The revelation of the severed star-vein had sent the Starborne court into a silent, frantic uproar. The ordered calm of the Spire was shattered, not by noise, but by the intense, whispered conferences happening in every alcove, the frantic re-calibrations of star-charts, the palpable sense of a foundational truth cracking. Ren was at the center of it, a calm eye in the storm he had unleashed, patiently answering the Asteri’s increasingly urgent questions. He was using memory as a weapon, and it was more effective than any display of power.
Kael watched from the periphery, as always. He was glad for the shift, for the focus moving away from Ren’s instability to something concrete, something he could almost understand. A hidden weapon was a concept he could grasp, even if it was a weapon ma
