the edge of the bed, his back to the door. The nobleman was shirtless, pale skin streaked with the harsh marks of the whipping. Phoenix paused in the threshold, his breath catching in his throat.

Even in this state, edge-worn and exhausted, Edgeworth held himself with the posture of a knight. His body bore the marks of a life carved by discipline, by a life with a sword in hand. The raw red welts on his back spoke of brutality, yet Phoenix could see beneath them the hard, sculpted muscles shaped by years of practice.

The firelight flickered, casting shadows across Edgeworth’s form, and something stirred deep in Phoenix’s chest. He tightened his grip on the shirt. It wasn’t desire—not in the sense that he had ever known—but something raw, something untamed, something that had no place in prayer nor in law.

With great care, Phoenix moved closer, trying to keep his gaze level—respectful—but it was impossible. His eyes followed the path of bruises, muscle, and memory.

Edgeworth didn’t speak. Didn’t turn. His head lowered slightly, as if he were waiting. Yielding.

Phoenix stepped closer, unable to keep the tension from his voice as he spoke. “Here,” he said, the words thick in his throat. “Let me help you with this.”

Edgeworth glanced over his shoulder, surprise flickering in his eyes before something deeper settled there—acceptance. He nodded once.

Phoenix lifted the shirt carefully, his fingers grazing Edgeworth’s shoulder as he guided the fabric up his back. He paused, his breath catching when his eyes landed on a deeper wound—one that ran across Edgeworth’s spine, still weeping faintly. The sight struck him like a blow to the chest.

Before he could stop himself, Phoenix bent forward, pressing his lips softly to the edge of the wound. It wasn’t desire—it was grief. Reverence. A vow unspoken. But the act, intimate as it was, was too personal to be innocent.

Edgeworth stiffened beneath his touch.

Phoenix pulled back at once, horror rising in his chest. What had he done? His heart raced, guilt clawing at him, a guilt that had been buried so deep it had festered without his realizing. A kiss. On a man. His chest tightened as shame threatened to consume him. The world called such things a sin. It was a betrayal of all he had been taught.

He couldn’t meet Edgeworth’s gaze. Couldn’t speak.

Before he could retreat further, however, a hand caught his wrist. Edgeworth’s grip was firm, not forceful, but anchoring. Phoenix turned slowly to face him, and for the first time since their reunion, Edgeworth was unguarded. No mask of rank, no lofty titles between them. Just skin, breath, and the silence of a thousand unspoken things.

Their eyes locked. Edgeworth’s hand trembled slightly against Phoenix’s skin. He gazed at Phoenix—truly looked at him—and something shifted in his eyes. Recognition. Memory. The face of the boy who once stood beside him in the orchard, laughing without care, without fear. The boy who had always been there—who had never turned away. The boy who had seen him as more than just the son of a nobleman. And this man—this same boy grown—was now here, tending to him when the world had turned its back.

Edgeworth parted his lips, the words coming slow, as if pulled from deep beneath layers of armor and pride. “Don’t pull away.” His voice was rough, quiet. A rawness lingered in it—something frayed, unraveling at last.

Phoenix’s breath hitched.

Neither of them moved. The world outside faded. All that remained were hands brushing, hearts unguarded, the ancient ache of wanting something forbidden, something dangerous, something that had always lived between them—hidden, denied by the world and its laws.

Edgeworth’s fingers tightened, ever so slightly, on Phoenix’s wrist. Phoenix didn’t pull away. Instead, he took a step closer.

Their faces were close now—too close. Phoenix could feel Edgeworth’s breath, uneven and warm against his skin. His own breath was shallow, his chest rising and falling like the ebb and flow of the sea. The fire crackled softly in the hearth, but it was as though Phoenix could hear only the pounding of his own heart.

He searched Edgeworth’s eyes—for fear, for permission, for something. Then, without thinking, without asking, Phoenix leaned in. But before his lips could meet Edgeworth’s, a hand came up—gentle but firm—pressing softly against his mouth. Phoenix froze.

Edgeworth didn’t push him away. Didn’t recoil. He simply held his hand there, steady and trembling.

Phoenix’s eyes widened, and his breath stilled against the warmth of skin, no silk, no leather—just the hand of a man he had chased through memory and shadow alike. He didn’t move. He dared not.

Edgeworth’s gaze dropped, and then, slowly, deliberately, he lowered his head and pressed a kiss to the place where Phoenix’s lips had just been—light, fleeting, a breath’s worth of contact. But it shattered the fragile silence between them.

When he drew back, he did not meet Phoenix’s eyes. His gaze shifted instead to the tall, arched window where moonlight cut through the darkness like the edge of a holy blade. The stars outside hung solemn above the rooftops of London, like a silent jury in judgment.

“If we go further…” he murmured, voice low and grave, heavy as confession. His hand fell to his side. “The Church would damn us. The Crown would destroy us.”

Phoenix said nothing. His throat had gone dry, as if dust had filled it. The weight of the words pressed into his chest, immovable and ancient.

Edgeworth’s jaw tensed. The candlelight caught on the sharp lines of his bare shoulders, a faint sheen highlighting the tension in his frame—too exposed, too raw for the shadowed world they now stood in. “You are a knight—by name, if not by birth. And I…” He turned toward him at last, his eyes storm-dark, his voice brittle. “I am a lord of the realm. Sworn to the Crown. A servant of the King. There is no abbey, no court, no altar that would offer us sanctuary were this known.” He paused, then, almost faltering. “They would strip you of your title. Bind you. Brand you. Hang you as a heretic. Or worse.” His voice cracked, just faintly—like silk torn beneath the weight of iron. “And I… I would not let them touch you.”

The silence that followed was sacred. Damned. The breath between lightning and the strike.

Phoenix didn’t move. Couldn’t. The ghost of Edgeworth’s touch still lingered upon his mouth like a seal. They had come close—so close to crossing a threshold that could never be undone. And yet... they hadn’t. Not yet.

Edgeworth’s shoulders dropped under the weight of what had passed between them. The torchlight haloed him, too noble and too human all at once.

Phoenix watched him. And in that stillness, he saw it—the echo of a boy he once knew. A boy with a stern mouth that softened only for him. A boy who had laughed with abandon, who had stood before the sneering sons of dukes and dared them to lay hand or insult upon Phoenix.

He saw him again now, not in fine raiment or gilded titles, but in the quiet defiance of this moment. In the kiss placed not on his lips, but on Edgeworth’s own hand, where Phoenix’s warmth had lingered. The only way the world would allow. Indirectly. Silently. Desperately. And it was more intimate than anything else in the world.

But beneath it, Phoenix saw more: fear.

Not of him. But of leaning on him. Of needing him.

Edgeworth’s voice, when it came again, was barely more than a breath. “You’ve done nothing but risk yourself for me. And yet…” He turned, his expression unreadable. “And yet I find myself doubting. Not you, perhaps, but the ground beneath our feet. The shadows in these halls. I was betrayed by the man I served since I was a child. And I do not yet know… where to place my trust.” His eyes flicked toward Phoenix, uncertain. Soft. “But I want to.”

The ache in Phoenix’s chest deepened, not with pain, but with longing.

There was no answer that could make the choice easier. No vow that could lift the sentence from their heads. But perhaps the truth—honest and unadorned—was enough.

And so he stepped closer, gently, reverently. “I’m still the boy you knew,” Phoenix said quietly. “And I still see the one who stood between me and the world.”

The stars beyond the window gleamed like candle flames caught in prayer. And for a moment, neither lord nor knight spoke, cloaked in silence older than their names.

Chapter Text

The sun hung low over the training grounds beyond the lesser courtyard, casting golden light upon the weathered stone of Whitehall. Dust stirred beneath the feet of boys who ought to have been at their Latin, but instead lingered near the stables, chasing trouble as only noble sons dared.

Phoenix Wright, barefoot and dust-covered, stood cornered against the wall of the old grain shed. His tunic hung loose over his thin frame, the hem frayed and one sleeve torn from a scuffle earlier that week. A red mark bloomed on his cheek, the sting still fresh from a noble boy’s ringed hand.

“You thought you could sneak apples again, rat?” sneered one of them—a blond boy in a fine doublet with gold-rimmed sleeves. “Bet you crept into the kitchens, same as last time. That’s what slum-borns do. Lie and steal.”

“I didn’t,” Phoenix bit out, fists clenched. “I never took anything—” Another boy shoved him hard. He hit the wall with a muffled grunt.

“I saw him near the smithy,” one jeered. “Staring at silver blades like he meant to steal one. Like a mongrel sniffing a nobleman’s plate.”

Phoenix bared his teeth and lunged, too angry to think—but his swing was caught mid-air.

The hand that stopped him wore a fine glove of soft leather. Its owner’s boots were dusty, though his maroon justaucorps was too fine for a stable boy. His silver hair glinted like moonlight drawn into a braid, and his grey eyes narrowed with the sharpness of a drawn blade. “Unhand him,” said the newcomer—cool, commanding.

The noble boys froze. “We—we weren’t—”

“I saw what you were doing,” Miles Edgeworth said, releasing Phoenix’s wrist. “He was not stealing. You were tormenting him for your sport.”

“He’s a stray,” muttered the smallest. “He shouldn’t even be here.”

“I see.” Miles’s voice was quiet but cutting. “Then I shall report to my father, Lord Edgeworth, that the sons of noblemen spend their idle hours battering the poor while cloaking it in righteousness. I’m certain he will find it most amusing.”

That silenced them. They cast nervous glances among themselves, muttering weak apologies before slinking away like curs with their tails tucked.

Phoenix remained still, pressed to the wall, his chest rising and falling. The heat in his cheeks no longer came from shame or bruises.

Miles turned and extended a hand—gloved, clean, noble. “Are you hurt?”

Phoenix hesitated, then took it. The warmth of that hand startled him more than any blow. It was steady, deliberate—gentle, but not soft.

This was not the first time they had met. He remembered when Miles had come to the slums months ago, led by Lord Gregory on one of his quiet visits to feed the hungry. Phoenix had been bold enough to speak to the noble boy, to ask his name, to challenge him to a game of stick-fighting behind the abbey walls. Miles had obliged, to everyone’s surprise, showing him how to hold a makeshift blade, how to parry. They had played often after that, hidden from prying eyes.

Phoenix remembered the laughter they shared, the small scrape Miles got on his chin, and how he had smiled through it. He remembered the precise way Miles had taught him to stand with his weight just so, repeating his father’s words like scripture. And he remembered, too, the day Lord Gregory himself had smiled down at Phoenix and corrected his stance with kind eyes and a teacher’s patience.

No one had ever looked at him that way before.

Up close now, Miles’s eyes were not cold. Only serious. As though he carried something heavy beneath his fine coat. “You’re flushed,” Miles said. “Do you feel ill?”

Phoenix blinked, heart still pounding. “No. I—I’m fine.”

“You sure?” Miles tilted his head. “You’re warm.”

“It’s nothing,” Phoenix said quickly, dropping his gaze. “Truly.” But he didn’t know what it was. His heart beat far too fast, far too loud. There was a weight in his chest he could neither name nor lift. It wasn’t fear. It wasn’t gratitude.

It was something softer. Something sharper. Something that felt like a sin he might someday be willing to commit.

Miles was quiet a moment longer, then looked away with a faint frown. “My father said you might be here,” he said, though his tone was oddly shy—deflecting.

Phoenix smiled faintly. “Did he?”

He knew better. Miles had come looking for him. Not because he’d been told to. But because he had wanted to. And for a moment, Phoenix felt like he belonged somewhere. Here. With him.

“Come,” Miles said after a pause. “I believe I have something to show you.”

Phoenix stepped forward without question, heart fluttering as he followed.

He didn’t know that this would be the last time. That by sunrise the next day, the Edgeworths would vanish without word. That Miles’s chambers at Whitehall would be stripped bare. That Saint Mary’s, where Phoenix had lived among the nuns and Sister Mia, would burn in the dark of night—its holy windows shattered, its bells silenced.

That everything would change.

But for now, there was light still in the air. And Miles’s hand had held his. And Phoenix—young, foolish, barefoot—believed that meant something.

•••

The torches lining the corridor hissed and spat as Princess Franziska strode through the east wing of Whitehall. Her boots struck the stone with clipped certainty, a quiet fury simmering beneath her composed mien. The guards at Lord Edgeworth’s door faltered beneath her gaze and stepped aside without protest. None dared cross the daughter of King Manfred—especially when her temper was roused.

The heavy oak door creaked open, and she entered the chambers of Lord Miles Edgeworth. It was precisely as she expected. Spartan. Austere. Every object placed with precision—books stacked by height, scrolls arranged in neat order, the hearth left barely lit. No letters strewn in haste, no garments tossed in idleness. It was less a man’s dwelling than a sanctum of discipline.

She shut the door behind her with finality and began to search. Drawers were opened, folios unrolled, codices thumbed through with her gloved fingers. The firelight caught upon the hilt of Edgeworth’s ceremonial sword resting on the mantle, gleaming like accusation.

She found nothing of treason. No seditious writings, no hidden missives from foreign lands. Only reports—military rosters, merchant tax records, maps, the King’s ledgers—all marked in Lord Edgeworth’s neat hand. And amid them, under a folded cloth, she found a bound stack of postings sealed with the Lord’s own signet.

Franziska frowned and brought the bundle to the desk. Breaking the wax, she spread them out. “Sir Nicholas Wright…” she murmured, her eyes narrowing. Line after line of military record. Observations. Assessments. Notes on his swordplay, his victories, his irregular style. Even sketches of duels fought during the Court of Steel.

So meticulous. So fixated.

She was still staring at the pages when the door creaked again. She turned sharply, hand at her hip, before easing only slightly when Sir Richard Gumshoe stepped inside, helmet tucked beneath his arm.

“Y-Your Grace,” he stammered, bowing quickly. “I heard you’d gone into Lord Edgeworth’s quarters, so I—I thought maybe you could use a hand.”

“You served him faithfully, did you not?” she asked coolly.

“Aye, m’lady. Since I could first lift a sword.” Gumshoe’s brow furrowed as he stepped forward. “He’s no traitor. I swear it on the honor of my name—and the name of every Gumshoe who came before me.”

Franziska studied him a moment, then gestured to the desk. “Then explain to me why your master kept so much on this ‘Sir Nicholas Wright.’ He was gathering these reports for weeks, perhaps longer.”

Gumshoe scratched the back of his head, eyes squinting in thought. “Well… he kept a close eye on that one, that’s true. Said there was something queer about him. Not wrong exactly—just… not right. Odd, like he didn’t belong.”

Franziska arched a brow. “Explain.”

“Aye, well…” Gumshoe shifted uncomfortably. “Sir Nicholas only showed up last year. No lineage worth mentioning, no tutor from court, no crest tied to any house. Just showed up with a forged letter of service and a blade sharper than sin. Beat knights twice his size in the first tournament he entered. Even the older knights began whisperin’—sayin’ he moved like a ghost, fought like one who’d learned on battlefields, not in salons.”

Franziska’s fingers tightened on the edge of the desk.

“After the Court of Steel,” Gumshoe continued, voice lowering as if the walls might listen, “I found Lord Edgeworth pacing in his chambers. Back and forth like a man haunted. And he kept sayin’ it—just under his breath. ‘Wright… Wright… Wright…’ Like a prayer. Or a curse.”

He looked up, a faint worry in his gaze. “Beggin’ pardon, Your Grace, but I think he knew him. Or thought he did. And it rattled him bad.”

Franziska’s eyes darted back to the name scrawled across the parchment: Sir Nicholas Wright.

“And during the masquerade?” she asked coldly.

“Oh, he was—uh—downright obsessive then,” Gumshoe admitted, scratching his cheek. “Kept prowlin’ the ballroom like a wolf scentin’ blood. I reckon he thought Sir Nicholas was hidin’ something, and he meant to uncover it before the Carivales was done. Never seen him that unsettled. Like he was chasin’ a ghost.”

Franziska said nothing. But already her thoughts were racing. A name. A sword. A memory.

That peasant girl, Maya, had called her Sir Nicholas. As if by instinct. And that smile—hesitant, sweet, and utterly sincere. The trembling hand offering her a bruised apple as though it were a crown jewel. The flutter she felt then stirred anew in her chest.

Without another word, the princess turned on her heel and swept from the room.

“Your Grace?” Gumshoe called after her, bewildered.

But she did not answer. There was one more mystery yet to chase. And this time, it wore a peasant’s cloak and spoke in riddles with honey on her tongue.

