As the brass bells of Excalibur knelled for the final time, marking the end of yet another week, the Crossroads City braced itself for the familiar weekend flood of academy students spilling into its cobblestone streets in search of anything that might offer a few precious hours away from drudging through scrolls, dust-laden books, and page after page of unfinished schoolwork. For some, the decision to repeat the semester in the aftermath of the Siege had been a welcome opportunity, especially among the more studious students who were eager to take another run at their examinations, improve their grades, and perhaps salvage assignments they had never been entirely satisfied with the first time around. Others were considerably less enthusiastic, particularly those who had spent months completing projects and essays only to discover that they were now expected to start over from scratch.
Professor Serfence had made his position on the matter painfully clear from the beginning, warning every class that he would strip points from any House foolish enough to submit old assignments as new work or attempt to cannibalize previous essays, research, or projects in any recognizable form. Professor Workner, Kyar, and Ryan had proven considerably less strict in that regard, allowing students to reuse portions of their earlier work so long as they could demonstrate meaningful improvement, though even that small mercy had done little to quiet the collective groaning that accompanied the reopening of old textbooks and the return of deadlines everyone had thought they had already survived.
Even so, schoolwork was hardly the greatest concern weighing on Excalibur anymore. The tension creeping through the student body had been growing steadily, particularly among members of the Congregation, many of whom continued leaving the castle on contracts, assignments, and requests issued by locals in Caerleon or clients from cities far beyond its walls. At the same time, Lucian's expansion of the Disciplinary Committee had continued at a relentless pace under the oversight of his newly appointed Head Prefects, with dozens of students recruited or elected into its ranks and assigned to patrol the academy at nearly every hour of the day.
Their duties ranged from enforcing curfew to breaking up fights and shutting down whatever mischief they believed might escalate into something more serious, but the increased presence had been received about as poorly as anyone with common sense might have expected.
Dissent had grown loudest among the third- and fourth-year students, whose whispers increasingly compared the Committee to Excalibur's own version of Norsefire. Some had taken the mockery further and begun calling Lucian "Hartshorne Junior," drawing an unmistakable comparison to Caerleon's disgraced former Sheriff, whose name had become synonymous with betrayal long before the Siege finally exposed the depths of what he had done. What had started as jokes muttered behind the Prefects' backs had gradually hardened into genuine hostility, and the laughter accompanying those insults carried less humor with every passing week.
Helena had watched the growing divide with the uneasy awareness of someone staring at a powder keg while everyone around it continued arguing over who held the match. Friends who had once sat together at breakfast now avoided one another entirely, students refused to acknowledge classmates simply because a Prefect's badge had appeared on their robes, and groups would sometimes leave a room the moment one of the Committee members entered. Even inside the Ignis common room, she had seen entire circles of students rise from their seats and move elsewhere whenever a Prefect joined them, leaving the unfortunate student behind in a silence far more deliberate than any spoken insult.
The shunning had only worsened over the past several weeks. In the Great Hall, Prefects increasingly found themselves pushed toward the edges of tables or forced to sit among their own ranks, treated less like fellow students and more like pariahs who had willingly chosen the wrong side of an invisible war.
Helena had watched students shoulder-check them in crowded corridors, heard slurs and insults muttered beneath passing breaths, and seen the resentment darkening the faces on both sides whenever neither believed the other was looking.
What unsettled her most was not the hostility itself, but where she feared it would eventually lead. Authority denied respect rarely remained patient forever, and Helena knew enough about people to understand that some would eventually begin abusing that authority simply to claw back the control and recognition they believed had been taken from them. Judging from the increasingly bitter whispers coming from the Harbingers and the High Table, patience was eroding just as quickly on the other side. Temperance had once been spoken of as a virtue, something necessary to keep the balance between the Congregation and the academy intact, but with every insult, every provocation, and every act of open defiance, that virtue seemed to be wearing thinner.
Helena could feel it in the halls now, that charged stillness beneath the noise of ordinary student life, and she knew it was only a matter of time before someone finally pushed too hard, someone else pushed back, and all the resentment Excalibur had spent weeks pretending it could contain finally ignited.
Even Salazar had begun to feel the weight of the conflict gathering around them, and beneath the thin layer of amusement he so often wore like armor, there was an unease he could no longer entirely dismiss. He understood better than most that in any struggle for power, it was rarely the opposing sides who paid the greatest price, but those unfortunate enough to be caught between them when tempers finally broke and restraint gave way to violence. The uninitiated, the enslaved, the staff, and every student who wanted nothing to do with either the Congregation or the Disciplinary Committee would be the ones forced to live with whatever consequences followed.
As far as Salazar could tell, Headmaster Blaise had deliberately struck the match that set the student body against itself, and the more he watched the tension spread through Excalibur, the harder it became to believe that the Headmaster had done so without understanding exactly what would happen. Whether Blaise had some greater purpose in mind or simply took a twisted sort of satisfaction in watching both sides expose themselves remained unclear, but Salazar suspected there was far more intention behind the unrest than anyone was willing to admit.
Jeanne, Rowena, and Helga had begun feeling the same unease, though each carried it differently. Jeanne worried about how easily fear and anger could drag otherwise reasonable people into choices they would later regret, while Rowena had grown increasingly concerned with how quickly the academy's fragile sense of normalcy was slipping away. Helga's worries, however, had become far more personal.
She could not stop thinking about Lucian.
