The rest of the day was eerily peaceful for Dean.
Not the kind of peace that meant everything had been resolved; Dean had lived in palaces long enough to know better, but the kind that occurred when chaos died down for a moment and the building returned to normalcy. Staff moved silently. Doors shut softly. Schedules reasserted themselves with the grim reliability of bureaucracy.
Dean moved through it with the cautious calm of someone waiting for the next blast.
None came.
He met Sebastian briefly in his own wing, because Dean still had a wing, technically, even if his body had begun treating Arion's as home with humiliating ease. Sebastian appeared tired in the controlled way that only dominant alphas do: perfect posture, eyes sharper than they needed to be, and concern hidden behind a polite face.
