The courtroom had become a stage, and the players had multiplied. Anton Vasiliev's testimony consumed three full days of the preliminary injunction hearing, and the gallery was packed for every minute of it.
The mighty tiger spoke steadily. He had built an empire only to lose it to his own son's treachery, and just now methodically reclaiming it piece by piece.
He described the poisoning in detail. The gradual weakening, the bought doctors, the falsified diagnosis, the moment he had realized his own heir was killing him…
Judge Venn's quill pen scratched across her legal pad without pause. The jury, those who weren't bribed, who were still capable of being moved, leaned forward in their seats.
Arzhen sat at the defendant's table and watched his father speak. His expression was unreadable and his tiger ears never moved. But his tail, curled around the leg of his chair, had gone completely still.