The chamber behind the Hall of Lanterns smelled of old rushes and damp stone. Flames in the iron sconces sputtered against the creeping chill, casting long shadows over the carved wood pillars and faded tapestries of Saint Edmund’s martyrdom. Somewhere, music filtered from the Great Hall—but here, the mirth did not reach.

Princess Franziska strode in with the sharpness of a blade drawn too early. Her half-cloak swept behind her in dark blue silk, her boots biting against the worn floor. In her hand, she held no torch—only a short sword, still sheathed, but angled deliberately. “Jester,” she called, her voice clear, edged. “A word.”

Yanni Yogi sat slouched in the window alcove, his gaudy motley catching the firelight in garish reds and greens. A tarnished bell hung limp at his elbow, unmoving despite the way he swayed slightly, as though dancing to music only he could hear. He blinked once, slowly.

“Oh ho,” he murmured. “The little hawk returns from her hunt. I’d ask if you found any worms, but I suspect you’ve been turning stones again.”

“Enough riddles, fool,” Franziska snapped, stepping forward. “I know you whispered something to the King. Something that made him turn on Lord Edgeworth.”

Yogi’s mouth twisted into a grin—jagged, half-mad. “Turn? The King does not turn. He simply chooses when to crush.”

Franziska’s hand clenched at the hilt of her blade. “What did you say to him? What tale of treason did you craft with your crooked tongue?”

The jester shrugged and plucked a dried fig from his pouch, popping it into his mouth with exaggerated slowness. “Only what I’ve seen. Only what I know. That our beloved Lord Edgeworth has grown… distracted. His eyes too long on shadows. His loyalty torn between crown and something... softer.”

Franziska stepped closer, steel glinting at her hip. “You mean the rogue.”

Yogi gave a low chuckle, eyes glinting. “Do I? I only said what I heard in the halls. What I saw during the masquerade. I saw his eyes chase a ghost all night. I saw him lose. And then—poof!—vanished, like a knight fleeing a battlefield. So unlike him.”

“You poisoned Father’s mind,” she hissed, voice low. “You speak in riddles so he may paint truth with his own blood.”

He leaned in, voice almost kind. “My lady, a jester never lies. We simply show the truth with brighter paint.”

Her blade hissed from its sheath.

Yogi went still.

The point of the sword came to rest just beneath his chin, nudging the skin between the folds of his collar. His eyes did not blink, but his grin faded slightly.

“Speak plainly,” Franziska said, her voice now ice. “Or I will carve your riddles from your throat.”

Before he could reply, a gust of wind swept into the chamber—followed by a heavy voice. “That is quite enough.”

Franziska did not lower her blade immediately, even as King Manfred stepped into the chamber flanked by two knights, his black robes trimmed in gold, the edge of his crown casting a long shadow across the flagstones.

“Daughter,” he said, eyes sharp beneath the crown’s weight. “You forget yourself.”

Franziska withdrew the sword slowly, but her gaze did not waver. “The jester speaks half-truths. You made judgment on Edgeworth based on riddles and theatre.”

Manfred stepped forward. “Judgment was made based on disobedience, vanishing acts, and the word of those loyal to the crown. Not from a fool in bells, but from careful counsel. Your beloved Lord Edgeworth has abandoned his post. He consorted with a criminal. I shall not wait for him to strike.”

Franziska's voice trembled—whether from fury or fear, even she could not tell. “He is no traitor.”

“Then he shall prove it,” Manfred said coldly. “But until that day, you will remain within the bounds of Whitehall Palace. You are not to leave its gates until both Edgeworth and the rogue are found.”

She flinched. “Father—!”

“No.” His tone silenced the air. “You may play at knighthood within these walls, but you will not risk this house’s future with foolish errands and sentimental quests. If Edgeworth is innocent, let him return and prove it.”

Franziska stood still, fists clenched.

King Manfred turned without another word, his cloak trailing after him like a final decree. The guards followed, steel boots echoing in the stone corridor.

Only once they had gone did Yogi speak again, voice lilting with amusement. “Careful, my lady,” he murmured. “Keep playing with blades, and one day you’ll find yourself the one bleeding.”

Franziska sheathed her sword with a violent snap.

She did not reply.

But even as she turned and stalked from the chamber, her heart beat with furious resolve. They would not cage her for long.

•••

Rain tapped soft upon the wooden shutters, each droplet a slow heartbeat in the hush of the slums. The hearth had burned low, embers dulled to a red glow, yet the air in the chamber remained warm—stifling, near, with a silence neither man dared break.

Phoenix sat by the window, back straight, fingers wet from the bowl beside him. Once more he dipped them into the sugared water and smoothed the mixture through his dark hair with practiced care, pressing the unruly spikes flat. They would rise again by nightfall, no doubt—but the effort mattered. Should the King’s men come knocking, he must bear no likeness to the rogue they sought.

Behind him, Edgeworth sat upon the low bed, a fine cloak wrapped about him—too fine for such a room, and already sullied from the night past. His gaze was hollow, his lips pale. Not even the firelight could warm him.

It had been but hours since the masquerade—since Phoenix had seized his wrist beneath velvet and deceit, and pulled him into the streets. A hunted man saving one condemned. King Manfred had called for Edgeworth’s arrest, branded him traitor for conspiring with the very rogue who now stood mere paces away, bent over a basin, combing sugar through his hair as if it were war paint.

Edgeworth’s voice broke the silence, low and bitter. “You never ceased your hiding.”

Phoenix turned half toward him, brow lifting. “What?”

“The sugared water,” Edgeworth said. His eyes met Phoenix’s. “You wore it the day we crossed blades at the Court of Steel. That is how you fooled me.”

Phoenix’s hand stilled. A thin smile curved his lips. “Well. Would’ve been poor sport to lose my head on account of my hair.”

Edgeworth’s gaze drifted toward the door. “You still might.”

Phoenix’s tone gentled, though steel underlay his words. “They know not my face. Only that I steal from the King and give too much to those who ought, by his reckoning, to starve. The knights searching now hail from a higher order—they’ve never seen my face, never known me but as a helm and a name.”

Edgeworth said naught for a moment. Then, grimly, “They shall not mark you as the rogue.”

“That’s the hope,” Phoenix replied, expression unreadable.

A soft tread of boots in the alley drew his ear. He moved to the door, listening, watching through the cracks. “They’ve reached Widow Althea’s. Two houses down.”

Edgeworth stood by the hearth, jaw set. “You should not have brought me here.”

“You’d be dead if I hadn’t.”

“Then perhaps I should be dead,” Edgeworth said, voice quiet but cold. “I am not the boy you knew. Not the one who chased alley cats and dueled with sticks. That boy died with my father.”

Phoenix turned, jaw tight. “You were worth saving.”

Edgeworth’s eyes darkened. “I’ve slain men, Wright. Not in battle. Not for justice. For silence. By order of the Crown. Their faces wake me in the dark, and my hands—” His voice dropped. “My hands are stained.”

Phoenix said nothing, though the lines at his brow deepened.

Edgeworth went on, quieter still. “I watched him die—the man they said murdered my father. A man from the slums. They dragged him to the gallows. I stood in mourning silk while he swung.” His voice broke. “I was ten.”

Phoenix’s hands curled at his sides.

“I believed it,” Edgeworth whispered. “Believed he was no more than gutter filth. It was easier. Simpler. But if what you said is true—if the Crown silenced my father—then all I’ve sworn myself to is naught but a lie.” He looked away. “And I do not know who I am, without it.”

Phoenix stepped nearer. “You fear the truth?”

Edgeworth met his gaze. “I fear it will undo me.”

He stood close now—too close. The pale linen of Edgeworth’s borrowed shirt clung loose, firelight catching on the faint scar beneath his ribs. A mark Phoenix had kissed in silence the night before. Edgeworth had not stopped him. Had only placed a hand to Phoenix’s mouth—his palm trembling—then pressed his lips to that hand in turn.

A sin. A confession. A vow unspoken.

Now, Edgeworth stepped back. His hand went to the sword beside the hearth. Steel sang faint as it left the scabbard.

Phoenix did not move. “Is that what we are, then?” he asked. “Steel between us?”

Edgeworth’s voice strained. “You are still a rogue. A fugitive. An enemy of Whitehall.”

“And last night?” Phoenix asked, eyes steady. “Was I your enemy then?”

The blade wavered. “They claimed justice was served,” Edgeworth murmured. “But then the King’s men came. Burned the tenements. The churches. They called it retribution. I watched from the tower, helpless.”

“I was in one of those churches,” Phoenix said, voice low. “Saint Mary. Sister Mia led us out before the flames took it. Maya clutched her cross so tight it bled. That was the night your crest fell in the mud. And you vanished.”

Edgeworth’s mask faltered.

Phoenix reached beneath his tunic and drew out a leather cord. Upon it hung a small carving—walnut wood, worn with time: a lion, rearing over a quill.

Edgeworth stared. Breath left him.

“Your father gave me this,” Phoenix said. “When I was but a soot-covered brat, bold and foolish. He knelt, placed it in my hands, and said: ‘One day, this kingdom shall answer for how it treats its poorest. And if not by mercy—then by reckoning.’” Phoenix swallowed. “‘There must be those brave enough to speak for them,’ he told me. ‘Even in a lord’s cloak. You remember this, Phoenix. The world is built by those who rise from the ashes.’”

The sword drooped in Edgeworth’s grasp. Then fell. His gaze did not fall to the floor—but to the carving.

“I never forgot him,” Phoenix said. “Nor you.”

Edgeworth’s voice was barely a whisper. “You think this—what lies between us—can withstand what I’ve become?”

Phoenix stepped closer. “You let me touch you. Kiss the place no one else sees. And you kissed me back—not my lips, but the hand that held you. You wear the King’s mark, Miles—but you are no liar.”

Edgeworth closed his eyes. “What passed between us… was madness.”

Phoenix’s voice was gentle. “No. Madness is pretending it meant nothing.”

“You speak as though we are equals,” Edgeworth said hoarsely. “But we are bound by blood, by God, by law. I bear the King’s seal. You bear his price.”

“God did not save us,” Phoenix said, voice sharp. “Not Mia. Not the children of Saint Mary. Mia gave her cross to Maya that night. Burned her hand shut while she prayed. And me—I was but a boy. Ten summers old. Buried in ash. And you never came.”

Edgeworth let the sword fall. It struck the stone floor like a sentence passed.

Phoenix bent, picked it up—but did not return it. He rested the flat of the blade upon his own shoulder. “You may strike me down,” he said. “Or you may see this for what it is.”

Edgeworth’s voice was raw. “And what is it?”

“A chance,” Phoenix said. “To do as your father would have done. To seek the truth. No matter how vile. No matter how perilous.”

Edgeworth stared, something splintering behind his eyes.

“We cannot stay here,” Phoenix added. “Not long. Someone wished you accused. Someone within Whitehall.”

Edgeworth gave a slow nod. “Sir Richard… Gumshoe. If loyalty lives still, it is in him.”

“Then we find him,” Phoenix said. “Together.”

Edgeworth’s voice wavered. “We are not meant to walk the same road.”

“Then we carve a new one.”

And for a breath, the sword between them was no longer a threat—but a bond. An oath. Forged not in gold nor law, but in ash, fire, and memory.

A sharp knock struck the door—three firm blows, bold enough to rise above the cries of babes and the hiss of boiling pots.

Phoenix halted mid-step, firelight catching the hard set of his jaw.

Edgeworth stood near the table, cloaked in the hush of shadows, his stance rigid as drawn steel. “They’ve come,” he said low.

Phoenix’s voice fell to a whisper. “Beneath the floor—quickly. Behind the larder, where the boards bear soot at the edge. Lift them. Go.”

Edgeworth faltered. “They shall tear the place apart. If they find you’ve given me shelter—”

“I’ve dwelt here many a year, Miles,” Phoenix said, already moving. “The rats have more cause for worry than I.”

Another knock—heavier now, followed by a cry: “By order of the Crown! Open, in King Manfred’s name!”

Edgeworth's gaze held Phoenix’s for a breath longer—unwilling, searching. But then his boots scraped backward, and he slipped behind the larder. Phoenix heard the hush of wood lifting, the groan of the hidden trap.

“Make no sound,” Phoenix hissed. “And no matter what you hear—stay below.”

Edgeworth vanished into darkness, and the board settled once more. Phoenix dusted a handful of ash over the seam, masking the break.

Drawing breath, he raked his fingers through his hair—taking care not to disturb the sugar-press that held it flat. None in the slums wore spikes. Not the quiet sort, not a tradesman with soft hands and a bowed spine.

He unlatched the door.

Three knights stood on the threshold. Their mail bore no crest of the borough—outsiders, surely, sent from Whitehall or farther still. Highborn men, not common street watch.

“Name yourself,” barked the lead knight.

“Thomas Fenwright,” Phoenix answered, slipping into the name worn five winters now, buying bread and silence alike. His voice was dull, slow. “Bricklayer by trade. You ride from the palace?”

“Mind your tongue,” the knight snapped. “We seek a traitor. Lord Edgeworth.”

Phoenix frowned. “A lord? Here?” He gave a dry laugh. “He’d lose his purse 'fore supper. No noble treads these streets.”

The knight's eyes narrowed. “We’ve word this quarter harbors enemies to the Crown. And another besides—the rogue. Masked. Seen in these alleys.”

“Plenty wear masks these days,” Phoenix muttered, stepping aside. “Look where you will. But mind the beams overhead—they don’t bear iron kindly.”

They entered without thanks. Two swept in, spears ready. One climbed to the loft, casting aside the thin blanket. Another tore through a cupboard, sending crockery and herbs to the floor.

Phoenix stood fast, arms folded, his mouth a thin line. He spoke only when they neared the larder.

“Food’s scarce enough for one,” he said. “You’ll find no feast.”

The knight’s gaze lingered too long in the corner—but he passed on. Below, Phoenix knew Edgeworth waited, still as prayer.

At length, after scouring every inch and finding naught, the lead knight growled. “No trace. But mark this—should we learn you’ve harbored them—”

“You’ll do as you must,” Phoenix said. “But take heed, ser—eyes in these alleys see more than you reckon. And tongues here hold long memory.”

The knight gave him one last look before turning. The door shut with a heavy slam.

The cellar was damp with the scent of earth and time, carved low into the stone foundations like a wound the manor had long forgotten. Above, the boards creaked once more—then fell still.

Miles Edgeworth was alone with the dark.

He did not move at first. The musty chill clung to his skin, curling beneath the fine cloak he wore, now dirtied with soot and sweat like a badge of disgrace. He drew a slow breath. The air tasted of limestone, salt, and the ghost of ash.

How fitting.

He should not have been here.

A knight accused of treason. A lord fallen from grace. And worse—saved not by sword or sovereign, but by the very man he was meant to capture. The rogue. The thorn in the Crown’s heel. Phoenix Wright.

His eyes adjusted, little by little, until the outlines of the cellar took form. Rough stone walls, beams blackened by old fire, and a cluster of half-rotted barrels lining one side. But what drew his gaze was the wooden chest, squat and broad beneath a draped oiled cloth in the far corner—waterproofed, carefully tended, wholly out of place.

He stepped toward it.

The floorboards gave gently beneath his boots. The chest bore no lock but had been sealed with wax around its hinges. A knight’s chest, he recognized it immediately—sturdy oak, iron-banded, standard issue to those who served in the field or kept their arms far from a noble hall. The oilcloth was stiff to the touch, well-used. He lifted the corner with care.

Beneath lay Phoenix’s armor, piece by piece: the cuirass, dulled but cleaned; greaves wrapped in linen; gauntlets resting like folded hands. Worn, yes. But meticulously kept.

Edgeworth’s frown deepened.

This was no makeshift storage. This was a reliquary, preserved with intention. Phoenix had hidden it well—but not cast it aside. There was pride here. Memory. A part of himself he had not discarded, though the world above might call him outlaw.

A knight without a manor.

Edgeworth straightened, cloak brushing the chest. Had the lower sect truly offered so little? No lands, no holdings? Or had Phoenix refused what was his by right?

Edgeworth thought of the women he’d seen the night before—the dark-haired one with shrewd eyes and the small girl who clung to her skirts. Maya, the elder had been called. There had been something of kinship between them all. Not nobility, no—but blood, perhaps. Or something stronger.

Had Phoenix forsaken his title to remain with them? With her? And then another thought struck him: had Phoenix ever accepted it at all?

Edgeworth stood motionless before the chest, something aching in his throat. Not jealousy—no, not that. It was something colder. Something older. A sense of distance not easily bridged. He had given everything to the Crown: blood, name, purpose. In return, he had become the King’s blade.

