a meeting with lady diva

Morning in the Crimson Veil did not arrive so much as loosen the night’s grip.

Alice woke to a pale band of light spilling through the mill’s shutters, soft and dim and almost uncertain. It was not like waking in Ikos, where the sun eventually decided to become everyone’s problem at once. Here, daylight felt temporary. The Crimson Veil never seemed to have a full, proper day. It stretched itself between long periods of dusk, dawn, and twilight, all rose-gold edges and blue shadows, as if the whole dungeon hated committing to brightness. Even the fire in the hearth looked bolder than the sky outside.

For a few seconds, Alice did not move.

She lay beneath a red blanket on one of Elowen’s beds, staring up at the timber beams while the water wheel thumped steadily through the wall. Her body felt rested, but not fully settled. Too much had happened the night before. Maelin’s body in the river. Veyr and Tidus in the shadows. Elowen’s arms around her. Kiki and Luna in the stable.

Then the smell of breakfast reached her.

Warm bread. Soft cheese. Stewed fruit. Something nutty and toasted.

Alice’s stomach made an undignified sound.

Koko appeared beside the bed a moment later carrying a wooden tray with the solemn focus of someone transporting a sacred offering. She had ducked through the doorway without making a sound, which was impressive considering her size. Her green blue skin caught the hearthlight, and her expression softened when she saw Alice awake.

“Wife wakes,” Koko said.

Alice blinked up at her, still slow with sleep. “Morning?”

“Almost,” Koko said. “This place has weak morning.”

Alice let out a small laugh and pushed herself upright. “That’s one way to put it.”

Koko sat on the edge of the bed and placed the tray across Alice’s lap before she could reach for anything herself. Bread had been sliced thick and spread with something sweet. There were berries, pale cheese, and a cup of warm tea that smelled faintly floral. Koko watched her like she was waiting for approval.

Alice picked up a piece of bread. “This looks good.”

Koko nodded, satisfied. “Eat.”

Alice’s hand moved before her thoughts did.

She ate.

Then froze.

It was not that she had not wanted to eat. She had been hungry. The bread was warm and good, and the fruit spread was sweet enough to make her shoulders relax. But the speed of it caught her. The ease. Koko had said eat, and Alice had obeyed like the word had slipped straight past thought and gone into her bones.

Her fingers tightened around the bread.

Koko noticed instantly. “Wife?”

Alice swallowed. “I’m okay.”

Koko’s eyes narrowed slightly. Concerned.

Alice looked down at the tray, at her hands, at the pigtails spilling over her shoulders from where they had loosened in sleep. “I just... realized something.”

Koko waited.

Alice’s voice came out quieter. “Last night, when you told me to... I did. When you both tell me things now, my body kind of just... listens.”

Koko went very still.

Alice quickly looked up. “I’m not mad.”

Koko did not relax. “Should be angry if bad.”

“It isn’t bad,” Alice said, though saying it out loud made her face heat in a way she did not know what to do with. “It’s just real. More real than I think I let myself understand before.”

Koko’s hand curled against the blanket. “Addiction.”

Alice nodded. “The bond. The addiction. Whatever the System calls it. I chose not to suppress it. I chose to embrace it. I meant that.”

The words settled between them with the weight of a vow.

Alice took a breath and forced herself to keep going. “But I think I need to learn what that means now. Not just the nice parts. Not just the closeness or the comfort or the way I feel when you and Kiki are near me. The obedience part too. Because I think if either of you told me to do something, really told me, I don’t know if I could refuse.”

Koko’s expression changed.

Not triumph.

Fear.

That made Alice’s chest hurt.

“Koko,” Alice said softly.

Koko looked away. “We never make wife small.”

“I know.”

“Never use wife like bad chiefs use weak ones.”

“I know.”

Koko’s jaw tightened. “If bond makes wife obey, then our words must be careful.”

Alice reached out and touched her hand. “That’s what I mean. I trust you. I trust Kiki. I know neither of you would hurt me or abuse this on purpose. But it’s something we need to understand. Together.”

Koko turned her hand over and laced their fingers.

“Together,” she agreed.

Alice smiled, small and tired and honest.

Then Koko picked up a berry and held it to her lips.

Alice stared.

Koko stared back, perfectly serious.

Alice sighed. “You are testing me.”

“Feeding wife,” Koko said.

“You are absolutely testing me.”

“Eat.”

Alice ate the berry.

Koko’s mouth twitched.

Alice groaned. “This is going to be a problem.”

“We learn,” Koko said, then brushed her thumb lightly over Alice’s thigh. “Slowly.”

Outside, someone made a noise that sounded like a very dignified squeak trying to escape a very undignified situation.

Alice turned toward the window.

Koko’s expression became suspiciously neutral.

Alice narrowed her eyes. “What was that?”

“Stable.”

“I gathered.”

“Breakfast outside too.”

“Koko.”

Koko stood and offered Alice a hand. “Come see.”

Alice did not need to obey that one.

She wanted to.

That did not make it less embarrassing.

She followed Koko out into the pale morning, blanket wrapped around her shoulders against the chill. The air outside smelled of damp straw, low fire, river mist, and something unmistakably Kiki. Alice felt the pull of it immediately, warm and familiar, but this morning it did not drag her under. Maybe because Koko’s hand was around hers. Maybe because they had talked. Maybe because wanting something was easier when she was not pretending she did not.

The stable doors stood open.

Inside, Lady Lunaneska of the Silver Vale, Sixth Paladin of the Cathedral Oaths, terrifying holy warrior and possible A-rank battlefield disaster, stood in the clean straw with her face so red Alice could see it even in the dim light.

Kiki stood beside her with a brush.

A large one.

Luna’s armor had been removed for comfort, leaving her in soft underlayers and a blanket draped over her shoulders. Her long silver braid had been undone, and Kiki was brushing her hair with slow, careful strokes, treating it like some sacred war-banner that also happened to belong to a very embarrassed horse. Luna’s unicorn half had been groomed too. Her pale coat shone where Kiki had worked through it, and her tail had been combed out into a smooth fall that looked unfairly elegant.

Kiki looked deeply pleased with herself.

“Pretty pony,” she said, brushing another section of Luna’s hair.

Luna made a small, strangled sound. “Please do not call me that where others can hear.”

Alice stood in the doorway, staring.

Kiki glanced over and smiled brightly. “Wife awake.”

Alice pointed slowly. “What is happening?”

“Kiki has decided,” Koko said dryly, “that Lady Lunaneska is her mount now.”

Luna covered her face with both hands.

Kiki nodded proudly. “My mount.”

“I am not your mount,” Luna whispered.

Kiki considered this, then stroked the brush down Luna’s hair again. “My pretty pony.”

Luna’s shoulders trembled.

Alice honestly could not tell if it was outrage, humiliation, or delight.

Given Luna, probably all three.

Kiki reached into a small basket and pulled out a carrot.

Alice’s mouth fell open.

“No.”

Kiki held it in front of Luna. “Toy eats.”

Luna stared at the carrot like it was a holy test designed by a cruel god.

“Kiki,” Alice said, voice climbing. “You are not hand-feeding the paladin a carrot.”

Kiki looked at her. “But she wants.”

Luna made a noise so faint it barely qualified as speech. “That is not the issue.”

Koko leaned closer to Alice. “She wants.”

Alice looked at Luna.

Luna did not meet her eyes.

That was answer enough.

Kiki held the carrot closer. Luna’s lips parted, then stopped. Her face burned crimson. For one suspended second, she looked like she might invoke every Cathedral oath she had ever taken just to survive the shame of it.

Then she took a careful bite.

Kiki’s expression went soft and victorious.

“Good mount.”

Luna’s eyes fluttered shut with absolute mortification.

Alice’s stomach twisted.

