Chapter 131 The Decree

By the time Riven reached the gate board, the crowd was thick enough to hide the herald entirely.

[ By Royal Decree: the Third Princess shall wed Lord Dorian in fourteen days, in gratitude for his service to the Crown. ]

[ Whosoever interferes with this union commits treason. Sealed in gold, Caius. ]

A hush rolled outward from the board as the cadets reached the last line and understood what it threatened. Mara’s tail lashed once against Riven’s leg, a warning in the shape of a whip, before she stopped herself.

"Say the word and I’ll shred that scroll," she growled, "plus the herald holding it."

Isolde read the seal in a low voice, "It is legally airtight, interference is defined as treason in the first clause."

"Airtight is just a door nobody has tried yet," Nix murmured.

"Treason carries exile or the block," Veska said, "I have checked the statute twice."

Tobin and Greta read the decree aloud to each other twice, hoping the words would rearrange themselves into something kinder. Cassen read it only once, standing very straight, with the face of a man deciding which law to break first.

"If I tear it down, who stops me?" he asked quietly.

"Nobody will stop you," Isolde said, "they will simply arrest you afterward, in order of rank."

Dorian stood at the foot of the gate steps in a freshly pressed coat, accepting congratulations from strangers like tribute. Lowell trailed him with a wide basket of cards, smirking into his collar each time a noble tipped a hat.

"The wedding invitations were mislaid," Lowell murmured as he passed, "regrettably, every last one."

Lowell bowed to Dorian with flawless sincerity, then dropped one invitation into the nearest fountain without breaking stride. Nobody noticed except Nix, who raised an eyebrow and mouthed a single word of respect, thief to thief.

Dorian lifted his chin as Riven’s gaze landed on him, "Fourteen days, villain, then the book finally ends—"

"Fourteen days is a long time to hold a straight face," he said, "congratulations on the paperwork."

’Sealed in gold, backed by the Crown, perfectly legal... the cleanest trap anyone has written for her.’

---

The Frost Wing stood silent behind a curtain of rime, every window glazed with ice that no sunlight could melt.

Old royal wards crawled across the door in spirals of pale blue, keyed to the blood of the princess inside. Her own Frostcrown could never break them, as the wards drank power from the very hand that pushed against them.

Nix crouched at the keyhole and wiggled her fingers, "Blood wards, how impolite, but they have forgotten that a wardrobe is also a door."

Mara and Veska took posts at either end of the corridor, back to back, daring any guard to try. Bram leaned against the wall between them, arms folded, looking like armed furniture and entirely content with the job.

"This is trespass against the Crown, I will stand guard in the corridor," she said.

"Fourteen days is plenty, I’ll be quick," he said, ducking toward the wardrobe.

Nix drew the wardrobe’s panel open from the wrong side, Open Account humming as a hallway opened behind the coats. Riven stepped through the wardrobe into the princess’s frozen chambers, brushing the soft silk gowns from his shoulders like cobwebs.

"It’s colder than I expected," he muttered, rubbing frost from his sleeves.

Frost furred every surface in the room, from the canopy to the chessboard waiting patiently on the window seat. Yukine sat beside it in a gray traveling dress, back straight, a white bishop already turning in her fingers.

"Bishop to a4," she said, setting the piece down, "your move."

"Knight to f6," he said, stepping off the wardrobe rug, "and I’m very sorry about your door."

"The wards drank half of what I threw at it this morning, they are thorough in their hospitality."

She looked up from the board at last, her cold calm almost hiding the exhaustion pressed beneath it. Two nights behind sealed doors left faint shadows under her eyes, but her spine never bent even once.

"I’m not here to rescue you, what do you mean to do?"

Yukine smiled for the first time, a real one, slow and dangerous, the frost on the canopy trembling. It rearranged her whole face, Riven realizing with some alarm that he would follow that smile almost anywhere.

"Refuse," Yukine said, "loudly, in front of my father."

"In front of the King, the court and your brother, with all of Solace listening?" he asked.

"And Lord Dorian, he will be wearing white, I am told he looks very pale in it."

"I’d pay silver to see his face... I wasn’t invited, though."

"Neither was the decree," she said, "you are coming as my guest and my witness."

She slid her king two squares toward the corner and hopped the rook over it, one move doing two jobs. Riven studied the board and found the best move she played all week, a retreat that was secretly an advance.

"Castling," she said, "a king and a rook crossing the board together."

"Together is the part I like," he said.

"Do not get sentimental, we have a court to ruin," Yukine said, though her cheeks were pink.

’Fourteen days, a hostile court, a royal champion... and a queen who just castled.’

He reached the wardrobe door and paused, noticing the frost-welded pawn still glittering on the board beside her hand. She left it there on purpose, he realized, a promise that this game would outlast any decree or herald.

---

In the Student Council tower, Ysabel sorted the same stack of papers for the fourth time that hour.

Her secretary, Petrik, watched from the doorway with a tray of tea going cold in his white-knuckled hands. Every sheet she touched grew slightly heavier, the desk sinking an inch into the floor under her irritation.

"Madam President, the news from the Crown has been posted," Petrik ventured, "I thought you would want to know."

"I do not care," Ysabel said, without looking up, "the Princess may marry the entire Academy."

"You have sorted that stack four times, the desk is sinking, and your tea is cold."

"The stack requires attention, the desk requires nothing," she said, "kindly leave."

Ysabel stood so abruptly that her chair skidded backward, the whole tower creaking under a sudden violent spike of weight. She crossed to the window, pressed her forehead to the glass, glaring at the distant Frost Wing with deep suspicion.

"If anyone asks, I was never worried," she told the window, "I merely dislike unfinished rematches."

"You have asked me to find the court schedule three times," Petrik said, "I have it right here."

"Put it on the desk, I will not read it," she said, snatching it before he finished setting it down.

---

Back in the corridor, Nix pulled him aside with her face pale, a scrap of paper crushed in her fist.

"Court convenes tomorrow at noon," she whispered, "full session, the King attending."

"That’s fast, Caius isn’t wasting a single day on pleasantries."

"That is not the bad part, the bad part is who he invited."

She flattened the paper against the wall, revealing a hurried sketch of a tall knight holding a long sword. Under the drawing, in Cael’s crooked handwriting, a single line read: bets declined, survivors not recorded in any archive.

’A man who rushes a court has already picked the ending... what’s waiting in that room?’

"Caius summoned the Crown’s Champion," Nix said, "and he doesn’t attend for the applause."