For all his stubbornness, arrogance, and infuriating inability to recognize when he was pushing too far, Helga knew that his sense of justice was genuine. That was what frightened her most. Lucian believed so completely in what he was doing that she feared he would keep charging forward long after caution, reason, and everyone who cared about him had begged him to stop. What he saw as conviction, Helga was beginning to see as a road toward self-destruction, and the deeper the conflict became, the more she feared that his refusal to bend might eventually be the very thing that broke him.
Meanwhile, a fair distance east of the towering castle that rose from the heart of Caerleon, the residential district unfolded in orderly rows of broad avenues, quiet cul-de-sacs, and carefully maintained homes. It was one of the more bourgeois areas of the Crossroads City, a neighborhood many of its residents proudly described as belonging to the citizen class, though Bastion found the distinction difficult to admire. He had grown up in Camelot in a district not entirely unlike this one, yet even with that familiarity, the pristine sidewalks, polished storefront windows, whitewashed walls, and carefully marked streets felt less like signs of prosperity and more like monuments to the divide that still ran through Caerleon.
His mismatched eyes moved over the steel grilles set between stone pillars, the manicured lawns beyond them trimmed with almost obsessive precision, while larger manors and opulent townhouses stood behind hedges and wrought gates as if shielding themselves from the city outside. Even the shops he had passed before the road gave way fully to residences seemed designed for people who never had to count what remained in their purse before making a purchase. Their windows displayed goods that most commoners would never think to buy without first weighing the cost against food, rent, or whatever emergency waited around the corner.
It was a far cry from the Heights, where Raul had grown up and where Caerleon's less fortunate had learned to make a life from whatever scraps the city allowed them. Refugees from other worlds, displaced families, day laborers, and the lowest rungs of Avalonian society had all found their way there, not because it welcomed them, but because it was one of the few places that could be afforded. The contrast brought Bastion back to the conversation he had shared with his newly assigned partner before their run-in with the Red Dragons, and as he continued down the sidewalk, he found himself thinking again about how easily people in places like this could forget what life looked like only a few districts away.
That blindness was not the only thing that caught his attention. Tower personnel were scattered throughout the area, though they were not alone. Clan members stood outside several properties, while Adventurers and what looked like hired mercenaries guarded others, their presence suggesting that wealth had begun purchasing private certainty where public trust had failed. Bastion found none of it particularly surprising. Not anymore. The state of the Tower had made people wary, and those with enough coin had simply found other ways to feel protected.
His boots scraped against the concrete as he walked with both hands buried in his coat pockets, the cool autumn breeze slipping through the fabric and biting lightly at his cheeks. The air carried the scent of dried leaves, damp earth, and something faintly spiced from one of the nearby bakeries, while the dim afternoon light caught against the massive sword strapped across his back and sent brief flashes of steel and chrome across the street. The weapon drew attention wherever he went, but here the looks were different.
Some of the Clan members recognized him immediately, remembering the young man with the monstrous blade and the fire that had burned beside them during the Siege, and they greeted him with small nods or quiet looks of approval. Others noticed only the badge. Those people scowled.
To them, it did not matter what Bastion had done during the Siege, who he had fought beside, or how much blood he had spilled protecting the city. He was still Tower, and the Tower had long since exhausted whatever goodwill Caerleon had once been willing to give it.
Bastion's expression dimmed as he kept walking.
The months had made him numb to most of it, or at least numb enough to keep moving without reacting, but every now and then, the contempt still found a way through. It was never enough to stop him, never enough to make him turn away from the badge he wore, but sometimes the sting remained longer than he cared to admit.
Bastion shrugged and let out a sharp breath through his teeth, his posture hunching forward slightly as he dug into his coat pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. The address had been scrawled across it in crooked black ink, along with a handful of equally messy directions leading to the Sheriff's manor somewhere deeper in the district, and Bastion still could not decide which part of the situation baffled him more. The fact that Elias had personally summoned him to his home on a Saturday morning without offering even the slightest explanation, or the fact that a blind man could apparently write at all, even if the results looked like a drunken spider had crawled through an inkwell.
What made the whole thing stranger was that Elias had asked for him alone. Raul had been given the day off to visit his extended family in Stornoway, something he had been meaning to do ever since returning to Caerleon, which left Bastion making the trip by himself with nothing but a badly written address and far too much time to wonder what the old man wanted.
He shook his head as a scowl crept across his face, muttering under his breath while he folded the paper and slipped it back into his pocket. He had to admit that Elias was not the man he had expected when the Tower elected its new Sheriff. Compared to Hartshorne, he was an undeniable improvement, though that was hardly a difficult standard to surpass. Even so, something about Elias still got under Bastion's skin, and it was not simply the man's almost infuriatingly relaxed approach to the job, but the way he handled everyone beneath his command as if hierarchy were something to be acknowledged rather than constantly enforced.
Within the first few weeks of taking office, Elias had somehow managed to change the atmosphere of the entire precinct. Officers, Guardians, and nearly every other member of Tower personnel seemed lighter than they had been in years, as though the burden waiting beyond the doors had not disappeared, but had at least stopped following them back inside. There was no longer a man sitting at the top who treated authority like a weapon to be swung downward whenever someone beneath him stepped out of line. Elias knew people by name, remembered their voices, recognized them by their footsteps, and could apparently identify half the precinct by the scent of their cologne alone. He showed up with coffee and donuts, asked after families, remembered birthdays, and somehow managed to become everyone's favorite person before Bastion had even decided whether he trusted him.
That, more than anything, made Bastion suspicious.
He had spent enough time around the higher ranks of the Tower while his grandfather was still alive to learn that charm and authority were rarely a combination worth accepting at face value. His grandfather had drilled one lesson into him harder than any other. Trust was earned, never owed, and those who carried power in the name of the law had to work harder than anyone else to deserve it. They held the ability to ruin lives with a signature, a command, or a badge, which meant they had no right to expect faith simply because a title had been placed before their name.
