They didn't need to give him their military secrets or anything of sorts.
Parker wasn't interested in maps, weapons caches, or hushed codes passed down like sacred scripture through the bloodlines of the Five Families. Well—Four now. He didn't care for that kind of leverage. The people who stand above these families—the Origin Bloodlines, his first creations—were already loyal to him in ways that went beyond threats or promises.
They didn't need convincing. They belonged to him.
But Diana and Isabella were right about one thing.
The world—the mundane world—ran on systems, and those systems had leashes. Not digital ones. Not magical ones. Mental ones. Cultural ones. Invisible threads of inherited obedience tied to names, crests, and the long shadows of old money and older violence. Governments didn't rule this world. The Five Families did. Quietly. Consistently. Through backroom deals, money, ultimate inherited power, oaths, and the art of whispered war.
