Vienna liked to pretend it was neutral ground.
It never was.
The city had always been a crossroads of power—old money, older bloodlines, alliances stitched together with civility and sharpened underneath with threat. The council chamber stood beneath a renovated opera house, marble restored, chandeliers gleaming. Elegant. Controlled.
And built for spectacle.
We arrived together.
Not as concession. Not as provocation. Simply as fact.
The chamber doors opened to a semicircle of seated Alphas and envoys. France. Spain. Italy. Germany. Smaller Balkan representatives observing from the outer tier. Conversations dipped when we entered.
Eyes followed.
They were measuring.
Derek walked at my left, steady and unreadable. Jax at my right, relaxed in a way that was never careless. I took the