Not with disgust.

That would have been simpler.

She felt jealousy.

Hot, sharp, humiliating jealousy.

It hit her so unexpectedly that she took half a step back. Koko noticed instantly, her hand tightening around Alice’s. Alice tried to school her face, but Koko had already seen. Kiki was focused on Luna, brushing her hair again, murmuring something low and pleased that made Luna’s ears flick.

Alice swallowed.

She had agreed to open.

She had meant it.

She had even been curious, maybe excited, when it was all theoretical and funny and wrapped in the safety of all three of them deciding together. But now Kiki had a new toy. A girlfriend, maybe. A pretty pony she could brush and tease and feed carrots to. Luna looked embarrassed and blissful and impossibly beautiful in the weak dawn, and Alice hated how much she wanted to be happy for them.

She also hated that some small, ridiculous part of her wondered what it would feel like to be the one held still and fussed over like that.

Not pony.

Probably not pony.

Almost definitely not pony.

But the attention.

The softness.

The private world Kiki had made around Luna while Alice had been sleeping.

That stung.

Koko stepped in front of her slightly, blocking her view without making it obvious. “Wife.”

Alice blinked up at her. “I’m fine.”

Koko gave her the look.

Alice deflated. “I am not fine.”

Koko’s expression softened.

Alice kept her voice low, not wanting Kiki or Luna to hear yet. “I’m trying. I really am. I said I was okay with open, and I am. I think. I want to be. I want Kiki to be happy. I want Luna to feel wanted if she wants that. I don’t want to be possessive and weird.”

Koko brushed a thumb under Alice’s eye, though Alice had not realized tears had gathered there.

“Jealous is not evil,” Koko said.

Alice let out a shaky breath. “It feels ugly.”

“It is feeling. Not action.”

Alice looked past Koko at Kiki and Luna. Kiki was now carefully working through Luna’s tail, while Luna stared at the stable wall like it held the secrets of the universe and her personal dignity had died somewhere in the straw. Kiki looked happy. Not replacing-Alice happy. Not leaving happy. Just happy.

Alice wanted to be happy too.

She really did.

“I don’t know how to do this,” Alice admitted.

Koko’s hand moved to the back of her neck, warm and grounding. “Then learn. Same as fighting. Same as healing. Same as pigtails.”

Alice gave a watery little laugh. “Pigtails are not a skill tree.”

“They are courage.”

Alice hated how much that helped.

Koko leaned closer, lowering her voice until it was just for Alice. “Kiki plays with pony. I watch wife.”

Alice looked up.

Koko’s golden eyes held hers, steady and intent. “Sister busy. I give mount care.”

Alice’s face heated despite herself. “You do not need to compensate for her.”

“I want.”

The simplicity of it hit harder than any argument could have.

Koko guided Alice back toward the fire pit outside the stable, where a second tray waited on a low crate. More bread. More fruit. A cup of tea already steaming. Koko sat first, then pulled Alice down beside her, tucking the blanket more securely around her shoulders.

From inside the stable, Kiki called, “Wife should eat more.”

Alice’s hand immediately reached toward the bread.

She froze.

Koko caught her wrist gently.

Not stopping her.

Just making sure she noticed.

Alice stared at her own hand.

Then took the bread anyway, deliberately this time.

“I wanted to,” she said.

Koko nodded. “Good.”

Alice took a bite, heart still tender.

Inside the stable, Luna made another mortified sound as Kiki apparently discovered a tangle in her tail and announced that her mount needed better grooming discipline. Alice winced, then smiled despite herself, then felt jealous again, then felt stupid for feeling jealous, then reminded herself that feelings were not actions.

It was exhausting.

Marriage was exhausting.

Koko seemed to know exactly where Alice’s thoughts had gone, because she leaned in and pressed a soft kiss against her temple.

“Wife is first,” Koko said.

Alice’s chest tightened. “That’s not fair to Luna.”

“Not rank,” Koko said. “Truth. Wife is wife. Luna maybe party. Maybe lover. Maybe more later. But wife is root.”

Alice looked down at the bread in her hands.

Root.

That sounded better than first.

Less like a competition. More like something everything else had to grow around carefully, without tearing it up.

“I can try,” Alice said.

Koko nodded. “Trying enough.”

Kiki stepped out of the stable a moment later, brushing straw from her hands, looking entirely too proud of herself. Behind her, Luna followed with her hair shining, her coat groomed, and her face still bright red. She looked beautiful. Humiliated. Peaceful in a way Alice had not seen before.

Alice felt the jealousy pinch again.

This time, she breathed through it.

Kiki looked at Alice, and some of her pride softened into concern. “Wife sad?”

Alice considered lying.

Then remembered the rules.

“A little jealous,” she said.

Kiki stopped.

Luna looked stricken.

Alice lifted a hand quickly. “Not angry. Not stopping anything. Just... jealous. I’m figuring it out.”

Kiki crossed the space between them slowly, stopping in front of Alice rather than grabbing her. Waiting.

Alice noticed that too.

Then she reached up.

Kiki immediately knelt.

Alice touched her cheek. “You should have told me before deciding Luna was your mount.”

Kiki nodded. “Yes.”

“And maybe ask Luna whether she wants to be called that somewhere private before announcing it to breakfast.”

Luna made a very small sound.

Kiki glanced back at her. “Do you want private?”

Luna’s mouth opened.

Closed.

Her face went so red it was answer enough.

Kiki nodded solemnly. “Private mount.”

Alice choked.

Koko looked away, shoulders shaking.

Luna covered her face.

“I hate all of you,” Luna whispered.

“No,” Koko said.

Luna’s fingers parted just enough to show one embarrassed eye. “No.”

Alice laughed.

The jealousy did not vanish.

But it loosened.

Kiki leaned forward and pressed her forehead gently to Alice’s. “Wife root,” she said, having apparently heard enough of Koko’s words to steal them. “Kiki stupid sometimes. But wife root.”

Alice closed her eyes.

“You are very stupid sometimes.”

“Yes.”

“And I love you.”

Kiki’s smile warmed against her. “Yes.”

Koko handed Alice another berry. “Eat.”

Alice looked at it.

Then at Koko.

Then she opened her mouth because she wanted to, and Koko placed it on her tongue with gentle fingers.

Kiki, apparently deciding this was now a shared duty of great cultural importance, immediately leaned in with another berry pinched between her fingers. Alice barely had time to object before Kiki pressed it to her lips, smiling with that warm, possessive pride that made Alice’s thoughts go soft around the edges. Alice opened her mouth again, more embarrassed this time, and Kiki pushed the berry in with far too much care and far too much confidence, her finger brushing over Alice’s tongue before withdrawing.

Alice froze halfway through swallowing.

Because Tidus was sitting across from her.

At the little table near the mill door, wrapped in a shawl and holding a steaming cup of morning tea between both hands, Tidus stared very intently at the surface of his drink. His mismatched eyes, were lowered so hard it looked painful. His ears were pink. His shoulders had drawn up nearly to his chin, and he seemed to be trying to become smaller with every passing second.

Alice’s soul left her body for the second time that morning.

“Oh gods,” she whispered.

Kiki blinked. “What?”

Alice swallowed the berry with great difficulty. “There is a person here.”

Kiki looked at Tidus. “Yes.”

“You just put your finger in my mouth.”

“Yes.”

“In front of him.”

Kiki’s expression suggested she did not understand why that mattered. Koko understood exactly why that mattered, which was worse, because she looked amused.

Tidus made a tiny sound into his tea. “It is fine.”

“It is absolutely not fine,” Alice said, face burning so hot she could feel it in her pigtails. “I am so sorry.”

Tidus shook his head quickly. “No, please, you are guests. I did not mean to stare. I was not staring. I was looking at tea. Very fascinating tea.”

