One hour later, Lara found herself in a room with Malvoria and Veylira, which was rarely a good sign.
There were rooms built for comfort, rooms built for war, and rooms built for women to interrogate other women while pretending it was a conversation. This one was definitely the third.
It was one of the smaller sitting rooms in the Celestian castle, though "small" in Celestian language still meant large enough to host a minor diplomatic hostage situation.
Pale walls, silver chairs, cold blue drapes, one elegant fireplace, and enough polished marble to make Lara feel morally judged by the floor.
Sarisa was elsewhere with Elysia, speaking to a few council members about the provisional decree and Aliyah's recognition. Raveth had gone to "check the security," which probably meant frightening guards for sport.
That left Lara alone with her sister and her mother.
Wonderful.
Malvoria sat in one of the silver chairs like she had conquered it and found the victory disappointing. Veylira stood near the window, calm, elegant, hands folded before her.
Lara remained standing.
It felt safer.
Malvoria stared at her for a long moment.
Then she said, "Are you really serious, Lara?"
Lara crossed her arms. "That depends on what I'm being accused of."
Malvoria's smile did not reach her eyes. "You never wanted to become Demon Queen. You ran from responsibility like it had teeth. And now you want to become the Celestian one?"
Lara looked at her.
"I said I would marry Sarisa by Celestian tradition. I did not say I wanted to sit on her throne and start wearing white robes like a depressed candle."
Malvoria did not laugh.
That, more than anything, made Lara's shoulders tense.
Veylira turned slightly from the window. "Do not deflect."
Lara's jaw tightened. "I'm not."
"You are," Veylira said. "You are very good at it. Unfortunately for you, I taught you some of those techniques, and you were never as subtle as you believed."
Malvoria leaned forward, elbows on her knees. "This is not about whether you love Sarisa. Everyone with eyes can see that. It's embarrassing, actually. You look at her like she invented oxygen and knife maintenance."
Lara narrowed her eyes. "That is oddly specific."
"It is accurate." Malvoria's expression sharpened. "This is about whether you understand what you offered."
Lara said nothing.
Malvoria continued, voice lower now.
"Celestian consort will not be decorative. Not now. Not after this. Sarisa's reign, if she survives the first few months politically, will be born from scandal, betrayal, reform, and marriage to a demon woman. Every conservative house will watch you for weakness. Every loyalist of her mother will call you corruption. Every time Sarisa makes a hard decision, they will say you poisoned her mind."
Lara's hands curled into fists.
Veylira's gaze remained steady. "And every time you lose patience, you will make their argument easier."
That hit.
Lara looked away first, toward the cold blue drapes and the slice of white courtyard visible beyond the window.
She wanted to say she knew.
She did know.
But knowing in theory was not the same as hearing it placed on the table by the two women who knew best what power demanded.
Malvoria stood. "You cannot solve this by punching people."
"I know."
"Do you?" Malvoria asked. "Because your first instinct when someone insults Sarisa is violence."
"They deserve it."
"Yes," Malvoria said. "Often. That is not the point."
Lara exhaled sharply through her nose.
Veylira stepped closer, her voice softening only a fraction. "When you were younger, you ran because you did not want to be trapped by a crown. I understood that more than you knew."
Lara looked at her then.
Veylira's face was calm, but there was memory in it. Old memory. Mother-memory. The kind Lara hated because it saw straight through all the armor she had built out of sarcasm and fire.
"You built a house in secret at sixteen," Veylira said. "You hid in bakeries. You took missions no one assigned you. You stayed close enough to help and far enough to deny that you cared."
Malvoria snorted softly. "Very poetic. Also very annoying."
Lara ignored her.
Veylira continued. "Now you are saying you will stand beside a woman whose throne may become a storm. So we are asking you plainly: is this love speaking, or choice?"
Lara's throat tightened.
The question hurt because it was fair.
She thought of Sarisa on the balcony, hands shaking only after the doors closed. Sarisa facing the council with her chin lifted.
Sarisa in the hidden house wearing Lara's shirt. Sarisa in the lake, glowing under sacred mist, saying she did not want to return to a life where she pretended not to love her.
Love was speaking.
Of course it was.
But not only love.
Lara slowly uncrossed her arms.
"I don't want a throne," she said.
Malvoria's eyes narrowed.
Lara looked at her sister first, then at her mother. "I didn't want yours. I don't want Sarisa's. I don't want to be worshipped, obeyed, painted, discussed, dressed, or used as a polite symbol while old men argue about tradition and pretend they are wise because they're close to dying."
Malvoria's mouth twitched despite herself.
"But I want Sarisa," Lara continued. "Not only in bed. Not only in secret. Not only when she is soft and laughing and easy to love. I want her when she is queen and exhausted and making decisions that hurt. I want her when people hate her. I want her when she doubts herself. I want her when she becomes cold because the room gives her no other choice. I want the difficult parts too."
Veylira watched her in silence.
Lara swallowed once.
"And I want Aliyah safe," she said. "I want Neris to stop thinking he was made to be used. I want the Celestian realm to stop poisoning children with purity and calling it culture. I want Sarisa to have someone in that white nightmare of a palace who will look at her and see a woman before a crown."
Malvoria's face had gone quieter.
Lara let out a rough laugh. "Will I hate it? Yes. Obviously. The council already makes me want to chew marble. I will probably be bad at half of it at first. I will say the wrong thing. I will scare people. I will have to apologize to at least one priest, and I'll hate every second of it."
"Only one priest?" Malvoria murmured.
"Don't interrupt my maturity."
"My mistake."
Lara looked back at Veylira. "But I won't run."
Veylira's eyes softened, just slightly.
Lara's voice dropped. "I ran from being Demon Queen because I thought the crown would take everything from me. I was young and stupid and afraid that duty meant becoming a cage. But Sarisa is not asking me to become a cage. She is asking me to stand beside her while she breaks one."
The room went still.
Malvoria stared at her for a long moment.
Then she sighed dramatically. "Fuck. That was actually a good answer."
Lara blinked. "Was that praise?"
"Do not get used to it. It curdles my tongue."
Veylira stepped closer and touched Lara's cheek with two fingers, brief and elegant, but Lara felt the tenderness in it.
"You have changed," Veylira said.
Lara almost looked away.
This time, she didn't.
"I had reasons to."
"Yes," Veylira said. "You did."
Malvoria crossed the room and stopped in front of her. "If this becomes too much, you talk to us. You don't vanish into some forest and pretend you are handling it."
Lara rolled her eyes. "I'm not sixteen."
"You still sulk like sixteen-year-old you when cornered."
"I do not."
Veylira and Malvoria looked at her.
Lara sighed. "Fine. A little."
Malvoria pulled her into a hug without warning.
Lara stiffened, then relaxed.
"You're an idiot," Malvoria muttered into her shoulder.
"You're very emotional today."
"Shut up."
Veylira joined them a moment later, more graceful, less crushing, but no less firm.
For a few seconds, Lara stood between her mother and her sister in a cold Celestian room and felt, absurdly, like she had been given permission to step into the fire.
Not alone.
Never alone.
When they finally pulled back, Malvoria wiped at nothing near her eye and glared. "Good. Now go marry your terrifying princess before the council develops another stupid objection."
Lara smiled.
"She's not terrifying."
Veylira lifted one brow.
Lara thought of Sarisa chaining her mother before three realms.
"All right," Lara said. "She's a little terrifying."
Malvoria grinned. "Perfect for you, then."