In a different wing of the school, Kavin sat in the darkroom of the photography club, watching a print develop in the chemical bath. It was a shot of the St. Jude's cathedral spires, looking more like the bars of a cage than a place of worship.
He thought of Mild's hollow eyes and the Matriarch's clinical cruelty. The "Christian Foundation" preached grace, but practiced a relentless, archaic brand of judgment. To them, a scholarship wasn't a gift; it was a leash. They used "morality" as a bludgeon to keep the poor in their place and the rich in their orbits. Kavin gripped the edge of the sink, his jaw tightening. If the rules are designed to break people, he thought, then the rules have to be burned.
While Kavin plotted rebellion, Arm stood in his father's study, the air thick with the smell of old paper and suppressed panic.
"He's going to leave!" Arm's voice was a jagged edge. "He stood in Madam Vora's office and told her to keep the scholarship. He's willing to lose everything just to get away from us—from me. If he disappears into the streets, we lose our only link to Shelmith. I won't be able to find the truth if he's gone!"
His father didn't even look up from his ledger. He turned a page with a crisp, terrifying snap. "Calm yourself, Armitage. You're becoming hysterical over a commoner."
"Hysterical?" Arm stepped closer to the desk. "He threw the evidence back in the Matriarch's face! He's not playing by the script anymore!"
"He is a mere boy, Arm," his mother said, her voice a silken purr from the chaise lounge. "A boy with no money, no family, and no options. He thinks he's running, but we own the roads he walks on. If he wants to be difficult, we simply change the environment."
His father finally looked up, his eyes cold. "If he's 'unstable' in his apartment, we will make him an on-school student. We'll move him into the high-security dorms—the ones for 'at-risk' scholars. Better yet, we'll transfer him to the sister campus's boarding wing. And you, Arm, will move into the senior prefect dorms there as well. We will keep him under a microscope 24 hours a day."
"But he hates me now," Arm whispered, the weight of the silver feather pendant in his pocket feeling like lead. "And there's more. I found this."
He placed Shelmith's opal feather on the desk. The sight of it brought a momentary, icy silence to the room.
"He says a courier gave it to him two years ago," Arm explained. "A 'promise of protection.' He didn't even know it was hers. Someone used him as a vessel for her belongings before she even died."
His father's eyes narrowed as he stared at the pendant. "Then he's even more valuable than we thought. He isn't just a witness; he's a locker for secrets he doesn't even know he has." He slid the pendant back toward Arm. "Keep it. And keep him. Use the boarding school transfer to 'rehabilitate' his image. Make him dependent on you for his every meal and every breath."
"And Arm," his mother added, checking her reflection in a hand mirror, "do not let this 'investigation' distract you from your real duties. The Centennial Gala is in three days. You are to take Style. You will dance with her, you will be seen adoring her, and you will treat your future wife with the respect her dynasty deserves. Is that understood?"
"Yes, Mother," Arm said, his heart a cold stone in his chest.
Outside the heavy oak doors, Style stood pressed against the floral wallpaper, her breath shallow. She had heard it all—the boarding school plan, the "Masterpiece" becoming a prisoner, and the mention of the silver feather.
But most of all, she had heard the way Arm's voice broke when he talked about Mild leaving. It wasn't the voice of a hunter losing his prey; it was the voice of a man losing his soul.
She clutched her phone, her knuckles white. She didn't care about the sister or the pendant. She cared about the fact that her future husband was obsessed with a boy who lived in a ghetto.
"Boarding school," she whispered to herself, a predatory glint in her eyes. "Fine. If they want to put him in a cage, I'll be the one holding the key to the lions."
She slipped away before the doors could open, already texting her father.
e Armitages wanted to play a game of "protection," she was going to make sure the price of that protection was Mild's total destruction.
***
The heavy oak doors of the East Wing groaned shut behind Skyler. Inside, the air was thick with the scent of expensive lilies and the sharp, metallic tang of cold authority. Madam Vora stood by the window, watching Mild's distant, fleeing figure through the glass.
"He's a cornered animal, Skyler," Vora said, her voice tight with a rare flick of agitation. "I offered him the world, and he spat on it. The scholarship—the thing he's bled for—he threw it back in my face. He isn't afraid of the poverty anymore. That makes him dangerous."
Skyler leaned against the marble desk, her eyes fixed on the photographs Vora had discarded. She picked one up, tracing the line of Mild's jaw with a pale finger. "He isn't dangerous, Madam. He's just finally awake."
