Strongest Incubus System

The carriage returned to the mansion at a fast pace, but not rushed enough to attract attention. Ingrivid had ordered the guards to spread out around the convoy as if it were merely a common escort, without a war formation, without raised spears, without any obvious sign that they were carrying an important prisoner and evidence capable of dragging an entire ducal house into an investigation. It was simple theater, but necessary. After that morning, any exaggerated movement could reach Valcair’s ears before Morgana decided the next step.

Damon remained silent for most of the way. Not for lack of subject, but because the name was still beating inside him. Underground Heart. The elemental root had reacted as if it recognized it, and he hated not knowing why. It was not the same feeling he had when reading Xue Lian’s memories, nor did it seem like a sealed memory. It was more physical. Deeper. As if the new body had heard a vibration from very far away and answered before his mind understood.

Ester, sitting beside him, did not look any less worried. She was no longer holding his wrist the entire time, but she looked at him every few minutes, analyzing his breathing, temperature, posture, and any sign that the cold might escape again. Damon noticed every time. She also noticed that he noticed. Neither of them commented.

Morgana sat in front, with the box of old seals on her lap. Her gaze remained fixed on the closed lid, but Damon doubted she was thinking only about the objects inside. Those seals connected Havelock to the Council, to the old registry office, to the false order, and now to Valcair. With each piece of evidence found, the situation became less nebulous and more dangerous. Before, Morgana had been fighting fraudulent debts. Now, it seemed an entire ducal house wanted to seize something buried in Arven’s mines.

Aria, on the other hand, was trying to keep three papers open at the same time inside the carriage, which was neither practical nor safe. Elizabeth watched her with limited patience.

”If you spill ink on those documents, I am going to forbid you from touching them for a week,” Elizabeth said.

Aria froze in place. ”That was the cruelest thing anyone has said today.”

”It was a preventive measure.”

”You threatened my spirit.”

Damon, still looking out the window, murmured, ”She threatened your documentary hygiene.”

Aria pointed at him with one of the papers. ”You are forbidden from making jokes while mysteriously connected to frightening underground names.”

”I support that ban,” Ester said.

”You are using my mystical condition as censorship.”

”Yes,” Aria and Ester answered at the same time.

Morgana released a short sigh, but the corner of her mouth moved. It was little, almost nothing, but Damon saw it. Elizabeth did too. Perhaps because of that, neither of them commented. The tension in the carriage did not disappear, but it became a little less hard. Sometimes, a bad joke was enough to remember that everyone was still alive.

When they reached the mansion, Havelock was removed from the separate carriage with his wrists bound by runic iron cuffs. Unlike Caldrick, he did not tremble, cry, or apologize. He walked with a straight posture, as if he were still in a meeting and not being taken to a cell. In a way, that made him more irritating. Damon watched the man cross the courtyard escorted by four guards and Ingrivid.

”He still thinks he can get out of this,” Damon said.

Morgana stepped down right after him. ”He may be able to.”

”Not with what we have.”

”With Valcair behind him, evidence can become a jurisdiction dispute. Witnesses can change their version. Documents can be contested. Seals can be declared old copies without validity. If there is enough influence, any truth has to fight to keep existing.”

Damon looked at her. ”That is depressing.”

”Welcome to politics.”

”I prefer monsters.”

”Monsters prefer you too. Nobles insist on surviving.”

Elizabeth passed by them, carrying the box of seals with two servants. ”The sooner we interrogate Havelock, the better. He is still affected by the capture, but he will not remain that way for long. Men like him reorganize lies quickly.”

Ester held Damon’s arm when he started to follow. ”You have one hour. And you are staying seated.”

”I know.”

”No threatening Havelock.”

”I did not even say I would.”

”You thought it.”

”This is becoming authoritarian.”

”Efficient.”

The smaller interrogation room stood at the back of the administrative wing, far from the bedrooms and archives. It was not a dungeon, though it could function as one. The walls were thick, the narrow window sat too high to be reached without a ladder, and the table in the center was fixed to the floor. Havelock was placed before it, seated, his hands still cuffed. Two guards remained outside. Ingrivid stayed inside, behind him.

Morgana entered first, followed by Elizabeth. Damon entered after them and, obeying Ester’s look, sat in a chair in the corner. Aria stood near the wall with a notebook, ready to record every word. Ester remained beside Damon, not because she had any legal interest in the interrogation, but because she suspected his body might react again to the subject of the mines.

