The Flower bud

**Chapter7–The Warden’s Duty**

The limousine glided through the Luminaria gates like a black shark returning to its silent lagoon. The journey home had been a tense, hollow quiet, broken only by the tap of Ryan’s fingers on his tablet screen. Outside, the sky was a deepening bruise of twilight, the last streaks of orange and violet bleeding away behind the distant Pandora Mountains. The ancient trees lining the drive stood as silent, judging sentinels.

I kept my face pressed to the cool glass, my breath fogging a small circle. The world outside was a peaceful, deepening blue, a lie that mocked the storm inside me. The message on my phone was a brand against my thigh.

Unknown: Let me know when you land. Wouldn’t want anything to happen to you now.

Vince. His feigned concern was just another move in his endless game. He’d won the wager, annexed my future, and now he was toying with me.

When the car crunched to a halt on the grand granite driveway, the scene was deceptively serene. And there she was. My mother. Not waiting on the imposing front steps, but standing by the wrought-iron entrance to her private rose garden, a place of vibrant color and deep shadows where the most delicate—and damning—family matters were often discussed. She wore a simple, elegant dress of dove grey, a faint, welcoming smile on her lips. It was a carefully staged picture of maternal warmth, but her posture was as rigid as the stone statues that dotted the lawn.

Ryan bounded out first, the gravel scattering under his shoes. “Mom! You should have seen it! She was incredible!”

“I’ve seen the reports, my love,” she said, pulling him into a brief hug. Her eyes, however, were on me as I stepped out of the car, the evening air cool on my skin. They were soft, but I saw the sharp, calculating light behind them. “Welcome home, Lassiter. You did well.”

She opened her arms. After a moment’s hesitation, I stepped into the embrace. She smelled of jasmine and the damp, rich earth of the garden. It was a scent I associated with both comfort and severe lectures. “Ryan,” she said, releasing me but keeping a firm hand on my arm, “your father is in his study. He’s eager for your firsthand account. And your sister just called—she’s decided to extend her tour in Thorvallia. She won’t be visiting after all. A shame, but it gives us more time to focus.”

The news about my sister was a small, unexpected sting. Another absence. Ryan, understanding the dismissal, nodded and hurried inside, his excitement undimmed. My mother’s grip on my arm tightened slightly. “Walk with me,” she said, her tone light but leaving no room for refusal.

She led me down the winding flagstone path into the heart of the garden. The air was thick with the cloying, sweet-and-spicy perfume of a thousand blooms, a stark contrast to the cold dread beginning to pool in my stomach. Fireflies sparked like tiny, wandering stars in the gathering gloom. “Your speech was perfectly pitched,” she began, her voice a low murmur that blended with the whisper of leaves. “You showed strength, not aggression. Vision, not naivety. You presented a united front with your team, even with… him. That was the masterstroke.”

We stopped before a trellis heavy with deep crimson ‘Crimson Glory’ roses, their color almost black in the fading light. She cupped one, not picking it, just feeling its velvety texture. “The project victory was the public success. But it is the private outcome that holds the most… potential.”

She turned to me, her gaze sharpening, catching the last of the daylight. “I know about the wager.”

The blood drained from my face, leaving me cold. “How?” The word was a choked whisper. Only my team—Kael, Lyra, Fjord—knew. Had one of them told her? The betrayal felt like a physical blow. My private humiliation was now a piece of her political chessboard.

“The details of a wager between the Primordial and Artemesian heirs are never truly private,” she said, a knowing, almost cruel glint in her eye. “But that is beside the point. What matters is the result. He is forcing you to Aetherius.”

She stated it as a fact. There was no anger, no disapproval. Only a cool, analytical acceptance that made my skin crawl.

“This proximity, while personally… challenging… is politically useful,” she continued, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial hush that was more threatening than a shout. “Vince Krueger is a key piece on the continental board. Brilliant, but volatile. His mother, Isolde, confides in me that he has… impulses. A taste for risk that goes beyond the acceptable. He is the future of Artemis, and his stability is intertwined with our own.”

She finally released my arm and faced me fully, a queen delivering a decree to a subject. “As the future Primordial, your role is not just to rule, but to steward. To guide. The other heirs are part of your circle, your responsibility. Vince, given his station, is perhaps the most crucial. This assignment at Aetherius is not a punishment. It is an accelerated lesson in leadership.”

“An assignment?” I echoed, my mind reeling. The cold dread was now a solid block of ice in my veins. “You want me to… what? Be his tutor? His conscience?”

“I want you to ensure he does not make a mistake that could shatter the fragile peace we have built,” she corrected, her tone turning to flint. “You will be his anchor. You will share a residence. You will steer him away from the parties, the drinking, the recklessness. You will help him focus on his studies, on his future role.”

The words share a residence hit me like a physical blow. The world tilted. The sweet scent of the roses suddenly smelled suffocating, funereal.

“No,” I said, the word leaving my lips as a desperate gasp. I took a step back, shaking my head, my heart hammering against my ribs. “No. You can’t be serious. Live with him? Under the same roof? After what he did to me? Mother, have you lost your mind?”

“Lassiter!” she snapped, her composure cracking, a flash of genuine anger in her eyes.

But I was beyond obedience now. The fear was too raw, the anger too hot. “Do you remember?” I demanded, my voice rising, trembling with a mixture of fury and panic. “Do you remember the guards dragging me from my room? The accusations? You want me to live alone with the boy who drugged me? How can you ask me to do that? How can you possibly think I would be safe?”

“Your safety is guaranteed!” she retorted, her own voice rising to match mine, cutting through the tranquil evening. “A security team will be embedded next door! This is not about your childish fears!”

