Lord Summoner's Freedom Philosophy: Grimoire of Love-Chapter 514: Children of Flesh and Shade (End)

Twilight slanted across the Grand Cathedral plaza like a tempered blade. Fires burned in shallow iron basins, their crackle underscored by the shuffling hush of hundreds. No banner rose, no drumbeat marked victory. Citizens wore linen patched with grief, eyes rimmed red not from smoke but from the shock of stillness after endless screams.

The pyre loomed on sandstone steps—three relics atop stacked cedar. The Queen’s moon-white coronet, pronged like frozen lightning; Kassia’s mirror blade, hairline fractures webbing its length so lamplight refracted in crooked rainbows; Ara’s twisted gauntlet, runes dark as dried blood. They looked small, almost fragile, dwarfed by the world they had once controlled.

Lyan stood front-center, cloak throat-pinned by a tarnished brooch shaped like a wolf’s head—Symbol of Astellia’s vanguard. He let silence wash over him, heartbeat syncing with crackling torches. Faces stared: men with sling bandages, women with soot-streak tears, children balanced on shoulders because they were too tired to stand. All waited for meaning, for closure, for an excuse to believe tomorrow would be gentler.

He drew breath. It carried woodsmoke into his lungs, tasted of resin and old sorrow. Words steadied in his mind like soldiers falling into line. "Let history remember their deaths as their choice," he began, voice low but carrying in the hush. "Not their curse. They were not tyrants by nature. They were tools—sharpened by fear, wielded by one man’s pride. And at the end, they broke free of that hand."

No cheers. Only wind, ruffling hair, flicking flames sideways. The pause felt right. Raw. Honest. Then a priest intoned in a tongue older than any living soul. Another joined, weaving counter-melody. Voices rose—thin, wavering, then sure. People who had never sung the same prayer found the vowel shapes anyway. The air trembled.

A single spark snapped from the torch Josephine held and kissed the edge of the mirror blade. A hiss, almost delicate, and a thin ribbon of flame crawled up polished steel. Runes on the gauntlet flared sickly green, then cratered black as pitch. Resin-rich cedar caught with a roar, sending orange gusts skyward.

Josephine edged close, whispered against Lyan’s ear. "You stiffened when they burned it."

He kept his eyes forward, forcing his breathing even. "I’ll live," he said. But the crack of the mirror blade splitting down its spine echoed inside his ribs like a bone snapping. That sword reflected more than enemy strikes—it showed what those girls were forced to be.

The crowd inhaled as the coronet melted, gold dripping like tears of a sun goddess. No one shouted. No one cheered. They simply watched, and in that shared silence Lyan heard grief leaving the square one breath at a time.

Night slid in soft over the broken palace cliffs. Clouds smothered the moon, leaving only scattered lanterns to bruise the dark. Lyan moved as shadow through shadow, Belle’s illusion charm pulsing cold against his wrist. Every guard who should have seen him saw only mist curling from a gutter or a trick of moonless light.

He followed Vharn’s chalk sigils—tiny V marks hidden where mortar had chipped. They led through a servants’ corridor thick with mildew, down a flight of spiral steps so narrow the walls scraped his shoulders, through a crumbling prayer well whose saints had lost their faces to heat. The silence felt thicker down here, as if the stone itself held its breath, waiting to see if the new era would be kinder than the last.

Scythrel was there at the threshold. Its obsidian limbs unfolded from ceiling shadows, each blade-edge catching the lamplight in quicksilver glints. The creature twitched once in greeting, then folded back to stillness, resuming its watch like a patient gargoyle.

Inside, the air felt warmer than before. A dozen temple gems glowed along the walls, their soft amber light pooling around the Queen and her daughters. Yet the glow did nothing to loosen the tension in their shoulders. All three sat in a tight half-circle, backs never quite turned, eyes never quite meeting. Even the silence had edges.

"You came back before leaving," the Queen said. She tried for a smile, but her fingers stayed laced, knuckles pale against the dark wool cloak.

