[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/seHu1lv.png[/img][/center]
[color=gray] [color=4C93C2]Location:[/color] Castle Dining Hall
[color=4C93C2]Time:[/color] Evening
[color=4C93C2]Mention:[/color]  [@Oso] Cassius [@Tpartywithzombi] Violet  [/color]
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[i]Scraping[/i], like chains dragged across stone. 

At first, he dismissed it as an illusion of the moment; after all, the night had already unraveled into chaos. But then came the second scrape, slower, heavier... His eyes lifted from his glass, the sharpness behind them returning.

The doors did not slam open, nor did any herald shout. Instead, silence fell by the force of presence alone. A man entered, tall and shrouded in black. He moved with a stillness that did not demand attention but consumed it. Each step brought a chain clinking behind him, the kind used to bind beasts.

Calbert watched intently, his expression unreadable. The chain stretched further until its end revealed a woman on its end. She was not a stranger to him. He recognized the servant, vaguely, from the gathering for Lord Drake Edwards.

And yet, it was not the display itself that held Calbert’s gaze, but the precision with which it was executed.

Calbert sat still, his gloved fingers resting lightly on the tablecloth. He offered no reaction, not publicly.

The chain was a symbol. The woman, a piece.

There was more to this than theater. It came ever so clear as the Killian had been addressed. The King and Queen were attempting, however belated, to seize control of Caesonia’s long-ignored mage crisis.

Calbert’s gaze remained still, but inwardly, his mind turned to Violet.  Then the prince spoke up and tore him from his thoughts once more. He remained motionless as Wulfric’s words hung in the air. 

Gasps and murmurs had swept the hall. Nobles shuffled in their seats. They looked to Alibeth, to Edin, then back to Wulfric, each mind racing to compute the implications of a Prince’s confession that the Queen had wielded magic herself.

Alibeth, regal even in disgrace, did not resist as the guards closed in. She rose and departed with her dignity intact, though the silence she left behind was suffocating.

Calbert watched her go.

If he harbored any opinion, it did not show on his face. 

Duke Laurent’s babbling had reached his ears like the incessant hum of a fly in his ear.  He fully ignored it. Calbert’s attention had already shifted more purposefully. His eyes landed on his wife, then slid to Violet, expression unreadable.

Finally, he murmured: [color=4C93C2]“I suppose we’d best find Cassius.”[/color]

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