Phoenix had given nothing. And yet—somehow—remained whole.

Edgeworth’s hand hovered over the cuirass. But he did not touch it. He could not. He had run men through in armor like this. Men with no sigil on their back but their own grit, driven only by duty.

Above, the bolt scraped faintly.

Phoenix waited until the guards' boots had faded down the alley, then latched the door and moved quickly. He lifted the scorched floorboard behind the larder.

Edgeworth emerged into the dim light, brushing soot from his shirt. His expression was unreadable. “You lied like you were born to it,” he said.

“I was,” Phoenix answered, voice low. “Long before I ever held a sword.”

Their eyes met. In the silence that followed, Phoenix felt a thrum behind his ribs—heat blooming low in his chest. He could not tell if it was fear. Or the echo of Edgeworth’s trembling hand, pressed to his lips in a moment neither of them had dared to name.

Edgeworth stood by the hearth, brushing ash from his sleeves. His face was drawn, pale even in the firelight, and his eyes lingered on the door as though it still bore the shadow of armed men.

Phoenix held his tongue a moment. He watched the man he had once known—the boy with clever hands and quiet laughter, now wrapped in fine linen and iron-bound duty—and felt the weight of a thousand words left unsaid. “We cannot tarry,” Phoenix said at last. “They will return. And next time, they’ll bring one who knows my face—one not so easily fooled by straight hair and soot-stained boots.”

Edgeworth gave a slow nod, silent still.

“A plan is taking shape,” Phoenix went on, pacing. “There’s a way into Whitehall—through the old wall beneath Saint Olwen. The stone’s crumbled, but it leads to the kitchen cellars. From there, we seek Sir Richard. Or a ledger. Or aught that proves you were betrayed.”

Edgeworth arched a brow. “You speak of treason.”

“No,” Phoenix answered, turning to face him. “Treason was done to your father. And now to you.”

Edgeworth’s gaze sharpened. “You speak as though you are not outlawed yourself.”

“I am,” Phoenix said simply. “And should this plan fail, I’ll vanish as smoke does. But you... if we succeed, you return to court with head held high, your name unsoiled.”

Edgeworth stepped closer. “And you, Wright? What of you?”

Phoenix hesitated, jaw set. “I’ll don the mantle once more. The rogue. They never see my face—only the coat, the boots, the blade. I’ll draw the eye elsewhere. Stir the guards while you slip through the walls.”

“You would stake your life on mine?”

Phoenix’s voice lowered. “I’ve been doing so for years.”

The silence that followed rang louder than the wind outside. The fire snapped. Edgeworth was the first to look away.

“You are not the boy I once knew,” he said.

Phoenix gave a short, humorless laugh. “You knew me once—before courts and lies.”

“You were reckless,” Edgeworth murmured. “Soft-hearted.”

“And you were kind,” Phoenix said, stepping nearer. “Even then. Even when the world sought to mold you into your father’s echo.”

“I am my father’s echo.”

“No,” Phoenix said, quiet but firm. “You are more.”

Silence again. But this time, when Edgeworth looked at him, he did not look away.

Phoenix’s breath came short. His heart beat louder than the ticking of the abbey clock nailed crooked above the hearth. The plan—yes, it was treason. But what stirred in him now felt a graver risk.

He had buried it for years. Told himself it was naught but childish awe, a fleeting affection, best forgotten like a name scratched into bark. But memory endured. The way Edgeworth had stood before him, long ago, shielding him from a circle of noble boys and their jeers. The way he’d spoken his father’s name—Lord Gregory Edgeworth, Esquire of the Body—and scattered them like crows before a hawk.

And then, he’d turned. Offered his hand to the orphan boy with blood in his brow and shame on his tongue. Phoenix hadn’t loved him then. But something had shifted. Tilted. Over time, that shift had become a slope—steep, inevitable, and impossible to climb back up.

Now, beneath a roof held together by prayer and rotting nails, Phoenix gave in. He stepped forward—tentative at first, hesitant as though some invisible force was pulling him in—and pressed his lips to Edgeworth’s. It was not a fierce kiss, nor one born of desperation. It was something more delicate. More dangerous. Phoenix's lips brushed once, then again—firmer now, more certain. The hesitation bled away as his thumb grazed the line of Edgeworth’s cheek.

Edgeworth stiffened. But he didn’t pull away.

Phoenix’s heart thundered in his chest as he deepened the kiss—not to claim, but to offer. It was a vow, a gesture of trust, not hunger. Reverence, like a prayer whispered in the dark, where no one else could hear. When he pulled back, it was only a hand’s breadth, his forehead resting briefly against Edgeworth’s.

His voice was low, hoarse. “I have loved you... since that day. When you named your father and gave me your hand, like I was worth saving.” He swallowed, the weight of his own words heavier than he anticipated. His eyes flickered between Edgeworth’s, searching for something. “And I’ve been losing this fight ever since.”

Edgeworth said nothing. His breath was unsteady; his throat worked with effort. In his gaze, war brewed—duty against desire, law against longing.

“I would burn for you, Miles,” Phoenix whispered. “And not ask to be spared.”

Edgeworth’s eyes shimmered—not with anger, nor scorn. “I... I cannot return it,” he said, voice frayed.

“You have,” Phoenix said, softer still. “You just lack the name for it.”

Edgeworth turned away, fingers tight on the back of a chair. “This is wrong,” he whispered. “We are knights. We are men. It is not our place.”

Phoenix stepped closer, careful as one might near a wounded hound. “This world would rather we die than love. But I’ll not let it tell me who I may cherish.”

Edgeworth did not answer. But when he turned back, something in his face had changed. There was no surrender in it—but neither was there denial.

Hope.

Pain.

Longing.

And something akin to love.

Phoenix did not touch him again. Not yet. The flame between them was real, but it had to be tended with care. Not all things could bear the weight of a kingdom’s gaze.

And yet, in the hush that followed, Edgeworth spoke. “When we reach Whitehall,” he said, steadier now, “we seek the vaults. Lord Barnham guarded them. He kept record of the king’s commands—orders, troop lists. If there be proof, it lies there.”

Phoenix gave a single nod. “Then we go together. And if we fall—”

Edgeworth met his gaze. “We fall together.”

Outside, the wind shrieked through the cracks of the rooftops. But within, by the hearth’s glow, two men stood on the cusp of a war not of their choosing—yet perhaps, if they stood fast, they might see the other side.

•••

Franziska had been warned, time and again, to keep well away from the training yard. “No daughter of the Crown ought to muck about in mud and steel,” her governess would chide, fussing over the hem of her gown. King Manfred had said it plain: “Swords are naught but tools for war, and war is no business of women.”

But warnings were made to be tested.

That morning, she’d slipped from her chamber at first bell, boots light against the stone, and climbed the outer stair that circled the garrison wall. From above, the yard lay wide and open beneath her—wet with last night’s rain, churned with boot prints and hoofmarks. She crouched low behind the crenellations, peering down like a hawk stalking prey.

Below, the knights moved in drills, blades clashing with dull rhythm. And at the heart of it, in a maroon jerkin darkened with sweat, was Lord Edgeworth.

No longer the quiet boy who once followed his father like a shadow—this was a man now. His strikes were swift and sure, each step placed with purpose. His frame had hardened, his shoulders squared, and yet, there was no arrogance in his manner. He fought as though the sword were an extension of his own thought. Not to boast. Not to bully. But to master.

Franziska’s breath caught as he paused, wiping his brow with his sleeve. The cravat at his throat hung loose, damp. His eyes swept the yard—not with scorn, but with focus. One of the stable lads fumbled a wooden blade and dropped it with a clatter.

Edgeworth knelt. He picked up the weapon and handed it back, saying nothing. Just a small nod, a motion of his hand that bid the boy try again. No lash of the tongue. No blow. Just a gesture, firm and steady.

Franziska remembered the words he’d spoken to her once, when she was but a child with a scraped knee and a wooden stick, sulking outside the practice ring.

“Any soul may wield a blade,” he’d said, “so long as they have the will to learn.”

She had not forgotten.

And watching him now—precise, quiet, patient—she felt the old ache rise anew. The ache to fight. To choose her own path, not one laid before her with pearls and prayers. Not one lined with silence and veils.

Franziska straightened, fingers curling against the cold stone beneath her. She would not be shut away. Not while men like Lord Edgeworth proved that honor was not loudness, nor strength the province of men alone.

She would find her way to the yard. If not today—then soon. And woe to the fool who told her she could not.

Franziska’s wrist throbbed. Her strike had gone wide again, and the wooden blade slipped from her grip, clattering across the courtyard’s worn flagstones.

From the shadow of the gallery, Lord Edgeworth closed his book with a sigh. He crossed the yard with that same quiet step of his—neither hurried nor slow, but measured, as always. “You hold it as though ‘twere a hammer,” he said, voice even.

“I do not,” she snapped, cheeks flushing with heat.

“You do,” he answered plainly.

Without another word, he stepped behind her, gloved fingers reaching to guide her form. He was precise in the way he moved her—no wasted gesture. Her elbow lowered beneath his touch. Her shoulder squared. His hand came to rest just above her wrist, correcting the angle. “Keep your middle firm,” he murmured, “and look ahead, not at your feet.”

She tried again. This time, it did not feel foolish. “I’ll not thank you for it,” she muttered.

“I would not ask it,” he replied, though a faint crease of amusement touched his mouth.

Whenever King Manfred rode out from court, or the knights were sent abroad, Franziska trained. Only then would Edgeworth allow it. They kept to the forgotten corners of the castle—the old stables, the shadow beneath the western wall. They fought with staffs or dulled steel, never sharpened blades.

Once, a steward spied them and carried word to the King. Manfred had Edgeworth whipped for it.

Franziska had not forgotten the lashes, nor the dark marks that bloomed across his back. She remembered, too, how he returned some days later—his step uneven, though he hid it well—and took up the lesson once more, as though no punishment had come.

“You were beaten for my sake,” she’d whispered once, voice small in the hush between strikes.

Edgeworth, ever still, had only said: “Then let it be worth it.”

Moonlight spilled like silver across the stone walls as Lord Edgeworth moved through the palace halls, his step swift, unaware of the eyes that followed him from the shadows.

Franziska lingered behind a column, breath held. Ever since the morning’s training, the thought had troubled her like a thorn beneath the skin—he had not returned to the yard. No sword in hand, no curt commands. Not even a passing glance.

So she followed him. Silent as a cat in the rafters.

He moved with purpose, as though on some private errand. She had come to know his ways, though he never meant for her to witness them.

He passed through a narrow doorway, and the thick door fell shut with a low thud. Franziska stepped forward, heart quickening. Just before it closed, she glimpsed him slipping behind what looked to be a wall—yet not quite. The stonework bore ivy thicker than the rest, and when she reached it, she found what she had not expected: an arched passage, veiled in shadow.

She ought to have turned back. Yet something in her would not allow it. Perhaps it was the same something that had always drawn her to him—his stillness, his silence, the way he carried grief like a sword she was never meant to see.

And so she stepped into the passage after him.

The air grew cold and damp as the stone corridor wound on. It narrowed, the light behind her fading. She kept close to the wall, heart pounding, following the faint sound of his footsteps ahead.

At last, the tunnel gave way to a small clearing. There stood an old chapel, its roof half-swallowed by ivy, the stone worn soft with time. Shattered stained glass hung in fragments, casting dull shards of color across the floor.

Saint Olwen.

She knew the name, though she had never come here. Few did. The place was half-forgotten.

From the shadows, she saw him enter. Edgeworth paused at the threshold, then stepped inside and knelt before the altar.

She opened her mouth to speak—but stopped. Something in the line of his shoulders, the stillness of his frame beneath the moon’s pale gaze, silenced her. He looked carved from marble, unmoving but full of strain, as if every breath were hard-earned.

And then, he spoke. “I miss you, Father,” he murmured. His voice was barely more than breath, but the chapel caught it, carried it. “I still know not why it happened. Why they took you. Why I was left behind with naught but silence.” He bowed his head lower, hands clenched against the stone. “I had no chance to prove myself. No time to become the man thou wouldst have me be.”

Franziska’s chest tightened. She had always seen him as unwavering, unshaken—as cold steel. But here, in the moonlight, that armor was stripped bare. And what lay beneath was not weak, but deeply human.

“I know not if I shall ever be enough,” Edgeworth said, quieter still. “I try. But there are days I feel lost, as though I walk a path with no end.” He waited, as though hoping some answer might rise from the silence. None came. Only the rustle of ivy, the hush of night.

Franziska did not move. She ought to have turned away. It was not her place to hear these things, not her right to witness them. Yet she stood frozen, caught between guilt and awe.

At last, Edgeworth rose. He wiped his face with the back of his hand and turned toward the door.

Panic took her.

She stepped back—too loud. A stone shifted beneath her boot. Her breath caught.

But he said nothing. He did not call for her. He did not demand an answer or question her presence. He simply walked on, silent as before.

As he passed from the chapel, Franziska fled. She turned and bolted down the passage, feet striking stone in a rhythm too fast for thought. She did not know where she was headed—only that she could not remain. Not there. Not in the quiet that followed his voice.

Behind her, Edgeworth did not pursue.

He let her go.

And in that silence, something deep and wordless passed between them—weightier than speech, and far harder to bear.

The days that followed passed in an uneasy quiet between them. Naught was spoken of the night at the chapel, neither by Edgeworth nor by Franziska. She kept her distance in the palace halls, though the memory of his voice still lingered in her mind like smoke after a fire.

When their paths did cross, brief and infrequent, there was a look that passed between them—a wordless understanding, as though both bore a secret too fragile to name aloud.

Franziska’s heart warred with itself. Her feelings were tangled things—woven with admiration, envy, and something deeper still. She had long looked upon Edgeworth as a figure of strength, a man fashioned by discipline and will. He bore their father’s legacy as though born to it, as though it were a cloak that fit his shoulders without strain.

And yet—how could she not envy him?

He was a man, and by that alone, the realm was open to him. A knight, a leader, one who might ride into battle or stand in counsel without question. He would carry the Edgeworth name into history, whilst she—she was reminded time and again that her place lay behind.

“You must learn to yield,” her father had told her once. “It is not for a daughter to carve her own path. Yours is to follow, not to lead.”

King Manfred had been far blunter: “Women wield no sword but silence.”

So it was that she watched from the edges of the yard the next morn, gaze fixed on Edgeworth as he trained. His blade moved with elegance and command, each strike clean, each block precise. He did not stumble. He never did.

A knot coiled in her stomach. She longed to move as he did—to prove herself not in whispers or obedience, but in strength. To stand beside him, not behind. To be seen not as the girl left waiting in the wings, but as his equal.

But such wishes bore no fruit. They never had.

The clash of steel faded. The yard fell still. And then Edgeworth turned, as though he had known she was there all along.

Their eyes met. There was no scorn in his gaze, no jest. Only that same quiet understanding that had passed between them since childhood—unspoken, enduring. They were not kin by blood, but they had grown beneath the same roof, trained in the same halls, learned from the same man. Yet even so, the world had drawn a line between them—one born not of merit, but of birth.

She held his gaze a moment longer, then turned away, jaw tight.

No matter how far she pushed herself, no matter how deeply she wished it—she was still the girl. And in this world, that was the thing that mattered most.

•••

The night air hung heavy with the scent of rain-soaked stone as Franziska slipped from the palace halls and into the shadows. No torch lit her way—she dared not draw attention. Not since her father had forbidden her from leaving the palace walls, sealing her off like a disobedient relic, as if distance from the world would cleanse her of her convictions.

Yet here she was again, treading the same secret path beneath the western wing, a narrow corridor carved behind ivy-covered stone. The same passage Miles—no, Lord Edgeworth—had once walked in silence. The same place he thought no one knew. But she had followed him once. And she remembered.

Her boots struck the damp stone as she moved through the cold tunnel, a heavy cloak wrapped tight around her to hide the silk beneath. No armor tonight—too many patrols now demanded to see a knight's face, and she could no longer pass as one. Not after what had befallen Edgeworth. Not after the king branded him a traitor.

A traitor. Her breath caught at the word. Her brother—not by blood, but by bond—had served their father with unyielding loyalty. And still, he had been cast aside, accused of conspiring with the rogue. The same rogue who haunted the court like a ghost, stealing from the crown, slipping through the fingers of every guard. The rogue they said moved like a knight but fought like a fox.

And then there was Sir Nicholas.

Franziska had seen him fight—yes, more than once. She had stood among the courtly crowd during the Court of Steel, eyes sharp as blades clashed beneath banners and fanfare. Sir Nicholas, unknown to all but name, had faced knights of high regard, yet none struck her more than the moment he met Lord Edgeworth in the lists.