It was a lesson Bastion had learned painfully well, and the Tower had given him more than enough examples of why it mattered. Burgess had simply been the worst of them. So, as much as everyone else seemed eager to accept Elias as the beginning of something better, Bastion was not ready to join them just yet. Maybe the man truly was everything he appeared to be, but until Bastion had reason to believe that for himself, he intended to keep watching.
Bright gold leaves swept across the cobblestones on the autumn wind as Bastion came to a stop before the gates of a quaint country manor set beyond a broad, well-kept lawn. Trees scattered across the property had turned shades of amber and copper with the changing season, their branches shifting softly overhead while the grass beneath them had begun to lose its summer color. Even so, the grounds were carefully maintained, the lawn neatly trimmed and the red-brick path beyond the gate bordered by square-cut hedges that led in a straight line toward the house.
The manor itself was noticeably smaller than many of the estates Bastion had passed on his way through the district, and for a moment, that alone made him wonder whether he had somehow taken a wrong turn. Its walls were built from red brick faded by age and weather, with tall white-framed windows lining the ground floor and smaller ones set above them. The roof was covered in dark obsidian tiles that had dulled toward gray beneath years of rain and sun, while four chimneys rose from the pitched sections above, giving the house more of an old country charm than the imposing grandeur he had expected from the residence of Caerleon's Sheriff.
Bastion narrowed his eyes and tilted his head, clearly underwhelmed.
This was the Sheriff's manor?
For a man as pompous as Hartshorne had been, Bastion found it difficult to imagine that anyone had ever managed to convince him to live somewhere this modest. The house looked barely large enough to contain the furniture, let alone the former Sheriff's ego. He pulled the folded paper from his pocket, checked the crooked address once more, then compared it with the number fixed to the stone pillar beside the gate.
"Yep, this is definitely the place," he muttered as he slipped the note back into his coat. A reluctant sigh followed. "Oh, boy."
Without wasting any more time second-guessing himself, Bastion pushed through the gate and started down the brick path toward the manor, his boots crunching lightly over the scattered leaves as the wind carried another golden wave across the lawn behind him.
****
The rasp of Bastion's knuckles against the solid wooden door echoed faintly through the manor before the brass handle turned from within, followed by the familiar click of the latch and the long creak of hinges as the door slowly opened. Bastion peered inside and was immediately met by a wave of warmth rolling across the threshold, a welcome contrast to the chill lingering outside. He remained where he was for a moment before taking a cautious step forward, because whatever his opinion of Elias might be, he had been raised well enough not to simply waltz into another man's home as though he owned the place.
"Hello?" he called, carrying through the entryway, though the only response came from the crackle and pop of firewood burning somewhere deeper inside. He waited a moment longer, listening for footsteps or an answer, then leaned slightly farther through the doorway. "Anyone home?"
When no one replied, Bastion finally stepped inside and pulled the door closed behind him with a soft click. He reached over his shoulder, carefully lifted the massive sword from his back, and leaned it against the wall near the foyer, making certain the weight would not send it crashing into anything valuable before removing his gloves and slipping them into his coat pocket.
His mismatched eyes wandered over the interior as he took in the manor properly for the first time. The house carried the unmistakable character of an old noble residence, not ostentatious enough to feel like a palace, but filled with the kind of traditional ornamentation that had clearly survived several generations. Intricately carved wooden pillars framed the foyer, while shelves lined portions of the walls and held everything from old books to decorative curios that looked as though they had been gathering dust since long before Bastion was born. Baroque-inspired cornices followed the edges where the walls met the ceiling, their floral patterns highlighted in faded gold paint that had chipped and flaked in places, while the walls themselves were covered in a deep turquoise that had dulled slightly with age.
Underfoot, the floor was laid with a mosaic of Minton tiles polished to a soft gleam beneath the amber glow of crystal lamps suspended from steel chandeliers overhead and mounted within ornate wall sconces. The whole place carried a sense of faded refinement, the kind that came from wealth old enough to stop trying to impress anyone and tradition too deeply rooted to care whether it still looked fashionable.
The living room opened just beyond the foyer, arranged around a large fireplace where flames crackled behind an iron grate. A couch and two armchairs faced the hearth, with a coffee table positioned between them that looked far more decorative than practical, its surface covered in delicate carvings and polished to the point where Bastion doubted anyone had ever been brave enough to put a mug on it without first finding a coaster. The fireplace itself was framed by such elaborate stonework that it looked less like something designed to heat a room and more like a monument commissioned by someone with entirely too much money.
Then Bastion's gaze lifted toward the portrait hanging above it, and his expression twisted almost immediately.
Former Sheriff Hartshorne had been painted standing triumphantly over the body of a slain dragon, one boot planted on the creature's neck while he held a massive sword aloft in a pose so exaggerated that Bastion could practically imagine the painter fighting for his life to keep a straight face. The weapon looked heavy enough to throw Hartshorne's back out if he had ever attempted to lift it in reality, while the former Sheriff himself had been rendered with a physique so flattering that it bordered on outright fiction.
Bastion stared at the painting for several seconds, caught somewhere between laughing and feeling physically ill. "Of course," he muttered under his breath, shaking his head as he tried to decide why Elias had not used the thing for tinder by now.
