Chapter Text
Chapter One
The Castle feels different when they return.
Keith notices it the moment his boots hit the hangar floor, the echo sharper than usual, the air too open, too clean after the dim metal corridors of the Blade’s base. The Lions disengage, the hum of systems settling back into something familiar, and for a second he almost convinces himself that nothing has changed. That whatever the Blade uncovered can stay compartmentalized, folded away like everything else he has learned to live with.
Then he catches Shiro’s eye. He looks just as shaken as Keith feels, and suddenly, Keith feels sick to his stomach. Galra…they’re the ones who took Shiros arm. They hurt him, tortured him even. And Keith is one of them now? No…not now. He always WAS one of them. How is Shiro supposed to even LOOK at him any more? Keith grips the sleeve of his arm hard, trying to shut up the thoughts in his own head. The time will come when he needs to adress them, but for now, he needs to calm down.
They didn’t speak during the ride back to the castle. They didn’t need to. The truth was still too fresh, too raw, sitting heavy between them like a weight neither of them has figured out how to set down yet. Shiro had been there when it happened, standing beside Keith as the Blade member’s gaze locked onto the knife that Keith had managed to awaken. The way the air had shifted. The way recognition had sparked not with welcome, but with surprise edged in something like discomfort.
His mother’s knife. The realization still makes his chest feel tight.
They make it to the common room without anyone saying anything, the rest of the team trailing in behind them, tired and restless in that post mission way. Lance is talking, filling the silence with noise the way he always does, but even he trails off when he notices the way Keith hasn’t taken his usual place near the wall, the way Shiro hasn’t said a word since disembarking.
Allura notices too.
She straightens, eyes narrowing, Altean instincts sharpening as she looks between them. “What happened on the Blade’s ship,” she asks, voice controlled but sharp, “that you have not yet shared.”
Keith’s heart starts to race.
This is the moment. He knows it is. There is no good time, no way to soften it, and delaying it will only make it worse. He feels that familiar urge to retreat, to HIDE like he so often does. To swallow it down and deal with it alone, but Shiro’s presence beside him keeps him anchored. Shiro had not stepped away when they learned the truth. He had not looked at Keith differently then, although Keith has a feeling that could change in a heartbeat.
Keith takes a breath.
“There’s something I need to tell you,” he says.
The room stills.
Lance’s expression shifts first, the easy grin fading into something cautious. Hunk’s shoulders tense. Pidge’s attention sharpens, eyes flicking rapidly as if already trying to calculate what could possibly warrant this tone.
Keith forces himself to keep going before he loses the nerve.
“The Blade…they um…,” he says. “They recognized my knife. It belonged to my mother. She was…one of them.”
Silence crashes down hard enough that Keith feels it in his bones. Allura stares at him. “Your mother,” she repeats slowly.
Keith nods. “She was Galra. She wasn’t apart of the empire, she was a part of the Blade. I-I swear, I never knew.” His voice is shaking.
Lance opens his mouth. Closes it again.
Pidge’s eyes widen, something between shock and confusion. Hunk swallows hard.
Allura takes a step forward. “And your father.”
“Human,” Keith answers immediately. “He died when I was little.” It stings to say it out loud. None of the team had ever known that both of his parents were out of the picture, but all of this new information was too big for anyone to dwell on that reveal.
Even so, the words do nothing to ease the tension in the room.
“And you expect us to believe,” Allura says, her voice rising now, cracking with something raw and furious, “that this changes nothing.”
Keith flinches despite himself. “I didn’t say that.”
Shiro finally speaks. “Allura, we only just found out ourselves.”
Her gaze snaps to him. “You knew.”
“At the same time Keith did,” Shiro says firmly. “I didn’t keep this from you. Neither of us did. I’ve known Keith for a long time, as far as I know, he NEVER knew.” The fact that he had to include the “as far as I know” line kind of hurts Keith a little, but he doesn’t dwell on it.
Allura’s hands curl into fists. “Galra blood has no place here,” she snaps. “Not after what they have done. Not after what they took.”
Keith feels the words like a physical blow. “I didn’t choose it,” he says quietly.
“That does not absolve you,” Allura fires back. “Do you know how many Alteans died at Galra hands like hers. Like yours.”
The room feels smaller by the second.
Hunk shifts uncomfortably. “Allura, maybe we should just slow down.” He says the words meekly as if he’s not sure that her harsh words ARENT justified quite yet. But Keith still appreciates his apprehension towards her attitude.
“No,” she says sharply. “We should not.”
Pidge has gone very still, her face unreadable, but Keith notices the way she has edged subtly closer to the console, fingers twitching as if she needs something solid to hold onto. He understands that instinct more than he wants to.
Lance finally speaks. “Okay, so, uh. This is a lot. But Keith’s still Keith, right. He didn’t even know.”
Allura rounds on him. “And how long before that blood asserts itself. Before loyalty becomes instinct.”
“That’s not fair,” Lance says, though there is hesitation there, uncertainty creeping in despite himself.
Keith hears it. It hurts more than he expects, coming from Lance.
Shiro steps closer to Keith without thinking, the movement instinctive, protective. “Keith has fought beside us since the beginning. He has never once shown anything but loyalty to this team.”
“And yet,” Allura says coldly, “he carries the legacy of our enemy in his veins.”
Keith’s hands are shaking now. He clenches them at his sides, grounding himself in the feel of his gloves, the familiar weight of his knife. His mother’s knife. The Blade had recognized it immediately. She had been a reminder of something complicated, something unresolved.
Just like him.
“I didn’t tell you because I wanted anything,” Keith says. “I told you because you deserved to know.”
No one responds.
The silence that follows is worse than the shouting. Lance looks torn, eyes flicking between Keith and Allura. Hunk won’t meet his gaze at all. Pidge’s expression has closed off completely, walls snapping into place.
Shiro stays.
That matters. It is the only thing that does.
Allura turns away sharply. “This conversation is over,” she says. “For now. I would recommend that the halfbreed stays in his quarters for the rest of the evening. I have half a mind to put him in a cell, but I have a feeling that won’t sit well with your human-like forgiveness.” She sneers towards the rest of the team. Keith lets out an audible sigh of relief when nobody fight for him to actually be locked up for the night…not like he would blame them if they DID make that decision.
She leaves without another word.
The sound of her footsteps echoes long after she is gone.
Keith stands there, chest tight, heart pounding, acutely aware of the space that has opened around him. No one says anything. No one reaches out.
Eventually, one by one, they drift away, excuses thin and unconvincing. They don’t turn their back to him as they leave. There’s only one way that can be interpreted.
Lance hesitates the longest.
“Hey,” he says quietly. “I just… I need time. Okay.”
Keith nods. “Yeah. Yeah man, of course. I-I do too, I get it.”
Lance leaves with a nod. He turns his back as he leaves and that shouldn’t make Keith so relieved.
When it is finally just him and Shiro, Keith lets out a shaky breath he has been holding since the hangar.
“That went bad,” he says flatly.
Shiro’s voice is gentle. “I know.”
Keith stares at the floor. Shiro reaches out, hesitates, and places a hand on Keith’s shoulder, solid and grounding. “That doesn’t define you.”
He doesn’t sound sure, and even if he did, Keith wouldn’t be certain he could believe that quite yet. He wasn’t sure he would EVER believe it.