Caught by the Mad Alpha King-Chapter 472: A better plan

"No," he said.

The room held.

Dean sat up straighter at once, delighted by the arrival of opposition.

Sebastian closed his eyes briefly in visible gratitude.

Nero looked offended on principle. "You don’t even know the plan."

"I know enough."

Zion, to his credit, did not wilt under Rowan’s tone. "It is not an unreasonable suggestion."

Rowan turned his head slowly. "That is not true in any political system I respect."

Dean made a small sound that was definitely laughter and immediately disguised it as a cough.

Nero folded his arms. "Why?"

Rowan looked at him with the grave patience of a man addressing an heir who was too clever to be dismissed and too dramatic to be indulged. "Because first, it is impossible."

"That sounds lazy," Nero said.

"No," Rowan replied. "That sounds informed."

He stepped farther into the room as the staff withdrew, leaving the trays behind and the atmosphere significantly more interesting.

"This is not simply a matter of sending one boy to another palace because the atmosphere there is personally inconvenient," Rowan said. "It would involve joint staff clearances, internal route access, restricted schedules, private household exposure, diplomatic risk, and far too many opportunities for two governments to accidentally learn things they would strongly prefer not to share."

Dean nodded solemnly. "See? Fancy impossible."

"Yes," Rowan said. "Exactly."

Zion remained calm. "All of that can be negotiated."

Rowan gave him a flat look. "No. Some of it can be negotiated. The rest is classified for excellent reasons."

Nero, instead of being discouraged like a normal child, looked more engaged. "So it’s complicated."

"Yes."

"That means important."

"That means dangerous."

"That too."

Sebastian pinched the bridge of his nose. "He hears ’dangerous’ like other people hear ’fun.’"

"Yes," Rowan said. "That is one of the reasons I’m objecting."

Zion leaned back slightly. "You said first."

"I did."

Rowan’s expression did not soften. "The second reason is more immediate."

The room quieted.

He looked directly at Nero now. "You would do something dramatic."

Nero looked deeply offended. "I would not."

Every other boy in the room looked at him.

Including Zion.

Nero held the silence for exactly two seconds before adding, with less certainty, "Probably."

Dean laughed outright.

Sebastian let out one tired, ruined breath and reached for a drink like the room had finally become honest enough to deserve hydration.

Rowan continued, mercilessly firm. "And Caelan does not dislike only Zion."

"He dislikes Dax and Chris as well," Rowan said. "He is polite when policy requires it. That is not the same thing. And what extends to parents often extends to children in old men with long memories and bad habits."

Nero, who should have looked chastened and instead looked invigorated, dared to grin. "Dislike is a polite word. He hates our guts. More reason to make him suffer in his own country."

"No," Chris said from the doorway, one hand on the frame and a level of calm that made everyone in the room temporarily more intelligent.

Behind him came Dax.

And the sight of the king wearing a bright grin explained far too much about Nero’s personality.

Dean noticed first and pointed at once. "And this is why Nero is how he is."

Sebastian let out one exhausted breath. "At last. We found the source."

Chris ignored all of them and looked directly at Nero. "No."

Nero sat up straighter. "You don’t even know the full idea."

Chris entered the room, followed closely by his amused husband. "I don’t need to hear it. I know who your father is, and he," Chris pointed at Dax, "is too amused by the idea to be safe."

Dean made a delighted sound at once. "Exactly."

Sebastian exhaled like a man whose private prayers had finally been answered by competence entering the room. "Thank God."

Dax, unfortunately, did not look remotely chastened.

He came farther in at an unhurried pace, one hand in his pocket, the corner of his mouth still carrying that deeply unhelpful expression that meant he was already entertaining logistics instead of killing the proposal outright. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

Rowan saw it and visibly suffered.

"Your Majesty," he said.

"Yes."

"You are proving the point."

"That seems subjective."

"It isn’t," Sebastian said flatly.

Chris turned slowly toward his husband. "Would you like to explain why you look pleased?"

"I haven’t said anything."

"That has never protected anyone from you."

Nero, sensing support somewhere in the room and deciding it was paternal, brightened. "Papa thinks—"

"No," Chris cut in.

Nero looked offended. "You didn’t let me finish."

"I don’t need the end of the sentence. I know the beginning is already a problem."

Dean, who had absolutely no survival instinct where entertainment was concerned, leaned forward in his chair. "To be fair, it was an extremely structured problem."

"No one asked you," Sebastian said.

Dean smiled. "That has never stopped me."

Dax glanced at Dean, then at Nero, then finally at his husband, and the grin sharpened instead of fading.

"Oh, I am absolutely in favor of making Caelan suffer."

Chris closed his eyes briefly, as if that sentence had confirmed several private fears at once.

Rowan looked like a man reconsidering every life choice that had brought him into royal service.

Sebastian muttered, "Of course you are."

"But," Dax continued, lifting one finger with infuriating calm, "not like this."

The room paused.

That was somehow worse.

Because if Dax had simply agreed with Nero’s ridiculous proposal, Chris could have killed it quickly. A better idea implied thought. Thought implied planning. Planning, in Dax’s hands, was rarely survivable for anyone within a ten-meter radius of pride and politics.

Chris’s gaze narrowed. "Define better."

Dax looked almost offended by the suspicion. "Elegant. Public. Impossible to refuse without permanent damage to his dignity."

Dean sat up straighter. "Oh, that’s evil."

"Thank you," Dax said.

"I did not mean it as praise."

"I chose to receive it that way."

Nero’s eyes lit up with the kind of dangerous filial delight that explained at least half his existence. "What kind of event?"

Dax looked at him, then at Zion, then slowly around the room as if measuring how much trouble each person could be trusted with.

"Not an exchange," he said. "I like chaos provoked by me, not you."

Dean made a strangled sound that was half laugh, half betrayal. "That is the most honest thing anyone has said in this room."

"It is also, somehow, the least reassuring," Sebastian muttered.

Chris folded his arms and gave his husband a look that should have stopped lesser men at the border. "You are enjoying this too much."

Dax smiled without shame. "Obviously."

Nero, instead of being discouraged by that answer, looked even more interested. "So you do have another plan."

"Oh, he does," Chris said grimly. "That is the problem."

Dax ignored him with the ease of a man who had been married long enough to survive disapproval and arrogant enough to treat it as weather. He strolled farther into the room, stole a piece of fruit from one of the trays as though the kingdom personally owed it to him, and said, "If Caelan is going to suffer, then it should be elegant."

Rowan’s expression turned deeply suspicious. "That sentence should concern everyone."

"It does," Sebastian said.

Dean leaned forward in his chair at once, all delight and absolutely no instinct for self-preservation. "No, let him continue. This sounds educational."

Chris turned his head. "For whom."

"For me."

"That is not a valid answer."

"It is to me."

Dax bit into the fruit, chewed with insulting calm, and then pointed lightly in Nero and Zion’s direction. "An exchange can be refused on security grounds, delayed by procedure, strangled by bureaucracy, or buried under polite diplomatic lies. Too many doors. Too many people with stamps."

Zion, to his credit, nodded once. He was listening seriously now.

Nero looked mildly offended on behalf of doomed ideas.

"So," Dax continued, "you do not give Caelan a private matter to reject. You give him a public one."