A moment later, however, the answer came to him, and Bastion almost snorted. Elias was blind, which probably explained how the painting had survived this long. If the man could actually see it, Bastion suspected he would have poked his own eyes out rather than endure looking at it every morning. Still shaking his head, he moved farther into the manor and glanced toward the dining area on his right. A long wooden table occupied the center of the room, large enough to seat at least ten people, though only three places had been set with cutlery, plates, and glasses arranged neatly at one end. The detail made him slow slightly, his eyebrow lifting as his gaze moved from one setting to the next before settling on the third.
A bouquet of autumn flowers sat in the center of the table, filling the room with a faint sweetness that mingled with the warmth of the fire, though several petals had begun to curl at the edges and the stems were starting to droop. Whoever had arranged them had clearly done so with care, but they were probably overdue for replacement.
Then another scent reached him, faint at first but rich enough to catch his attention. Bastion sniffed once, then again, his gaze shifting toward a closed door at the far end of the dining room as the smell of something cooking slipped through the cracks and settled warmly into the air. Judging from the position of the door, it likely led into the kitchen, and a moment later, the soft clink of cutlery and the rustle of movement confirmed that someone was definitely back there. Bastion narrowed his eyes slightly and started toward the sound, curiosity beginning to replace some of the suspicion he had carried with him all morning.
"Grandpa?" came a voice from somewhere above and behind him, drawing Bastion's attention toward the staircase as the soft patter of footsteps descended from the upper floor.
He heard the rustle of fabric against damp hair, but the moment his gaze settled on the figure approaching the landing, his entire expression went slack, his eyes widened, and a violent flush spread across his face before his mind had even managed to process what he was looking at.
Standing before him was a young tiger beastias therian, perhaps somewhere in her mid-to-late teens and a head shorter than Bastion, with pristine snowy-white fur patterned by striking black stripes that followed the natural lines of her slender, athletic frame. Her long white hair carried the same dark markings and fell nearly to her waist, still damp from what had clearly been a recent bath, while her striped tail curled lazily behind her as she rubbed a towel vigorously over her head. The towel obscured most of her face, leaving her completely unaware that the person standing before her.
Bastion froze where he stood, immediately averting his eyes the moment he realized she had come downstairs without bothering to dress first. Every lesson in manners his family had ever beaten into him seemed to collide inside his head at once, leaving him stranded between turning around, announcing himself, apologizing, or simply throwing himself through the nearest window, though before he could settle on any of those options, the girl continued stepping toward him without the slightest idea that anything was wrong.
"That was fast," she said as she continued drying her hair. "I thought you'd be out at least until—"
The sentence died the moment she lowered the towel and her bright emerald eyes settled on Bastion, leaving the two of them staring at one another through a silence that seemed to stretch far longer than the few seconds it actually lasted.
For one painfully long moment, neither of them seemed capable of moving or speaking. Bastion quickly fixed his gaze somewhere safely above her head with the rigid desperation of someone trying very hard to convince himself that the ceiling had suddenly become the most fascinating thing in all of Avalon, while the girl blinked at the unfamiliar young man standing in her grandfather's foyer. Confusion crossed her face first, followed almost immediately by understanding as her gaze dipped toward herself before snapping back to him, and as color flooded her face beneath the white fur, Bastion somehow managed to turn even redder.
Surprise twisted into horror, horror into mortification, and mortification into pure, incandescent fury as both of them reached the exact same conclusion at nearly the same moment, and the resulting screams tore through every corner of the manor loudly enough to drown out the crackling hearth and whatever had been happening in the kitchen.
Bastion spun around so quickly that he nearly walked straight into the dining table, throwing both hands over his eyes despite already having his back turned as he blurted, "I didn't see anything! I swear to the Old Gods, I didn't know anybody was home!"
"You, what are you doing in my house?!" the girl shrieked, hastily retreating several steps as she clutched the towel around herself and glared at the back of his head. "Turn around, and don't you dare look over here!"
"I am turned around!" Bastion protested, keeping both hands firmly over his eyes as though she might somehow accuse him of seeing through the back of his skull. "Believe me, I'm not planning on changing my mind!"
"Then stay that way!"
"I already said I would!"
Before either of them could get another word out, the front door slammed open hard enough to rattle the foyer, and Bastion nearly jumped out of his skin as the sudden noise cut through their argument. A familiar voice thundered through the manor from the entrance, carrying the irritated confusion of a man who had returned home only to discover that complete chaos had somehow erupted in his absence.
"What's all that friggin' noise?!" Elias exclaimed.
****
Elias' booming laughter filled the living room as he sat sprawled across one of the couches, slapping his thigh hard enough to make the cushions bounce beneath him. He finally pulled off his shades and wiped the tears from his pale blue eyes, though every time he looked across at Bastion, another round of laughter threatened to break loose. "Oh, Gods above, I swear I'm gonna keel over and die."
Bastion sat on the couch opposite him with his arms crossed tightly over his chest, his expression caught somewhere between humiliation and murder. "Glad you find this so damn hilarious, old man," he muttered, glaring at him. "Yeah, real funny."
Arianna sat nearby with her legs crossed, now fully dressed in a plain white shirt and blue jeans, though changing clothes had done absolutely nothing to improve her mood. Her emerald eyes remained fixed on Bastion in a steady glare while her striped tail flicked behind her in irritation, and the black claws at the ends of her fingers tapped impatiently against her arm.
Elias finally managed to get himself under control and slipped his shades back into place. "Sorry, sorry, I couldn't help myself," he said, drawing in a breath before letting it out slowly. "Suppose we should get the introductions out of the way before one of you decides to kill the other." He tilted his head toward the girl. "This here's Arianna, and she's my granddaughter."
Bastion's scowl faded almost immediately, one eyebrow lifting as his gaze moved from Elias to Arianna and then back again.
