Viktor walked between them.
Werner on his left. Charles on his right. The hallway that had felt endless and suffocating an hour ago now felt different. Shorter. The cold stone didn't press in anymore. The shadows didn't feel quite so heavy.
Because his father was here.
Because his father had called him strong.
Viktor's heart was racing, but it wasn't the sick, terrified racing from before. This was different. Electric. Like something coiled tight in his chest waiting to spring. He kept replaying his father's words, turning them over and over like precious stones.
I see strength.
That is our power.
I want to see it for myself.
His father wanted to see. Not Orell with her abacus and her clinical measurements. Not Aldwin with his endless precision drills. Werner. The Emperor who ruled a third of the world and made kingdoms bend and never looked at Viktor the way he'd looked at him in the solar—like Viktor was something worth watching.
Like Viktor mattered.
Werner's boots struck the marble in steady rhythm. He didn't speak. Didn't need to. His presence filled the corridor like a physical thing. Servants pressed themselves flat against walls when they passed. A minor courtier saw them coming and simply turned around, finding somewhere else to be.
Charles walked in perfect lockstep with their father. Silent. Observing. His face was still that careful blank mask, but Viktor caught him glancing at Werner every few steps—watching how he moved, how he held himself, how he commanded space just by existing in it.
Learning. Always learning.
Viktor's hand drifted to the locket at his throat. The silver was cool now, his mother's warmth long faded. For a second, her words flickered through his mind—his praise is a cage—but they felt distant. Muffled. How could praise be a cage when it felt like this? When it made him feel seen and chosen and strong?
They turned the corner.
The training hall door stood ahead. The same heavy oak Viktor had pushed through this morning, terrified and small. Now he was walking toward it with the Emperor at his side.
Everything was different.
Werner pushed the door open himself. Didn't wait for servants. Just shoved it wide and stepped through.
Master Aldwin was inside.
The old instructor stood near the center of the room with a cloth and basin, cleaning up the mess from Viktor's earlier failure. Water and melted slush pooled across the geometric floor patterns. The practice dummy Viktor had been working with earlier sat off to the side, frost patterns still ghosting across its surface.
Aldwin looked up.
His face went pale.
The cloth dropped into the basin with a wet slap. He straightened immediately, hands going to his sides, spine rigid. His eyes tracked from Werner to Charles to Viktor, and something flickered across his expression—confusion, maybe fear.
"Your Majesty." Aldwin's voice was tight. Formal. He bowed stiffly. "I was not expecting—that is, I did not know you would be—"
Werner cut him off with a single look.
"Leave us."
Two words. Flat. Cold. Not angry. Not explaining. Just dismissing.
Aldwin's jaw tightened. His eyes flicked to Viktor for half a second—something wounded in them, something that might have been betrayal or confusion or just shock—then away.
"Of course, Your Majesty." He bowed again, deeper this time. His movements were stiff, humiliated. He grabbed his formal tutor's cloak from the hook near the door, pulled it on with shaking hands.
He didn't look at Viktor again. Just walked past them, head down, and disappeared into the hallway.
The door closed behind him with a soft thud.
Viktor's stomach twisted. Aldwin had been his teacher since he was six. And Werner had just—
But his father was already moving, already commanding the space, and the discomfort faded under the weight of Werner's attention.
Silence filled the training hall.
Werner stood in the center of the room like a general surveying a battlefield. His eyes tracked across the water basins, the practice dummies, the geometric patterns on the floor marked with water and slush.
He turned to face the largest practice dummy.
It stood against the far wall—tall as a man, broad through the chest and shoulders, made of mana-reinforced wood that was scarred and dented from years of impact. Its surface was marked with scorch patterns, frost burns, the evidence of countless training sessions.
Charles moved to the side wall, positioning himself where he could watch both Viktor and their father. Silent. Still. Learning what this test was really about.
Werner ignored the small water basins Aldwin had been using for precision work. Didn't even glance at them.
"Aldwin and Orell want 'precision,'" Werner said. His voice carried through the room, filling it. "They want a 'parlor trick.' Pretty ice sculptures for dinner parties."
He gestured to the dummy.
"I want to see force."
Viktor's breath caught. His father was looking at him now—not at Charles, not at the room, at him—with those emerald eyes that saw everything and judged everything.
"The Glacies Spiculum," Werner said. "The frost spear. The first offensive chant every acolyte learns."
He stepped aside, giving Viktor clear line of sight to the dummy.
Viktor's hands started to shake again. Just hours ago, he'd failed this exact test. In this exact room. With Orell watching and judging and—
"Do it."
Viktor stepped forward.
His legs felt unsteady. The training hall stretched out before him—the same room where he'd failed this morning, where Orell's abacus had clicked and clicked and marked him as insufficient. The same geometric patterns on the floor. The same water basins. The same dummy.
But everything was different now.
Because his father was watching.
Viktor stopped at the second circle from center. The position he always used. His hands were shaking. He pressed them together, focusing inward on his Source. It stirred immediately—that cool crystalline presence behind his ribs, eager and ready.
Cold bloomed through his chest and down his arms.
He looked at the dummy. Mana-reinforced wood, scarred and dented. Aldwin had always taught him to use the smallest basin. To make precise, controlled strikes. To prove he could shape the magic cleanly.
A lattice is a cage, his father had said. Parlor tricks for artists.
