Arik stood by the window while Liam slept softly in their bed.
Their bed.
The designation had established itself sometime between Liam threatening an attendant to reach the imperial suite, claiming Goliath’s unfinished collar as his property, and spending half the morning proving that Arik’s newly altered body had not diminished his enthusiasm.
Liam had fallen asleep diagonally across the mattress, wrapped in the cleanest section of the duvet while occupying enough space for a man three times his size. His long brown hair spread over the pillow and across one flushed cheek, his breathing deep and even despite the diagnostic band still secured loosely around his wrist.
The physicians had found no immediate danger.
His gland activity was elevated, his channels were recovering faster than expected, and pregnancy remained possible but entirely unconfirmed.
He had studied the collar for nearly three hours afterward.
No ether, no dismantling, and no standing without assistance.
He had still managed to produce twenty-seven pages of notes, three structural diagrams, and a list of questions long enough to make Engineer Selkis request access to the next examination.
Then he had eaten half a meal, insulted the cushions, and fallen asleep before Arik finished moving him to the bed.
Arik turned back toward the window.
Liam had been right.
He had been unnecessarily brutal about it, as Liam often was when he believed gentleness would allow Arik to evade the truth, but he had been right.
Arik would accept the oath.
Not because the Golden Court had threatened him. He still intended to remember every member who had spoken of his death as a tolerable alternative to Nuria’s continued isolation, and several of them would discover that accepting a sovereign did not guarantee surviving his administrative reforms.
Not because Goliath’s memories demanded it.
They did not.
The portion of Goliath within him wanted Nuria with a hunger so old that it had ceased to resemble ambition, but it did not pull him toward the throne by force. If anything, it waited with something close to shame, as though it had no right to ask another life to repair what Felix had destroyed.
Arik would take the oath because Nuria was already his.
He had felt it when the lower-city wards failed and terror moved through the sovereign network. He had felt it when Cassian presented seventy-two years of rationing plans, defensive compromises, and emergency laws written by a government that had never known whether its emperor was dead or merely absent. He had felt it when the council suggested sacrificing districts to preserve the imperial center, and his ether had responded before thought could become command.
Agaron was home.
Nuria was need.
Perhaps Liam was right that desire and responsibility had already become indistinguishable.
A quiet knock sounded at the outer door.
Arik did not answer immediately. He looked toward Liam, but the rhythm of his breathing did not change.
The knock came again, softer.
"Enter."
The door opened only far enough for Mezos to pass through before closing silently behind him.
His injured arm remained secured against his chest, although the support had been reduced from a full stabilization brace to a narrow sling. Fatigue shadowed his face, and the damage to his channels still made his blue ether flicker unevenly beneath his skin, but his steps were steady.
His gaze went first to Arik.
Then to the bed.
Liam shifted beneath the duvet, one bare foot emerging from the edge before disappearing again.
Mezos lowered his voice. "He is asleep?"
"He exhausted himself examining a collar he was forbidden to dismantle."
"So he dismantled it."
"No."
Mezos looked impressed. "The physicians found something serious?"
"Nothing yet."
"That explains the palace-wide reproductive alert."
Arik’s eyes narrowed.
Mezos showed no remorse. "The wards are unusually communicative."
"The wards should learn discretion."
"They spent seventy-two years with no sovereign. They are overexcited."
Arik glanced toward the golden lines moving faintly beneath the walls. "That appears to be everyone’s excuse."
Mezos approached the window and stopped beside him, leaving enough distance that neither man had to acknowledge the support his injured shoulder might eventually require.
Arik studied his expression.
"You found nothing."
Mezos’s mouth tightened.
"Nothing," he confirmed. "We searched the arrival site again. Severin opened every shadow path within three hundred paces. Kamal provided the original palace maps, including passages removed from the public records before Goliath’s reign. The Nurian engineers ran ether-frequency sweeps from the lowest detectable resonance to the upper limits of the remaining border system."
"And our equipment?"
"Every relay, communicator, emergency beacon, and field detector we brought through the Gate. I even let Selkis connect one of our damaged units to the Nurian conversion array."
Arik looked at him.
"She did not damage it," Mezos said. "Her team improved the signal stability by eight percent."
"Liam will attempt to recruit them."
"He already has."
Mezos turned his gaze toward the city. "There was no echo, no residue, no directional pull, and no instability in the space where the Gate opened. Not even a whisper. As far as every instrument and ether-sensitive person can determine, there has never been a Gate there."
Arik rested one hand against the window.
Below them, Nuria’s capital extended beneath the pale afternoon light, its white stone towers veined with gold and its distant districts fading beneath the protective haze of the sovereign shield.
"No Gate means no return," Arik said.
"Not through anything we currently understand."
"And the core may be the only system capable of producing one."
"That is the conclusion the engineers refused to put in writing because they consider it insufficiently supported."
"But?"
"They believe it."
Arik nodded once.
Mezos looked at him.
The silence between them lasted long enough for the palace to shift its light against the glass.
"I am taking the oath," Arik said.
Mezos did not react visibly.
That lack of reaction made Arik turn toward him.
"You already knew."
"I suspected."
"From what?"
"You began referring to the lower-city defenses as ours."
Arik frowned. "That proves nothing."
"You also threatened to personally remove three council members for proposing that Nuria surrender control of its border wards to Agaron after the Gate reopened."
"They were discussing annexation before determining whether return was possible."
"Yes."
"That was strategically offensive."
"Yes."
"You are agreeing too easily."
Mezos’s mouth moved faintly. "Liam has already exhausted the difficult arguments."
Arik looked toward the bed.
Liam remained asleep, apparently unaware that his habit of analyzing Arik aloud had become a recognized strategic force.
"I will take the oath before the council’s deadline," Arik said. "But not under their terms. Cassian will provide the original text, the sovereign laws, and every surviving record concerning dual succession and the authority of the core. Kamal will review the household and ceremonial protocols. Liam will examine any technical component, whether the council approves or not."
"And Severin?"
"He will investigate everyone who threatened to kill me."
Mezos nodded. "He will enjoy that."
"I am aware."
Arik turned fully toward him.
"If you do not want to remain in Nuria, you will be treated as an imperial guest until we reopen the Gates."
Mezos raised one brow.
Arik continued before he could interrupt.
"You followed me here believing we would return to Agaron. Taking Nuria’s oath changes the nature of my position, possibly permanently. I will not assume that your service transfers with it."
Mezos stared at him for several seconds.
Then he looked toward the sleeping figure in the bed, as though checking whether Liam’s habit of saying outrageous things had somehow become contagious.
"I swore loyalty to you."