Trevor was the first to break the silence, his voice controlled but strained. "He is barely eighteen."
Dean flinched. Almost nineteen, but hearing it phrased like that made him feel painfully young and tragically unprepared. Trevor wasn't trying to embarrass him; he was trying to buy time, to create space where none remained.
"It's rushed," Trevor continued. "Unreasonably so. You've barely been here a month…"
Arion didn't let him finish.
"With respect, Grand Duke Fitzgeralt," he said, tone still polite but edged with certainty, "Lucas was not much older when he married you."
Lucas stiffened in his seat, and Trevor's jaw tightened. The entire table shifted subtly, like someone had pressed a fault line.
Dean felt his breath catch. Lucas met Arion's eyes briefly, expression unreadable, then looked back down at his plate. They couldn't say Lucas had been mentally older, reborn, experienced, and twice-lived.