"You're doing it again, kid," Elias said, sounding more amused than bothered. "That silence of yours says a hell of a lot more than you think, so you might as well come right out and say whatever's rattling around in your head."
"She's..." Bastion pointed toward Arianna, clearly trying to find a polite way through the question and failing almost immediately. "She's your granddaughter?"
"Yeah," Arianna said, her stare flattening even further. "Got a problem with that, perv?"
Bastion flinched at the word, then immediately straightened. "First of all, I'm no perv. That was an accident, and you know it." He held up a finger before she could interrupt him. "Second, you're beastias, and judging by the stripes, Tiger Tribe. Aren't there, like..." He waved one hand vaguely, searching for the right words. "I don't know, laws about your kind?"
Arianna's expression hardened, though Bastion's attention had already shifted back to Elias as another thought struck him. "Wait," he said, narrowing his eyes. "Do they even know?"
Elias drew in a long breath and let it out through his nose, his shoulders sagging with the weary patience of someone who had apparently heard some version of this question far too many times before. "Hoo, boy," he muttered. "Every damn time."
Elias gave Bastion a level stare, the last of the humor easing from his face. "In case you haven't put two and two together yet, and I'd be mighty concerned if you hadn't, Arianna and I ain't related by blood," he said. "And yeah, she's beastias. I'm well aware of what that means."
Bastion noticed the change in Arianna almost immediately. The irritation in her face softened, and her emerald eyes shifted toward Elias with something heavier behind them, something close to sadness. Her hand moved toward his arm, and Elias answered by covering it with his own before giving her a warm smile. "Arianna, my dear, do me a favor and go see if Rosa needs any help in the kitchen."
Her whiskers twitched slightly, her ears flicking once as she glanced back toward Bastion. For a moment, it looked as though she wanted to say something, but instead she gave a small nod and rose from her seat. "All right." Before leaving, she shot Bastion one last glare over her shoulder, then disappeared from the living room toward the kitchen.
Bastion scowled after her, only for Elias to draw his attention back. "Don't let her get to you, kid. She gets wary around strangers, and honestly, I can't blame her for it. Give her some time and she'll warm up to you eventually."
"Yeah, well, I'm not holding my breath," Bastion said as he leaned back into the couch. "So, what, this is where you start telling me some long, sad story about how you played hero and rescued her from the kind of sick bastards you used to hunt?" He gave a short laugh, but when Elias didn't join him, the humor faded from his face. "Wait, I was kidding."
Elias shrugged, though his gaze lowered slightly. "You were right about some of it, but it wasn't me. Not exactly." His fingers tapped lightly against his lap before he went on. "I had a family once. Wife, son, the whole deal."
Bastion's expression settled as he listened.
"But you know how it is, being a Tower brat yourself. Happy endings ain't exactly common for people like us," Elias said. "Wilhelm used to joke about Tower folks ending up with broken marriages and families that barely spoke to each other, and for the longest time I thought he was just being an ass." He let out a tired breath and reached up to remove his shades. "Turns out the fool was me."
He rested the glasses in one hand as he continued, his pale blue eyes lowered toward the floor. "The work took me all over Avalon. Sometimes I'd disappear into a case for months and barely send word home. I kept telling myself it was part of the job, that I was doing something important, but after a while that excuse stopped meaning much to the people waiting for me." His jaw tightened faintly. "It drove a wedge between me and my wife, and eventually it did the same between me and my boy. By the time we finally called the marriage quits, most of the damage had already been done."
Bastion remained quiet.
"I tried to be there for Jonah afterward," Elias said, stripped of the easygoing tone Bastion had come to expect from him. "But somewhere along the way, he got it in his head that I loved the job more than I loved him." He paused, his thumb brushing absently along the frame of his shades. "And the part that still eats at me is that I can't really say he was wrong."
"Come on," Bastion said, his expression settling as he looked at the older man. "You don't really mean that."
Elias gave a bitter chuckle and raised his pale eyes toward him. "Look me in the eye and tell me you never felt the same way about your grandpa once in a while."
Bastion opened his mouth, but the answer never came.
"Yeah," Elias said quietly. "Thought so." He leaned back slightly. "Anyway, just like with the missus, Jonah and I fell out. Barely spoke for years, but no matter how much he resented me, no son of mine could completely ignore the Tower's call. After I left, I found out he'd graduated from the academy, enlisted, and eventually became an Adjudicator. Damn good one, too."
The crackle of the fireplace filled the room for a moment as Elias gathered himself before continuing. "And just like his old man, Jonah never wanted some comfortable seat in the Crown City. He wanted to be out there helping the people who lived beyond the Tower's reach, the ones too weak to protect themselves or too insignificant for the law to care about." A faint smile pulled at his mouth, though there was more pain in it than pride could hide. "I was proud of him. Hell, I guess I still am."
His expression dimmed again. "Then somewhere along the way, war broke out between the beastias tribes. Elder Niju of the Wolf Tribe got into a territorial dispute with Matriarch Vala of the Tiger Tribe, and as usual, everybody who wanted nothing to do with it ended up caught in the middle."
"Wait," Bastion said, his brows drawing together. "You mean the Moonveil Conflict?" He hesitated as an old memory surfaced. "I remember overhearing Grandpa telling my mom that my d—"
The word died before it could leave him completely, but Elias caught the hesitation and chose not to press.
"Yeah, that's the one," Elias said. "Regular therians are subject to the laws of whatever kingdom or territory they live under, but beastias are different. Protected might be the simplest way to put it, and fiercely so." His expression hardened as he folded his hands together. "They live in Avalon, but their tribes and clans have enough sovereignty that they decide which outside laws they recognize and which ones they don't. Some of the territories they control might as well be independent kingdoms."
