Sarisa stared at the chains as if sheer disbelief could stop them from existing.
For one suspended second, she saw everything too clearly: Lara's bruised knuckles, Vaelen's blood on the marble, her mother's cold satisfaction, the guards shifting in careful half-steps like men approaching a caged beast.
"Mother, stop your nonsense."
The words came out sharper than Sarisa intended, but she did not take them back. She stepped forward, skirts whispering over broken stone, putting herself between Lara and the first guard who dared raise the chains.
The corridor went still again.
Her mother's expression did not change. "Step aside, Sarisa."
"No." Sarisa's voice shook once, then steadied. "This is absurd. She hit him, yes, but chaining her like a criminal in front of half the household is madness."
"It is consequence," the queen corrected.
"It is theater."
That landed. A few of the women at the far end of the corridor exchanged looks and immediately regretted it when the queen's gaze flicked their way.
Vaelen, leaning on one of the guards, touched the blood at his temple with what might have been meant as quiet dignity. "Sarisa, please. Let it be handled."
Handled.
As if Lara were a riot to be quelled.
Sarisa rounded on him, eyes blazing. "Be quiet."
He did, startled into silence.
Behind her, Lara made a low sound in her throat, not quite a warning and not quite a laugh. Sarisa knew that sound. It meant she was one heartbeat from making this ten times worse.
The queen looked from daughter to bodyguard and, in that cool, cutting way she had, seemed to weigh exactly how much cruelty the situation would bear.
"You are emotional," she said at last. "That is understandable. But your judgment is compromised."
Sarisa laughed, once, harshly. "My judgment is compromised? You're trying to throw my bodyguard into a dungeon over one punch."
"One punch at a prince," the queen said. "A prince you are due to marry. A prince she attacked like a rabid animal."
Lara took one step forward at that. The chains jerked higher in the guard's hands.
Sarisa did not look back, but she lifted one hand slightly, enough to warn Lara to stay still. "No one is taking her anywhere."
This time the queen's patience finally cracked.
"Enough." Her voice rang off the marble. "She struck a royal. She is lucky I do not have her executed."
The words hit the corridor like a blade to the throat.
Sarisa went cold all over.
So did Lara. She felt it behind her, not fear exactly, but a sudden, terrible stillness.
"No," Sarisa said, and there was something in her voice now that made even the nearest guard flinch.
"No. You do not get to say that. Not after everything she has done for this family. Not after every time she has saved me."
The queen's jaw hardened. "You will lower your voice."
"I will not."
There it was. The line crossed. The daughter she had trained into obedience choosing defiance in front of witnesses.
The queen's face changed. The softness of control vanished. What remained was pure rule.
"Take her," she said.
The guards moved.
Sarisa did not even think. She lunged toward Lara just as two men came from either side, chains ready.
She caught one by the arm and shoved him back with enough force to make him stumble into the shattered wall.
"Do not touch her!"
At the same moment, Lara moved too.
Not away from the guards.
Toward Sarisa.
"Don't touch the princess," Lara snarled, catching the second man's wrist before he could lay a hand on Sarisa's sleeve.
She twisted hard enough to wrench a cry out of him, then shoved him away. "If you want chains, use them on me and keep your filthy hands off her."
That only made it worse.
More guards poured into the corridor now, drawn by the queen's raised voice and the escalating chaos.
The noblewomen had retreated to the far wall, pale and whispering. Vaelen was still there, still bleeding, still being held upright by someone else while the scene unraveled around him.
"Sarisa." The queen's voice had gone frighteningly quiet. "Stand down."
"No."
Lara's hand closed around Sarisa's elbow, not restraining, just anchoring. She was breathing hard, chest heaving, fury coming off her in waves. "Princess—"
"Don't," Sarisa snapped, not taking her eyes off her mother. "Do not princess me right now."
For one mad second, Lara almost smiled.
Then two guards came for Sarisa from behind.
Lara saw them first.
She shoved Sarisa sideways hard enough to unbalance her, taking the brunt of the rush herself. One man caught her shoulder, another got a chain around one arm before she jerked free, but the movement cost her balance and gave the others enough time to circle.
"Back off!" Lara roared.
Sarisa staggered, regained her footing, and turned just in time to see one of the queen's attendants lift something small and silver from the folds of her sleeve.
A vial.
Her blood turned to ice.
"Mother—"
Too late.
The vial shattered against the floor between them with a crack like thin glass and a burst of glittering white powder.
The scent hit first. Sweet. Wrong. Heavy.
Lara swore violently and reached for Sarisa, but the first breath was enough. Sarisa coughed, stumbled, her vision blurring at the edges almost instantly. Magic.
Sleep powder or some Celestian equivalent of it, strong enough to take down a mage before she could chain the room apart.
"No," Sarisa rasped, trying to back away, trying to pull air that didn't taste like honey and ash into her lungs.
Lara was already weaving.
She still got one arm around Sarisa's waist, hauling her upright even as her own knees began to fail. "Don't breathe," Lara choked out, which would have been useful about three seconds earlier.
Sarisa's hands clutched weakly at Lara's shirt. Around them, voices blurred into a distant, muffled hum.
Guards were shouting. Someone caught Vaelen as he sagged against the wall, though Sarisa couldn't make out why that mattered. The corridor had begun to tilt.
The queen stepped forward at last, skirts whispering through dust and broken marble, perfectly untouched by the chaos she had made.
"Take them now," she said.
Two guards moved in, hesitant because Lara still looked like she might kill all of them with her bare hands even half-drugged.
One reached for Sarisa.
Lara reacted instantly, jerking him back by the collar with a strength born entirely of rage and instinct. "Don't—touch—her."
But the words were slurring. Her grip slipped.
Sarisa tried to lift a hand, tried to call chains, fire, anything, but her magic felt very far away now, as if it belonged to someone else. The floor rose strangely toward her. Or she was falling toward it. Hard to tell.
Lara caught her again before she hit the ground.
That was the last clear thing in the world.
Lara's face, too close, too pale beneath the bruises. Her mouth moving. Maybe saying Sarisa's name. Maybe a curse. Maybe both.
Then the second wave of powder hit, finer this time, blown directly into their faces by one of the attendants.
Lara sagged first, still fighting it, still trying to hold Sarisa upright as her own body gave way beneath her. Sarisa felt their knees buckle together. Their weight dragged them down in one tangled collapse of silk, leather, and stubbornness.
The queen stood over them, a terrible calm in her eyes.
As darkness rushed in, Sarisa heard her voice one last time, cool and almost gentle now.
"Sorry, Sarisa. I had no choice."