Edgeworth, the finest swordsman of Whitehall, had never faltered in a duel. Yet before Sir Nicholas, he had yielded—no, been bested. Not by brute strength, but by cunning, precision, and a style too unorthodox to be learned within palace walls.

She no longer thought it coincidence. There was something strange about Sir Nicholas. Something hidden.

The passage opened at last to a clearing bathed in moonlight, and before her stood Saint Olwen—crumbling now, like memory left too long untended. Its stone walls were split with ivy, the bell tower cracked, windows shattered. The chapel had been abandoned ever since Lord Gregory Edgeworth had been murdered there. Stabbed in the back. Left to die beneath the altar.

She stepped inside. The air was damp and cold, heavy with dust and the ghost of incense. Pale moonlight spilled through the fractured glass, painting fractured halos upon the ground. Where once knights had knelt in prayer, weeds now grew between the stones.

She knelt where she remembered Edgeworth had, all those years ago—shoulders stiff, fists clenched, eyes hollowed with grief. “I will find the truth,” she whispered into the silence, “even if Father bars every gate.”

The narrow, winding alleys of the slums seemed endless, each turn offering only more misery and decay. The dim light of flickering torches barely illuminated the walls, which were covered in grime and rot. Franziska’s steps were muffled against the cold cobblestones, her heavy cloak wrapped tightly around her form, the edges nearly brushing the ground. Beneath the cloak, she wore a more masculine outfit—one fit for a prince, to hide the silk and finer fabrics she had been raised in. It was a deliberate choice; she could not afford to be recognized as the princess of the kingdom. The cloak hid her royal insignia, her status, and her womanhood. Here, in the slums, her identity had to remain a secret.

Her heart pounded as she navigated through the filth and desperation, the weight of her secret growing heavier with each step. The people here, the ones abandoned by the crown, seemed as much a part of the city as the crumbling buildings and the shadows. She could feel their eyes on her as she passed, but they did not know her. No one knew who she was.

Franziska’s thoughts drifted to her father—King Manfred, Sovereign of the Realm. His face rose in her mind: cold, unyielding, carved from the same stone as his laws. She had feared him, obeyed him, and once—even admired him. Though he had never encouraged her strength. When she reached for a sword, he had struck her hand away. “A woman’s place is in obedience, not in arms,” he had said, more than once. And still, she had learned. Quietly. Defiantly.

Now, walking the crooked lanes of the slums, the filth clinging to her hem, she saw his kingdom for what it was. Not a realm of order and justice, as he claimed, but of rot and ruin. Children slept in soot; men starved beneath the banners of nobles who drank from silver. She had known suffering in theory—read of it in court records, heard it behind closed doors—but she had never stood in the middle of it, breathing it in.

And all of it was under his reign.

She had tried to believe he acted with purpose, that his punishments kept the realm from falling into chaos. But the more she saw, the less she could cling to that fiction. Perhaps he was being misled. Poisoned by flatterers, twisted by whispers in his court. Or perhaps he had always been this way, and she had only just opened her eyes.

Either truth was unbearable.

And then there was Edgeworth—Lord Edgeworth—her brother in all but name, raised beside her, now cast aside and accused of treason. The stain of it struck at her own blood, her own memory. And always near him, this rogue—this so-called Sir Nicholas—who moved too sharply, too surely, to be mere coincidence. They were tied by something deeper. And she meant to uncover it.

Even if it led her back to the throne.

But she wasn’t here for answers from the palace. She was here for Maya. She had to find her—needed to speak with her.

Maya had once mistaken Franziska for Sir Nicholas, thinking she was a knight just like the rogue who had become both a myth and a threat in the kingdom. Franziska still didn’t know exactly what to make of that mistake, but it had planted a seed of suspicion.

As she rounded a corner, Franziska finally spotted Maya and Pearl, standing near a rickety doorway that led into one of the hovels. Pearl was clutching a small bundle of cloth, and Maya was speaking to her softly, her brow furrowed in concentration. Franziska took a moment to observe them—Maya’s easy affection for Pearl, the way her eyes softened whenever the child spoke, and how she always tried to put on a brave face for the girl. It made Franziska feel like an intruder in a world she could never understand.

She took a breath and moved closer, her steps careful, almost watchful.

Maya looked up at the sound of approaching footsteps, her expression cautious. When she saw Franziska, she seemed to hesitate for only a moment, confusion passing across her face. She was used to seeing people in this part of the city, but the stranger before her was different. There was something in her eyes that Maya couldn’t place.

“Who goes there?” Maya called, her voice calm but wary, one hand slipping beneath her rough cloak to the worn dagger at her side.

A figure emerged from the shadows between two crooked hovels, the air thick with tallow smoke and damp wood. The stranger lowered the hood of a heavy traveler's cloak, and silvery gray-blue hair caught the torchlight.

“It is I,” said the voice—low, clipped, and quieter than Maya was used to. “Franziska.”

Maya blinked. She lowered her hand, though her guard did not fall. “Your Highness! Have you lost your wits?” she whispered, stepping forward. “You ought not be here.”

Franziska moved toward her, careful yet without fear, the hem of her cloak already sodden with filth. “Yes, I’ve lost them,” she said tightly. “And I’m reminded of it with each step through this mire.” She grimaced as her boot found something unpleasant. “Is it always this wretched?”

Maya’s brow furrowed, but her voice held steady. “It is home,” she said, drawing Pearl close to her side. “Mine. And hers.”

Franziska halted, and her expression shifted. “I meant no insult,” she said quickly, her voice softening. “Only that my father has let this part of the city fall into ruin. I knew it in thought, but I did not—”

“Of course you didn’t,” Maya said, not unkindly. “You never had to.”

The words struck deep. Franziska straightened, casting the edge of her cloak behind her shoulder. “I did not come to quarrel,” she said. “I came for answers. I believe Lord Edgeworth has been falsely accused.”

Maya tilted her head. She remembered the pale, bloodied man Phoenix had shielded. “You place your faith in him?” she asked, her voice low.

“I do.” Franziska hesitated. “And I believe you know Sir Nicholas. He is no common knight. Nor is the rogue a common thief. They move with purpose. Together.” Her eyes fixed on Maya. “You have seen them. I saw it in your eyes when you mistook me for him.”

Maya’s breath caught. She looked away. “You saw what you wished.”

Franziska took a step forward. “No,” she said, gentler now. “I saw truth.”

Pearl stirred at Maya’s side, small fingers curling into the hem of her cloak. “Peace, Pearly,” Maya murmured, resting a hand on the girl’s head. She lifted her gaze once more. “What would you do with the truth if I gave it? The king beats loyalty into his own men. You think you can keep Edgeworth safe from that?”

Franziska’s jaw tightened, but she did not falter. “I must try. Perhaps I have lived in silken cages, as you say. But I know the look of injustice. I see it at court each day.” She took another step closer. “Tell me who he is. If he can save my brother, I must know.”

Maya’s fingers curled at her side. Her voice dropped. “I have reason not to trust those born to wealth.” She spoke evenly, but something in her tone carried weight. “When Saint Mary burned, it was not beggars who lit the flame. I lost my sister to their fire.”

Franziska was silent. She had not known.

Maya’s voice gentled. “Still, you came here. You left your title behind. That speaks.”

Their eyes met—gray to brown—and the torchlight flickered between them.

“I trust you,” Franziska said quietly. “And I believe you trust me, though you try to hide it.”

Maya swallowed. “That is dangerous trust.”

“Then call me reckless.”

They stood close now. Closer than either had planned. Maya tilted her chin to meet Franziska’s gaze. The silence between them crackled like a held breath.

“You’re stubborn,” Maya said at last. “And proud.”

Franziska arched a brow. “And you are not?”

A small smile tugged at Maya’s lips. “Well struck.”

Franziska’s posture eased, the tension in her shoulders melting somewhat.

Maya looked at her—truly looked at her. The fine cut of her jaw, the faint defiance in her stance, the glimpse of softness beneath steel. Franziska looked more real here in the dirt than she ever had among tapestries and gold. “Tomorrow night,” Maya said softly. “Near the old tannery, just past the river bend. Come cloaked. And no fine cloth.”

Franziska smirked. “I am already dressed in rags, by courtly standards.”

“You’re still too clean.”

“I could remedy that,” Franziska offered, dryly amused.

Maya’s smile lingered, then faded to something quieter. “You would defy your father for Edgeworth?”

Franziska nodded. “I would. And for you as well.”

The hush that followed was not cold, only full. Pearl shifted beside her, reminding them both of time’s passing.

Franziska turned to leave, then paused. “You ought to have told me sooner.”

“Perhaps I wanted to,” Maya said. “But I could not be certain you would listen.”

Franziska looked back at her, steady. “I am listening now.”

And with that, she vanished into the dark, the scent of smoke and rose petals trailing in her wake.

Chapter Text

The fire had long since dwindled to embers, casting but a dim, ruddy glow across the stone floor. Smoke curled lazily upward, trailing into the rafters like a ghost risen from prayer. Without, the wind did moan, stirring the shutters with each gust; yet within, all lay still—save for the rustle of cloth and the soft creak of leather.

Phoenix stood before the hearth—not the meek knight in borrowed steel, but the rogue born of shadow and smoke. He wore a long coat of storm-blue wool, its hem sweeping about his boots like the sea under tempest. The lining, a faded crimson, showed as he moved—a flash of blood beneath the tide. At his throat, a dark pink ribbon lay knotted in careless defiance, more mockery than adornment, as though he dared the Crown itself to name him.

A mask, plain and black, veiled his eyes—cut narrow, hiding all but the glint of mischief behind. His hair, loosed from its daily binding, rose in wild, untamed spikes, untouched by comb or sweetwater. Like the bristles of a boar, it framed his masked visage with the air of something otherworldly—a trickster of old Saxon song, conjured from hearth-fire and oath.

Beside him, Edgeworth fastened the collar of his justaucorps—maroon velvet, dulled where blood had soaked deepest. Phoenix’s stitching marked the shoulder and sleeve—coarse thread upon noble cloth, uneven yet earnest. Still, the garment kept its grace. It drank the firelight like aged wine—dark, rich, and warm.

Beneath, he wore pantaloons of the same hue, tucked into white stockings bound with black ribbon bows. A close-fitted jerkin of black cloth, trimmed fine and fastened with toggles of brass, wrapped him firm. At his throat, a cravat of ivory linen sat neatly, pinned with a crimson stone that glimmered like a drop of blood just spilled.

Where Phoenix bore the air of legend and flame, Edgeworth wore the dignity of a man wronged, yet unbroken. Tempered, not tarnished.

He stood tall despite the ache of wounds—shoulders set, gaze steady. Pride dwelt in his bearing, though not the peacock kind. It was the quiet sort, hard-won and held close, like a seal upon old parchment.

Phoenix held out a cloak of coarse wool, its scent faintly of smoke and dried lavender. “You shall need it,” he said. “We pass through Fishersgate, and over Old Bailey Bridge. Should any glimpse that coat—”

“They shall not,” Edgeworth replied, taking it. He drew the hood low. “And if they do, may God strike them blind.”

Phoenix gave a smile—thin, brittle. “That may be too bold a prayer.” He turned and fastened his own cloak. In that moment, he was no longer knight nor fool, but the thing they whispered of in court kitchens and thieves’ dens alike—the rogue who left silver where bread had been taken, whose knife came swift and silent, whose laughter lingered long after the guards had ceased to stir.

The bell struck in the distance—three slow tolls. The hour before dawn.

Now both were cloaked in rough-spun hoods, travel-stained and dull, their faces hidden from the world that hunted them. They moved swift about the chamber, gathering their scant belongings. Phoenix’s satchel held tools of quiet passage: chisel, twine, a candle half-burnt. Edgeworth slid his sword into its scabbard, the steel vanishing into worn leather with a sigh. His gloved hand lingered upon the hilt—a breath too long.

Phoenix paused by the hearth and took up a short, curved dagger. The hilt was worn smooth, old as the roads. “We strike not, save we’re pressed,” he said low. “I come to steal proof, not blood.”

Edgeworth inclined his head. “Let us pray the night agrees.”

They stepped into the alley behind the crumbled chapel, cloaks drawn close against the damp. Southwark lay quiet. A dog barked yonder in the gloom, and the Thames whispered beyond the eaves. The moon above wore a crown of mist.

They kept to shadow, moving like rumour through the bones of the city. Past shuttered taverns and soot-caked smithies, over cobbles slick with rain. At times Phoenix darted ahead, crouching beneath archways, pressing his ear to cellar doors. His every motion was born of years lived between cracks in the law.

Edgeworth followed, his gait deliberate. The sword beneath his cloak was familiar weight—steadying. He spoke little, but missed nothing. They passed beneath the ragged lip of the old Roman wall, its stones worn with moss and age. At a narrow arch half-swallowed by bramble, Phoenix halted.

He turned to Edgeworth. “Beyond this, there is no return. The tunnel leads beneath Saint Olwen, and from thence into the cellars.”

Edgeworth drew breath, slow and even. “Then we go forward.”

Phoenix gave a nod, bent low, and slipped into the dark. Edgeworth followed, and the gloom took them.

The tunnel’s air was thick with damp and earth. Rats scattered before them, and cold water clung to their boots. The candle Phoenix bore cast a faint light, its flame shielded behind his hand. Shadows leapt upon the walls—long-limbed ghosts dancing in silence.

Edgeworth watched those wavering forms, memory rising unbidden. He had walked here once before, cloaked in mourning, a lad of twelve winters. The friars of Saint Olwen had led him thus—through shadow and stone—to the place where Gregory Edgeworth, father and knight, had bled into the stones. No justice had been wrought. A man from the slums, nameless and condemned, had swung for it. A tidy end to an untidy truth.

The scent of mildew and old stone wrapped around him, unchanged through the years. His jaw clenched. One hand brushed the hilt of his sword—not in fear, but remembrance. The past blurred with the present, like candlelight upon warped glass. And through it, he heard his father’s voice—too sharp to forget.

“Do you recall,” Phoenix murmured, “the old tales? Of hollow roads ‘neath the city? Where traitors walked in chains, and kings in secret?”

Edgeworth’s voice was soft. “My nursemaid warned me—step too near a cellar door, and the Black Knight would drag thee down.”

Phoenix’s smile was faint. “Perchance we are the Black Knights now.”

“No,” Edgeworth said. “Black, mayhap. But not villains.”

They pressed on. The damp deepened, and the scent of rot clung like a wound unclosed. Overhead, the city schemed or slumbered—silent but for cartwheel or drunken cry.

Edgeworth’s stride did not falter. “As Esquire of the Body, I knew the King’s habits. Manfred holds counsel at the third bell past dusk. Thereafter, he retires not to his chambers, but to the solar above the west wing—to sign, and seal, and feign his hand upon others’ will.”

Phoenix cast him a sidelong glance. “Then the chambers lie empty?”

“They should,” said Edgeworth. “He returns not ‘ere the sixth bell. We have but a narrow glass.”

“And if that glass run dry?”

“Then we are buried beneath it.”

Phoenix snorted. “A poet’s doom, as ever.”

“And you,” Edgeworth returned, “still boast a fool’s courage.”

They spoke no more, for the tunnel narrowed and breath grew short. Yet Edgeworth’s mind was clear—counting turns, measuring echoes. Each step a ledger, each shadow a wager. Once, he had walked this path as a boy in grief. Now, he walked it a man condemned—armed not with rank, but steel and a hope too perilous to name. They would emerge into peril, into the lion’s den of Whitehall.

But for now, there was only the way forward—narrow, cold, and lit by borrowed flame. Two men cloaked in defiance: one noble, one fable. And both, in truth, beginning to walk the same road. Together.

The hush of the undercroft hung like a funeral cloth, heavy and unmoving, disturbed only by the slow, mournful drip of water from the vaulting stones above. Far overhead, laughter and lute-song still danced through the rafters of Whitehall, but here—beneath its bones—there was naught but stone, shadow, and breath.

Edgeworth stood with his back to Phoenix, unmoving, eyes fixed upon a darkened alcove where cobwebs veiled the slumbering wine barrels. His voice came at length, quiet yet resolute. “Beyond that door lies the chamber of King Manfred.”

Phoenix inclined his head, the gesture near swallowed by his hood’s fold. “And the guards?”

“Two stand watch,” Edgeworth murmured. “Sir Avery, and young Rence—unless the King hath altered his watch this week.”