Bastion listened closely as Elias continued.
"That doesn't mean the tribes hate each other, but nobody should mistake tolerance for friendship, either," Elias said. "Most of the time, they keep their distance, respect each other's borders, and try not to start anything they can't finish. The only time I ever saw them stand together as one was during the war with the Guild, and let me tell you, they scared the Authority half to death."
"And that's what led to the Accords, right?" Bastion asked. "The agreement that made beastias off-limits, even though everybody else was still fair game?"
"Pretty much," Elias said, though the lightness in his expression faded. "I knew both Elder Niju and Matriarch Vala long before either of them ended up leading their tribes." He lifted one finger as if sorting through the memories. "Vala, though?" A faint smile returned. "That woman always knew how to have a good time. We ran together more than once, usually chasing down some idiot who thought slipping into beastias territory would keep the Tower off his back." He chuckled under his breath. "Gods, I lost count of how many times I drank myself stupid around that crowd and woke up butt naked with half the tribe piled around me."
Bastion raised an eyebrow, his face twisting into a look that made Elias sigh before he could even speak.
"Tigers sleep communally," Elias said, giving him a flat stare. "It's a cultural thing, kid. Doesn't mean anything happened, and even if it did, they're therians. You know how they are about that sort of thing."
"Still sounds weird as hell when you tell it like that," Bastion replied.
"Yeah, well, that's your problem," Elias said with a grin, though it faded almost as quickly as it appeared. "Now Niju was another story. That jackass was the Elder's son back then, and he was exactly the kind of spoiled, arrogant bastard you'd expect from someone raised believing leadership was his birthright." He exhaled sharply.
His expression hardened as he leaned back. "The Accords are clear that the Guild can't enslave beastias, but what a lot of people conveniently forget is that the protection cuts both ways. Being beastias doesn't give them the right to start trafficking their own people or anyone else under their protection. I was with Vala on a case when Niju and one of his hunting parties hit a settlement near the edge of Wolf territory. Turned out they wanted the land, so they burned the homes, killed the men, and started rounding up the women and children to sell through Guild channels."
"Gods," Bastion said, the disgust plain on his face. "What did you do?"
"Pretty much what you'd expect," Elias replied, and the corner of his mouth curled faintly. "I put down the whole hunting party. Niju would've joined them too if I hadn't figured killing the Elder's son was a good way to start a war I didn't need." He leaned forward slightly. "So, I left him something else to remember me by."
Elias pointed toward his own ear. "Took half of his left one clean off."
Bastion frowned. "That supposed to mean something?"
"Yup," Elias said. "See, torn ears happen all the time from fights, accidents, wars, whatever, so nobody really thinks twice about scars like that. But a clean cut through part of the ear carries a very different meaning, especially among some of the older beastias traditions."
His expression grew more serious as he continued. "It's used as a mark of illegitimacy, not just on the child, but on the parents responsible as well. Therians mate for life, so breaking that bond is treated as one of the worst betrayals a person can commit. Their thinking is that death would be too merciful, so instead they mark everyone involved and let the shame do the rest."
Bastion's eyes widened as the implication sank in.
"And the marked?" Elias continued, his tone turning grimmer. "They're treated like pariahs, complete outcasts from the tribe. They're banished from the main settlements and forced to live, hunt, and survive beyond the walls with no rights and no protection. No one's allowed to speak to them, trade with them, or even offer them help without risking punishment themselves." He shook his head slowly. "Hell, they could get mauled by beasts and drag themselves half-dead back to the gates, and the tribe would still leave them there to bleed out rather than lift a finger."
Bastion's expression tightened. "That's... hella cruel."
"Cruel? Absolutely," Elias continued. "Sick in its own way? I'd say so. But it's their custom, and customs can be just as vicious as laws when enough people believe in them." He folded his arms. "Now, Niju wasn't actually a bastard, but that didn't matter once people saw the ear. As far as anyone outside his inner circle knew, I might as well have carved whoreson across his forehead."
Bastion let out a slow breath. "Yeah, I can see why he hates you."
"Hate?" Elias barked a laugh and shook his head. "That's cute. The bastard despised me enough to try having me killed more than once, and every time he sent one of his merry little bands of assassins after me, I made sure whatever was left of them found its way back home." His expression darkened as the humor faded. "Problem was, back then I was an Unspeakable, and Niju knew better than to push things too far unless he wanted the entire Tower crawling up his ass, especially with your grandfather, Winston and Burgess still around."
He sighed and rubbed at his jaw before leaning back. "Once he became Elder, though, the whole situation changed. The Wolf Tribe never forgot what I did, and they sure as hell never forgave it either." A crooked smile tugged at his mouth. "Which is why I don't go wandering into their territory unless I've got a damn good reason and an even better exit plan."
"That's all real interesting and all, old man," Bastion said, folding his arms across his chest, "but where exactly are you going with this?"
"Hold your horses, kid, I'm getting there," Elias replied, making a small gesture with one hand before drawing in a breath and letting it out slowly. "Long story short, the conflict got bad. Peace talks stalled, Niju kept being an asshat, Vala kept trying to protect her people, and eventually the fighting spread far enough that the Tower decided to stick its nose into something it barely understood."
His gaze lowered slightly. "Jonah was one of the ones they sent in. When he wasn't trying to negotiate between both sides, he was out on the front lines protecting civilians and helping people get clear of the fighting." A faint smile touched his mouth. "Heard he was real good with a wand, too."
Bastion said nothing, letting him continue.