"Why this one?" Vora turned, her eyes narrowing at the girl. "Of all the scholars, all the 'Masterpieces' we groom, why are you so obsessed with this boy? He is a commoner with a pretty face. Nothing more."
"You see a smudge on a legacy. I see a soul that doesn't belong in this filth," Skyler whispered, her gaze softening for a fleeting second. "It's his eyes. They're calm, even when he's drowning. Last term, when I was struggling with the Advanced Ethics module—the one even the tutors couldn't simplify—he sat with me for three hours in the library. He didn't ask for my name. He didn't look for a reward. He just... helped. He is a masterpiece because he's the only real thing in this school. He needs to be taken care of, tucked away where the world can't bruise him."
"He's trying to leave," Vora reminded her coldly. "And his resolve is absolute."
Mild found out quickly that the gates of St. Jude's didn't just keep people out; they kept people in.
At the main exit, his keycard flashed red—Access Denied. At the side gate, the guards looked through him as if he were a ghost, citing "administrative lockdown." Even the ride-share apps on his phone showed a continuous, spinning wheel of "No Drivers Available." He was trapped in a gilded cage that had suddenly become a fortress.
By dusk, he had managed to slip out through a delivery service tunnel, hitching a ride on the back of a laundry truck. He arrived at his apartment, gasping for air. The space was nearly empty; he had already packed his few belongings into a single duffel bag. The room felt haunted by the scent of Arm's expensive cologne and the dampness of the compress from that morning.
He reached for his bag, but a shadow blocked the doorway.
Arm was there. He wasn't wearing his school blazer anymore. He looked raw, his chest heaving as if he had run the entire way from the campus.
"You can't go," Arm said, his voice a ragged plea.
Mild didn't flinch. "I'm already gone, Arm. Look around. There's nothing left for you to control." He stepped forward, his eyes burning with a final, desperate curiosity. "But before I walk out that door, I want the truth. One thing. Why did you do it? Why did you put that Rolex in my bag that first week? Why set me up for a crime I didn't commit just to 'save' me later?"
Arm's heart jolted. He couldn't tell him about Shelmith. He couldn't tell him that his sister had been obsessed with Mild first, or that the watch was a marker meant to track his movements for the Foundation's sick games.
"It wasn't a setup," Arm lied, the words tasting like ash in his mouth. He took a step into the room, his eyes darting away. "It was... a test. My father wanted to see if you were 'corruptible.' If you would keep it, or sell it, or report it. I put it there to give you a choice, Mild. I wanted to see if you were as perfect as you looked."
It was a pathetic lie, a shield for a much darker truth involving his family's bloodline, but it was all Arm could offer to keep the boy from looking deeper into the abyss where Shelmith's memory lay.
Mild let out a dry, hollow laugh. "A test. My entire life was a lab experiment for you." He swung his bag over his shoulder and pushed past Arm, his shoulder hitting the President's chest. "I failed the test, Arm. I'm human. And I'm leaving."
As Mild descended the creaking stairs, he didn't see the black sedan idling at the end of the street, or Skyler's silhouette in the back seat, watching the GPS tracker on his phone.
The cool night air bit at Mild's face as he marched down the narrow alleyway, his duffel bag thumping rhythmically against his side. Behind him, the steady, rhythmic click of expensive leather soles on pavement followed.
"Stop following me, Arm," Mild snapped without turning around.
"No," Arm replied simply. His pace didn't falter.
Mild spun around, his face flushed with frustration. "I'm not a project anymore! I'm going to a part of the city where people like you don't even have GPS signal. Go back to your marble halls and your Matriarch."
Arm stood his ground, his rumpled designer shirt looking wildly out of place against the graffiti-covered brick. "You told me you have nothing left to lose. Neither do I. I'm staying with you until you change your mind and come back to school. Whether that's tomorrow or next year."
Mild let out a jagged laugh of disbelief. He turned and kept walking, faster now, hoping the grit of the city would discourage the prince. But Arm remained two paces behind, stubborn and silent.
The railway station was a chaotic sprawl of flickering neon and the smell of grease and damp metal. Arm froze at the entrance, his eyes wide as he took in the sea of people, the screeching brakes of the trains, and the grime on the turnstiles. It was his first time ever stepping foot into public transport.