Phoenix slipped a small case of polished wood from his satchel. Within, a spread of cards lay nestled—no playthings these, but tools of misdirection, of silence, of sleep. Each bore a painted sigil, curling like vine over vellum, edges dusted with powder that shimmered faintly in the candle’s breath. He drew one free—a queen of swords, her face contorted into a mockery of royal decree. “They shan’t see me,” he said lightly. “Only a flicker. A jest. Then dreams.”

Edgeworth turned, brow knit. “Poison?”

“No,” said Phoenix. “Only dust—of bellflower and monk’s root, gathered beneath a waning moon, stirred with powdered pearl. It dulls the mind, silences the tongue. Harmless… unless resisted.”

Edgeworth raised a brow. “And this craft you learned where, precisely?”

Phoenix’s lips curved, half rueful, half amused. “In the slums,” he said. “Among those who asked no name—only what you could carry, and how cleanly you left.”

Edgeworth studied him a moment longer, then gave a single nod.

Together they ascended the final stair to the narrow servants’ passage curling behind the royal chambers. From a slit in the masonry, they spied the guards: two figures slouched in the torchlight, heads bowed, halberds resting loose in weary grip.

Phoenix stepped forward now, the rogue’s mantle full upon him. His coat flared with each pace, the dusk-hued ribbon at his throat catching firelight in brief flashes. The black half-mask gleamed beneath the hood—a smile cast in shadow, a jest given flesh. With a flick of his wrist, he loosed two cards—not flung, but let fall with artful ease. They drifted upon the air like leaves upon a still breeze, gliding past the sentries’ shoulders.

The elder coughed. The younger blinked. Then—a sway. A stammer. The taller dropped first, eyes rolling as lids fell shut. The other made to speak, but his tongue turned thick, slow. Both crumpled to the stones, silent.

Phoenix caught one halberd ere it fell, lowering it soft to the floor.

Edgeworth stared. “You make it seem as naught.”

Phoenix gave a lopsided smile. “So long as they look away. Much like law, in that regard.”

Edgeworth passed the sleeping men, pausing as his fingers found the chamber door’s iron ring. He looked back, his eyes catching the candle’s gleam beneath Phoenix’s hood. “You’ll not come?”

Phoenix shook his head. “Best I stand watch. Should they glimpse me within, they’ll see a rogue. But if they see you, garbed as a lord… they may pause.”

Edgeworth hesitated, fingers tightening on the ring. “If I do not return within ten minutes—”

“I’ll find you,” Phoenix said. “Be it wall or fire, I’ll come through.”

Their eyes held—just a breath, caught between torchlight and shadow.

Edgeworth nodded, once. Then he turned the ring, and slipped within.

The chamber was untouched, heavy with the scent of wax, parchment, and something iron-sweet that no fire had ever quite burned away. The curtains stood still as stone; the hearth, cold. And yet the room breathed with memory.

Edgeworth stepped into it like a man stepping into a dream long denied. Shadows clung to the wainscoting, thick with secrets. The tapestries were faded but regal—hunting scenes, saints in triumph, the Lion of Albion stitched in blood-red thread above the mantle. He should not have been here. No one entered the King’s chamber without summons—least of all a man accused of high treason. Yet if the truth lay anywhere, it would be here.

He moved with purpose to the writing cabinet that stood against the far wall. It was a familiar piece—oak-veined and brass-fitted. As a boy, he had stood beside it, waiting in silent reverence while King Manfred penned decrees and received messengers. He had thought it sacred once. Now he saw only a reliquary of deceit.

Edgeworth knelt, his gloves whispering against the polished wood. His fingers traced the third drawer, seeking the catch. As they moved, memory surfaced—unbidden and sharp. His father’s journal. He had not held it since the day Gregory Edgeworth left court, never to return. A plain book, bound in dark leather, the ribbon always tucked inside the cover. Gregory had kept it close—always on his person. He would write in it each evening before prayers, his brow furrowed as though weighing not just facts, but truth itself.

Edgeworth remembered asking for it—days after the execution of the man from the slums, after Gregory’s death had been declared an accident, a misstep in the dark. He had stood before King Manfred, barely tall enough to meet his eye.

“His journal,” he had said. “May I see it?”

King Manfred’s smile had been gentle. Too gentle. “Your father kept no such thing, lad.”

But Edgeworth had known better. Still, he had never seen it again. Until now.

Click.

The catch gave way beneath his fingers. The drawer slid open with a sigh. There it was. Bound in dark leather. The ribbon frayed. The cover softened by time and touch. His throat tightened. He reached out and took it in both hands, lifting it as though it were relic or rosary. His breath trembled. He turned the first page. And there, in familiar script—bold, precise, unmistakably his father’s—were the words: “Gregory Edgeworth, in service to truth, doth herein set down those things which must not be forgotten.”

The ink had faded slightly, but the hand was steady. He ran a gloved finger beneath the line, then turned another page. And another. And then he saw it—entries, dated and detailed, matching the time Gregory had spent making his quiet inquiries. Whispers of missing nobles. Suspicious edicts. The death of Archbishop Langmere. The falsified records of royal lineage.

Each line was a thread, pulling taut the tapestry of treason Gregory had been unraveling before his death. Edgeworth’s jaw clenched. He should not be surprised. And yet the weight of the truth bore down on him, cold and final.

Gregory had known. And someone—no, King Manfred—had hidden this from him. This book, this silent witness, had been secreted away for more than a decade in the one place Edgeworth had never dared to search.

Until now.

He did not weep. But his hands gripped the journal tighter as he closed it, pressing it to his chest like a shield. Then he rose to his feet, every breath burning in his lungs. If this was what it took to clear his name, to bring justice for the man who had raised him—Then he would see it done. Even if it meant standing alone against a crown.

The journal still pressed firm to his breast, Edgeworth scarce had time to draw breath when a voice slipped forth from the shadows—light and lilting, yet lined with venom. “Well, well,” it said, almost merrily. “The hound hath found his master’s leash.”

Edgeworth turned sharp, his blade half-drawn, its point catching the firelight like a star. Upon the King’s oaken throne, perched like a crow atop a cathedral spire, lounged a man clad in a fool’s garb. Bells whispered at cuff and collar, but the eyes beneath his cap held naught of mirth—only the chill gleam of purpose.

Yanni Yogi.

Edgeworth’s jaw clenched. “You.”

“Yes, my lord,” said Yogi, rising with mock grace. “Strange, is it not? How the wheel comes full circle. And here thou stand’st—where once thy father stood.” He descended the dais with the soft tread of silk upon stone. “I watched him, you know. Just there. Pale as parchment, hand to the hilt, eyes brimming with questions best left unasked.”

Edgeworth stood fast, voice like iron drawn. “You saw him die.”

“I saw many die,” Yogi said softly, a thread of weariness curling through the words. “I saw a king unmake his own soul. And thy father—poor Gregory—he stood too firm. Far too firm.”

The journal’s weight grew heavier in Edgeworth’s grasp. He looked down. Dried blood marred the parchment’s edge, drawn deep into the spine. His father’s hand remained beneath: steady, deliberate, unflinching.

Yogi’s eyes flicked toward it. “He wrote more than ever crown or council knew. His thoughts inked in cipher, his fears bound tight in leather. Dangerous things, thoughts. Sharper than steel when left to fester.”

Edgeworth frowned, the shape of old memories forming anew—of missing lords, vanished monks, and the quiet dread that crept through palace halls. The notes had been precise: names, dates, letters never received. He remembered again. The journal had not returned to him. As a boy, he had asked, pleaded—what became of it? And Manfred, cold as stone, had said, “Your father kept no such thing, lad.” A lie. One of many.

Yogi’s voice slipped back like a serpent. “Think you he trusted the King alone? No. He wrote it all. For a son, perhaps. Or for penance.”

Edgeworth’s eyes narrowed. “You speak as one well-acquainted with these pages.”

The jester’s grin curved like a sickle moon. “Would you believe I’ve seen their like before? Inked by the same hand, passed in secret through friars and scribes. Little truths… that oft found their way to ruin.”

Edgeworth’s breath caught. “You intercepted them,” he whispered. “The letters—the missives to the abbeys. The ledgers—”

“A jest here, a whisper there,” Yogi said with a shrug. “A page misplaced. A steward misled. A fire lit in time.”

Edgeworth stared, the pattern unfolding like smoke. The Queen’s physician’s letter—buried at the abbey. A clerk drowned in the Thames. A friar vanished on the road to Calais. His father had been hunted by shadows. Always a step behind—always too late. And the stage had ever been set with care.

Yogi tilted his head. “There was no grand design, my lord. Only the price of asking questions the realm had no wish to hear.”

But Edgeworth no longer heeded the fool’s tongue. His eyes had fallen to a near-finished entry in the journal, penned mere days ere his father’s death: “Saw him again, the motley man at Manfred’s side. He listens more than a fool should. Too often I find his gaze on seal and scroll. He laughs at sermons, and the King’s wrath burns brighter in his company. I trust him not. If the crown must be won by the murder of a child, then it is a crown already cursed. And cursed, too, shall be he who guards it.”

Edgeworth’s gaze rose slow to meet Yogi’s. “You whispered in the King’s ear,” he said, voice brittle as winter glass. “You fed his dread. Fanned it. Made treason of shadows.”

Yogi did not deny it. His smile only deepened. “The King chose his path,” he said mildly. “I but offered… clarity.”

The truth fell like a stone. Edgeworth’s hand tightened upon his sword’s hilt—yet his limbs felt leaden, his mind unmoored. It was not Manfred alone who had damned Gregory. It was the jester. The man behind the mirth. The hand behind the curtain.

Yogi’s gaze drifted to the journal, then to the blade. “Careful, young lord,” he said, his voice now velvet. “That book in thy grasp may yet undo more than thou canst reckon.”

At that moment, the chamber door groaned ajar. Phoenix burst within, his coat catching flame’s glow, eyes swift from Edgeworth to the jester and the journal clutched tight. “Miles—”

Yogi spread his arms in mock delight. “Ah, the rogue arrives! Shall we name it treason now—or let the gallows speak first?”

Edgeworth lunged—but Yogi was already in motion, slipping away like a shadow at dusk. He vanished through a hidden door in the stone, laughter trailing behind him, cruel and echoing, as the thunder of boots rose from the corridor beyond.

Phoenix was at Edgeworth’s side in a breath. “Guards. We must go. Now.”

Edgeworth lingered one heartbeat longer, staring at the place where the jester had stood. Then he looked to the journal. His father’s voice. A trail of truth long buried. “He was there…” Edgeworth breathed, voice faint. “From the beginning.”

Then he turned—and fled.

Behind them, the shadows whispered, and laughter echoed low in the dark. They fled not as rogues, nor as knights, but as phantoms—moving swift between braziers whose coals had dimmed, beneath tapestries of old conquests and saints long forgotten. The journal was clutched to Edgeworth’s breast like some sacred relic. His grip held fast, though the tremor in his breath betrayed the storm within. Phoenix, two paces behind, cast wary eyes to each flicker of torchlight, each corner of shadow, his hand ever near the blade at his hip.

Only when their steps met the hush of wind curling through a servants’ stair did Phoenix speak. His voice, low and firm, pierced the quiet. “What saw you in the pages?”

Edgeworth halted. One gloved hand met the wall, his frame drawn taut as a bow at full pull. “My father… he knew,” he said, and his voice cracked like frost beneath an iron tread. “He knew of the usurper. Of Baldwinus. Of the names wiped clean—erased from record like soot scrubbed from marble. He saw the rot ere it bloomed.”

Phoenix stepped closer, his tone gentled. “The boy—this Baldwinus. The Queen’s own son?”

“Yes,” Edgeworth said. “The trueborn heir. Hidden away. The physician named him in his own hand.” His gaze darkened. “And Manfred… Manfred cast down those loyal to the crown. My father traced it—each vanished name, each silence stretched too long, each lie wrapped in courtly silk.”

Phoenix drew a slow breath, steadying them both. “Then the fool spoke true.”

Edgeworth turned sharply. “He spoke as one who dons motley but bears steel beneath. Yanni Yogi—he wore the garb of jest, but his was no mirthful role.” He faltered, then his voice turned hard. “He pulled the strings.”

“A jester with daggers behind his smile?” Phoenix asked, brow raised.

Edgeworth stared back into the gloom from whence they’d come. “No,” he said grimly. “A dagger, wrapped in a jester’s smile. He wove it all—my father’s fall, the king’s turning, the silence that buried Baldwinus. This was no chance nor counsel. It was design.” He opened the journal once more, hands unsteady, and turned to a page where hurried ink scarred the vellum: “Beware the fool who forgets his place. His tongue dances in court, but his shadow is long. He was not always a fool.”

Edgeworth read the line aloud, slow as snowfall. “‘He was not always a fool…’”

Phoenix’s eyes narrowed. “What mean you by it?”

“I know not yet the name he bore ere the bells and cap,” Edgeworth murmured. “But he is no common madman. He is cunning—measured. Each jest hides a blade. He is the architect behind the ruin of my house, and the unmaking of the crown.”

“And if he wears many masks,” Phoenix said, “then he may walk beside us in any hall, at any table.”

Edgeworth’s jaw clenched. “He it was who bled my father beneath Saint Olwen’s stones. And still he laughs.”

A silence passed between them—thick and long, as though the world itself held breath.

Edgeworth’s knuckles blanched upon the spine of the book. “This tome bears blood still—not only my father’s, but the blood of justice itself, spilled and left to blacken. He wrote these words with death at the door. He hoped they would be found. And I—I let them lie.”

Phoenix shook his head. “No. You knew not what was buried.”

“I should have asked. I should have seen. I sat beside the tyrant who damned him.”

“You were but a boy.”

Edgeworth looked up at that. “So was Baldwinus.”

The moment lingered, brittle and heavy with what might have been.

Phoenix reached out, his hand firm but careful, and closed the journal. “We know our enemy now.”

Edgeworth’s eyes lifted, hollow with weight. “He has had years—decades. Power in every corner. And now… now he knows we know.”

Phoenix’s hand brushed the hilt hidden beneath his cloak. “Then let him know. So long as we draw breath, he shall learn there are still those who hunt the truth.”

Edgeworth’s breath trembled out, more shudder than sigh. Then he nodded. “We ride for Saint Olwen,” he said. “My father’s bones lie beneath its stones. Mayhap more truths lie with him.”

“Saint Olwen,” Phoenix echoed, the name ringing like tempered steel. “Then let the hunt begin.”

And into the wind they vanished, their forms lost to mist and the murmuring dark. Behind them, far beneath Whitehall’s cold stone belly, laughter rose again.

Not bright.

Not merry.

But low—knowing—and waiting.

•••

The moon rode high, a half-shuttered eye veiled in cloud. Mist curled low over the banks of the river bend, silvering the stones and muffling footfalls. The tannery’s ruin crouched in silence—its walls sunken and blackened by years of disuse, its chimney long cold. There, beneath its shadow, Maya waited, the hood of her cloak drawn low. A nightjar called once. Then came the soft rasp of boots on gravel.

Maya turned. A figure stepped forth from the mists—cloaked in simple grey, no embroidery nor crest to mark her station. Yet even stripped of silks and titles, Maya knew her. She’d have known her in any crowd, at any feast, on any battlefield of words or steel.

Princess Franziska.

“You came,” Maya said, voice low, yet steady.

Franziska’s eyes, sharp as ever, missed nothing. “I gave my word.”

A beat passed. Maya’s mouth curved, wry and quiet. “That’s more than many royals dare boast.”

Franziska lifted her chin, proud as a stag. “I am not many royals.”

“No,” said Maya, soft as dusk. “You are not.”

They stood in silence, the air thick with unspoken things.

Franziska’s gaze drifted to the darkened river. “I should not have come.”

“But yet, you did.”

Wind stirred the trees beyond the tannery’s crumbling walls. A crow called once, then was still.

“My brother is gone,” Franziska said at last. “Vanished into shadow with the rogue. They call him traitor now.”

Maya’s chest tightened. “He seeks the truth,” she said. “And truth bends the knee to no man.”

Franziska looked at her, quiet and unreadable. “And you? What is it you seek?”

“I know not,” Maya replied, eyes locked to hers. “But of late… I find it often near you.”

Franziska opened her mouth—yet the thought never passed her lips. The thunder of hooves shattered the moment. Steel boots struck stone, voices rang down the foggy road: “Search the banks! The heretic may skulk nearby!”

Maya stiffened.

Franziska seized her wrist. “This way,” she whispered, pulling her into a narrow alley behind the tannery. The passage was close, hemmed in by broken walls and the stench of tallow long since cured. They pressed together in shadow, breath mingling in sharp, fast gasps.