Havelock observed everyone carefully. When his eyes passed over Damon, they lingered a little longer. Then he looked back at Morgana.

”If you intend to frighten me with him, spare your time,” Havelock said. ”I have already understood the message.”

Morgana sat before him. ”If I wanted to frighten you, I would not have asked him to sit.”

Damon tilted his head. ”That was almost offensive.”

”It was factual,” Ester said.

Aria wrote something down.

Elizabeth placed the box of seals on the table. ”Let us begin simply. Lady Seraphine Valcair. What was her objective in the northern mines?”

Havelock leaned back in the chair. ”Protection.”

Morgana did not react.

Neither did Elizabeth.

The lack of reaction forced Havelock to continue.

”She believed there was something ancient in the lower layers. Something dangerous, unstable, and, if left in the hands of a weakened house like Arven, capable of causing a catastrophe.”

Damon made a low sound. ”That is the pretty version.”

Havelock looked at him. ”It is the version I was given.”

”And you believed it?”

”I believed Valcair paid well and that Arven was already breaking before Morgana took over. The real reason mattered less than the result.”

Morgana placed her hands on the table. ”Then you admit you tried to weaken Arven in order to hand our mines to Valcair.”

”I admit I participated in an operation to place the mines under external supervision.”

”Weak choice of words.”

”Precise choice of words.”

Elizabeth opened one of the recovered documents. ”Was the former Duchess also looking for the Underground Heart?”

Havelock hesitated. That hesitation was different from the others. Not calculated. Instinctive. As if the answer touched a part of the story he preferred not to visit.

”Yes,” he said at last. ”But she did not know what it was. She received fragmented instructions.”

”From whom?” Morgana asked.

”Intermediaries.”

”Useless,” Ingrivid said behind him.

Havelock threw her a look, but did not answer. Elizabeth merely turned another page, far too calm. ”Names.”

He took a deep breath. ”Soren Vale was one. A man named Darius Kelm delivered messages from Valcair. There was also a woman, Nera Solt, an expert in arcane prospecting. She was in the mines two years ago.”

Aria stopped writing for a second. ”Nera Solt appears in the accident records.”

Everyone looked at her.

Aria quickly flipped through the notebook. ”A private team died in a collapse in the third northern mine. Her name appears as an absent consultant in the final report. I thought it was strange because absent consultant is a very elegant way of saying ’she was involved, but we do not want to explain how.’”

Morgana looked at Havelock. ”What happened on that expedition?”

Havelock stayed quiet.

Damon felt the root pulse.

This time, smaller.

But it pulsed.

Ester placed two fingers against his arm. ”Control.”

He nodded.

Havelock noticed the reaction. ”They opened a lower gallery that was not on the maps. They found a chamber. At least, that is what I heard. After that, there was a collapse, several miners died, and the Duchess ordered the entrance sealed.”

Morgana went very quiet.

”How many miners?” she asked.

”I do not know.”

”Lie better.”

”Twenty-seven,” he said after an instant. ”Perhaps more.”

The room grew cold.

Not because of Damon.

Because of Morgana.

Her expression did not change much, but something hardened on her face. Twenty-seven men dead in a clandestine expedition ordered by her stepmother. Twenty-seven families perhaps deceived with false reports about an ordinary accident. Twenty-seven names buried beneath papers that Aria was only now beginning to understand.

”I want that list,” Morgana said.

Havelock nodded slowly. ”Soren may have it. Or Nera, if she is still alive.”

Elizabeth leaned in slightly. ”If?”

”After the expedition, she disappeared for almost a year. When she returned to work for Valcair, she was no longer the same. She was the one who told Lady Seraphine the Underground Heart could not be removed by ordinary miners.”

Damon raised his eyes. ”By whom could it?”

Havelock looked directly at him.

That was the first true answer before the words.

”By someone compatible.”

Ester tensed.

Morgana turned her face toward Damon.

Elizabeth showed no surprise, which probably meant she had been considering that possibility since the registry office.

Damon went still. ”Compatible with what?”

”Deep cold. Elemental core. A body that does not die in environments where common life stops.” Havelock spoke slowly, observing every reaction. ”Lady Seraphine was looking for someone like that. Perhaps she believed the former Duchess could produce a solution through rituals. Perhaps that is why she was so interested in research on blood, lineages, and spiritual control in Arven.”

