The air inside the drafty cabin was thick with the smell of damp wood and the sharp, ozone scent of the receding storm. Mild stood by the door, his duffel bag gripped so tightly his knuckles were white. He was ready to vanish into the morning mist, convinced that by walking away, he was finally taking his life back.
Arm stood up from the rickety bench, his movements slow and deliberate. He didn't chase Mild this time; he simply leaned against the wooden post of the cabin, his eyes regained their terrifying, clinical focus.
"You're making a mistake, Mild," Arm said, his voice dropping into that smooth, velvet tone that preceded a kill. "You think walking away from St. Jude's makes you free? You're forgetting that freedom has a price, and you aren't the one who's going to pay it."
Mild didn't turn around. "I don't care what you do to me anymore, Arm. You can take my name, my future, my house. I'm done."
"I'm not talking about you," Arm countered. He pulled a slim smartphone from his pocket and tapped the screen. "I'm talking about Georgia. Her father's transport company just signed a three-year logistics contract with the Armitage Foundation. It's their only lifeline. And Georgia herself... she's currently top of her class at the Medical Institute, isn't she? A scholarship student, just like you."
Mild froze. The blood drained from his face as he slowly turned to look at Arm. "What does she have to do with this? We're over. I left her to protect her from you!"
"And yet, you were going to run back to her the moment you left this cabin," Arm said, a cold, knowing smile playing on his lips. "If you don't return to school today—if you don't accept the boarding mandate—I will call the Institute. By noon, her scholarship will be revoked for 'ethical violations.' By evening, her father's trucks will be seized. She won't just be a dropout, Mild. She'll be the reason her family is in the gutter."
"You monster," Mild whispered, his voice trembling with a raw, visceral hatred.
"I'm a President," Arm corrected, stepping closer until he could see the tears of fury welling in Mild's eyes. "And I don't lose my Masterpiece. Choose, Mild. Your freedom, or her life."
Style, watching from the corner, felt a chill. She had seen Arm ruthless before, but this was different. This was a man burning down the world just to keep one person in his sight.
Mild slumped, the duffel bag hitting the floor with a dull thud. He was a Luthier; he was the "Future" they all wanted to own, but his present was nothing but a series of cages. "I'll go back," he rasped. "Just... leave her alone."
***
Arm marched into his father's study, his eyes bright with a dark victory. He had successfully forced Mild back. He was ready to begin the "rehabilitation" phase, to keep Mild in the dorms where he could finally protect him properly.
"He's back," Arm announced, throwing his leather bag onto the chair. "I've secured his return. I'll be moving into the dorms tonight to oversee his—"
"You will be doing no such thing," Silas said, not looking up from his desk.
Arm stopped. "What?"
"The Foundation has issued a 'Zero-Contact' order, Armitage," his mother said, standing by the window. "Effective immediately, you are barred from any private interaction with Mild Runner Cho. You will not visit his dorm. You will not summon him to the Council. You will not even sit at the same table in the cafeteria."
"You can't do that!" Arm shouted, the blood rushing to his face. "I'm the one who brought him back! I'm the one investigating Shelmith!"
"And you've proven you're too compromised to do it," Silas snapped, finally standing up. "We have delegated the investigation to someone more... objective. Your cousin Enock will be handling the Cho boy from now on. You are to focus on the Centennial Gala and your betrothal to Style."
Arm felt the world tilt. Enock? He knew his cousin. Enock didn't have a moral compass; he had a hunger for whatever Arm possessed.
"You gave him to Enock?" Arm's voice was a horrified whisper. "Enock will destroy him. He doesn't care about the truth; he only cares about the sport!"
"Enock is a professional," his mother said coldly. "And more importantly, he isn't in any shady relationship with the boy. You are a liability, Arm. Stay away, or we will remove Mild from the school—and this country—permanently."
Arm backed out of the room, his chest heaving. He had built a cage for Mild to keep him safe, only to find that he had locked himself on the outside. He looked out the window toward the school, knowing that somewhere in those halls, Enock was already beginning to weave a web around the only thing Arm had ever truly wanted.
The next morning, Mild was a ghost in the halls of St. Jude's. He had been processed into the high-security dorms, his life reduced to a single trunk and a keycard. As he walked toward the library, still reeling from Arm's extortion, he was intercepted by a boy who looked like he was made of summer.
"Careful," a warm voice said as a hand caught Mild's elbow to steady him.
Mild looked up into Enock's golden-brown eyes. "I'm sorry, I wasn't looking."
"Don't apologize for being overwhelmed," Enock said, his smile radiating an easy, effortless empathy. He didn't look at Mild with the hunger of the others; he looked at him with pity. "I'm Enock. I'm Arm's cousin, but I promise I'm the black sheep of the family. I hate the way they run this place."
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, vintage tin of high-end lozenges. "You look like you haven't slept in days. My father—the Governor—always says the best way to handle a storm is to find a quiet corner. I have a private study in the West Wing. No Council members, no Armitages, no cameras. If you ever need to hide, the door is always unlocked for you."
Enock leaned in, his voice a gentle whisper. "I know about the pendant, Mild. Arm told the family. He wants to use it to trap you. If you want to find out the real truth about Shelmith without being a 'project,' come find me."
He patted Mild's shoulder and walked away, leaving the scent of expensive citrus and a feeling of genuine safety in his wake.