The boots drew near. A knight’s figure loomed in the mist. He paused, head tilting as though scenting the air.

Franziska’s blood ran cold. If he looked close—too close—he would see her face. She, daughter of the throne, forbidden from leaving Whitehall under royal edict. Her voice, her bearing, even the shape of her mouth could betray her.

“M’lady?” the knight called. “Is someone there?”

Franziska turned, heart hammering. Her mind spun with dread. Then—instinct. Desperation. A single reckless stroke. She caught Maya’s face in her hands and kissed her. Not gently. Not politely. Her palm cupped Maya’s cheek, angling their faces into the fold of their hoods, shielding skin and breath. Her cloak fell close about them both. She pressed forward, body and mouth and cloak all turned to concealment.

The knight rounded the edge. He stopped short. He saw figures entangled in shadow—neither speech nor station visible, only intimacy. “Shameless,” the man muttered, disgust curling his lip. “At God’s hour, no less.” He spat, turned, and strode away into the mist.

They remained motionless, locked in breathless stillness, until the hoofbeats faded. Franziska broke away with a gasp. Her eyes wide, stunned. “I—I beg pardon,” she stammered, voice breaking. “I had no other choice. If he had seen my face—”

But Maya silenced her with a kiss.

Not to hide.

To speak what words could not.

The second kiss surged with heat—sure and fierce, like rain breaking upon drought. It was no longer fear but fire that drove it. Maya’s hand tangled in Franziska’s cloak, then in the braid at her neck. Franziska gave a soft, surprised sound—then melted into her, lips parting, hands gripping Maya’s waist. She pulled her closer, closer still, as though distance itself were a wound.

Their mouths moved hungrily, with longing long denied—slow at first, then unbound. Franziska felt herself unravel, her guard crumbling like mortar in storm. All she had pent up—duty, rage, want—poured forth in that kiss. She tasted salt and wind and recklessness. Maya kissed her as one seizes the only breath left in a drowning world.

They broke apart at last, gasping, foreheads pressed together.

Franziska whispered, “This is foolish.”

Maya touched her cheek, eyes burning. “Yes.”

Franziska nodded once, eyes closed. “Do it again.”

And Maya did.

•••

They had made it far enough to breathe again—at least for now. The ruined cloister offered sanctuary of a sort: cracked stone walls swallowed in ivy, a long-forgotten shrine to some saint whose name had faded with the rain. Night pressed close beyond the broken arches. The journal lay between them on a folded cloak, its leather worn, the script inside untouched since the chamber.

Edgeworth knelt beside it, hands folded, gaze sharp and unmoving. He had been silent for some time now, but Phoenix knew better than to mistake stillness for peace. Edgeworth’s voice came at last, low and deliberate. “To move against them, we must needs gather names. Patterns. This ledger my father kept—it is a map, of sorts. There may yet be loyal hearts buried in the court, unnamed but watchful. Perhaps even Baldwinus lives still, hidden away. Yogi’s power must be rooted in some rot long left to fester.”

Phoenix crouched beside him. “You have not slept.”

“I dare not,” came the reply.

“Nor eaten, I wager.”

Edgeworth gave no answer. His eyes remained fixed on the pages, his mouth drawn like a blade. He looked every bit the knight still: precise, poised, cold.

But Phoenix saw the tremor. It was slight. Barely a flick at the cuff of his sleeve. Like a reed bowing against the weight of wind. “You’re trembling,” Phoenix said quietly.

Edgeworth did not look at him. “The night air. It is of no matter.”

“No,” Phoenix replied. “It is of every matter.”

Still, Edgeworth would not turn. “Manfred was my sovereign. My father gave him loyalty, and I followed suit. I believed him a just king.”

“And Yogi?” Phoenix asked, soft and careful.

Edgeworth’s jaw grew tight. “A shadow that never cast a sound. A fool in cap and bell, yet all the while he moved unseen. He fed the King’s fear—stoked it, shaped it, until it devoured him. I see now he wanted my father silenced not for what he knew, but for what he was. A man beyond his reach.” His voice cracked, but he mastered it quickly. “I thought truth would bring me peace,” he said. “That it would cleanse. But all I find is ruin.”

Phoenix stepped closer. Still, he did not speak.

“I must think clearly,” Edgeworth continued. “We have but days—”

“No,” Phoenix murmured, and reached out.

Edgeworth flinched, just slightly, as Phoenix drew him into an embrace—gentle, firm, and warm. He did not lean into it at once. His spine remained taut, his hands unmoved.

But Phoenix held fast. “I do not ask you to be a knight nor son nor avenger,” Phoenix said, quiet into his ear. “Only to be still. Only to breathe, Miles.”

Miles’s breath caught.

Just once.

Then again.

He did not weep.

Not truly.

But his shoulders trembled, and his jaw clenched hard against the swell rising in his throat. His eyes burned, though no tears fell.

After a long moment, his hands rose—slowly—and found Phoenix’s back. Not to hold. Merely to touch. As if unsure he had leave to do even that. “I must not unravel,” Miles whispered, voice like glass pressed by storm.

“You shan’t,” Phoenix said. “You are not unmade. You are here. That is enough.”

They remained thus, unmoving. And when at last Miles let his eyes close, he leaned his brow lightly against Phoenix’s shoulder. He said no more. But for the first time since the chamber, he let himself be still. And not alone.

Chapter Text

The chapel ruins had become their sanctuary. For three days they lingered beneath crumbling vaults and ivy-laced beams, where the air hung heavy with moss and the faded perfume of old incense. The journal had not left Miles's side—not once. He turned its pages with reverence, each line a relic, each word a blade honed in silence.

He spoke little now. He thought more.

Schemes began to take shape—letters penned in hidden cipher, seals borrowed and altered, names once scorched from memory now summoned back to ink and reckoning. A storm was stirring, slow but certain, and at its center stood Miles Edgeworth: gaunt, grim, and unbending.

Yet Phoenix grew restless.

Maya was still somewhere beyond the walls. Pearl, too. And the city had soured—choked with rumor and red-liveried knights who swept through alleys with suspicion bright upon their blades. The likenesses of Phoenix and Miles now hung at each gate and marketplace, scratched in swift ink: “Wanted for high treason and incitement of sedition against the Crown.”

Phoenix could tarry no longer. Upon the fourth morning, he rose before the sun. The woolen cloak, coarse and road-worn, he drew over his shoulders; his sword, he sheathed without sound.

Miles looked up from the journal, brows knit with quiet worry. “Where do you go?” he asked.

Phoenix’s smile was brief—flickering like lamplight before a gust. “To find what still remains of my family.”

Miles rose, half a breath away from protest—yet held. His gaze lingered on Phoenix’s face. “You will be hunted,” he said.

“Not if I wear the right shadow,” Phoenix answered. And without further word, he stepped into the breaking hush of morning, vanishing into the sleeping city, leaving Miles with the dawn.

Whitehall had grown colder. The cobbled streets stank of smoke and iron, the air thick with murmurs not yet named aloud. The bells tolled heavier now, as if mourning something the city dared not speak. Grief hung low, shapeless, in every alley.

Phoenix moved swift and sure, his hood drawn deep across his brow. He took the lesser ways—mud-caked drover paths, butcher lanes, the winding cuts betwixt shuttered chapels and soot-streaked walls. But near the old gaol, fortune turned her face.

There—beside the stable doors—stood a lone knight. Young. Slender of frame. Drowsing in the gray light, his halberd resting idle against the stone.

From shadow, Phoenix stepped. Not a footfall betrayed him. He drew a sliver of fine-ground sleeproot from the hollow spine of a playing card—an old rogue’s trick—and struck fast, a sharp blow to the neck. The knight sagged without a sound, sleep’s hand swift and merciful. “Forgive me,” Phoenix murmured, steadying him. He worked quickly: steel breastplate, shoulder plates, the crimson cloak of the crown’s patrol. It fit him ill, but well enough for passing glance. The helm he pulled low. The buckles he drew tight. And last, he slipped the marked card back into its place among the others.

A ghost clad in borrowed steel, he stepped into the morning. His stride shifted—longer now, with the stiff gait of a man sworn to oaths and order. He passed two guards at the crossroads, who gave him no more than a cursory nod. Just another red-cloaked loyalist, bound to sweep the streets for rebels.

But beneath the helm, Phoenix’s heart pounded like war-drums.

Maya. Pearl. Gods keep them.

And if not—His gloved hand gripped the hilt hidden beneath the cloak. If not, then blood would answer.

The slums breathed like a wounded beast. Fog clung thick about the narrow lanes, curling round broken shutters and chimneys blackened by soot. The stones beneath Phoenix’s boots were slick with mire, the air steeped in smoke from low-burning tallow and the sour reek of river rot.

He passed the ruins of the old tannery, where hides once hung like pennants upon iron racks, now left to fester in the damp. Beyond that lay the riverbend—silent, half-consumed by mist. And there, where a crumbled smithy gave way to the bank, he beheld her.

Maya. She stood nigh to Pearl, cloaked in ash-grey wool, firelight dancing faint upon her dark eyes. But she was not alone.

A knight kept watch beside them—lean, poised, clad in light mail. Her helm shone dully in the gloom, the red-and-gold sigil of King Manfred faint upon her pauldron.

Phoenix’s breath caught. His blood turned cold. He moved without thought, each step weighed in silence. One hand drifted toward the hilt beneath his cloak.

The knight had not yet turned.

“You’ll not lay hand upon them,” Phoenix called, voice low beneath his helm. “Step aside.”

The knight wheeled round, swift as a drawn blade, her stance honed and still. “You claim command in streets not thine own?” Her voice bore the polish of court—sharp, measured, unmistakably feminine.

Phoenix stepped forward, steel half-drawn. “I give no second warning.”

Steel answered steel. She struck first—fast, relentless. Phoenix caught the blow, but barely; the force near drove him from his feet. Another came swift after, and again he parried. Yet the contest proved brief. She was his better.

A slip of footing. Her point struck true—measured, not to wound, but to force him down. With a deft motion, she knocked the helm from his head.

Their eyes met.

Phoenix gasped for breath.

Pale gray eyes, keen as winter light, studied his face with mounting astonishment. Beneath the helm, her pale blue hair—tied neatly—was unmistakable.

“Princess Franziska,” he whispered.

She stood frozen, blade still raised.

Maya cried out, rushing forth. “Nick—wait! That’s Nick! Please—do not strike him!”

Franziska’s blade wavered mid-air. She stepped back half a pace, gaze fixed. “This man?” she asked, her tone edged with disbelief. “He is the one?”

Maya nodded fast, placing herself between them. “He means no harm. I never told you his name before, but when I spoke of ‘Sir Nicholas’… I—I let it slip.”

Phoenix blinked. “What?”

“She named me so once,” Franziska said slowly, lowering her sword. “And it set me on a path—of questions, of truths. It led me to my brother. To you.”

Phoenix stared, breath unsteady. “You’ve followed her?”

“She spoke in riddles, ever circling the truth,” Franziska said, frowning. “But when she trusted one so deeply to name him even in jest… I knew I must find him.”

She studied him anew. “And now I see. You wear no spurs. You are no knight. You are the rogue they speak of in whispers and gallows-jests.”

Phoenix gave no denial.

Franziska raised her chin. “You tread dangerous ground. You are marked for treason. Should the crown find you, the rope awaits.”

“Then why not carry out their sentence now?” Phoenix asked, quiet.

Franziska’s eyes flicked to Maya, then Pearl, then back to him. Her voice dropped. “Because she trusts you. And such faith is not lightly given.”

Phoenix clenched his jaw.

Maya stepped closer. “We are not foes. I meant not to hide the truth, only to protect it. He fights for justice. I know it.”

Franziska held still a moment more. Then, with deliberate care, she sheathed her blade. “I seek only the truth,” she said. “But seeing what lies beneath the helm… I find myself burdened with more questions than I brought.” She turned, then paused. “You are bold, sir, to stride so near Whitehall in the king’s colors. They double the watch. The court stirs with unrest.”

Phoenix nodded. “We feel the tremor as well.”

Franziska’s gaze lingered upon him. “If it is truth you chase, and if you mean to clear my brother’s name… then walk with care. My father is not the man he once was.”

The lantern sputtered in the damp breath of the alley, casting long, uneasy shadows upon the crumbling walls. Phoenix drew off the helm he had stolen, sweat sheening his brow, his jaw set in grim suspicion. Across from him stood Franziska, her travel cloak drawn close about her frame, pale blue hair catching glimmers of torchlight where it slipped free of her hood. Her grey eyes, cool and watchful, did not reach for steel. Pearl peered from behind Maya, who held the child with quiet protectiveness. The girl clung to her sleeve, but her gaze was sharp with curiosity.

Maya tugged gently upon Phoenix’s arm. “We must speak,” she said.

Pearl stepped forward with a child’s courage, chin raised in miniature defiance. “I shall stand between you,” she declared.

Maya stifled a laugh and combed a hand through her hair. “Very well, Pearly.”

Phoenix allowed himself to be drawn aside, though his gaze lingered upon Franziska. “You trust her?” he asked in a low tone.

“She brought no guards,” Maya answered. “Made no demands. She came with questions only. She found me after I let slip the name ‘Sir Nicholas’—but once, and by accident. That alone brought her here.”

“She’s highborn,” Phoenix muttered. “And I’ve seen what highborns do when the ground begins to shift beneath their feet.”

“And yet,” Maya said, eyes steady, “you were the first to say Lord Edgeworth was not like the others. Perhaps she is not, either.”

He frowned. “Then what purpose brings her hence?”

“She told me she was forbidden to quit the palace,” Maya said softly. “Her father forbade it. But she felt something amiss. She is not here to hunt, Nick. She seeks the truth.”

“She speaks sharply,” Maya added, “but she wears sorrow in her eyes.”

Phoenix looked once more at Franziska, who stood like a statue, her gaze turned outward to the mist-veiled street, her posture that of one well accustomed to being pursued—and not always by enemies. “She knows Edgeworth yet lives,” he said after a moment.

“She suspected,” Maya corrected. “Now, she is certain.”

Phoenix exhaled. “And still she came.”

Maya gave a slow nod.

“She knows naught of Manfred,” Phoenix said carefully.

“No,” Maya replied. “Why? Is there something I should know?”

Phoenix hesitated, his jaw flexing, but he gave no answer.

Pearl tugged at Maya’s robe. “May we go now? I am hungry. And cold. And I like not the way that man looked at you when he passed.”

Maya smiled, then turned to Franziska. “We return to the place where Nick keeps hidden.”

Franziska’s pale gaze slid to Phoenix. “Will you take me to him?”

Phoenix held her in a long, unreadable stare. “You are not coming to drag him back to the noose?”

Franziska shook her head. “I come because something festers in Whitehall. My father sees ghosts in every shadow—but never the one seated nearest to him. I know not what truths remain, only that I must find them.”

Phoenix looked to Pearl—who had, with great purpose, resumed her post between them—and then to Maya. She gave him a small nod. “Let her come,” Maya said.

Phoenix gave a short nod. “Then stay close. And lower your hood. Your hair is no friend to subtlety.”

Franziska’s lips curled, faintly. “Nor is yours.”

And so the four of them—rogue, priestess, princess, and child—vanished once more into the folds of the slum-streets, drawn deeper into the city's shrouded heart, where truth lay buried beneath stone and silence.

•••

The doorway was little more than a fissure in crumbling stone, hidden behind the blackened husk of what once had been a shrine. Moss clung to the arch like funeral cloth. Within, the passage fell beneath the earth—cold, still, and steeped in silence.

Franziska passed last, her pale cloak brushing the lintel. Her boots rang soft upon the uneven flagstones, each step echoing faintly in the chill. They came into a hollow chamber—a wine crypt, once noble, now half-swallowed by soil and time. Smoke from a single lantern curled upward, casting long shadows against damp-hewn stone.

Miles Edgeworth stood near the far wall, hunched o’er a table strewn with parchment. He looked up at once—his gaze finding Phoenix first, then freezing when it fell upon her.

Franziska drew back her hood. Her pale hair slipped loose, catching golden glints in the lantern’s glow. Her face was unreadable.

“…Franziska,” Miles breathed.

She stepped forward, slow and sure, her eyes never leaving his. As though he might vanish, were she to blink. “You live,” she said.

“I do.”

Silence stretched between them like drawn wire.

At last, she spoke again. “Why did you not send word?”

“Because word travels poorly when the name it bears is traitor,” he said, a bitter smile shadowing his lips.

Franziska’s jaw tensed. “They say you conspired against the throne.”

