The west greenhouse doors clicked softly behind Lucian as he stepped out.
The sound was small, almost polite.
Like the palace itself was pretending nothing important had just shifted.
Late afternoon light spilled across the outer corridor in long, tired strips of gold. The warmth should have felt comforting, but it only made the air inside the greenhouse feel even more artificial in hindsight—too controlled, too carefully maintained.
Lucian walked without stopping.
Alistair's last words followed him anyway.
The more you question it… the less certain I feel about what I actually remember.
That shouldn't have mattered. It wasn't evidence. It wasn't a lead. It wasn't even useful.
But it stuck.
Because Lucian wasn't just dealing with missing records anymore.
He was dealing with the possibility that memory itself in this palace was unreliable.
He exhaled slowly through his nose.
"Great," he muttered under his breath. "Even eyewitness testimony comes pre-corrupted here."
