The next week did not pass.
It attacked.
Every morning began with documents and ended with documents, as if the entire Celestian realm had decided to reproduce through paperwork.
Sarisa signed emergency decrees, reviewed arrest warrants, corrected public statements, approved witness protections, and listened to legal advisors argue over words so small they could have been crumbs.
And Lara helped.
Not gracefully, perhaps. Not in the soft, polished way the Celestian court expected. Lara helped like a blade helped a tangled rope.
She cut through excuses, simplified reports, pointed out contradictions, and terrified three clerks into admitting that some "missing" archives had only been moved to protect noble reputations.
By the third day, Sarisa realized Lara had become essential.
Not because Lara knew every Celestian law. She did not. She still called half the court titles "decorative nonsense with inheritance problems." But she had instincts. She saw weakness in reports, cowardice in phrasing, and lies in people's shoulders before they reached their mouths.
When Sarisa grew tired, Lara fed her.
When Sarisa froze over a difficult decree, Lara leaned over the desk and murmured, "One line at a time, love."
When Sarisa wanted to scream, Lara quietly locked the door, wrapped her arms around her, and let her shake until the rage turned back into breath.
Somehow, the week moved.
The trial arrived.
It was held in the High Tribunal Hall of Celestia, a place Sarisa had always hated as a child. The hall was built in a circle, all white stone, silver pillars, and high windows that poured light down like judgment.
At the center stood the accused platform, surrounded by runes that blocked magic. Above it, the tribunal seats rose in a crescent, filled today by Celestian judges, neutral human observers, two demon legal witnesses, and three senior priests sworn to truth verification.
The galleries were full.
Not crowded like a festival. Crowded like a wound.
Nobles sat in stiff lines. Common citizens filled the upper tiers. Officials stood against the walls. Guards watched every entrance. Whispers moved in waves, then died every time someone in authority turned their head.
Just before the doors opened, Sarisa stood in the side chamber with Lara.
Her dress was black and silver today, not mourning, not celebration. Something sharper. A statement without ornament.
The mating mark at her throat was visible. So was the small Daemara crest pinned beside the Celestian royal symbol at her collar.
Lara stood before her in formal black, hands around Sarisa's.
"You're cold," Lara said.
Sarisa gave a faint smile. "I am always cold in this building."
"I can burn it later."
"That is not how reforms work."
"Then reforms are too slow."
Sarisa let out a breath that almost became a laugh.
Lara lifted their joined hands and kissed her knuckles. Her eyes were steady, gold-dark, fierce beneath the calm she was forcing into place.
"Everything will go well for us," Lara said.
Sarisa looked at her. "For us?"
"For us," Lara repeated. "You are not facing her alone. You are not carrying this alone. Whatever she says, whatever face she makes, whatever old poison she tries to use, she does not get inside you today."
Sarisa swallowed.
Beyond the door, a bell rang once.
Time.
Lara's thumb brushed over her fingers. "Breathe."
Sarisa breathed.
The doors opened.
The tribunal hall rose to its feet when Sarisa entered.
The sound of everyone standing rippled through the chamber like a storm made of silk and armor.
Sarisa walked to her seat at the front, with Lara beside her, Malvoria and Elysia just behind, Veylira and Raveth farther to the side where their presence alone made several Celestian officials sit straighter.
The judges took their places.
The herald struck the staff against the floor.
"Bring in the accused."
The side doors opened.
Marena Nocturna, former Queen of Celestia, entered in chains.
The hall erupted.
Not loudly, because the tribunal wards swallowed most uncontrolled sound, but the shock still moved visibly through the crowd.
Marena walked between four guards, wrists bound in silver-demon alloy cuffs, magic sealed at her throat by a black rune collar.
She wore white prison robes, but her posture remained queenly, her chin high, eyes burning with fury.
She looked damn angry.
Not frightened.
Not ashamed.
Angry that she had been lowered to this.
Angry that people saw.
Angry, perhaps, that Sarisa sat above her and not beside her.
When Marena's eyes found Sarisa, her mouth curved slightly.
Sarisa felt the old instinct in her body. The need to straighten. To prepare. To become pleasing enough not to be wounded.
Then Lara's hand found hers beneath the table.
The instinct died.
Marena was brought to the accused platform. The runes flared around her feet.
The trial began.
First came the charges.
Forbidden life-craft. Theft of demonic essence. Falsification of testimony. Abuse and illegal conditioning of a constructed child. Conspiracy to frame Lara Daemara.
Attempted coercive control of Princess Sarisa through unlawful marriage arrangements. Planned nonconsensual blood extraction.
Preparation of an artificial heir bound by soul-thread obedience magic. Treason against Celestian succession law. Crimes against sacred life statutes.
Each charge struck the hall with brutal clarity.
Marena listened without blinking.
Then came the evidence.
Veylira presented the laboratory records first. Her voice was elegant, precise, devastating. She explained the seals, the wards, the hidden chamber, the queen's signature. She projected the authorization pages into the air, where every person in the hall could see them.
Marena called them stolen.
The priest-verifiers confirmed them genuine.
Then came Caldris.
He looked smaller now. Less polished. Less certain. He stood behind a truth ward and confessed in a voice that shook but did not break. He named the queen. He named the orders. He named Neris as Subject N-01.
The hall shifted when Neris's existence was described.
Sarisa held Lara's hand so tightly her fingers ached.
Lara did not complain.
Maelia came next. She wept before speaking. Then she spoke anyway. The hidden archive. The Glass Heir Program. Vessel S-Alpha. The intended use of Sarisa's blood.
That was when Marena finally moved.
"She lies," she hissed.
The chief judge lifted one hand. "The accused will remain silent unless addressed."
Marena's eyes blazed. "I was protecting the realm."
A low sound moved through the galleries.
The chief judge's voice hardened. "Silence."
The trial continued.
Selene testified under guard, pale and shaking, confessing that she had been paid to claim Neris as her child. Vaelen spoke too, stiff and humiliated, confirming that he had not known of the heir program and had been used as a pawn. His voice cracked when he said it. Sarisa almost pitied him.
Almost.
Then Sarisa herself was called.
The hall went very quiet.
She stood.
Lara's hand released hers only after one last squeeze.
Sarisa walked to the witness circle and faced the judges, not her mother.
She spoke of the wedding. The pressure. The way her mother had pushed the marriage forward.
She spoke of Lara's exile, of Neris, of Aliyah's fear, of the moment she read the documents describing her own blood as material.
Her voice did not break.
When she finished, the hall was silent.
Marena stared at her with hatred so pure it seemed almost clean.
Sarisa returned to her seat.
Lara's hand waited for hers.
The closing arguments were shorter than expected. The evidence had become a mountain no clever speech could climb. Marena was allowed to speak last.
She did.
She stood on the platform, chained and furious, and looked around the hall as if searching for the realm she had once commanded.
"You will regret this," she said. "All of you. You think mercy and openness will save Celestia. It will weaken it. You think this girl can rule you because she cries prettily and sleeps beside a demon. You think truth matters more than strength."
Her eyes landed on Sarisa.
"You will break."
Sarisa did not look away.
"No," she said softly, though the room heard. "I already did. Then I became something else."
Marena's face twisted.
The judges withdrew.
The wait felt endless.
Then the tribunal returned.
The chief judge stood, holding the sealed verdict in both hands.
Every person in the hall rose.
Sarisa felt Lara beside her, warm and steady.
The judge's voice rang through the chamber.
"We are now going to pronounce our sentence."