The words should have made Alice laugh.

They did not.

Because once the first wave of embarrassment passed, something worse took its place.

Tidus was not just embarrassed because he had seen something intimate. He was embarrassed because Alice had something he was not allowed to have. She sat there in the open morning, between her wives, being fed fruit by women who adored her so obviously that even strangers could see it. She wore pigtails as a public declaration of desire. Kiki and Koko touched her without shame, without hiding, without flinching when someone noticed.

And by Aurelian standards, there was no clever loophole to make it acceptable.

Kiki and Koko were hermaphrodites, yes. But that did not make the relationship safe in a culture that sorted bodies by purpose and desire by bloodline. To people like the ones who raised Tidus, Alice’s marriage was not respectable. It was not properly procreative. It was not tidy, not holy, not approved.

And yet she had it.

Openly.

Messily.

Ridiculously.

Tidus had Veyr only in shadows.

Alice’s chest tightened.

She looked at him, at the way he held the cup too tightly, at the flush that would not leave his face, at the tired sadness tucked beneath the embarrassment.

The question left her before she could make it gentle.

“Do you love him?”

Tidus went perfectly still.

Kiki’s eyes sharpened.

Koko’s amusement vanished.

For one second, the only sound was the river wheel turning behind the wall and Luna outside making a faint mortified noise as she tried to pretend she had not heard anything through the open stable doors.

Tidus looked toward the kitchen.

Then toward the back door.

Then toward the stairs.

His voice dropped to a whisper. “My mother can never know.”

Alice’s heart sank.

Tidus realized what he had said a heartbeat later.

His mouth opened. Closed. The cup trembled in his hands.

“Oh,” he whispered.

Alice said nothing.

She did not need to.

Tidus set the tea down with shaking fingers and bowed his head so low his orange-gold hair slipped forward, hiding most of his face. For a moment, he looked as if he might pull all the words back inside himself and lock them away again.

Then his shoulders shook.

“Yes,” he said, so softly Alice almost missed it. “Yes. I love him.”

The confession seemed to break something in him. His hands covered his face, and when he spoke again, the words came uneven and wet.

“I know what he is. I know what this village is. I know what everyone says about him. I know what they would say about me if they knew. I know it is forbidden. I know it is shameful. I know every doctrine word for it. Sterile. Corrupt. Selfish. Sin. Desire that bears no fruit. I have heard them all my life.”

Alice felt Kiki go very still beside her.

Koko’s hand settled on Alice’s back, warm and grounding.

Tidus laughed once, but it broke immediately. “And still, when he looks at me, I feel as if I exist. Not as my mother’s son. Not as Riverward’s mill boy. Not as a body meant for a wife and children I do not want. Me.”

His voice cracked on the last word.

Alice’s throat tightened.

Tidus wiped at his eyes with the heel of his palm, ashamed even of crying. “He has never asked me to say it. He has never forced me. He has never even promised me anything. That almost makes it worse. He is careful because he knows what it would cost me. And I hate him a little for being careful.”

Kiki frowned. “Careful can hurt.”

Tidus looked up at her, startled.

Kiki’s expression was blunt and strangely gentle. “Not cruel. Still hurt.”

Tidus’s face crumpled again. “Yes.”

Alice leaned forward, elbows on her knees. “Tidus…”

He shook his head. “There is no future. Not a real one. He is a lord. I am...” He gave a helpless little gesture at himself. “This. A miller’s son. A man who cannot even tell his own mother where his heart has gone.”

“Your mother loves you,” Alice said.

“I know,” Tidus whispered. “That is why I cannot bear losing her.”

Alice had no answer for that.

The mill felt too warm suddenly.

Tidus stared down at his hands. “Sometimes I think... maybe it does not have to be forever, Merely just as I draw breath.”

Alice went cold.

Koko’s hand stiffened against her back.

Tidus continued, voice distant and trembling. “Elves do not wither the way humans do, but we still die. Accidents. Illness. Violence. Time, eventually, in ways even we cannot outrun. And when I pass, if he still wants me, perhaps he could raise me. Make me one of his attendants. Then I could stand beside him openly. No wife expected. No children demanded. No doctrine to obey. Just service. Loyalty. Eternity, maybe.”

Alice stood up so fast the chair scraped backward.

Tidus flinched.

“No,” Alice said.

The word came out sharper than she meant it to.

Tidus stared at her, eyes wide and wet.

Alice forced herself to breathe, but her heart was hammering now. She knew enough about vampires to know the ugly rule. A living person did not simply become one. A corpse could be raised. A dead body could be remade. There were rituals and permissions and bloodlines and all sorts of poetic nonsense vampires used to make it sound less awful, but the shape of it was simple.

Dead first.

Changed after.

And Tidus was talking about it like a hope.

Like a rescue.

Like the only door left.

Alice’s hands curled at her sides. “Do not talk like the only way you get to love him is by dying first.”

Tidus’s face went white. “That is not what I had intended by my words my lady.”

“It is close enough.”

Kiki rose beside Alice, not threatening Tidus, but present. Koko stood too, slower, eyes fixed on the boy with painful understanding.

Tidus hugged himself. “You do not understand.”

Alice laughed once, breathless and almost angry. “No. I think I understand too much.”

Her voice shook.

She hated that it shook.

“I know what it is like to be told your body makes everything complicated. I know what it is like to be someone people want to file away as inconvenient. I know what it is like to love someone the world thinks you should be ashamed of. I know what it's like to stand on an edge and think the ground is beautiful.” Her eyes burned. “I walked through a city yesterday while people stared at my wives like they were animals. I put my hair up this way knowing exactly what people would think. I married them anyway.”

Tidus stared at her pigtails like he was seeing them for the first time.

Alice touched one of the loosened ties unconsciously. “I’m scared all the time. I’m jealous and confused and addicted and married and apparently bad at every conversation that matters. But I am not going to let the world decide that love only counts when it looks convenient.”

Koko’s hand slid into hers.

Kiki’s voice came low from her other side. “Wife speaks war words.”

Alice did not look away from Tidus.

“I don’t know your laws,” she said. “I don’t know your church, or your doctrine, or every terrible thing people here would say if they knew. I don’t know how to fix this today. But I know this: there is always another way before death. Always. And if there isn’t, then someone is lying or someone is building the walls too high.”

Tidus shook his head, tears slipping down his cheeks. “You cannot fight an entire culture.”

Alice’s smile was shaky and fierce. “Fucking watch me.”

The words surprised even her.

They came from somewhere deep. Somewhere raw. Somewhere that sounded like Maria at her most impossible, standing behind a bar and daring the world to touch what was hers. Somewhere that sounded like Alice herself after finally deciding she did not want to apologize for loving Kiki and Koko anymore.

“I will fight for you,” Alice said, quieter now but no less intense. “And for him, if he deserves it. I will help you find a way that does not require you to become a corpse first. I don’t care if that means paperwork, blackmail, quests, finding a loophole, yelling at a priest, or making Dice so entertained he throws a title at the problem.”

A faint chime rang in Alice’s ears.

[System Notice]

Dice is listening.

(Dice: Yelling at priests? Vampire yaoi romance? Murder mystery? Orc wife drama? Oh, Alice, you are feeding me a banquet.)

Alice squeezed her eyes shut. “Not now.”

Tidus blinked. “What?”

“Nothing. The worst god in existence is being nosy.”

Kiki nodded solemnly. “Dice likes wife chaos.”

Koko looked at Tidus. “Wife is serious. She fights stupid walls.”

Tidus pressed both hands over his mouth, trying to hold himself together and failing. “Why?”

Alice blinked.

“Why would you Aid me in this?” he asked, voice breaking. “You met me yesterday.”

