# Chapter 581: A Council of Doubts
The air in the Triumvirate Council Chamber was cold and still, heavy with the scent of old stone and unspoken fears. Sunlight, strained through the high, arched windows, fell in dusty columns across the polished obsidian floor, illuminating the three great thrones. Two were empty, placeholders for the absent powers of the Crownlands and the Sable League. The third, where Prince Cassian sat, was the sole point of focus. He looked older than his years, the weight of the regency settling on his shoulders like a physical mantle. Before him, on a simple velvet cushion, lay the two impossible flowers, their green so vibrant it seemed to drink the light from the room. Beside them, a crystal orb swirled with captured images: shadowy husks moving with Soren's fluid grace, a commander wearing his face.
Nyra stood at the center of the chamber, the silence pressing down on her. The journey back from Cinder-Fall had been a blur of forced marches and sleepless nights, the survivor's testimony a constant, horrified whisper in her mind. Now, facing the council, she felt the exhaustion settle into her bones, a deep, aching weariness that went beyond the physical. She had presented her findings with a soldier's crisp efficiency: the adaptive nature of the Bloomblights, their use of memories as weapons, the purification tactic that had won them a temporary victory, and the final, chilling appearance of the second flower.
Isolde stood a few paces behind her, a silent, steadfast shadow. The Inquisitor's face was pale, her own ordeal etched in the fine lines around her eyes. She had not spoken since they entered, her gaze fixed on the crystal orb as if trying to divine the soul of the creature she had helped destroy.
The silence was finally broken by Lord Valerius, a man whose face seemed permanently carved from granite. He was a staunch traditionalist from the Crownlands, his loyalty to the old ways absolute. He gestured with a dismissive hand toward the crystal orb. "An echo," he declared, his voice a dry rasp. "A residual psychic phenomenon. The Withering King's power is vast and corrupting. It latched onto the most potent memory available to it in that region—the memory of Soren Vale. It is a weapon, yes, but a crude one. A ghost in the machine."
"A ghost that moves with tactical precision," Nyra countered, her voice steady despite the tremor in her hands. She kept them clasped behind her back, a soldier at attention. "It didn't just mimic his form. It used his techniques. It anticipated our strategies. The commander I faced… it fought like Soren. It thought like him."
"A projection," Valerius shot back, his eyes narrowing. "You are too close to this, Councilor Sableki. Your personal history with Vale clouds your judgment. You see a conspiracy where there is only catastrophe."
"It is not a judgment, it is an observation," Nyra insisted, stepping forward. The sound of her boots on the obsidian floor was sharp, a crack in the tension. "The husks in Cinder-Fall were not random. They were reforged from the villagers, their bodies twisted, but their movements… they were an army. They responded to commands. The commander was not just a powerful husk; it was a general. This isn't a mindless plague, my lords. It is an invasion."
Prince Cassian leaned forward, his steepled fingers tapping thoughtfully against his lips. His gaze was not on the flowers or the orb, but on Nyra. He saw the exhaustion, the raw conviction in her eyes, and the heavy burden she carried. "Let us assume you are correct, Councilor," he said, his voice calm and measured, a stark contrast to Valerius's gravelly tone. "Let us assume this is a coordinated force. What does that change? The logistical problem remains the same. We have reports of three more Bloomblights sprouting along the Riverchain, each one larger than the last. We cannot afford to treat them as unique tactical puzzles. We need a strategy of containment and eradication, not interpretation."
"The strategy must be born from interpretation, Your Highness," Isolde spoke, her voice quiet but carrying an unexpected weight in the cavernous chamber. All eyes turned to her. She stepped forward, her golden aura, though faint, lending her an ethereal authority. "The light we used in Cinder-Fall… it did not just burn the shadows. It cleansed the ground. The Blight recoiled from it as if from a holy flame. This is not just a physical enemy. It is a spiritual corruption. To fight it with swords and soldiers alone is to try and bail out the ocean with a bucket."
Valerius scoffed. "Spiritual corruption? We are fighting a magical cataclysm, Inquisitor, not a demon from a fireside tale. Your light is a tool, a weapon. Let us not ascribe divinity to what is merely effective."
"It is effective because it is pure," Isolde insisted, her gaze unwavering. "The Blight is born of the Withering King, a being of pure, consuming emptiness. It is anathema to life, to memory, to faith. Soren's final act was one of absolute sacrifice, a purifying fire that seared the land. The flowers… they are not a weapon. They are a sign. A testament that even in the heart of that corruption, life can be reborn. Hope can endure."
"A sign," Valerius repeated, dripping with scorn. "A pretty sentiment. But hope does not fortify walls or feed the people. We need solutions, not parables."
"The solution is in the sign!" Nyra's voice rose, sharp and edged with frustration. She pointed to the flowers on the cushion. "These did not just appear. They bloomed from the point of purification, from the focal point of Soren's dagger. They are connected to him, to his power, to his sacrifice. This isn't the Withering King using his memory as a weapon. This is Soren himself, or a part of him, reaching out. Fighting back. The Blight isn't just mimicking him; it's reacting to him. It's a war being fought on a level we cannot even see!"
The chamber erupted in a murmur of dissent and agreement. The rift was forming, just as she knew it would. On one side, the pragmatists like Valerius and the military commanders who saw a threat to be contained with overwhelming force. On the other, those like Isolde, and a few of the younger, more idealistic nobles, who saw a deeper, more meaningful conflict. Cassian remained the fulcrum, his expression unreadable, caught between the desperate plea of his friend and the grim reality of his duty.
"A message," Nyra said, her voice dropping to a near-whisper, yet it silenced the room. "That is what Isolde called it in the square. She was right. It is a message."
The question came from the far end of the chamber, spoken by a woman whose family had lost their ancestral lands to the Bloom. Baroness Elara Vane, her face a mask of hardened grief, rose slowly from her seat. Her eyes, fixed on Nyra, were not accusatory, but hollowed out by a pain that had become her defining feature.
"A message from whom?" she demanded, her voice cutting through the silence like a shard of glass. It was not the question of a scholar or a politician, but of someone who had paid the ultimate price. "From our savior," she paused, her gaze flickering to the impossible green of the flowers, a flicker of something ancient and terrible in her eyes, "or from the monster he became?"
The question hung in the silent chamber, a venomous seed of doubt planted in the heart of their fragile unity. The sunlight seemed to dim, the vibrant green of the flowers suddenly appearing sinister, a beautiful lie. Nyra felt the words like a physical blow, stealing the breath from her lungs. She had no answer. Or perhaps, she had too many. The whispers from the Blight, the echo of Soren's rage, the purity of the cleansing light, the impossible life of the flowers—it all swirled into a vortex of contradiction. She looked at Cassian, saw the same dawning horror in his eyes. They had won a battle in Cinder-Fall, but in this room, facing the terrible weight of that question, they were losing the war.