The room was quiet.
Not the peace of silence.
But the kind of quiet that waited.
Reynald sat alone in the center of a perfectly square chamber carved from deep, dark stone. Smooth walls pulsed faintly with containment glyphs—soft runes etched into the walls like veins, shifting gently with blue-white light. Not enough to blind. Just enough to remind.
You are not free.
It had been a day and a half.
Thirty-nine hours, by his count.
He had not been questioned.
He had not been summoned.
Not a single mage had stepped through the reinforced threshold that sealed the only door. No instructors. No judges. No Crown-bearers.
Just silence, and the quiet hum of restraint wards working endlessly overhead.
He shifted slightly on the bench they'd given him—clean, polished stone, with a cushion that suggested civility rather than mercy. The food had been fine. Nutritious. The water was cool. His injuries had been treated, his burns salved, his bones aligned.