"You're actually going to get on that?" Arm asked, his voice betraying a hint of genuine shock.
"It's called a train, President," Mild muttered, buying two of the cheapest tickets available. "Welcome to the real world."
As they moved toward the platform, a familiar, sharp scent of expensive perfume cut through the station's heavy air. Standing near the pillar was Style. She was dressed in a sleek, ivory coat, looking as if she had just stepped off a runway rather than a midnight train platform.
"Arm? And... Mild?" she said, her voice a perfect lilt of surprise. "What a delightful coincidence."
"Is it?" Arm asked, his eyes narrowing. "What are you doing here, Style?"
"The same as you, I imagine," she smiled, her eyes glinting with a hidden agenda. "Adventure. And since we are betrothed, I thought it was high time we got to know each other better. I'm coming with you."
The train car was cramped and smelled of old coffee. Mild sat by the window, staring out at the blurred lights of the city, feeling like a ghost. Arm sat beside him, his body tense and uncomfortable in the plastic seat, while Style sat opposite them, watching them both like a predator observing its prey.
When the train stopped for a brief layover, Arm stood up. "I need to... find the washroom," he said, looking at the narrow, metal door at the end of the carriage with deep suspicion.
As soon as the door clicked shut behind him, Style's posture shifted. The "innocent fiancée" mask dropped, replaced by something razor-sharp.
"He's quite obsessed with you, isn't he?" Style whispered, leaning toward Mild.
Mild didn't look away from the window. "I don't care. I'm leaving everything—him, you, St. Jude's—behind. I want nothing to do with him."
"Oh, but I'm here to help you, Mild," Style said, a slow smile spreading across her face. "I want you two to have a very special relationship. I want you so deeply entwined that the scandal would burn the Armitage name to the ground. Think of it: the perfect heir and the broken scholar. It's a tragedy I can use to my ultimate advantage."
"You're insane," Mild stated flatly.
"I'm a strategist," she corrected.
When Arm returned, Style's demeanor flipped instantly. She reached over and brushed a piece of lint off Mild's shoulder, her voice loud enough for Arm to hear. "You know, Arm, I was just telling Mild how remarkable he is. His bone structure is even more divine in this lighting. He really is the only interesting thing about your school."
Arm's jaw tightened. The possessive fire in his eyes flared, exactly as Style intended. Mild felt a wave of nausea. He looked at them both—the hunter and the manipulator—and felt a profound sense of disconnection.
"Both of you," Mild said, his voice hollow. "Just... stay away from me."
In the vestibule between cars, Arm's phone vibrated. It was his father. He stepped away, his voice low and urgent. "Father... yes, Style is with me. We're... on a private excursion. It's for the sake of the merger. I'll bring her back when it's settled." He hung up, his knuckles white as he stared at his reflection in the dark glass.
Miles away, in a room filled with glowing monitors, Skyler watched a red dot pulse on a map.
"The railway," she murmured, her voice cold and focused. She wasn't looking at Mild as a person anymore, but as a piece of a puzzle that had been moved without her permission. She turned to a man standing in the shadows of the office.
"Intercept them at the Northern Junction," Skyler commanded. "I don't care about the Armitage heir or the girl. Just get Mild. If he wants to be invisible, I'll find a place where no one will ever see him again."
The train rattled violently as it sped toward the Northern Junction. Inside the carriage, the air was suffocating. Style had moved from her seat to sit directly next to Mild, her hand resting casually on his arm.
"You have such a tragic aura today, Mild," Style cooed, her voice carrying easily to where Arm stood near the door. "It's much more attractive than that stiff uniform you used to wear. Don't you think so, Arm? He looks like a rebel prince."
Arm's expression was a storm of repressed fury. He hated how Style touched him, but he hated even more that Mild sat there like a statue, refusing to even fight back. Mild simply stared at his reflection in the dark window. He felt like he had already left his body; the more they fought over him, the more he felt like a ghost.
"Get your hands off him, Style," Arm said, his voice a low, dangerous vibration.
"Why, darling?" Style laughed, her fingers trailing up Mild's sleeve. "Are you jealous? Or are you just upset that I'm seeing the masterpiece for what it truly is?"
Mild finally spoke, his voice flat. "I told you both to leave me alone. You're talking about me like I'm a piece of furniture." He looked at Arm, his eyes dead. "Is this the 'protection' you promised? Being a prize in a game between two vipers?