Alice looked at him, really looked at him. The delicate face. The mismatched eyes. The way his whole body seemed built around a secret too heavy for him to carry forever.

Then she looked toward the window, where she could see Kiki’s fire outside the stable.

“Because someone should,” Alice said.

That was all.

Tidus bent forward and sobbed.

Not prettily. Not softly. The kind of crying that came from years of locked doors opening all at once. Alice moved before she could overthink it and crouched in front of him, not hugging him immediately, not touching without permission.

“Can I?” she asked.

Tidus nodded into his hands.

Alice wrapped her arms around him.

He collapsed against her, shaking. He was light, all sharp shoulders and trembling breath, and Alice held him like Elowen had held her the night before. Kiki and Koko stood close, guarding the moment without intruding on it.

For a while, there were no answers.

Only the river wheel.

The fire.

The cold, strange morning that was barely morning at all.

And Alice, holding a boy who loved a vampire lord and had somehow convinced himself that death was the only future where he could feel joy.

When Tidus finally pulled back, his face was blotchy and embarrassed. “My mother really cannot know.”

Alice nodded. “Then we don’t tell her. Not until you choose to.”

He swallowed. “And Veyr?”

Alice looked toward the village, toward the manor on the hill hidden by pale dawn.

“We talk to him,” she said.

Tidus panicked immediately. “No, please, you cannot just storm up to him and demand he solve my life.”

Alice hesitated.

Kiki tilted her head. “Why not?”

Koko nodded. “Seems direct.”

Tidus made a distressed sound.

Alice sighed. “Okay. Fine. We do not storm. We... approach strategically.”

Koko looked pleased. “Better.”

Kiki looked disappointed. “Less fun.”

Alice pointed at her. “No storming vampire lords before breakfast.”

Kiki frowned. “After breakfast?”

“We’ll see.”

That got the smallest laugh out of Tidus.

Tiny.

Fragile.

But real.

Alice sat back on her heels and let herself breathe.

Elowen returned a few minutes later with more tea and a quiet look. Tidus kept his head low, his eyes red from crying but steadier than before, and Alice pretended very hard that she had not just declared war on an entire culture before finishing a slice of buttered bread. Kiki and Koko, for their part, acted as if Alice threatening doctrine itself was a normal morning development. Which, given their lives lately, maybe it was.

They ate. They cleaned up. They gathered their things.

And then Kiki saddled Lady Lunaneska.

Alice stood outside the mill with her staff in one hand and stared across the stable yard as if staring hard enough might make the scene rearrange itself into something less insane.

It did not.

Luna stood in the pale Crimson Veil morning, fully groomed, fully armored again, and fully fitted with tack. Kiki had somehow found or assembled a riding saddle wide enough to sit properly against Luna’s equine back without pinching beneath the plates of her armor. Leather straps ran neat and secure across Luna’s chest and barrel, practical enough that Alice could not even pretend Kiki had done a bad job. A bridle framed Luna’s face, polished dark leather against her flushed cheeks, and a simple snaffle bit rested in her mouth with reins falling back into Kiki’s hands.

Luna’s face was an impossible color.

Her silver hair shone from Kiki’s earlier brushing, pulled back but not braided as tightly as before, and her long pale tail swept behind her in slow, restless motions that absolutely did not match the rigid dignity she was trying to project. Her elf ears were the real betrayal. They kept flicking. Forward when Kiki adjusted the reins. Back when Tidus glanced at her. Sideways when Alice looked too long. Then forward again the moment Kiki called her pretty pony under her breath.

Alice covered her mouth.

Koko, standing beside her, looked completely unsurprised. “Sister committed.”

“That is one word for it,” Alice whispered.

Kiki swung herself up into the saddle with the casual confidence of someone mounting a war beast. She settled there easily, one hand on the reins, the other resting against Luna’s shoulder with an affection that was not subtle in the slightest. Her shirt was one of the graphic ones they had bought back in Ikos, dark fabric stretched over her strong frame, the skull design on the front still meaningless to her but apparently beloved. Cargo pants, heavy boots, and a proud grin completed the picture.

She looked absurdly happy.

Luna, unable to speak around the bit, made a soft sound that could have been protest if her tail had not swished with humiliating delight.

Kiki leaned forward and patted the side of Luna’s neck. “Good mount.”

Luna’s ears flicked so hard Alice worried one might detach.

Tidus, standing beside his mother with a basket under one arm, stared for a moment too long before turning red and looking at the river wheel as if mills were suddenly fascinating. Elowen, to her credit, only lifted one eyebrow.

Alice took one step closer. “Luna, are you actually okay with this?”

Luna went even redder.

Kiki immediately loosened her grip on the reins and sat straighter, waiting.

That, at least, mattered.

They had rules now. Not perfect rules. Not finished rules. But real ones. Kiki did not pull, did not command, did not laugh over Alice’s question. She let Luna answer in the only way she could.

Luna closed her eyes, suffering visibly through the shame of being perceived, then gave one stiff nod.

A beat.

Then another, smaller nod.

Koko hummed. “She likes.”

Luna made a muffled sound of despair.

Alice rubbed her forehead. “Okay. Then... okay.”

It was not really okay in Alice’s head yet. Not fully. Her emotions were still moving around like furniture dragged across a floor. Jealousy scraped. Embarrassment bumped into curiosity. Arousal, Burned like a house fire. But beneath all of that was a newer thought, one she had not expected to feel so clearly.

Maybe this was Luna’s pigtails.

Not literally. Gods, not literally. But the shape of it felt familiar. Alice had tied her hair high and walked through judgment because hiding her love had begun to feel worse than being stared at. Luna had spent her life being treated as a holy mistake, too sacred to mock openly and too uncomfortable to accept honestly. Her body did not fit the categories Aurelians loved. Virgin elf purity and unicorn holiness had somehow made someone they still treated like an abomination when she stood too close, breathed too loudly, wanted too obviously.

This world hated Luna’s body almost as much as it hated Kiki and Koko’s.

Maybe more politely.

Which might have been worse.

And now Luna was standing in a stable yard, blushing herself half to death, openly wearing the thing that made her want visible. Not because she was helpless. Not because Kiki had forced it. Because some tangled part of her had chosen humiliation over denial.

Alice looked down at her own pigtails, loosened from sleep but still tied.

(Oh. Damn it. I get it.)

She did not have to fully understand Luna’s desires to respect the courage in showing them.

Kiki clicked her tongue softly, not hard enough to command, more like testing a sound. Luna stepped forward anyway, hooves careful on the packed earth. Kiki’s smile turned radiant.

“My pretty pony walks good.”

Luna’s whole face tried to vanish into itself.

Koko leaned toward Alice. “Wife thinking hard.”

Alice sighed. “I think everyone in this party is becoming a public scandal one accessory at a time.”

Koko looked pleased. “Good.”

“That was not praise.”

“Still good.”

They set off toward Lord Veyr’s manor while the Crimson Veil morning hung pale and uncertain around them.

The walk took longer than Alice expected. The manor had looked close from the village green, but hills were liars. The path curved up through black cypress, thorned roses, and pale grass silvered by dew. Riverward shrank behind them, the mill wheel turning slowly in the distance, the empty boat still tied near the bank as a reminder that the murder was not the only problem waiting to be solved. The air smelled like wet leaves, old stone, and roses that had no business blooming in such shadow.

Kiki rode beside the party rather than ahead, clearly making a point of keeping Luna visible. Luna tried to hold her head high, but every time a villager glanced from a doorway or field path, her ears twitched and her tail brushed back and forth like a banner of betrayal. She could not say a word. The bit made sure of that. But her body was loud. Embarrassed, yes. Horribly. Catastrophically. But also bright with a strange, shivering joy she could not quite hide.

Alice watched her for a while, then looked away before the jealousy could sharpen again.