Viktor's eyes flicked to Werner. His father stood with arms crossed, emerald eyes locked on him. Waiting. Measuring. Not the way Orell measured—not with fear or disapproval—but with expectation.
Like Viktor was capable of something great.
I want to see force.
Viktor took a breath. Four counts in, like his mother had taught him. Hold. Four counts out.
His hands steadied.
He raised them toward the dummy, fingers spread, and began the chant.
"Glacies—" His breath caught. Not from difficulty with the words, but from the weight of his father's eyes on him. "Glacies Spiculum!"
The words came out rough, unpracticed, but he pushed through them.
And Viktor didn't hold back.
His Source surged.
The cold that had been building in his chest exploded outward. Not careful. Not measured. Just raw—all the power he'd been holding in check all morning, all the strength Orell had called a liability, all the force Werner had told him was theirs.
The air crackled.
Ice formed in front of him—not a small, neat spike like Aldwin's exercises. Not a delicate lattice. A spear. Thick as Viktor's arm, jagged and brutal, frost spiraling down its length in wild patterns. It hung in the air for half a heartbeat, massive and terrible and beautiful.
Then it launched.
The sound was like thunder in the enclosed space.
The spear hit the dummy square in the chest.
The mana-reinforced wood didn't just crack. It exploded. Splinters burst outward in every direction. The torso shattered completely, chunks of wood and ice flying across the training hall. The spear drove through where the chest had been and slammed into the stone wall behind it with a deafening CRACK, embedding itself deep into the rock.
Pieces of the dummy clattered to the floor. The ice spear groaned, frost spreading outward from where it had struck the wall in branching, crystalline patterns.
Then silence.
Viktor stood frozen, breathing hard. His chest heaved. His arms trembled. The Source had drained fast—too fast—leaving him hollowed out and dizzy. His vision swam at the edges.
He'd just destroyed the dummy.
Completely destroyed it.
Orell had been right. Aldwin had been right. He had no control. He was a liability. He'd proven it conclusively. His father was going to—
"That."
Werner's voice cut through the silence.
Viktor's head snapped around.
Werner was smiling.
Not the cold, controlled expression Viktor was used to. A genuine smile. Proud. Satisfied.
"That is what Aldwin is trying to ruin." Werner walked forward, boots crunching over splinters and ice. "He wants a tiny 'spike.' You gave him a spear that could kill a manticore."
He stopped in front of Viktor, looking down at him with those emerald eyes that suddenly held something Viktor had never seen before.
Pride.
"That is strength, Viktor." Werner's hand landed on his shoulder. Heavy. Solid. The weight of it grounded Viktor, kept him from swaying. "That is the blood of a Kirchner."
Viktor's throat was tight. He couldn't speak. Couldn't do anything but stare up at his father and feel the warmth of that praise sinking into him like sunlight.
He'd done it.
He'd proven himself.
He was strong.
"You've proven your strength," Werner said. His hand squeezed once, firm. "You've proven you're not one of Aldwin's 'artists.'"
The smile shifted slightly. Something calculating flickered behind it—there and gone in a heartbeat. The warmth in his father's voice cooled just a fraction.
"I think you're ready for a real test."
Viktor's breath caught. "A test?"
"Duke Farrow." Werner's hand stayed on Viktor's shoulder, but his tone had changed. Sharper. More focused. "He grows bold. He thinks he can cheat me at my own table. Collect dues late. Make excuses."
Werner leaned down slightly, bringing himself closer to Viktor's eye level.
"He's hosting a spring gala next week. He'll have an ice sculpture on display—his pride and joy. He commissions them every year, brags about them to his guests." Werner's eyes bored into Viktor's. "I want you to destroy it."
Viktor blinked. "Destroy—?"
The word felt wrong. He'd just proven he couldn't control his power—hadn't he? But his father wasn't disappointed. His father was smiling. Which meant... which meant the destruction was exactly what Werner wanted.
"From outside. Where you won't be seen." Werner's voice was matter-of-fact, like he was assigning a training exercise. "It's a message, Viktor. Duke Farrow displays his wealth through art while he withholds what he owes the crown. You'll show him—and every noble watching—that beauty means nothing without loyalty. That power breaks pretension."
He straightened, hand lifting from Viktor's shoulder.
"Go to the gala. Find the sculpture. Be a storm."
The words settled into Viktor's chest like stones. Important. Real.
His father was giving him a mission. Not Aldwin's precision exercises. Not Orell's measurements. A real chance to prove himself outside the training hall.
Viktor's exhaustion didn't matter anymore. The trembling in his hands didn't matter. Nothing mattered except the intoxicating feeling of being chosen.
"Yes, Father," Viktor whispered.
Werner nodded once. Final. "Charles will provide the details."
Charles nodded once from his position by the wall. His expression hadn't changed throughout the entire demonstration—not when Viktor destroyed the dummy, not when Werner praised him. Just that same careful blank mask, watching and learning and filing everything away.
Werner turned and walked toward the door, boots crunching over debris. Charles pushed off from the wall and followed, silent as always.
At the threshold, Werner paused. Looked back.
"Don't disappoint me."
Then he was gone.
Viktor stood alone in the destroyed training hall, heart pounding, his father's praise still ringing in his ears.
He touched the locket at his throat. His mother's locket. Her warning felt very far away now.
All he could feel was the weight of Werner's hand on his shoulder. Next week, at the gala, he would be a storm.