The room grew heavy again.

Damon thought of his own coma.

Of the ice.

Of the elemental root.

Of the Celestial Ice Body.

He thought of the Duchess manipulating rituals, of the glacial power that had nearly destroyed him, of the coincidence that perhaps had never been coincidence. The former Duchess had been looking for something in the mines. Valcair too. Damon had appeared in Arven, survived the impossible, and awakened exactly like someone ”compatible.”

”I do not like this direction,” he said.

Ester answered immediately. ”No one does.”

Havelock, however, kept looking at Damon. ”You feel it, do you not?”

Damon did not answer.

Havelock smiled without humor. ”Then it is true.”

Morgana struck the table with her hand. The sound was dry, and Havelock finally looked away.

”You do not speak to him as if he were Valcair property.”

”I did not say that.”

”But you thought it.”

Havelock remained silent.

Morgana stood. ”You will write every name. Soren Vale, Darius Kelm, Nera Solt, the men in the Council, bought guards, mine administrators, anyone who touched those contracts. If you forget someone and I discover it later, your protection ends.”

”You offer me protection, then?”

”I offer you usefulness. Protection depends on how useful you are.”

Damon looked at Elizabeth. ”She is learning too fast.”

Elizabeth looked proud. ”I know.”

Ester murmured, ”Terrible influences.”

Aria continued writing quickly, but her face was serious. ”If the third northern mine was sealed after a clandestine expedition, the current maps are wrong. We need the old maps.”

Morgana nodded. ”Where?”

”Maybe in the mining archives. Maybe with the dismissed administrator. Maybe among the former Duchess’s belongings.”

The last option made Morgana go still.

Damon noticed. ”Her room?”

”Not only the room,” Morgana said. ”There is a private chamber we still have not opened.”

Elizabeth looked at her. ”You never mentioned that.”

”Because I did not want to open it.”

No one answered immediately. There was no need. Everyone understood, to a greater or lesser degree. The private chamber of the woman who destroyed her family, manipulated her father, nearly ruined Arven, and perhaps sent dozens of men to die in the mines. Opening that place was not merely investigation. It was entering her space again, moving what remained, accepting that the dead still had secrets waiting.

Ingrivid was the first to speak. ”You do not need to go alone.”

Morgana closed her eyes for a second. When she opened them, the decision was already made.

”I know.”

Damon tried to stand.

Ester placed a hand on his shoulder and pushed him back into the chair.

”Do not even think about it.”

”I did not even speak.”

”You are going to rest.”

”Morgana is going to open the Duchess’s chamber.”

”And you are going to rest.”

Morgana looked at him. ”She is right.”

Damon stared at Morgana, betrayed once again by reasonable people. ”Did you all plan this?”

”No. You are predictable.”

Aria raised her hand without taking her eyes off the notebook. ”I will go with Morgana. If there are documents, maps, or hidden compartments, I am useful.”

Elizabeth nodded. ”I am going too.”

Ingrivid spoke next. ”I go first.”

Morgana looked at Damon. ”You stay. The hour is over.”

He tried to argue, but his body helped the others. The exhaustion came like a sudden weight, and for one second his right shoulder failed. Ester felt it before he did and held his arm. Damon closed his mouth.

Morgana saw it.

Her irritation softened. ”You said we need to be faster. For that, you need not to fall.”

Damon slowly released the air. ”Fine.”

Ester blinked, surprised again.

Aria raised her head. ”He is very obedient today. I am worried.”

”I am choosing my battles,” Damon said.

Ester answered, ”Finally.”

Havelock was taken to a guarded room with paper, ink, and two guards to supervise the list of names. The meeting ended without ceremony. Morgana, Elizabeth, Aria, and Ingrivid headed toward the old wing of the mansion, where the chambers that had belonged to the Duchess were located. Damon remained still for a few seconds, watching them walk away.

Ester did not need to pull him.

He went to his room on his own.

On the way, the elemental root pulsed again.

Weaker.

More distant.

As if something in the north were breathing beneath tons of stone.

Damon stopped in the corridor.

Ester noticed immediately. ”What is it?”

He looked toward the windows, in the direction of the mountains he could not see from there.

”Nothing.”

”Damon.”

He breathed, controlled the cold, and began walking again.

”I only think the mines will not wait much longer.”