Koko noticed anyway.

“Wife jealous still?”

Alice exhaled. “A little.”

Koko walked close enough that their shoulders touched. “But not mad?”

“No.” Alice glanced back at Luna and Kiki. Kiki had leaned down to murmur something near Luna’s ear. Luna’s hooves stumbled once, then corrected quickly, her face going scarlet. Alice felt the pinch again, but this time it did not make her feel ugly. It just hurt. “I’m not mad.”

“Good.”

“I’m trying to be supportive.”

Koko nodded. “Supportive can be jealous.”

“That sounds fake.”

“It is true.”

Alice looked at her.

Koko’s expression was steady, serious in the way she got when she was saying something simple enough to matter. “If sister happy, wife wants happy. If wife hurts, wife hurts. Both true.”

Alice swallowed. “Both true.”

“Do not pretend one eats other.”

Alice let out a small laugh. “You’re getting very good at emotional advice.”

Koko’s mouth curved. “I am wise more often than Kiki.”

From Luna’s back, Kiki called, “Lies.”

“You cannot hear us,” Koko called back.

“More Lies.”

Luna made a muffled sound that might have been laughter.

Alice smiled despite herself.

That helped.

The path climbed higher, and the manor slowly revealed itself through the trees. It was less enormous than Alice had imagined, but somehow more intimidating for it. Not a castle. Not a gothic monstrosity with lightning striking behind it, though she was fairly sure Veyr would have arranged that if given enough notice. The manor was long and elegant, built from dark stone and pale trim, with tall narrow windows shuttered against the weak morning light. Crimson rose vines climbed one wall in controlled, thorny patterns. The roof was steep. The chimneys were thin. Black iron lanterns hung unlit beside the main gate.

Alice stared.

“villain lair,” she said.

Koko nodded. “Very villain.”

Kiki, from Luna’s back, looked up appreciatively. “Good villain lair.”

Luna made a muffled protest.

Alice glanced at her. “Sorry. Historic residence.”

Luna nodded once, grateful.

Kiki patted her neck. “Pretty pony likes proper words.”

Luna’s elf ears flattened in mortified agreement.

Two vampire servants stood at the gate. Both wore black and burgundy livery with silver clasps at the throat, their eyes red and calm. They did not react to Kiki riding Luna.

That made Alice suspicious.

Not because she wanted them to stare, but because not reacting felt like a servant skill taken to a disturbing level. One of them opened the gate before the party stopped. The other bowed.

“Miss Alice,” he said. “Lady Lunaneska of the Silver Vale. Honored companions.”

Luna’s eyes widened slightly around the bit.

Alice glanced at her, then at the servant. “You are extremely composed.”

“My lord values composure.”

“I bet he does.”

The servant’s gaze shifted briefly toward Kiki in the saddle, then back to Alice with no visible judgment. “Lord Veyr is within the morning parlor. He expected you.”

“Of course he did,” Alice muttered.

Koko looked toward the upper windows. “Vampire lord watches roads?”

“The manor watches many things,” the servant said.

“That is not creepy at all,” Alice said.

“It is intended to be reassuring.”

“It missed.”

The servant bowed again, which somehow made it worse.

Alice straightened, remembering at the last second that she had a legitimate reason to be here other than meddling in forbidden vampire romance and processing her feelings about her wife’s new pony paladin girlfriend.

“We need to speak with Lord Veyr about the investigation,” she said. “The empty boat we found last night belonged to the upstream blood farm. Lady diva’s seal was on it. Missing shipment, cooling racks empty. That seems connected.”

That got a reaction.

Very small.

But there.

The servant lowered his chin. “Lady Diva of the Moonlight Blade.”

Alice blinked. “That is the full title?”

“It is the title she prefers.”

Koko leaned toward Alice. “Sounds dangerous.”

“She probably made sure of that,” Alice said.

The servant’s mouth moved in what might have been the ghost of a smile before discipline murdered it. “Lady Diva holds the Moonreach estates upriver and controls several blood routes feeding the city.”

Luna shifted beneath Kiki, ears flicking forward. Even unable to speak, the sudden alertness in her posture was clear.

Alice nodded. “Then we definitely need that meeting.”

The servant hesitated. “Lady Diva is not known for granting casual audiences.”

“Good thing this is a murder investigation involving stolen blood shipments and a village about to blame its own lord,” Alice said.

Kiki grinned proudly. “Wife speaks sharp.”

The servant looked at Alice’s pigtails, then at Kiki, then at Luna, and wisely decided not to comment on any part of that.

“I will inform Lord Veyr,” he said.

He stepped aside.

The gate opened wider.

As they entered the manor grounds, Alice glanced back once. Riverward lay below them, small and pale in the weak morning, the mill wheel still turning by the river.

The manor doors opened before them, tall and dark and dramatic.

Veyr really did need practice being less villainous.

The interior did not help his case.

Alice stepped inside with Koko at her side, Kiki still mounted proudly on Luna just behind them, and immediately had to admit that the manor was beautiful. The entrance hall was high-ceilinged and narrow enough to guide the eye forward, the walls paneled in dark wood polished until they reflected the candlelight in long amber streaks. Blue roses sat in black vases along the walls, their petals too vivid to look natural, and silver sconces held tall candles whose flames burned with a faint red core. It was not truly dark. In fact, there were candles everywhere. But the light never quite reached the corners. It softened there, dimmed there, as if the house wanted shadows for decoration.

A vampire servant led them through the hall without comment, his steps silent across the dark carpet. He did not look back when Kiki and Luna entered. He did not even react when Luna’s hooves clicked against the polished floor and echoed up into the rafters with the mortifying authority of a horse entering a noble parlor. Luna’s ears flattened against her silver hair, and her tail flicked once in pure embarrassment. Kiki leaned down and patted her shoulder.

“Good inside walking,” Kiki whispered.

Luna closed her eyes like she was attempting to transcend her mortal suffering.

Alice had to look away before she laughed.

The servant brought them to a set of double doors and opened them with another bow. Beyond lay a meeting room that was far too large to be called a parlor and far too intentionally arranged to be anything but a stage. A long dining table took up most of the floor, black wood set with silver plates, folded napkins, crystal glasses, covered dishes, and several tall decanters filled with liquids Alice chose not to identify. Candelabras ran down the center of the table in a line of red and gold flame, casting enough light to see by but not enough to make the room feel safe. At the far end, raised on a short dais, stood a massive throne carved from dark wood and black stone. Behind it was an enormous window, almost the entire height of the wall, filled with pale morning light.

The throne blocked most of it.

Its high back cut a dark shape against the window, turning the sunlight into a halo around the empty seat. Alice stared at it for a moment and felt the full theatrical weight of the arrangement press down on her.

“He has a throne,” she said flatly.

Koko nodded. “Of course.”

Kiki looked delighted. “Good throne.”

Luna made another muffled protest, though this one sounded almost like agreement against her will.

Alice pointed at the throne. “No one who owns that gets to complain when people call their house a villain lair.”

A soft rush of wings answered her.

The candles guttered all at once.

A cloud of bats poured through the room from the side hall, black bodies flickering between candelabras and silverware, circling the dais in a spiral so precise Alice could practically hear Veyr enjoying himself. The swarm collapsed into smoke over the throne. Smoke became silk. Silk became Lord Veyr Alisandre, seated comfortably with one leg crossed over the other, cane resting against the armrest, red eyes bright with morning amusement.

“Good morning, Miss Alice,” he said. “Lady Lunaneska of the Silver Vale. Honored companions. I trust the mill provided better hospitality than my villain lair could have managed.”

Alice stared at him. “You heard that.”

“My manor watches many things.”

“That is not making it better.”

“No,” Veyr said. “But it remains true.”