"It happened near the edge of Tiger Tribe territory, not long after they'd managed to push the Wolf Tribe back across the border," Elias said. "Jonah was moving through the woods when he came across this busted-up hut sitting alone in a clearing. The place was barely standing, patched together from whatever someone could scavenge or drag out of a dump, and from the look of it, nobody should've been living there in the first place."
His expression darkened. "He went inside and found the whole place torn apart. Furniture smashed, blood everywhere, signs of a struggle, and then he found a Tiger Beastias woman on the floor. She was already gone." Elias paused, his fingers tapping lightly against his knee. "Her clothes were torn, and from the state of the place, it wasn't hard to guess what had happened before they left her there."
Bastion's jaw tightened.
"Then Jonah noticed her ear," Elias continued, lifting a hand toward the side of his own head.
"She was marked?" Bastion asked.
Elias nodded. "Yeah. An outcast. Probably been living out there alone for Gods know how long." His words grew quieter. "Jonah figured the wolves had come through, found her, did what they did, and left her for dead. He was about to move on when he heard something under the floorboards."
Bastion's expression shifted.
"Crying," Elias said. "Real faint. He moved her body aside, pried up the boards, and found a little crawlspace underneath." His pale eyes lifted toward Bastion. "There was a baby down there."
Bastion's eyes widened as the pieces finally came together. "Wait, you don't mean..." His gaze snapped toward the kitchen door before returning to Elias. "But she..." He lifted a hand and pointed toward his ear.
Elias simply stared at him.
Bastion held the gesture for another second before realization hit him. "Right. Blind."
Elias rolled his eyes. "I'm gonna assume you were pointing at your ear, but yeah, I don't really have an explanation for that. Jonah figured her mom either managed to hide her before they found the baby or got her far enough away that they never knew she existed. Probably explains why she was living so far from the settlement in the first place."
A soft smile touched his face as he leaned back. "Anyway, Jonah had spent enough time around the tribes to know exactly what would happen if he turned the girl over to her people, so he did what you'd expect him to do. He left her with someone he trusted, then went right back into the fighting."
Bastion listened as Elias continued.
"Eventually, the Moonveil Conflict ended in a truce. The Wolves pulled back and stayed on their side, the Tigers stayed on theirs, and everybody pretended the whole thing had ended cleanly." His expression soured. "Truth is, the Tower had to twist Niju's tail pretty hard. They threatened to cut the Wolf Tribe out of the Accords and leave them fair game for the Guild, and considering how many enemies he'd already made among the other tribes, he knew damn well nobody was gonna come running to save him when the slavers came knocking."
"Well," Bastion said, "that's one way to settle a war."
"Yeah, ugly as hell, but it worked," Elias replied. "After all that was over, Jonah went back for the girl and raised her as his own." His smile returned, quieter this time. "And somewhere along the way, becoming a father changed something in him. He started reaching out to me again. Nothing dramatic at first, maybe a letter here and there, then a little more often once the years went by." Elias paused, the warmth in his face fading. "Eventually he asked if he could come visit for Yuletide."
Bastion's expression shifted before Elias finished the thought.
"He never got the chance," Elias said. "Arianna was six when Jonah died in the line of duty. Nothing scandalous, mind you. Burgess didn't have him killed, there wasn't some conspiracy buried under it, just regular Tower business that went bad."
He looked down toward his hands. "Honestly, part of me used to wish there had been more to it. If there'd been someone responsible, someone I could blame, I'd have had a face to hate and no hesitation putting a blade through it. Grief's a hell of a lot harder when there's nobody to punish."
Bastion stayed quiet.
"Jonah left me a letter," Elias continued after a moment. "Apparently, he'd written it ahead of time in case anything ever happened to him, which tells me he understood the risks better than he ever let on. In it, he asked me to take care of Arianna, to raise her like she was my own if he couldn't be there to do it himself." His pale eyes lifted toward Bastion again. "So, I did. She's been with me ever since."
Bastion paused, his gaze settling more seriously on Elias. "Hell of a story, old man. And look, it's not really my place to go poking around in your family business," he said, glancing briefly toward the kitchen door before looking back. "But correct me if I'm wrong. Under tribal law, beastias kids are supposed to be raised by their own people, right? Tigers with Tigers, Wolves with Wolves, Lions with Lions, all that. I don't know every detail, but I've heard stories about tribes taking adopted kids back from families because they believe they need to grow up around their own culture and their own kind. Preservation, tradition, keeping the bloodlines going."
Elias drew in a breath and let it out slowly. "Yeah, you're right on the money. Their numbers have been dropping for generations, and the tribes are some of the last places in Avalon where full Beastias bloodlines are still concentrated. To them, every child matters, so they don't take kindly to one being raised completely outside the tribe."
He clasped his hands together and leaned forward slightly. "Normally, Arianna would've been taken back years ago, and that's without anyone knowing she was born to an outcast. The only reason she stayed was because of Vala."
Bastion tilted his head, waiting.
"I didn't just ask her for a favor, kid. I begged," Elias admitted. "For Jonah, for Arianna, for whatever was left of my family, and Vala finally agreed to a compromise. Arianna stays with me until she turns eighteen, and after that, she returns to the Tiger Tribe."
Bastion's expression tightened.
"She's fifteen now, which gives me three more years," Elias said, leaning back as the weight of that number settled over him. "Problem is, she doesn't know any of this, and I haven't found the guts to tell her."
Bastion stared at him for a moment before his scowl deepened. "Wait, you kept something that big from her?" He glanced toward the kitchen again. "From the way she nearly tore my head off earlier, she's gonna lose her damn mind when she finds out."