Ara raised her good arm in a small wave. "We heard the crowd. You made us disappear with words." Her voice sounded thankful, but there was a tremor under it—as if she feared the words might vanish, too.

Kassia said nothing. She worked a whetstone over the warped length of her blade, each stroke scraping like flint. Sparks tried to rise and died at once, as though the steel itself was too tired to ignite.

Lyan approached, boots whisper-quiet on marble that still held the faint scent of incense. He noticed everything: how Ara’s cloak slipped to reveal a ring of bruises around her bicep; how Kassia positioned her body between the altar and the entrance as if she alone must guard the family; how the Queen’s gaze flicked each time his shadow crossed the gemlight, measuring whether he came as savior or executioner.

"A child drew me with lightning wings," he said, kneeling to reduce his height, palms open on his thighs. "Thought I came from the sky." ƒгeeweɓn૦vel.com

The Queen’s lips parted in gentle surprise. "He gave you wings."

"They burned off," Lyan murmured, unable to stop his eyes from tracking the curve of her braid as it fell forward. "Like everything good."

Kassia’s whetstone paused. She looked up, eyes a storm-grey that held less anger than before, more weary interest. "You burned part of yourself for us," she said, voice blunt but softer than any greeting she’d offered yet. "I don’t hate that."

He dipped his head in thanks. A bead of sweat slid behind his ear—not from heat but from the uneasy weight of three women assessing his worth in a single heartbeat. He drew a small leather pouch from his belt and set it on the altar. When he untied the cord, a pair of ivory-handled scissors, a vial of dark dye, and three lengths of plain flax ribbon spilled out.

"All of Varzadia thinks the royal women died in the collapse," he said. "If any spy catches even a hint you’re alive before we reach Astellia, every faction with a grudge will line up to claim you. Disguises start now."

Ara’s hand rose to her long chestnut hair. "You want us to cut it?"

"Cut, bind, dye—whatever hides what the painted walls once showed." He softened his tone. "Hair grows. Heads do not."

The Queen exhaled, a quiet sigh that trembled only at the beginning. She picked up the scissors, weighing them like a scepter. "My mother taught me never to fear loss that can grow back," she said, then slipped the blades under the first silver strand just above her collarbone. Snip. The lock fell, gleaming like moonlight, and landed on the cold stone. Another snip, and her braid loosened.

Ara shifted closer, surprise widening her eyes. Kassia’s jaw tightened, but after a moment she laid the sword aside—edge out, within reach—and reached for the scissors. "I’ll do Ara’s," she muttered. She combed gentle fingers through her sister’s hair, finding the least tangled section. The care in that motion, more than any words, told Lyan the sisters were still a single unit despite iron, fire, and a tyrant father.

He pulled his cloak tighter, partly to keep dust from his wounds but mostly to hide where his gaze kept drifting. Focus on procedure, he scolded himself. Yet he could not escape noticing the slope of Kassia’s neck when she bent, or the way Ara’s shoulders relaxed once the heavy hair lifted. (Eyes forward,) Cynthia murmured, a gentle slap of conscience. (They’re frightened, not flirting.)

He coughed and uncapped the dye. "A few streaks will do. We’re not turning you into tavern performers, just strangers." He dabbed a cloth, offered it. The Queen took the rag with a small nod and painted a dark stripe at her temple, then another over the greying tips that framed her face.

Ara tilted her head so Kassia could reach the back. Each snip sent brown strands drifting like dried leaves. "If I choose Astellia," she asked, voice steadier now, "will you show me the world when it’s not just shadows and relics?"

"Mountains, sea, libraries that smell of dust not blood," Lyan said. "Even a bakery that sells honey bread at dawn. All of it."

A faint smile ghosted across her lips. Kassia’s eyes flicked to him, narrowing. "If I follow—" she hesitated, glancing at the sword lying dull beside her "—will you let me bring my blade?"