Kavin lowered his camera, his jaw set. He had seen the way Mild relaxed slightly around Enock. He tapped his headset. "We have a new player. Enock's on the field. He's using the 'Soft Approach.' He's more dangerous than Arm because Mild doesn't know to fear him yet."
Simultaneously, in the shadows of the corridor, Skyler leaned against a pillar, her grey eyes narrowed into slits of ice. She had heard Enock's invitation. She knew the Governor's son was a predator who dressed as a savior.
She gripped her phone, her knuckles turning white.
"You think you're charming, Enock?" Skyler whispered, her voice a low, vibrating threat. "You think you can take the Luthier for yourself? You don't realize that the only shadow deep enough to hold him... is mine."
She turned and vanished into the darkness, already planning the "accident" that would remind Enock exactly whose masterpiece Mild Cho really was.
Mild, overwhelmed by the forced containment and Arm's cruelty, decided to test Enock's offer. He found the West Wing study that evening. It was small, lined with leather-bound books, and smelled pleasantly of pipe tobacco and old paper. The lack of surveillance—the conspicuous absence of polished metal or reflective surfaces—felt like a vacation.
Enock was waiting, not behind a desk, but sprawled casually on a worn leather sofa. He immediately handed Mild a chilled bottle of imported water.
"Sit, Mild," Enock said, his charm effortless and warm. "I know this whole 'boarding' situation is a ridiculous overreach. My family thinks they own everyone's choices."
Mild sank onto an armchair, clutching the water bottle. He still felt suspicious, but the fatigue was winning. "Why are you doing this, Enock? Why help me?"
Enock's smile softened into something genuinely compassionate. "Because I grew up watching the Armitages and the Foundation devour people. They tried to chew up Arm, too, and look what it did to him—turned him into that cold President. You're the one person who hasn't bowed, and I respect that. I think you deserve to know the truth about the pendant, not as a tool for Arm's revenge, but as a path to your own freedom."
Mild felt the pendant under his shirt. The thought of Arm's calculating eyes and his family's threats made him lean into Enock's offered sympathy. "What do you know?"
"I know the names they didn't tell Arm," Enock whispered, leaning forward. "The courier, the timing... it points to a very specific political rival of my father's. A man who might have used Shelmith's obsession with you to set a trap for the Armitages. If you help me uncover this, I can expose the plot, prove you're a victim, and permanently destroy the Foundation's hold on you."
Enock didn't ask for the pendant or a confession. He only asked for Mild's trust—a currency Mild was desperate to spend.
Kavin watched the footage from a low-powered security camera he had hacked near the West Wing. He saw Mild enter the unmonitored study, and he saw Enock's face—the easy smile, the disarming gestures.
"Damn it," Kavin muttered, slamming his fist lightly on the desk in the darkroom. "Arm was a hammer, but Enock is oil. He's going to slide right under Mild's guard."
Kavin was meticulously tracking the flow of power at St. Jude's, diagramming the alliances. He had placed Mild at the center of a chaotic Venn diagram where the circles of Armitage (The Predator), Foundation (The Cage), and Mild (The Prize) violently intersected. Now, Enock's circle was being added, and it threatened to destabilize Kavin's plan to gently extract Mild from Arm's orbit.
"He's playing the 'Black Sheep' angle," Kavin realized, rubbing his temples. "Enock will destroy Mild's trust in everyone else, making him think he is the only safe one. I need to get ahead of this. I need a distraction that pulls Enock's focus."
Skyler didn't need cameras; she had eyes on the ground. When she heard that Mild was spending time with Enock, her quiet, obsessive fury escalated into a cold resolve.
She walked through the West Wing, her expression blank, but her hands trembling with possessive jealousy. She had engineered Mild's imprisonment to protect him from the world, and now a charming rival was offering him an escape route.
"He thinks he can just poach him," Skyler whispered. "He thinks his father's name protects him."
Skyler knew Enock's schedule. She knew he drove a customized, high-performance sports car with notoriously bad brakes—a detail that was easy to exploit. She wasn't just working for no reason; she was working for her obsession. Mild was hers to watch, hers to hide, and hers to free—not Enock's.
She pulled out her phone and sent a coded message to an untraceable number: "The Black Sheep needs a warning. Soft impact, high visibility. Tonight."
***
Arm had been relegated to his suite in the main building, ostensibly studying for his diplomatic exams. The room felt like a solitary confinement cell. He couldn't call Mild, he couldn't see him, and he couldn't even leave a note.
When his phone finally pinged, it was not the official Foundation message he dreaded, but a taunting text from Style:
Style: Having fun in your room, darling? Guess who just saw Enock walking out of the West Wing with your little scholar? He looked quite pleased with himself. It seems your cousin is handling the 'investigation' with great... charm.
Arm felt a cold, violent wave of betrayal. He had made the ultimate sacrifice—risking his inheritance and reputation by sending Mild away—only for his parents to hand his "Masterpiece" to his closest rival.
He threw his phone across the room, watching it shatter against the marble wall.
"They used me," Arm snarled, pacing the room like a trapped animal. "They used my sister's death to get the boy back, and then they gave him to Enock to clean up my mess!"
He grabbed his jacket. The "Zero-Contact" order was irrelevant. He couldn't let Enock, the reckless womanizer, touch Mild. Enock would destroy Mild's spirit in pursuit of a political win.
Arm looked at the scattered pieces of his phone. He couldn't call, but he could certainly visit. He was the President. He was still an Armitage. He would find Mild, and he would end Enock's interference—whatever the cost.