"Thank you, Captain Obvious," Elias said dryly, though there was no real irritation behind it. "I know exactly how bad this looks, and believe me, I've gone over it in my head more times than I can count. I keep telling myself I'm taking it one step at a time, but sooner or later I'm gonna run out of steps."
His expression softened. "I love that girl. She's my granddaughter, blood or not, and she's the last piece of Jonah I've got left. I know I can't stand the thought of losing her, and I sure as hell know she won't take being pulled away from the only home she remembers any better, but rules are rules and laws are laws."
Bastion sat with that for a moment before a short laugh escaped him, more bitter than amused. Elias raised an eyebrow. "Something funny, kid?"
"No, it's just..." Bastion shook his head and looked down for a second. "Therians and painful decisions seem to go hand in hand. My mom and dad are one thing, but then there's Godric Gryffindor, the kid everyone keeps calling the Hero of Caerleon."
Elias's interest sharpened. "What about him?"
"You'd think standing up to Burgess was some noble hero thing, but from what I heard, that wasn't really how it started," Bastion said. "I'm close with one of Godric's friends, and apparently he wanted the bastard dead because he blamed the Tower for taking away the girl he loved, a wolf therian named Raine."
Elias frowned, the name stirring something in his memory. "Why does that sound familiar?" His brows pulled together before recognition hit him. "Hang on. The Lion and the Wolf? You're telling me that story's actually real?"
"Pretty much," Bastion replied. "And by the Gods, every time there's some tragic love story in Avalon, there always seems to be a therian caught in the middle of it." He leaned back, his expression turning more thoughtful. "Rules, laws, traditions, whatever people wanna call them, they keep getting in the way of how things are supposed to be. If the whole mess with Burgess taught us anything, it's that just because something's legal doesn't mean it's right, and sometimes the law creates more damage than the thing it was supposed to fix."
Elias let out a slow breath. "Hell, if that ain't the truth." He studied Bastion for a moment, then added, "Sounds like that's been weighing on you too."
Bastion met his gaze and gave a small shrug. "Yeah, I guess you could say that." After a moment, he nodded toward the kitchen. "So, what are you gonna do? About Arianna, I mean. You planning to tell her?"
Elias went quiet before rubbing one hand across his face. "I'll cross that bridge when I get there, kid. I just hope I don't chicken out when the time comes." A bitter chuckle escaped him. "Funny thing is, I've faced down some of the sickest sons of bitches in Avalon without blinking, but sitting my granddaughter down and telling her the truth scares the hell out of me. Wilhelm would be laughing his ass off if he were here."
"I wouldn't be so sure," Bastion said, a faint smile finally returning. "Gramps was pretty much the same way. He used to say he'd rather swing an axe into some warlord's face than have one honest conversation with my mom." His smile widened slightly. "Said it more than once, too."
It was then that the kitchen door opened and Arianna stepped back into the living room, the irritation in her expression returning almost immediately when her emerald eyes landed on Bastion. "Gramps, Rosa says the food's ready," she said before giving Bastion another look. "Oh, great. The perv's still here."
Bastion's face twisted, and he lifted a finger to fire back, but Elias beat him to it. "Great!" he exclaimed as he pushed himself to his feet and reached for the cane leaning against the couch. "Tell Rosa to set the table." He turned toward Bastion with a grin. "Hope you like beef stew. Between you and me, I could eat that stuff all day, every day, but Doctor Adani keeps telling me a man my age should start watching his cholesterol, whatever the hell that means."
Bastion stared at him for a moment before shaking his head. "I'm sorry, what?" He gestured between Elias and the dining room. "Stew? Table? I came here because I thought you wanted to talk Tower business."
Elias blinked. "Nope. I invited you over for brunch." He sighed as though Bastion were the difficult one in the room. "Figured you've been neck-deep in work long enough that taking time off probably feels like a foreign concept by now. Wilhelm was the same way. Gods, that man loved working himself half to death."
"B-But..." Bastion stammered, clearly struggling to reconcile the entire morning with something as ordinary as lunch.
Arianna's eyes widened, her tail flicking behind her in disbelief. "You actually invited him here to stuff his face?" she asked, pointing toward Bastion. "That's why he's here?"
"Pretty much," Elias said with a grin. "Now come on, before the food gets cold."
His cane tapped rhythmically across the floor as he headed toward the dining room, leaving Bastion and Arianna staring after him in equal disbelief before both of them slowly turned toward one another.
"I've got my eye on you, perv," Arianna said, pointing two fingers between them. "And if you pull anything like that again, I swear I'm gonna claw your face off."
Bastion scowled as he got to his feet. "All right, enough with the perv crap. It happened once, and it was an accident." His mouth curled into a grin as he looked her over. "Sides, you're acting like there was anything worth gawking at in the first place. A washboard's got more curves than you do, and that's saying something."
Arianna's face flushed as her expression twisted with outrage. "Why, you snarky little—!"
Her fingers curled as black claws slid free, but Elias' voice carried in from the dining room before she could do anything about it. "What's the holdup? You two planning to eat, or are you gonna stand there insulting each other until dinner?"
Bastion bowed with exaggerated politeness and swept one hand toward the dining room. "After you, Your Furriness."
A low growl rumbled in Arianna's throat as she turned away and stalked toward the table, her tail flicking sharply behind her while Bastion straightened with a satisfied grin. As he followed, the kitchen door opened again and the rich scent of beef, herbs, and slow-cooked vegetables rolled through the manor. Bastion's stomach answered almost immediately with a low rumble, and whatever irritation he had left softened just a little. Maybe lunch wasn't such a bad idea after all.