“I did not,” said Miles. “Yet I no longer serve the man who wears the crown.”

Her gaze dropped to the dust-laced floor. “And now you hide in crypts and gutters, side by side with outlaws and common-born?”

“I stand with those who seek truth,” he said gently. “And you have come in search of it.”

Something flickered across her face—uncertain, sharp, but swiftly veiled. “I came,” she said, “for something is amiss. I feel it like steel between the ribs. But where the wound began, I cannot say.”

The chamber held its breath. Only the lantern’s flicker marked the hour’s slow drift.

Miles turned, face in shadow. From a recess in the stone he drew forth a leather-bound journal, worn and faded. With care, he placed it in Franziska’s hands. “This was my father’s,” he said, low. “Hidden in Manfred’s own chambers, buried beneath dust and silence.”

Franziska took it as one might take communion—slowly, reverently, as though the pages might burn or bleed. The old leather groaned beneath her fingers. She turned to the place Miles had marked with a sliver of dried rose-stem—carefully, as though turning scripture. Her eyes traced the lines, lips parted. Soft breath escaped as she read aloud:

“ It is with a heavy hand I set these words to parchment, for I know not whom I may trust, save perhaps the Lord above.

I did ride to the abbeys, clad as a man of the cloth, under colour of collecting tithe. My true purpose lay hidden—questions masked in courtesy, inquiries veiled beneath scripture. I asked after the Liber Regius, that hallowed register of royal line, where coronations and births are set down in ink more lasting than memory.

At Saint Braithwald’s, I was granted brief sight of the book. What I beheld chilled me more than the cloister’s stones. A page—rent not by time, but by hand. Torn clean at the edge, with soot staining the margins as though fire had licked at the truth. There had once been a name there, I am sure of it. The gold leaf lingered faint about the void, like a halo robbed of its saint. I lingered too long, perhaps. My thoughts dwelt too deeply on what had been removed.

Three nights thereafter, young Elric of Worcester, the clerk assigned to my aid, was pulled from the Thames. His tongue was severed. His fingers shattered. The city guard muttered of thieves’ justice. I knew better. He had seen too much, or guessed near enough.

I dared not speak of it. I could only kneel in the chapel and pray—though for what, I cannot say. Justice? Mercy? Courage, perhaps. I rose and rode again, cloaked now not only in duty but in dread. Scrolls hidden beneath my doublet. Rubbings taken from crypts where no voice had sung in centuries. I became as a ghost among stones, a shadow in candlelight.

It was in the forgotten depths of Saint Olwen’s that providence found me. Among dust and rat-gnawed hymnals, I uncovered a letter—ink faded, hand trembling, but legible still. From the Queen’s own physician, it spoke thus: The boy lives. Hidden. The King knows not.

I read the name twice, thrice, unable to breathe.

Baldwinus.

Prince Baldwinus. Son to Queen Rosamund. By all reckoning, dead these nine years of sudden fever. Yet here named, plainly, with the hand of a man who had been at her bedside. And more—tucked within a psalter, behind a loose board in the monk’s cell, I found a drawing. Crude, as by a trembling or unskilled hand, yet full of care. A boy, crowned in jest, smiling faint. Beneath it, the words: Baldwinus Rex.

The date gave me pause. Three winters past his supposed death.

I write this by candle’s last breath. I know not what force seeks to bury this child’s name, but it is strong, and swift, and without mercy. Yet I will not turn back. The truth has taken hold of me, and I fear it shall not let go."

The words hung in the crypt like incense—heavy, sharp, and slow to vanish.

Franziska looked up. Her grey eyes were troubled. “The murder… of a child?”

Miles gave a solemn nod. “A rightful heir. Baldwinus—born of the Queen, hidden for fear of his life. My father found whispers of the truth—but he did not live to speak it. The King ensured as much.”

Her brow knit, her throat worked. “No. That cannot—”

“I do not speak in wrath,” Miles said. “Only in sorrow. Manfred gave the order. He struck the blow.”

She stepped back. “You lie.”

“I do not,” he said, his voice raw. “I saw the place where my father fell. Saw how the blood pooled—clean, contained. Not the mark of thieves, nor riot. The blade was royal. The silence, purchased in fear.”

“But why?” she asked, her voice splintering. “Why would he…?”

“Because he feared the child,” Miles said. “Feared what truth might unmake. Yanni Yogi stoked that fear. My father suspected him—but lived not to see the whole hand behind the veil. I have seen it. I have stood before it.”

Phoenix now stood behind her, arms crossed, posture rigid. Maya and Pearl were beside him—Pearl half-hid in Maya’s cloak, her eyes wide and silent.

Franziska’s voice wavered. “I wished to believe it was madness. Or sorcery. Or something other than cold murder.”

“I once wished the same,” Miles said softly.

Her gaze dropped to the book. Her fingers clutched it tighter. “If he was misled… then who bears the blame?”

“Both,” Miles answered. “Yogi whispered poison, yes. But Manfred drank full, knowing the cup.”

A silence followed, deep and terrible.

Then Franziska closed the book, and gave it back. “Then we must end them both,” she said.

Miles’s head snapped up.

“I would see no more blood spilt for crowns false-won,” she said, voice iron though her eyes gleamed. “And no more truth buried in stone.”

Miles’s hand lingered o’er the journal’s cover. He gave a single nod.

Behind them, firelight danced against the walls, casting all their shadows long and lean—the shapes of rebels and reckoning.

The silence held, like breath before a storm. Franziska stood motionless, her gaze fixed upon the cold stone beneath her feet. Her arms, once so tightly folded in command, now hung at her sides—loosened, uncertain. The steel in her spine wavered beneath the weight of revelation.

Maya watched her with quiet ache. She stepped forward, gently, until but a breath’s span lay between them. “Franziska,” she said, soft as a prayer.

The princess did not turn. Her voice, when it came, was low and distant. “All my life I held him righteous. That even in his wrath, his purpose was ordained. I defended him—against whispers, against doubt, against the unease within my soul.”

Maya reached forth, her fingers brushing lightly against Franziska’s sleeve. “You knew not,” she whispered. “And to know—to truly know—brings pain. I’ve felt the like.”

Franziska’s breath caught, near-silent. “He raised me on sermons of justice. Spoke of loyalty, and the doom of traitors. I thought myself his blade. And now I find I was but a shadow, dancing upon a tyrant’s wall.”

At last she turned. Her eyes—cool grey and full of storm—shone not with tears, but with the strain of holding them back.

Maya looked up, voice steady though low. “You are not him.”

Franziska swallowed. “No. But his blood runs in me.”

“And so does your will,” Maya said. “Whatever he’s done… you stepped away. You chose to hear me. You chose to keep me safe.”

At that, something gentle broke across Franziska’s face. Not collapse, but the first cracking of a wall long held.

Maya stepped closer still, her hand resting over Franziska’s. Their fingers did not twine, yet pressed together—warm, firm, real. For a moment, silence held sway. The crypt lay hushed. Miles and Phoenix stood apart, quiet as carved stone; Pearl, drowsy, leaned against Maya’s pack.

Franziska’s voice trembled. “You ought not trust me.”

“I already do,” Maya answered, softer than before.

Franziska looked down at her, and in her face passed a flicker—of disbelief, of longing, of some unspoken truth on the verge of flight. Her lips parted, but no word found shape.

Maya smiled faintly. “You’re not so clever at hiding what you feel, you know.”

“I am a princess,” Franziska said, quick and brittle.

Maya leaned in, her voice almost teasing. “Even princesses falter. Not from me, not tonight.”

Their eyes met. The air between them trembled—filled with something quiet and vast, not yet named. Franziska’s breath hitched as Maya’s thumb swept softly over her hand—a touch as light as thread, yet grounding as stone.

Franziska closed her eyes. When she opened them, she whispered, “You are… a danger.”

Maya’s grin came slow. “So are you.”

And though no kiss passed between them, no vow, no vow-breaking—something had shifted. The space between them had changed. And neither stepped back.

At the chamber’s edge, Phoenix cast a glance toward Miles and murmured, “Well… that’s new.”

Miles gave no reply. He only watched, as one who knew what it meant to fear the heart’s desire—and let it rise, undeterred.

The quiet lingered but a moment more—long enough for grief to soften, though not to vanish. Miles closed the journal with careful hands, as though it might crack beneath a careless touch. He set it down upon the stone table, beside an oil lamp and scraps of half-mapped parchment.

Phoenix stepped forward, still clad in the guise of a Whitehall knight, though the helm now hung from his hand like an afterthought. “We hold the words,” said he, voice calm, sure. “The truth, writ by Gregory Edgeworth’s own hand. The names. The warnings. The pattern. All lies plain.”

Miles gave a grim nod. “Yet parchment alone shall not bring down a king.”

“No,” Phoenix answered. “But it may yet raise the gallows.”

Franziska’s gaze passed between them, her brows drawn in a troubled line. She held herself upright, yet the fire that oft marked her had dimmed—replaced now by something heavier, more uncertain. “You speak of war,” she said at last. “Of banners raised, and blood let upon the earth. This is no longer a game of courtly secrets. You mean to strike at the crown itself.”

“I mean to strike,” Miles said, steady, “at the hand that stained it.”

Her voice faltered. “That hand is my father’s. Whatever madness holds him now… whatever poison Yanni Yogi did pour into his ear… he is yet the man who raised me.”

Maya’s voice, when it came, bore no judgment. “And that is why it wounds.”

Franziska turned to her, her eyes bright as wet glass. “You understand not.”

“I do,” said Maya gently. “Not as you do, but I know this pain—this choice. It asks what sort of soul you are, and whether you’ll live by that answer.”

Franziska’s jaw clenched. She looked down at her hands—fine-boned, gloved, no longer still.

Miles’s tone was quiet, but keen-edged. “This is no cry for vengeance, Franziska. I seek not blood for blood’s sake. But I shall not suffer the man who slew my father, who soils the court with false trial and shadows the rightful heir, to sit the throne unchallenged.” He turned to the table, spreading the parchment before them. “Yogi remains at his side, whispering behind painted smiles. And Manfred listens. That counsel is no accident. Yogi sees what others dare not. And if we tarry, the truth we hold shall vanish like smoke in a storm.”

Phoenix gestured to the map. “Two heads, one beast. We must divide. One hand to draw out Yogi. One to stir the people—with the truth.”

Pearl, perched atop an overturned crate, frowned as she raised her small voice. “Will there be shouting?”

Phoenix’s mouth twitched. “Most likely.”

“I don’t like shouting,” she said gravely, then added, “but I’ll stay with Maya.”

Maya smiled, placing a gentle hand to her shoulder. “We shall keep to quiet, Pearly.”

At length, Franziska stepped forward. Pale strands of her hair caught the lantern’s light like silver thread. “If you seek to bring truth before the court… I may be of use. They will not heed a rogue. But they may yet listen to a princess.”

Miles’s gaze met hers. “Even should you speak against your own blood?”

Her lips parted, then closed. She drew breath through her nose, as if to hold her composure fast. “I speak not against him,” she said at last. “I speak for the realm. For justice. He taught me to wield it—and if he has lost its meaning, then I must remember it in his stead.”

A moment passed, quiet and thick with weight.

Phoenix gave a single nod. “Then we make ready. Tonight, we move in shadow. But ere the week is done…”

Miles’s voice finished the vow: “The court shall burn with light.” And above them, in the old bones of the city, the wind began to turn.

•••

A storm brooded beyond the arched windows, rain tapping upon the leaded glass like a thousand impatient fingers. Within, a hush lingered. The hearth had long since gone to ash. Tapestries stirred not with breeze, but with something colder—dread unspoken, woven like thread into the very stones.

King Manfred sat slouched upon a high-backed chair of carven oak, a goblet forgotten in his hand. His crown—more shackle than symbol—rested askew upon his brow. His gaze was distant, hollow, fixed upon some shape just beyond reach. “My daughter,” he murmured. “She is not in her chambers.”

A servant, pale and quaking, bowed. “Aye, Your Grace. None have laid eyes upon her since the bells rang for tierce. We—we have searched the cloisters, the stables—”

“She does not stray,” Manfred growled, rising. His cloak fell from his shoulders like a spill of blood. “I forbade it. She is watched. She is guarded.”

“She is gone,” came another voice, smooth and soaked in mockery. Yanni Yogi leaned in the shadow of a stone column, motley dulled by the gloom, though his grin kept its edge. He twirled a long-handled spoon—stolen from the banquet table—in slow, idle circles. “Shall I sing a ballad, my king?” he crooned. “ The Dove Who Slipped Her Gilded Cage, mayhap? Or The Faithless Blood of Daughters?”

Manfred turned on him, voice low and sharp. “Mock me not, fool.”

“Mock?” Yogi gasped, placing a hand to his chest. “Heavens, I tremble. Is it not said—when the lion’s cub slips into shadow, the dagger follows close behind?” He stepped nearer, smile curling. “She has met with the traitors.”

Manfred’s eyes narrowed. “You speak of Edgeworth.”

“Lord Edgeworth,” Yogi said, savoring the name like spoiled wine. “And the rogue beside him—the shadow-walker, the whisper-thief. They gather in silence. They draw to them the lost, the angry, the bold. A nest of rats beneath your very floor, my king.”

The King’s fingers twitched at his side, brushing the velvet-wrapped hilt of the dagger he kept always near. “He was as a son to me,” he whispered. “And yet he turned.”

“As did his father,” Yogi murmured.

A shadow passed over Manfred’s face.

“You gave him your trust,” Yogi went on, circling slowly now, his voice low and laced with venom. “And he repaid you in questions. And what are questions, if not blades drawn in a court of masks? Gregory Edgeworth asked too many.”

“He was loyal.”

“He was proud,” Yogi countered. “He doubted your rule. He questioned decrees writ in royal hand. He whispered of heirs long buried, of truths meant to stay hidden. He wrote. He planned. And so you did what must be done—for the good of the realm.”

Silence gathered in the chamber, heavy as stone.

Manfred turned to the window. The sky had bruised to violet and iron-gray. The storm had grown its teeth.

“Shall I send riders?” Yogi asked sweetly. “Let the city be torn stone from stone. Let no alley, no altar, no cradle pass unseen.”

Manfred nodded, slow and grave. “Bring her home.”

“And the traitors?”

The king’s mouth twisted. “Let them hang.”

Yogi bowed low. “As you command, Majesty.” But before he could slip back into shadow, the doors creaked open. A figure stood there, cloaked in storm-wet grey, rain clinging like tears to her cheeks.

Princess Franziska.

For a moment, none moved.

Yogi’s grin did not fade—but his eyes gleamed with keen attention.

“Daughter,” Manfred said at last, his voice unsteady. “You return.”

Franziska’s eyes did not meet his. They fixed instead upon the fool by the throne. “I return,” she said. “With questions.” She did not kneel. Her cloak fell from her shoulders with a whisper, revealing sword at her hip, raindrops still glistening on the silver trim of her tunic. Her pale grey gaze did not flinch, even as Manfred rose from his seat, arms trembling beneath the weight of his crown.

“I forbade you to leave the palace,” he said.

Franziska’s voice was calm, measured. “Then you ought to have chosen better guards.” Behind her, those same guards stood silent—knowing well the peril of standing between blood and truth. Yogi had not moved, but his posture had drawn taut, like a blade beneath brocade. “I sought only answers,” she said. “And I found too many.”

Manfred stepped toward her. “What poison has turned you against your kin?”

“Poison,” she echoed. “Yes. The kind that creeps by inches—through whispers, through laughter, through ink… and silence.” Her gaze turned to Yogi. His grin wavered. “I know of Gregory Edgeworth’s death,” she said. “And I know it was your hand that struck him down.”

The king’s lips parted—but no denial came.

“Why?” she asked, voice soft as snowfall.

Yogi stepped forth, arms wide. “He was dangerous, my lady. He would have torn the realm apart. Even you, gentle child, would not survive what he sought to uncover.”

Franziska turned to her father.

And this time, he spoke, though his voice was raw. “He questioned me. Again and again. He challenged the crown. I feared what he knew—what he might do, unchecked.”

“You feared the truth,” she said.

Yogi’s voice curled like smoke. “And is a kingdom not forged in choosing what truths endure?”

“No.” Franziska’s voice rang clear. “A kingdom built on murder and deceit shall rot from within.”

Manfred’s face crumpled—some part of him caving inward. “Franziska, my daughter—”

But she had already turned. “I loved you,” she said. “But I will not follow you into shadow.” Her words fell like a blade drawn in a chapel—holy, and final. Franziska turned, cloak whispering across the stones, her back straight as judgment. The rain still clung to her like baptismal water, streaking down the silver-stitched trim of her tunic. She did not weep. She did not tremble. She walked.

