The discovery of the practice sheet was the final, undeniable stitch in the tapestry of guilt. Prince Lucian did not wait for a private hearing. The evidence demanded a public reckoning. The setting was not the detention block but the academy's Grand Receiving Hall, a cavernous space of vaulted ceilings and cold marble. The scattered, shell-shocked nobility from the tea party had been summoned back. They stood now in a murmuring, anxious semi-circle, their fine clothes a stark contrast to the grim proceedings.
At the front of the hall, on a raised dais, Lucian stood with the Captain of the Guard, the royal physician, and the pale, trembling professor of alchemy. I stood to the side with Kaelen, a witness rather than a participant. Before them all, on the open floor, stood Seraphina Vale. She had been allowed to change into a simple day dress of pale yellow, but it hung on her like a shroud. Her father, the Marquis of Vale, had not yet arrived. She was alone.