“Childish fears?” A hysterical, broken laugh escaped me. “He spiked my drink! He lied and said I assaulted him! That’s not a childish fear, it’s a memory of a violation! And you’re handing me back to him on a platter!”

“I am asking you to act like the heir to the Primordial throne!” she roared, her face flushing with anger, the carefully constructed matriarch vanishing. “This is not about you! This is about the continent!”

“It’s always about the continent!” I screamed back, tears of rage and shame blinding me. “What about me? What about what he took from me? My trust? My sense of safety? You’re asking me to sacrifice what’s left of it for ‘the continent’!”

“Yes!” she shouted, stepping toward me, her eyes blazing with a fury I rarely saw. “That is the price of the crown you will wear! It is a price I have paid every day of my life! You do not get to refuse!”

The fight was a raw, ugly tearing open of wounds I’d kept buried for years. But the political angle, the one she cared about most, was my last resort.

“And what about the other heirs?” I shot back, my voice dropping to a venomous whisper. “What do you think happens when Cassian or the Calonian twins find out that the Primordial Heir and the Artemesian Crown Prince are living together? It won’t look like stewardship, Mother. It will look like an alliance. It will look like a betrothal! They will see it as Vince getting an unfair advantage, as me choosing my mate before I’ve even taken the throne! You’ll have a rebellion on your hands before I turn twenty-five! You’ll destabilize the very balance you’re trying to protect!”

I saw a flicker of doubt in her eyes. I had hit a nerve. The political ramifications were a minefield.

But it was fleeting. Her expression hardened into absolute, unyielding resolve. "Then you will manage those perceptions!" she retorted, her voice like shattering ice. "You will be discreet. You will explain it as a necessary collaboration born from your Conclave project. But you will do it. And don't you dare lecture me on political consequences," she sneered, stepping so close I could see the fine lines of fury around her mouth. "If you were truly so concerned about what the other heirs would think, you never would have made that reckless wager in the first place! You created this mess with your pride, Lassiter. Now you will lie in the bed you made."

The accusation was a masterstroke, and it struck true. She was right. My own arrogance had led to this. The wind went out of my sails, leaving me deflated and shaking. I had no more arguments. The personal trauma, the political scandal—she had an answer for everything. The helplessness was a suffocating weight on my chest. I wasn't being given a duty; I was being sentenced to a nightmare of my own making.

The fight drained out of me, replaced by a cold, numb horror. I looked at my mother, this elegant, unyielding woman surrounded by her beautiful, dying roses under the darkening sky, and I didn’t see a parent. I saw a general who had just checkmated her rebellious soldier.

I didn't speak. I couldn't. I simply turned and walked away, my shoes crunching on the gravel path.

"Lassiter!" her voice cracked like a whip behind me.

I stopped but didn't turn.

"The decision is final," she said, her voice cold and flat. "The townhouse at 7 Willow Creek Lane is already secured. For both of you. Your documents are on your desk. Start preparing."

I couldn't hold it in anymore. I spun around, the tears finally breaking free, streaming down my face. "f**k you," I whispered, the words carrying clearly in the still evening air.

I didn't wait for a response. I ran. I ran past the rose bushes, across the vast lawn, and back into the mansion, my vision blurred. I didn't know where I was going, only that I had to find someone, anyone, who might understand. My father.

I found him in his study, the warm, wood-paneled room smelling of old books and brandy. But he wasn't alone. Ryan was there, leaning over the desk, pointing at something on a map, both of them laughing. They looked up as I burst in, disheveled and crying.

"Lassiter?" my father said, his smile fading into concern. "What's wrong?"

"It's Mother," I choked out, gasping for air. "She… she's making me live with him. With Vince. At Aetherius. You have to talk to her. You have to make her see this is insane!"

My father's face fell. He exchanged a quick, heavy glance with Ryan. "Lassiter… your mother and I… we discussed this."

The bottom dropped out of my world. "You… you knew?"

"It's for the best, lil' sis," Ryan said, his voice uncharacteristically gentle, but firm. "It's a smart move. It keeps him close. It's control."

"Control?" I echoed, hysterical. "It's a prison! How can you both agree to this? After what he did!"

"What he did was six years ago," my father said softly, coming around the desk, his hands outstretched in a placating gesture. "People change. And the political landscape requires… difficult choices."

I looked from my father's pained but resolute face to Ryan's pragmatic one. I was utterly alone. There was no ally here. No reprieve.

Without another word, I turned and fled the room, their calls echoing after me. I took the stairs two at a time, my sobs echoing in the grand hallway. I slammed my bedroom door shut and slid down to the floor, my back against the cool, solid wood, finally giving in to the overwhelming waves of despair.

The fight was over. I had lost.

It was then that I saw it. Slid under the door. A thick piece of cardstock.

With trembling, tear-stained hands, I picked it up. It was a mock-real estate flyer.

SOLD! it declared. Below was a sketched floor plan of a narrow townhouse. The address was circled: 7 Willow Creek Lane. Scribbled in the margin was a note in that familiar, arrogant script:

*Blackwood. Looks like we’re roomies. I call the bigger bedroom.

· K*

P.S. Can’t wait to see you try to be ‘unremarkable.’ Game on.

He was mocking me. He thought this was a game.

He had no idea that my entire family had just sanctioned my imprisonment. That my hatred for him was now a mandated, miserable part of my royal duty.

The flyer crumpled in my fist. The despair began to harden, forged in the fire of betrayal into something colder and sharper: a determined, clear-eyed rage.

Fine. If this was the game, I would play. But not as a victim. Not as a scared little girl. And certainly not as an obedient warden.

If I was being sent into the viper’s nest, I wouldn’t go as a keeper. I would go as a queen. And my first decree would be to ensure I was the most dangerous thing in it.