But the door did not open to let her pass. Yanni Yogi had moved before it—arms crossed, his smile gone to frost. The torchlight threw his long shadow upon the wall, more serpent than man. “So soon?” he asked, voice no longer syruped but sharpened like a dagger’s edge. “Do you flee from questions, my lady? Or from answers that give no comfort?”

Franziska drew her sword—not in rage, but with perfect clarity. “Step aside, fool.”

“Oh, but we jesters never step aside. We bow, we grin… and we linger.”

The tension snapped. Steel rang behind her. From the side vestibule, Miles stepped forth, Phoenix at his side. Oddly, they had met little resistance upon entering the palace—few guards, and fewer questions. It was as though the halls themselves had grown weary of silence and turned away their watchmen. Behind them came Maya, her hand resting gently upon Pearl’s shoulder. The child clung close, eyes wide, until Maya bent low and whispered something soft and sure. Pearl gave a small nod, and Maya wrapped her in a firm embrace before guiding her to a narrow alcove behind the doorway—safe, unseen. Then Maya rose and joined the others.

“Princess Franziska!” Phoenix called, his voice ringing through the vaulted chamber.

She did not turn from Yogi, but her breath caught—barely—and in that tremor lived her relief. “He confessed,” she said. “My father. He slew Gregory Edgeworth with his own hand.”

Miles’s jaw tightened, but he nodded. “Then truth has found its voice.”

Manfred staggered back, pale within the shadow of his own throne. His gaze passed over them all—his daughter, the son he cast off, the thief in a knight’s guise, the mystic girl who saw the dead.

He saw not treason.

He saw reckoning.

“You come into my hall like wolves,” he breathed. “Dragging ghosts behind you.”

Phoenix stepped forward, helm beneath his arm, armor dulled by the city’s soot. “No, Your Majesty. We come as those your crown has cast aside.”

Yogi turned sharply, arms flung wide. “They conspire in darkness! Traitors, every one! They come to spill royal blood!”

“No,” Franziska said. “Only to end this rot.” Her gaze fixed upon him, hard and unflinching. “And you—you whispered poison into my father’s ear. You watched as he murdered a loyal man. You smiled while the realm buckled under lies you helped spin.”

Yogi’s eyes darted, searching the room. “Yet ‘twas your father who held the blade,” he said, voice soft. “I merely jested.”

“A jester does not shape law through laughter,” Miles said. “You are no fool. You are a viper draped in motley.”

Maya’s hand curled tighter around the charm at her neck, but her stance held strong.

The torches sputtered as thunder growled beyond the high glass. King Manfred sank into his chair, crown slipping again upon his brow. “I sought only peace,” he whispered.

“Then you should not have built it atop bones,” Franziska answered. She raised her blade—not in threat, but as sign. “I do not recognize your reign, Father. Not until you stand before the very law you betrayed.” Her voice rang out like a bell cast high in the rafters. “By blood, by right, I claim justice.”

Yanni Yogi lunged—wild, desperate.

But Franziska was swifter. Her sword swept in a clean, practiced arc, and the point found his throat. He froze, inches from her, breath caught, laughter strangled.

Maya stepped forward, voice clear. “It’s over, Yogi.”

Franziska did not lower her sword. Her eyes, pale and unwavering, held his.

Miles approached the throne. “This is where it ends.”

Phoenix drew his blade. “Let the court rise.”

The room fell to silence—but only for a breath. Then thunder echoed down the halls: boots pounding, doors flung open wide. Armored men spilled forth—knights of the crown in gleaming plate, banners of Whitehall draped upon their cloaks. Their swords sang sharp, a chorus of steel and twisted loyalty.

At their head, a captain barked, “By order of King Manfred—seize them all!”

Franziska’s blade stayed sharp at Yogi’s throat as he laughed, dark and delighted. “Oh, sweet fools,” he said, eyes gleaming with malice. “Did you think the tide had turned? How charming. But what’s a tide to a flood?”

“You brought them here,” Franziska growled, steel pressing close.

“I planted but few knights ‘round the palace—enough to cage you here,” Yogi said with a sly wink. “They hunger to serve their king.”

“Hold the line!” Miles cried, moving fast to Franziska’s side, sword raised. “Let none break through!”

The clash roared like thunder—steel rang on steel, bodies surged forward, the narrow hall alive with battle’s fury. Phoenix drew blade swift as shadow, pulling Maya behind a pillar as knights descended. Franziska met two strikes in a heartbeat, driving one back with fierce kick and sharp curse.

“Your Majesty!” a knight called, straining to reach Manfred. “We must retreat—”

But before the King could rise, the air was pierced by a hiss—a breath pulled by shadow. From beneath Phoenix’s cloak poured ash-gray smoke, scented faintly of crushed lavender and burnt charcoal. It curled up fast, snuffing torchlight, draping the hall in rolling fog.

“The rogue!” a voice cried. “He’s vanished!”

“Miles!” Phoenix commanded, close and clear. “We move—now!” Through the thick haze, Phoenix’s hand caught Miles’s wrist. Without pause, he pulled him back into the smoky veil. Miles stumbled once but caught himself, following—the battle’s roar fading behind.

“Where now?” Miles gasped.

“To finish this,” Phoenix said grimly. “Manfred and Yogi won’t flee—not this night.”

But beneath the smoky veil, the trap still burned. And in the great hall’s heart, slicing through fog with a fierce cry, came a voice known true.

“You’ll not touch a hair on Lord Edgeworth’s head whilst I breathe!” Sir Richard Gumshoe charged through the cloud like a raging bull, helm tucked ‘neath one arm, broadsword swinging. Behind him came loyal men, clad in worn armor and mismatched cloaks—veterans, stablehands, old allies of the Edgeworth name. “For truth and justice!” Gumshoe roared, striking at a knight raising blade at Franziska.

Franziska blinked, lowering her sword just a breath. “Sir Richard?”

He grinned wide. “My lady! Sorry I’m late—trouble at the gates, but I’d not let Lord Edgeworth face this alone.”

Franziska almost smiled—almost.

Maya took Pearl’s hand, leading her through the shadowed alcove as battle surged behind. “Stay close, Pearly.”

In the smoke-wreathed corridors, Phoenix and Miles moved swift—through hidden passages and servant’s ways, deeper into the palace’s stone heart.

“Where will Yogi and the King flee?” Miles asked.

“To the west stair,” Phoenix answered. “Down to the Queen’s crypts, then out through the river path.”

“And how do you know this?”

“I’m a rogue,” Phoenix said with a faint grin. “I chart secrets for a living.”

They did not slow. Behind, the trap snapped shut. Ahead, the hunt had begun.

•••

The air grew colder here. Stone gave way to older stone—walls laid long before Manfred’s reign, even before Gregory Edgeworth had drawn breath. Dust curled in the corners like forgotten prayers, and the torch Phoenix carried sputtered against dampness.

Miles’s footsteps rang beside his own, sharp and measured. He moved as one who’d turned rage into iron resolve.

“They won’t have gone far,” Phoenix whispered low, careful not to stir echoes. “They knew we would follow—but they are slower. A wounded king’s pride is a heavy burden.”

Miles said nothing, his gloved hand tracing the crypt’s worn carvings—names smoothed by time and reverence. Queen Adeline. Queen Ysabel. Queen Theodora. “They fled into history,” he said at last. “How fitting.”

Phoenix paused at a fork—one tunnel sloping deep into shadow, the other bending beneath a broken arch. A faint trail of dust marked the latter. “This way,” Phoenix said.

The arch yawned like a beast at rest. As they passed beneath it, silence stretched thick—unnatural, heavy. Even their breaths held still.

“They’ll try to flee by river,” Phoenix whispered.

Miles shook his head. “Not yet. Yogi waits to weave one last lie. He always waits. Always lets himself be seen.”

A distant laugh, high and cruel, answered them like dark confirmation. They broke to a run. Their feet thundered as the corridor opened to a circular chamber—an ossuary of queens, marble effigies slumbering side by side. At its far end stood Yanni Yogi.

He smiled, perched upon the ancient well once leading to riverbed caves below. His motley dripped rain, sleeves stained with soot and wine.

King Manfred leaned heavily on the stones behind him, crown lost, face gaunt and hollow. Smaller, older—like a boy trapped in a dream too dark to escape.

“You’ve come,” Yogi said, voice almost surprised. “All the way down to the bones of your kingdom.”

Phoenix stepped forward, blade drawn. “It ends here.”

“But who ends whom?” Yogi mused. “I held no blade, signed no edicts, spilled no blood.” He gestured to Manfred. “He did all that. I merely watched.”

“You twisted him,” Miles spat. “Fed him poison and fear until he saw ghosts behind every loyal face—including my father’s.”

Yogi bowed with mock grace. “What king is not a mirror, my lord? I reflected only what he wished to see.”

Miles turned sharply to Manfred, voice tight. “You killed him—Gregory Edgeworth, my father.”

Manfred said nothing.

Phoenix stepped close to Miles, steadying him with a quiet touch.

Miles’s voice wavered but did not break. “He trusted you, defended you. When he learned of Baldwinus—the lost heir—and saw your grip falter, you called him traitor.”

“Enough,” Manfred rasped, voice dry as tombstone dust. “You know not what it is to bear the crown.”

“No,” Miles said coldly. “But I know what loyalty means—and what it means to murder a man in the dark.”

Yogi stepped back toward the well. “Touching, truly. But I must away. History is unkind to jesters—unless they’re the ones writing it.” He dropped a small vial on the stone. Blue light burst forth—not smoke this time, but blinding flame.

Phoenix lunged forward, clutching Miles’s cloak and dragging him down as the chamber flared. When light faded, the well was empty. Yogi and Manfred vanished into the tunnels below. “They’re escaping!” Phoenix shouted.

Miles rose swiftly. “After them.”

“No more speeches?”

Miles glanced back. “Not till they’re dead.” Together they leapt into the well—into darkness and the slick path beneath the crown.

The tunnels twisted tighter, descending until the breath of the palace above felt like a forgotten wind. Phoenix’s boots splashed through shallow water, torchlight trembling on the walls. Miles ran just ahead, cloak dragging through the damp, his sword unsheathed, eyes burning. A whisper—then a laugh.

They burst into a cavern carved by time and tide. Faint moonlight filtered in through a grating far above, gilding the scene in ghostlight.

There, amidst bones and brackish mist, stood Yanni Yogi, dragging King Manfred by the collar of his regal cloak. The King stumbled, bloody and dazed, his once-commanding form sagging like a marionette undone.

Yogi’s motley clung to him like a second skin, soaked and torn. In his hand—gleaming in the gloom—was a slender dagger, curved like a serpent’s fang. “Stay back!” Yogi barked, the mirth stripped from his voice. “Come closer and I’ll open his throat like a letter!”

Phoenix froze, breath catching. Miles stepped beside him, blade half-lifted.

Manfred groaned. “Yogi… what is it you do…”

“What I have always done, Majesty,” Yogi sneered. “Cleaning up your blunders. Burning the truth. Killing in your name.” He twisted the dagger, not yet striking. “But this kingdom is no longer yours. ’Tis rot. And rot must be purged.”

Footsteps echoed behind them—then voices. Franziska, sword in hand, followed by Maya and Pearl, wide-eyed and breathless. The child was quickly pulled behind the column by Maya, away from the blood-soaked confrontation.

Franziska’s eyes locked on her father—and then on Yogi. “No,” she breathed. “Do not harm him.”

Miles turned. “He murdered mine.”

“I know well what he’s done!” she snapped, anguish etched deep upon her pale face. “But he is still my father!”

Yogi laughed again, shrill and high. “Ah, the loyal daughter. Come to plead for the throne, or merely its shadow?”

“Release him,” Franziska growled.

“Why?” Yogi said, his voice coiling ’round the chamber. “That he might die slowly in a tower? So the court may watch him wither ’neath his own shame?”

Maya’s hand brushed her belt—the bow she’d seized from a fallen knight in earlier skirmish—quiet, calm. Her fingers notched the arrow in silence, steady as the calm before a storm.

Phoenix’s gaze darted to her, then widened. He opened his mouth to protest—But Maya had already drawn the string.

“Don’t you dare,” Yogi hissed, pressing the dagger to Manfred’s throat.

Maya fired. The arrow struck Yogi square in the side, just beneath the ribs. His eyes bulged. He staggered, blood blooming ’cross his motley. With a cursed cry, Yogi lurched backward—his foot slipping on the slick stone edge near the grated opening.

Time seemed to slow as he teetered, arms flailing—before plummeting down the shadowed shaft below. A sickening silence followed, broken only by the drip of water and Yogi’s fading curses.

Manfred’s body crumpled, blood dark against stone. He gasped, clutching his throat, fingers trembling. A strangled, broken sound escaped him—a name whispered through dying breath. Whether it was Franziska’s or another’s, none could say.

Franziska fell to her knees beside her father, pressing her hand against his wound. His eyes blinked slowly—his crownless brow streaked with tears. “I tried to keep you safe,” he whispered.

“You failed,” she said, voice breaking.

And he was gone.

Phoenix turned. Maya still held the bow, arms trembling slightly. Her breath was uneven, lips parted in disbelief.

Franziska rose slowly, eyes lingering on Maya—not with words, but with quiet, fierce admiration she dared not speak aloud. There was something wild and fierce in the way Maya moved, something both unsettling and captivating. Inside, she felt a stirring—something forbidden, buried beneath duty and fear.

Pearl peeked from behind the column. “Is it over?”

Phoenix stepped forward, finally exhaling. “It is now.”

Miles closed his eyes, breath steadying. The old kingdom had died here—in blood and silence. Yet perhaps… from this, something new might grow.

•••

The dawn broke slow and heavy over Whitehall Palace, the storm spent but its memory lingering in puddled courtyards and sodden banners. Word of the night’s bloody reckoning spread like wildfire through the city streets and whispered halls alike.

Inside the grand hall, draped now in quiet austerity, Franziska stood before the council—a lean figure of steel and grace, her pale gray eyes steady beneath the weight of a crown newly forged from sorrow and resolve.

Phoenix and Miles stood to one side, silent sentinels in dark cloaks. Maya was nearby, ever watchful, her bow slung across her back like a shadow tethered to her. Pearl clung to Maya’s skirts, eyes wide but bright.

The murmurs of courtiers rose and fell like restless tides, many wary, some hopeful. Yet all bore witness to the truth that had shattered the old order.

“My lords, my ladies,” Franziska began, her voice ringing clear as the morning bells. “This kingdom hath suffered long under shadow’s hand. Betrayal took root within these walls. A crown soaked in blood is no crown worthy of its name.” She lifted the journal of Gregory Edgeworth, its pages worn but steadfast. “This record, penned in secret and pain, hath revealed treason not just ‘gainst the throne, but ‘gainst all the people.” She met the eyes of those assembled—nobles, knights, clerics—each awaiting her words with bated breath. “King Manfred is dead. Not by chance nor cruel fate, but by the weight of his own misdeeds. And Yanni Yogi, the jester who veiled lies ‘neath laughter’s mask, hath perished as well. Their corruption shall no longer poison this realm.”

A hush fell.

Franziska’s gaze softened, turning briefly to Phoenix and Miles. “My life and truth I owe to these men, whose courage did not falter in the darkest hour.”

Miles inclined his head slightly, a rare warmth touching his features.

“Now, the kingdom looks to a new dawn. I accept the mantle of Queen—not as one crowned by birthright alone, but as servant to justice, to truth, and to the people.” She paused, the weight of crown and promise settling upon her shoulders. “I vow to rule with honor, to hear each voice as well as command, and to see that no cry be silenced by fear or treason again.”

A murmur of approval swelled, rising to steady applause.

Phoenix stepped forth, voice warm. “And as ever, you shall not stand alone.”

Maya smiled gently at Franziska, the silent bond ‘twixt them a quiet flame beneath the court’s watchful eyes.

Pearl tugged at Maya’s sleeve, whispering, “Will all be well now?”

Maya knelt beside her. “It shall be better, I promise you.”

As the crowd dispersed, Franziska lingered by the window, gazing out o’er the city awakening beneath the pale sun.

Miles approached quietly. “Your Majesty.”

She turned, the weight of her journey etched deep in every line of her face. “Thank you—for your faith.”

Miles’s lips twitched in rare smile. “Justice hath found its queen at last.”

Together, they looked forward—into a future uncertain, but unbroken. Beneath the crown’s cold weight, hope blossomed anew.