He gestured toward the table. “Please. Sit. Eat if you wish. Drink if you are brave. Refuse if you believe I have poisoned the jam, though I assure you I have more elegant methods of assassination than breakfast preserves.”

Alice looked at the covered dishes.

Koko leaned toward her. “Do not eat villain jam.”

“I wasn’t planning to.”

Kiki finally dismounted from Luna, not because anyone told her to, but because the dining room was clearly not built for mounted social negotiation. She slipped down with a soft thud, reins still in hand, and helped Luna stand to one side of the table. Luna’s face was crimson around the bit, but her posture remained painfully formal, which made the whole image somehow worse. Alice caught Veyr’s eyes flicking once over the bridle and saddle, merely with the quick assessment of a man who collected secrets as naturally as breathing.

To his credit, he said nothing.

That restraint probably cost him dearly.

Alice decided to reward it by getting to the point.

“Lady Diva’s shipment was stolen,” she said. “We found the boat near the mill last night. Empty racks. Cooling runes still active. No blood left.”

Veyr’s smile thinned. “Yes. I was informed.”

“By who?” Alice asked.

The question landed cleanly.

Veyr’s fingers rested lightly against the head of his cane. “By the river.”

“That is not an answer.”

“No,” Veyr said pleasantly.

Alice opened her mouth to argue.

A girl’s voice came from the side hall before she could.

“Oh, Veyr, stop being difficult. You’re only charming when people don’t know you yet.”

Alice turned.

A young woman stepped out from the same side corridor the bats had used, though she used her own feet instead of making a production of it. She had short turquoise hair that curved neatly around her face, with darker shadows near the roots and lighter blue at the ends, and amber-brown eyes bright with mischief. She wore a tailored white suit cut sharply enough to look like armor made from fashion, black trim at the collar and cuffs, and a blue rose pinned at her throat with a black thorn brooch curled beneath it. The symbol was elegant and deliberate.

Alice had seen enough religious symbols in the Crimson Veil by now to recognize that it meant something.

Luna stiffened beside her, ears flicking forward.

Veyr’s expression changed by half a fraction. “Lady Diva of the Moonlight Blade.”

The girl smiled brilliantly. “There it is. Full title. Proper respect. Try not to sound so wounded by it.”

Alice blinked.

This was Lady Diva?

The name had made Alice expect someone taller. Or darker. Or at least someone who arrived surrounded by thunder and violin music. Instead, Lady Diva looked like she had stepped out of a noble dueling school, won an argument before entering the room, and was now waiting for everyone else to catch up.

Her personality filled the room before her body did.

She clasped her hands behind her back and swayed slightly on her heels, looking from Alice to Koko, then to Kiki, then to Luna. Her gaze lingered on Luna’s bridle for just long enough to register, then she smiled as if the world had offered her a private joke.

“My,” Diva said. “Veyr, your morning guests are much more interesting.”

Kiki looked pleased. “Yes.”

Koko nodded once, accepting this description.

Behind Lady Diva, another figure emerged from the hallway.

Alice’s hand tightened around her staff on instinct.

It was a werewolf.

Pure white.

Not gray. Not silver. White, like snow under moonlight, with thick fur, broad shoulders, and a muzzle full of teeth that could have torn through a person’s throat without effort. He stood taller than even luna, powerfully built in the unnatural way werewolves were when fully transformed, every muscle shaped for violence. A simple dark loincloth covered him, and a silver collar circled his throat, fitted with a ring at the front. His claws clicked softly against the floor as he stepped into place behind Diva.

And then he bowed his head.

Docile.

Attentive.

Almost gentle.

Alice stared.

Her mind threw the forest at her for half a second. Moonlight. Teeth. Eyes in the dark. Werewolves rushing the camp while she was exhausted and half-dressed and certain she was going to die. Her pulse spiked so hard she tasted metal.

Kiki moved closer instantly.

Koko’s hand found Alice’s back.

The white werewolf noticed. His ears lowered slightly. Not in threat. In apology.

That startled Alice enough to pull her out of the memory.

Diva glanced over her shoulder. “Don’t loom, Snowdrop. You’re frightening the healer.”

The werewolf made a low sound in his chest, almost like a whine, and took one careful step back.

Alice blinked. “Snowdrop?”

Diva smiled. “Aren’t you adorable?”

Alice honestly could not tell whether Diva meant the werewolf, herself, or the entire situation.

The werewolf could not speak in that form. That much was obvious from the way he communicated with posture, small sounds, and the tilt of his ears. But there was intelligence there. More than intelligence. Devotion. His pale eyes stayed fixed on Diva with a softness that looked completely absurd on a body built for ripping things apart. When she moved, his attention moved with her. When she smiled, his tail gave one involuntary sweep before he forced it still.

Alice’s fear shifted into confusion.

Werewolves were supposed to be rampaging beasts. they had been like nightmares with claws. The pack in the forest had been intelligent enough to coordinate, but not civilized. Not dressed. Not collared. Not attending a noble lady with the careful affection of a knight holding back a confession.

Alice looked at him, then at Diva.

(What do you look like when you’re not transformed?)

The thought made her curious in a way she did not have time for.

Diva, meanwhile, seemed entirely unaware of the werewolf’s heart trying to crawl out of his chest and offer itself at her shoes.

She had eyes only for Veyr.

“How tragic you look this morning,” she said, strolling toward the table without waiting for permission. “All pale grief and wounded dignity. If I did not know better, I would think you arranged the stolen shipment yourself just to lure me here.”

Veyr’s smile became courtly and cool. “If I wished to lure you, Diva, I would send a compliment. You have always been vulnerable to those.”

She placed one hand over her heart. “Cruel. Accurate, but cruel.”

“You arrived quickly.”

“Of course I did. Someone stole my blood.”

Alice’s head snapped up. “Your blood?”

Diva looked toward her. “My shipment. My routes. My estate upriver. My seal on the boat you found. The blood itself belonged to the cattle under my protection, if you are the sort of person who cares about the moral grammar.”

“I am,” Alice said.

“How exhausting for you.”

Koko’s eyes narrowed.

Diva grinned at her. “Oh, I like this one. She looks like she might throw me through a wall if I phrase something badly.”

“Koko might,” Alice said.

Koko shrugged. “Depends on wall.”

The white werewolf made a sound suspiciously close to amusement. Diva glanced back at him, and he immediately straightened, pretending innocence with the full incompetence of someone not built for subtlety.

Veyr tapped his cane once against the armrest of his throne. “You were informed before I sent word.”

Diva’s smile did not falter. “Yes.”

“By whom?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?”

“Given that your empty boat drifted into my village hours after one of my citizens was murdered, yes, I would very much like to know.”

The room cooled.

For all her playfulness, Diva’s expression shifted. Not into grief exactly, but into seriousness edged with steel. “I heard before dawn. A courier bat reached Moonreach with news that my shipment had failed to arrive at the city transfer point. A second message followed from my own river watch, reporting an unmanned vessel drifting downstream. By the time I traced its path, your charming little village had already begun whispering murder.”

Alice watched her carefully.

“Your information moves fast,” Alice said.

Diva looked at her again. “It has to. Blood routes are delicate, Miss Alice. Nobles require supply. Petty vampires get desperate when prices rise. The Cathedral’s healing stores depend on regular deliveries. A missing shipment is not merely theft. It is pressure. Pressure makes hungry things careless.”

“And the murder?”

Diva’s eyes flicked to Veyr. “Convenient.”

Veyr’s fingers tightened almost imperceptibly on the cane.

Diva continued, voice lighter but no longer careless. “Someone steals from me, If I were sentimental, I might say it feels personal.”

“If you were sentimental?” Veyr asked.

She smiled at him, softer than before, and for one instant Alice saw it.