"It’s yours," he replied. "But lose the embellishments. I’ll find you a plainer sheath. Noble steel draws noble assassins."

Kassia actually huffed, almost a laugh. "You assume anyone left wants to assassinate us."

He shrugged. "Hope and weeds, remember? Enemies sprout in the same soil."

The Queen set the scissors down. Her hair hung jagged at shoulder length, the dye turning silver into sable shadows. "I trust you’ll let us choose," she said.

"I will," Lyan promised. He produced three strips of flax ribbon. "Braid these in. Soldiers scanning crowds remember faces first, hair second. One new detail buys a second glance; two buys indifference."

They worked in silence broken only by occasional metal clicks and the soft rasp of Kassia’s whetstone when she resumed sharpening between cuts. Lyan watched the ribbons weave through darkened hair, his mind cataloguing next steps—secure transport, forged papers, fallback signals. Yet part of him noted tiny details he would not record on parchment: the Queen’s fingers trembling only after she finished helping Ara; the way Kassia brushed loose strands from Ara’s cheek with surprising tenderness; how Ara, once freed from the gauntlet’s pain, tapped her toes in an unconscious rhythm—as if music hid somewhere inside her, waiting for permission to step into daylight.

When the last ribbon knotted, he gathered the hair they had shorn and fed it into the low altar brazier. Flames licked pale gold, devouring proof of bloodline. Smoke curled up, spicy with old oils, and vanished into cracks in the high vault. (Clever,) Griselda crackled. (Anyone scrying for hair will chase ashes.)

He offered each woman a plain canvas satchel. "Inside: travel cloak, bread, water stones, a coin pouch with small silver. Nothing rich enough to tempt pickpockets, everything light enough to run."

The Queen examined the satchel, then Lyan. "And if someone still recognizes us before Astellia?"

"Then I plant myself between threat and quarry," he said simply. "Shadow or flesh, blade or word. Whatever it takes."

A pulse of something warm crossed the Queen’s eyes—respect, maybe gratitude deeper than politeness. She offered her hand. He took it, alarmed to feel a tremor in his own. Her fingers were soft, but the grip was decisive. "Then let us choose," she said again, sealing promise with pressure.

Footsteps thudded in the corridor above—changing guards. Time pressed.

Lyan lifted his hood. "Sleep until first bell," he told them. "Vharn will rouse you if anything shifts. At dawn follow Eloix through the tunnel under the east wall; it opens near a burned orchard. I’ll leave a wagon with ointment-smoke in the rear lamps—blue flame. If plans change, look for green."

Kassia slid her blade into a rough leather wrap and tied it tight. Ara tucked stray ribbons under her hood. The Queen closed her satchel and drew the cloak around her shoulders, the new dark hair framing her face like younger years rediscovered.

He turned to leave, then hesitated. The gemlight threw their silhouettes on the far wall—three shapes unbowed, no longer crowned or shackled. For the first time since entering Varzadia he believed these women might reach a future not written in fear.

Outside the sanctuary, torches sputtered in the stairwell. Scythrel’s limbs flexed soundlessly as Lyan passed. "Guard them well," he whispered. The shade dipped its blunt head in acknowledgment.

When he emerged under the sharpening sky, dawn brushed the palace ruins with a wash of pale gold. Surena already barked orders; Wilhelmina leaned over a field map pinned to a barrel; Josephine raised a tin flask in greeting, grin crooked. The world waited for its next burden of plans.

Erich wheeled his horse alongside. "Ready for Astellia?"

Lyan’s gaze drifted once—to the cliff face hiding the sanctum, to the thin fumaroles of smoke from hair-ash still curling into wind. "I’m always ready," he said, adjusting his gloves, "just never certain."

They spurred forward. Hooves clattered on broken flagstone, banners caught fresh breeze, and the future unrolled like a long, dusty road.

Behind him, Vharn, Eloix, and Scythrel settled back into their dark alcoves, silent as stone, still watching the women once shackled by a crown.

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