Jack sat alone in his chambers two nights after the interrogation, surrounded by the detritus of governance.
Reports and maps of Sorne's districts lay scattered across his desk like fallen leaves, marked with notations of things needed to be done.
His fingers traced the edge of a report Octavia had left him labeled "Marcus Thorne/Phallanax Solutions."
The spy had broken completely under his mother's touch.
Jack had watched a man's mind shatter like glass dropped on stone. The terror into his eyes was real. Whatever exactly Jack's mother did, it made a grown man want to kill himself.
And it left Jack feeling hollow.
'When did I become someone who stands in a room while a man screams?' he wondered.
He thought of Caelen's oath. The priest kneeling in that stone chamber, offering his life with the quiet dignity of a man who'd found his true calling. That had felt clean. A choice made in light, witnessed by honor.
The interrogation had felt like something else entirely.