Not the game.

Not the teasing.

Want.

Diva was in love with him. Not subtly either, at least not to anyone already drowning in everyone else’s romantic disaster. Her eyes lingered too long. Her jokes reached too eagerly. She leaned toward Veyr like Tidus did, though with none of Tidus’s fear and all of a noblewoman’s confidence that if she wanted something badly enough, the world should eventually become embarrassed and hand it over.

Behind her, Snowdrop watched.

The werewolf’s ears lowered a fraction.

Alice’s chest tightened with secondhand ache.

Diva did not notice at all.

Veyr noticed Alice noticing.

His gaze flicked once to Snowdrop, then to Diva, then to Alice. The faintest warning entered his eyes, though whether it meant do not meddle or yes, this is also a disaster was impossible to tell.

Probably both.

Alice looked away first.

Too many hearts. Too many secrets. Too much blood.

The pieces were everywhere and none of them clicked cleanly together. Maelin dead by the river. Veyr absent but not guilty. Tidus hidden in shame. Diva already informed before any normal message should have reached her. A stolen shipment from Diva’s own estate. A docile werewolf in a collar, loyal enough to ache, standing behind a woman who could not see him because she was too busy aiming herself at a vampire lord who loved someone else.

Alice felt the shape of a pattern without understanding it.

She hated mysteries.

Kiki leaned close to Alice, voice low. “Too many pretty nobles.”

“Way too many,” Alice whispered.

Koko’s gaze moved from Diva to Snowdrop to Veyr. “Everyone wants wrong person.”

Alice glanced at her.

Koko shrugged. “Obvious.”

Diva clapped her hands once, bright again. “Well then. Shall we sit? I have lost a shipment, Veyr has lost a citizen, the Cathedral has sent a bridled paladin and a healer with scandal hair, and someone is clearly trying to make all of us look foolish.”

Alice touched one of her pigtails defensively. “Scandal hair?”

Kiki beamed. “Good hair.”

Diva’s smile widened. “Excellent hair. No insult intended.”

Veyr gestured toward the table. “Sit. All of you. We will compare what we know.”

Snowdrop moved to pull out Diva’s chair.

Diva did not sit in it.

Instead, with the bright, shameless confidence of someone who had never once worried that the room might not rearrange itself around her, she stepped past the chair, crossed to the head of the table, and settled directly onto Lord Veyr’s lap.

Alice stared.

Veyr did not move.

He remained seated at the head of the table, one hand still resting on his cane, the other on the carved arm of the chair, his expression so perfectly composed it looked painted on. Only the smallest tightening at the corner of his eye betrayed that he had not expected her to actually do that in front of guests. Lady Diva, all five feet and three inches of her, looked almost tiny against him. She was only an inch shorter than Alice, but she carried herself like a queen. She adjusted herself with theatrical comfort, shifting her hips just enough that Alice saw Veyr’s fingers tighten once against the cane before his face returned to perfect neutrality.

Snowdrop stood behind the empty chair, hand still on its back.

For the first time since entering the room, the werewolf looked genuinely lost.

His ears dipped.

His tail went still.

Diva did not notice.

Diva adjusted herself deliberately, grinding into his crotch, shifting her hips until she had found the most inconvenient possible position. She sat like a cat that had stolen the warmest cushion in the house and intended to defend it with claws, smiling over her shoulder at Veyr as though daring him to object. “Much better,” she said brightly. “Your chairs are lovely, Veyr, but they lack warmth.”

Veyr’s smile remained polite enough to qualify as a weapon. “How tragic for them.”

“You should consider improving your furniture.”

“I will direct the staff to make the chairs more presumptuous.”

Diva laughed, delighted.

Snowdrop still stood behind the chair he had pulled out for her, one clawed hand resting on its back. For a moment, the great white werewolf simply stared at the empty seat, then at Diva perched happily on Veyr’s lap. His ears lowered by a fraction. His tail went still. The motion was so small most people would have missed it.

Alice slowly looked at Koko.

Koko slowly looked at Alice.

Kiki, still holding Luna’s reins, looked fascinated.

Luna, unable to speak around the bit, made a muffled sound that might have been horror, sympathy, or very strong secondhand embarrassment. It was difficult to tell with Luna. Most of her emotions sounded like she was apologizing to a god.

Veyr’s eyes flicked toward Luna. Then to the bridle. Then to Kiki.

Kiki noticed at the same moment.

“Oh,” Kiki said, as if remembering a minor housekeeping task. “Pony should talk.”

Luna’s ears shot up.

Alice opened her mouth, but Kiki was already stepping closer with surprising gentleness. She loosened the straps, slid the bridle free, and eased the snaffle bit from Luna’s mouth with the careful attention of someone who was treating the whole thing as both play and responsibility. Luna swallowed, cheeks burning, lips wet from the bit, chin glistening slightly before she turned her face away in a burst of mortification.

Kiki wiped her chin with a cloth without being asked.

“Good pony,” she murmured.

Luna made a sound that was almost a sob. “Please do not say that in front of nobility.”

Diva leaned forward on Veyr’s lap, eyes sparkling. “Oh, please do.”

Luna looked like she wanted to fall into the floor.

Veyr, with the restraint of a saint, said nothing.

Koko pulled out a chair for Alice, mimicking Snowdrop’s earlier motion with exaggerated dignity. It should have been sweet. It was sweet. It was also so obviously an orc wife trying to play noble attendant that Alice’s face heated immediately.

“Wife sits,” Koko said.

Alice looked at the chair, then at Diva sitting on Veyr’s lap, then at Snowdrop quietly suffering behind the chair Diva had abandoned, then at Luna still flushed from the bridle, then at Veyr pretending none of this was happening.

She did not sit.

“Maybe,” Alice said carefully, “this conversation would be better had in private.”

Diva turned her head slowly, turquoise hair swaying against Veyr’s shoulder. “Later.”

Alice blinked. “Later?”

“Yes,” Diva said. “Private conversations are for after food, after tea.”

Snowdrop’s ears lowered another fraction.

Alice’s chest hurt for him.

Diva clapped once, and the vampire servants moved immediately. Covers were lifted from platters, releasing the smell of baked fruits, dark bread, spiced meats, roasted mushrooms, honeyed roots, pale cheeses, smoked river fish, and several items Alice could not name but which looked expensive enough to have legal representation. There were also crystal cups arranged near Veyr and Diva, though they remained empty until a servant approached with a silver pitcher.

Alice’s stomach, traitor that it was, reacted despite the breakfast at the mill.

Then she remembered she had already eaten breakfast.

(Do I tell them? Is there a polite way to say we already ate before coming to your murder breakfast?)

Kiki sat immediately and reached for bread.

Koko sat beside Alice and reached for something that looked like a meat pastry.

Apparently, they had no such concerns.

Alice sat down mostly because standing there would only make everything more awkward.

Diva, however, did not reach for any plate.

Instead, she tilted her head back and smiled up at Veyr.

Alice’s instincts immediately began screaming.

Veyr’s expression did not change, but something in his eyes sharpened.

“Diva,” he said.

“Yes?”

“We are in company.”

“I noticed. You invited them.”

“I invited them to discuss a murder investigation.”

“And I am hungry.” She lifted one hand and brushed the tips of her fingers against the side of his throat, where his collar met pale skin. “Unless you intend to deny hospitality to your liege.”

There it was.

Liege.

Alice caught the word and filed it away. Veyr’s village might have been his by charter and blood-right, but the Moonreach estates were higher in the web. Lady Diva was not merely another noble with a stolen shipment. She stood above him, at least in some formal way, and that meant Veyr could not reject her as sharply as he might have wanted.

Or perhaps he simply would not.

