The First Test

A dried flower once burned itself into my thoughts. Beneath folds of cloth, tucked inside a small box lined with velvet, I kept it hidden. Through fabric and timber alike, its weight pressed slow and steady, like breath against skin. The hours that followed blurred - each floorboard groan snapped me upright. Liza’s expression stayed flat, yet I searched it anyway, hunting shadows behind her eyes. Soldiers passing by held no different look than before, but now their steps felt heavier.

A knock came just before dusk. It wasn’t the housekeeper this time. The captain stood in the doorway, face still, eyes hard to read.

“His Grace requests your presence in the study, Miss Rimestone.”

A shadow slipped ahead - Alex, moving fast. My gut clenched with every turn we took. These corridors twisted like riddles without answers. Here stood the room where everything began. His strength lived inside these walls. One step forward meant no going back.

One step inside, you saw it: this room meant business. Center stage stood an oak desk, heavy and bare except for a lone folder, glassy ink pot beside it. Walls swallowed by shelves - row after row of matching dark books, silent and tight. Flames danced in the stone mouth of the fireplace, though chill clung stubborn to the air. He appeared like that - facing a wide map stretched across wood, Wisteria drawn thick with lines showing where goods moved, hands locked behind him.

Without looking up, he spoke. Shut the door behind you, Alex

The heavy click echoed as the door sealed behind us. Fire cracked through the quiet, sharp and sudden. Not quite sure where to stand, I hovered near the entrance. Being there felt wrong, somehow.

His back stayed turned to her, eyes on the lines of the map. Tired, you look, he stated without rising pitch.

The wind howling outside had filled my head with noise. That part was real enough, even if something else stayed unspoken.

That moment, he faced around. Wearing just a plain white shirt, unbuttoned at the neck, paired with black pants - less polished than before. This casual look didn’t soften him. Instead, it sharpened the edge. More real, yes - but that realism carried risk. A glance from his pale brown eyes took me in completely, every detail noted.

A problem exists," he said, moving toward his desk. Not sitting down mattered more than it should have. Leaning on the edge, arms folded, changed how things felt in the room. His shirt stretched slightly when he shifted weight. My gaze stayed fixed up high - on his face, nowhere else. Tomorrow morning marks the start of a trade meeting with the Republic of Arcadia. The heart of talks? That silver tax. Some say hit it hard so mountain diggers stay safe. Others whisper slow and steady - less cost means more rings, more money spinning. Their voices come from shop lords who count coins like stars. Then silence. His eyes lock onto mine. Truth? Maybe somewhere in between

Throat tight, like sand had settled there. Here it was - no distant maybe, just now, sharp and real, politics pressing close. Eyes shut, breath slow, shoving through the dread. Memory opened, old pages flipping: Arcadia first, then metal gleam, paper weight, words that once whispered about markets between lines meant for story

Flickering images came fast. Tucked deep inside that well-worn book - read how many times now? - sat a small report. It detailed rock layers below the ground.

“Our northern mines…” I said slowly, opening my eyes. “The Vein of Loras. It’s… played out. The yield has been artificially maintained for the last two years by processing lower and lower grade ore. The reports have been falsified. The guilds know it. They want the Arcadian silver because in six months, our own supply will collapse and the price will triple. They’re positioning themselves to make a fortune.”

A silence followed. For the first time, a whole stream of words had come out at once, aimed right at him. Not even a blink. His face stayed still - yet something shifted behind his gaze: sudden clarity, like light catching a blade edge.

“The Vein of Loras report is sealed by the Crown’s own geologists,” he said, his voice dangerously soft. “How do you know this?”

“The same way I knew about Sundial Mercantile.” I held his gaze, though it felt like staring into the sun. “It’s in the… records I’ve seen.”

Off the desk he shoved himself, moving toward the window without a word. His back faced me, stiff under the coat. The tightness there was impossible to miss. Not merely trade, if what you say holds - this crosses into betrayal. Plotting against the Crown, twisting the realm's money from the shadows

Facts sat heavy in my voice when I spoke. Knowing how things turned out gave weight to the words. Silver markets would crash, prices jump, people grow restless. A small detail in the tale, yet everything hinged on it.

A heavy quiet sat between us while he looked past the window into the dull sky. After that pause, movement came sudden - he crossed the room in just three steps. Now face to face, near enough that details sharpened: tiny gold sparks inside his dark eyes, the soft trace of eyelashes on his cheek. Air shifted with his presence - sharp like frost, wood smoke clinging low, mixed with a warmth that belonged only to him.

I’ll check the mine myself. Directly. Should you be correct… He stopped short. His eyes moved across my face, not wary anymore, yet fixed, intense, like he wanted to spot what lay behind my thoughts. You state it without doubt. Not some idea. Not a theory. A known thing. Almost like the document has been seen by you before

Something caught in my throat. Eyes locked, unable to move. That space - thin, sharp - hummed with words never said but known all the same.

Close he came. Without reaching out. Shrinking everything till just his face, the unspoken thing hanging there, and my stillness filled the air. Out of his throat came sound like breath held too long - soft, near, filling the gap where silence had been.

Not the Duke spoke, but Noah - someone facing something he could not explain. His voice carried a rough kind of awe. Questions about who I was born to or where I stood in rank never came. What rose instead was curiosity stripped bare. Something in his words reached into me. That simple ask - like a key turning where only silence lived before.

There it hung, my silence. Stillness held me fast, caught in the pull of him, pulse hammering under bone. Passing his test didn’t free me - it sharpened his interest, deepened the risk, widened the crack where that dark curiosity shone through.