Chapter 182: A Leader, Not A Banner To Be Raised
Aveline swallowed hard.
She could let them go.
The thought came to her so clearly that it made her chest ache.
She could open the cages. She could break the runes. She could release them all and leave the dungeon with the knowledge that they were no longer suffering under these walls.
But then what?
Where would they go?
Who would take them?
Would they survive outside, or would they simply be hunted by the same world that had locked them away in the first place?
Aveline did not know.
And because she did not know, she could not move.
She lowered her eyes and felt guilt settle over her like a weight. She hated that she could not fix it. She hated that kindness was not always enough to make suffering disappear. She hated that wanting to save something was not the same as being able to save it.
So instead, she did the only thing she could.
She turned the creature gently around and led it back toward its cage.
It followed without resistance, as though it understood that she was not rejecting it. As though it knew she had touched its pain and carried it with her for those few terrible seconds, and that had been enough for now.
Aveline guided it carefully back inside, then stepped away before her heart could change its mind.
She did not turn back.
If she turned back, she thought she might do something foolish, like try to open every cage in the room and then stand there helplessly while the world punished her and them for it.
So she kept walking.
Her chest felt heavy.
Her fingers were still faintly trembling.
Behind her, Aelion’s voice cut through the dim air, sharp with disbelief.
"That is it? You are walking away?"
Aveline did not answer at once. She kept moving, though every step felt heavier than the last. The creature’s pain still lingered in her chest, raw and immediate, and for one terrible second, she remembered Helena. She remembered what waiting had cost.
A single moment of uncertainty, a single step too late, and a life had been lost. That memory sat too close to her heart for her to pretend bravery came easily.
She blinked hard against the sting in her eyes and forced her voice to remain steady.
"There should be a proper way to handle this," she said.
"Proper way?" Aelion barked out a laugh. "What are you going to do? Write letters? Gather signatures? Ask everyone nicely to stop torturing them?"
The words stung more than she wanted them to. He sounded disappointed, almost offended, as though he had expected her to become something grander the moment she laid a hand on the creature’s head.
Aelion had believed she would be the one to open the cages, the one to raise a banner, the one to ignite some grand rebellion for the sake of the spirits. Instead, she had turned away. And to him, that looked like fear. Disappointment.
Aveline stopped.
Her hands tightened into fists at her sides.
"I will talk to Lucien," she said.
Aelion gave a short, incredulous laugh. "Lucien? You mean that man who forgets which decade he is in? You think he will listen to you because he mistakes you for his mistress?"
"Enough."
The single word came out with far more force than she intended, and when Aelion looked at her, he saw that the softness he had mistaken for weakness was gone. She turned fully toward him, and the change in her expression was so sudden it almost startled him.
There was nothing helpless in her now. Nothing fragile. She looked steady, direct, and strangely commanding, as if some older part of her had stepped forward to take control.
"What do you want from me?" she asked, taking one step closer.
Aelion, despite himself, stepped back.
Aveline’s mouth curved faintly, but there was no warmth in it.
"I will listen to you, Aelion," she said, her tone light and edged with something almost amused. "And then what? I let them go. And then what? Where do they go? Can you promise they will not be hunted the moment I open the cages?"
Aelion swallowed.
No, he could not.
That was the problem. That had always been the problem.
He had wanted her to be the answer, the spark, the proof that his theory was right and that a revolution could begin if only the right person cared enough to start it.
But Aveline was not a banner to be raised. She was not a simple weapon to be pointed at the world. She was thinking.
She was weighing. She was asking the exact questions he had hoped she would ignore.
He lifted both hands in surrender, his expression shifting into something less defensive and more respectful.
"Forgive me, Your Highness," he said, though the title sounded more startled than deliberate. "I did not think this through."
Aveline exhaled slowly and turned away again. "I’m not a princess, Aelion. Your address sounds like mockery."
She did not trust him. Not fully. There was something in him that was always reaching, always testing, always trying to draw her toward a purpose she had not yet chosen for herself.
But she needed someone who understood this place, someone who could show her the ropes and not expect her to already know how everything worked. She would have preferred that person to be Theron. In his absence, Aelion would have to do.
Still, the truth remained unchanged.
Everyone seemed to want her for something.
Theron, perhaps, had been the only one who had looked at her and wanted her without first trying to reshape her into a role. Even when he gave her his night robe and asked her to do whatever she wanted with it, he never asked her to change herself.
And... Lucien too, perhaps, didn’t want to mould her into something she was not.
But... She did not want to think about Lucien.
Not now. Not with the strange, unsettling warmth of Lucien’s attention still lingering at the edges of her thoughts like something she had not yet decided whether to welcome or fear.
"What is the name of your King?" she asked.
That man... he too wanted something from her.
Aelion, who had been standing behind her, hurried to catch up and fell into step beside her. Something had shifted in him after what he had witnessed in the dungeon. Respect remained, but now it was mixed with something else.
Something almost like fear.
"Kevron," he answered. "Kevron Blackwyre. Why do you ask?"
Aveline smiled faintly.
Kevron.
Mr. Just Kev.
"What do you think I am, Aelion?" she asked.
He blinked.
Aveline turned her gaze toward him. "From what I’ve heard, no one can use high-level bending of more than one element. So what am I?"
Aelion’s throat tightened. The answer sat heavily in his chest.
Should he tell her what he was beginning to suspect?