That was the frustrating part. Veyr was not interested in her the way she wanted. Alice could see that clearly now. His body was controlled, his smile measured, his eyes distant whenever Diva pressed too close. But there was no hatred there. No contempt. If anything, there was tired affection. He liked her. He found her amusing. Her boldness, her teasing, her ridiculous confidence. In some other version of the world, one where Diva had not decided romance was a siege engine and Veyr had not given his heart to a miller’s son, they might have been friends.

Maybe they still were.

In the most stressful possible way.

Veyr exhaled through his nose. “You are impossible.”

“And yet adored.”

“By yourself, certainly.”

Diva grinned. “By you eventually.”

Snowdrop looked down.

Alice’s chest tightened again.

Then Diva leaned in and sank her fangs into Veyr’s throat.

Alice went rigid.

It was not like watching someone eat. Not remotely. Diva’s hands curled against Veyr’s coat, one at his shoulder, one pressed lightly to his chest, and her eyes fluttered half-lidded as she drank. Veyr’s head tilted by a fraction, not quite offering and not quite resisting. His hand tightened on the arm of the chair. The candlelight caught the line of Diva’s throat as she swallowed, each careful gulp visible in the silence that had fallen around the table.

Alice stared despite herself.

Then wished very much that she had not.

(That is breakfast? That is her breakfast? Vampire blood? Is that cannibalism? Wait, vampires drink blood, but if a vampire drinks vampire blood, is that cannibalism? Or is it just vampire food? Are all vampires technically cannibals if they drink human blood? No, that’s species eating, not same species. But Veyr is also a vampire, so she is a vampire drinking vampire blood, which makes her a cannibal vampire. Or a cannibal cannibal? Is that worse? Why am I thinking about this while she is making eye contact?)

Koko leaned slightly toward Alice. “Wife thinking too loud again.”

“I am having a moral taxonomy crisis,” Alice whispered.

Kiki watched Diva drink with open curiosity. “Blue noble eats vampire?”

Veyr’s eyes flicked toward Kiki, strained but still dry. “Exclusively.”

Alice made a strangled sound. “Exclusively?”

Diva did not stop drinking.

One of the servants poured tea with the composure of someone who had witnessed worse at breakfast.

Luna, now able to speak, looked as if she wished Kiki had left the bit in just so she would not be expected to produce words. Her face was bright red, her eyes fixed determinedly on a candelabra rather than the extremely intimate feeding happening at the head of the table.

Snowdrop remained behind Diva, still as a statue, except for the faint tremble in his claws.

He was not jealous like Alice had expected.

He looked hurt, yes.

But also worried.

Protective, even now.

That made Alice like him, which was inconvenient.

Diva finally withdrew with a soft breath, her lips red, her smile pleased and lazy. Veyr’s composure had taken a visible hit. His cheeks were not flushed, exactly, but there was color there now, a faint tension around the mouth, a betrayed stiffness in his posture that made him look far less untouchable.

Diva noticed instantly.

Her grin turned wicked.

“There,” she said, dabbing delicately at the corner of her mouth with a napkin. “Finally got a reaction out of you.”

Veyr closed his eyes.

Alice died inside.

Luna made a noise like a tea kettle attempting prayer.

Kiki leaned toward Alice. “What reaction?”

Alice grabbed Kiki’s wrist under the table. “No.”

Kiki blinked. “No what?”

“No asking.”

“But I want to know.”

Koko looked at Veyr, then Diva, then Alice’s face. Understanding dawned. Slowly. Then her mouth curved. “Ah.”

Alice pointed at her too. “Also no.”

Diva laughed brightly, the sound far too pleased with itself. “Oh, Miss Alice, you are adorable. For someone walking around with two orc wives, you embarrass very easily.”

“I contain multitudes,” Alice muttered.

Veyr opened his eyes again, red gaze settling on Diva with exquisite suffering. “Must you make every meal a performance?”

“Only the important ones.”

“This is an investigation.”

“Exactly. Morale matters.”

“I assure you, my morale has not improved.”

“Liar.”

Alice looked desperately at the food.

Then at Koko, who was already eating.

Then at Kiki, who had somehow acquired a full plate and was sampling everything. Neither of them seemed remotely troubled by the fact that they had already eaten at the mill.

“How are you hungry again?” Alice whispered.

Kiki looked at her, confused. “There is food.”

“That is not an answer.”

“It is answer.”

Koko swallowed and nodded. “More food means eat more.”

Alice glanced at her own plate, where a servant had placed fruit, bread, and something soft with herbs before she could refuse. “We literally had breakfast.”

Kiki patted her hand. “Now noble breakfast.”

“Those are not different meals.”

“They are,” Koko said. “Different table.”

Alice had no rebuttal for that because, horrifyingly, she understood the logic.

Diva watched them over the rim of her cup with a smile that suggested she was collecting every word for later use. “Your wives are sensible.”

“They are bottomless pits in love with me,” Alice said.

Kiki looked proud.

Koko looked proud too.

Snowdrop made another soft sound behind Diva, and this time Alice caught the faintest hint of humor in it.

Diva did not.

Veyr did.

His gaze moved briefly to the werewolf, and something like pity, or warning, passed across his face before he looked back to the table.

Alice picked up her fork and forced herself to focus.

“Lady Diva,” she said.

Diva’s eyes brightened. “Oh, finally. Serious voice.”

“The stolen shipment. Who knew its route?”

Diva’s smile remained, but her posture changed. Still perched on Veyr’s lap, still playful, still shameless, but suddenly sharper beneath all of it.

“My river watch,” she said. “My attendants. The city transfer office. Veyr’s manor would know the general schedule because my boats pass through his territory. The Cathedral registry knows enough to plan purchases. The Paladin orders know delivery days for medical allocation.”

“So half the valley,” Alice said.

“More than half,” Diva replied. “Blood is trade, medicine, politics, comfort, addiction, and leverage. Everyone claims to dislike how much they rely on it. Everyone notices when it stops.”

Veyr touched the bite mark on his throat with two fingers, then lowered his hand as if annoyed at himself for acknowledging it. “The killer chose Maelin because she was known. The theft chose Diva’s shipment because it was valuable. The combination is too deliberate to be chance.”

“And too fast,” Alice said.

Diva’s gaze sharpened. “You noticed that.”

“You were here before anyone normal should have been here.”

“I am not normal.”

“Clearly.”

Diva smiled. “But yes. Someone wanted me informed. Quickly.”

Veyr’s eyes narrowed. “You did not mention that.”

“I was waiting to see if the healer with scandal hair was clever.”

Alice stared. “That is not my title.”

“It is becoming one.”

Kiki looked delighted. “Good title.”

“No.”

Koko leaned close. “Wife title grows.”

“No it does not.”

Diva leaned back against Veyr, pleased as a cat. “Someone ensured word reached Moonreach before dawn. A courier bat arrived with my seal on the message thread, but the bat was not mine.”

The table went still.

Veyr’s voice lowered. “A courier message.”

“A very good one,” Diva said. “Good enough that my guards accepted it until I inspected it myself.”

Alice set her fork down. “So someone steals your shipment, sends you a forged message to make sure you come here, murders someone in Veyr’s village while he has no public alibi, and leaves the boat near Tidus’s mill.”

Luna’s ears flicked sharply.

Veyr’s eyes went cold.

Diva finally stopped smiling.

Snowdrop’s head lifted, nostrils flaring once.

Alice’s stomach sank.

She had said it without thinking, but now that it was out loud, she could hear the shape of it.

Not just near the mill.

Near Tidus.

Near the one person who could explain Veyr’s absence and destroy him another way by doing so.

Veyr’s hand tightened around his cane until the silver creaked.

Diva looked at him, her expression unreadable now. “Veyr?”

He did not look at her.

Alice’s voice came out quieter. “Someone knows.”