Returning from Silverwood felt like re-surfacing from a deep, clear dive. The palace air was different—not hostile, but thick with the suspended particulates of unfinished business. The quiet understanding of the lodge couldn't shield them from Lord Berrick's next move, which arrived via formal petition two days later.
He wasn't targeting the logs or the gossip now. He was attacking the heart of their public partnership: the commission. His petition alleged "procedural overreach and fiscal negligence" by the chair, Princess Seraphina, citing the "excessive" cost projections for the wetland restoration and the "unproven, fanciful" tidal turbine design. It was a direct challenge to her authority, couched in the dry language of bureaucracy. A defeat here wouldn't just stall a project; it would publicly humiliate her and cripple the commission's future.
"He's using the old playbook," Seraphina fumed in Hadrian's studio, pacing before the pinned-up canal schematics. "Undermine the woman's competence. Frame passion as recklessness, vision as extravagance."
Hadrian leaned against his drafting table, his mind already moving past outrage to strategy. "He's right about one thing. The turbines. They're innovative. Greymont's engineers call them 'a maritime fantasy.' The cost projections are speculative because no one has built them at this scale."
She stopped, glaring at him. "You're agreeing with him?"
"I'm acknowledging his ammunition,"he corrected calmly. "To defeat him, we don't deny his charges. We invalidate them. We need a foundation stone he can't argue with."
"What foundation stone? More data? He'll just call it biased!"
"Not data,"Hadrian said, a spark lighting in his eyes. "A witness. An authority he can't dismiss." He pushed off the table. "We need Sultan Argenthelm."
Seraphina blinked. "Argenthelm? What does a desert king know about tidal turbines?"
"Nothing.But he is the single largest private investor in green energy technology on the continent. His holding company owns patents on half the solar-grid innovations in the southern deserts. If he publicly expresses interest in funding a pilot program for the Lysterin-Aquillian tidal turbine design—calling it a 'visionary leap in hydrologic engineering'—it does two things. It validates the technology's financial viability, and it makes opposing it look not just conservative, but stupidly backward. Berrick can argue with your science. He can't argue with a sovereign's investment portfolio."
It was a breathtaking pivot. He was using the very 'evolving dynamic' they had showcased at the dinner—Freya and Argenthelm's connection—as a strategic weapon. It was politically elegant and personally daring.
"Would he do it?" Seraphina asked, doubt warring with hope. "For us?"
"Not for us,"Hadrian said. "For Freya. And for the narrative. He's crafting a legacy as a modern, visionary ruler. This fits perfectly. And Freya… I think she would advocate for it. Not for you, or for me, but for the principle. For the stars, and the clean energy to power the telescopes that see them."
The plan was audacious. It required navigating the delicate, unspoken understandings between four people. Hadrian sought out Freya first, finding her, as expected, in the observatory in the late afternoon.
He laid out the proposal plainly, without embellishment. "We need Argenthelm's public, financial endorsement to save the turbine project, and possibly Seraphina's chairmanship."
Freya listened, her fingers steepled, her gaze on the intricate brass fittings of the telescope. "You are asking me to use my… influence."
"I am asking you to consider an alliance of conveniences,"he said honestly. "One that benefits your friend, stabilizes the kingdom, and furthers a technological vision your… companion… believes in. No one is asking for a personal favor. We are proposing a strategic confluence."
A faint, knowing smile touched her lips. "You have become a diplomat, Hadrian. Or perhaps you always were one, buried under all that stone and certainty." She sighed. "Argenthelm is bored with trade symposia. He craves a project with… poetry. Tidal power harnessed by a shell-inspired design… he would find that poetic. I will speak to him."
The next day, Sultan Argenthelm requested a private meeting with King Maris and the commission's treasury liaison. The news that rippled out afterwards was precisely calculated: The Sultan was so impressed by the integrated design of the canal and energy project—a masterpiece of "land-sea synergy"—that his royal holding company was prepared to underwrite forty percent of the pilot turbine development, in exchange for a shared licensing agreement.
Lord Berrick's petition collapsed overnight. To oppose the project now was to spurn foreign investment and insult a friendly monarch. The foundation stone was laid not with data, but with gold and diplomacy. Seraphina's authority was not just preserved; it was bolstered.
That evening, she stood with Hadrian on their balcony, the city lights sprawled below. "You built a bridge," she said, wonder in her voice. "From our personal mess to a political solution. Using Freya and Argenthelm as the piers."
"We adapted," he said simply, echoing their own motto. "The ground was shifting, so we used a different kind of material for the foundation."
He had protected her. Not by building a wall around her, but by building a platform under her feet that was stronger than anything her opponents could muster. The romantic void had no map for this. This was new territory, and they were charting it together.