Lara had not expected the bath to be the thing that undid her.
Not the court. Not the exile. Not even Sarisa crying in that awful little chamber before they dragged them apart again.
No. It was the quiet, humiliating intimacy of kneeling beside a copper tub and helping a half-feral three-year-old scrub soot from his elbows.
Neris had not wanted help at first. He had stood in the middle of the bathing room with his jaw set and his little fists clenched, staring at the steaming water as if it were part of a trap.
His clothes, once she had managed to get a proper look at them, were worse than she'd realized. The tunic was too tight at one shoulder, loose at the neck, and stitched badly at one seam as though it had been repaired in a hurry by someone who did not know how.
There were old scorch marks at the hem and new ones at the sleeve from his outburst earlier. His boots were a size too big.
Nothing about him sat right.
Lara had crouched again instead of looming, because she was learning that everything with him required lowering herself first.
"You can bathe alone if you want," she had told him. "I'm not here to wrestle you into the tub."
That had earned her one suspicious look after another.
"Then why are you here?" he had asked.
Good question, Lara had thought.
Because apparently the gods have decided I'm a parent twice over and they hate me personally.
Instead she had said, "Because if you set the room on fire, I'd like enough warning to move the towels."
He had stared at her for a second. Then, very carefully, he had taken off the ruined tunic himself.
And that was when Lara had seen the bruises.
Not all of them were fresh. That made it worse. A fading mark near the ribs. A yellowing bruise at the thin curve of one shoulder.
A scrape at one knee with the sort of dried edge that said no one had bothered healing it when it happened. Too many little signs of rough handling. Too many places where care had clearly run short.
Lara had gone cold from the inside out.
She had not said anything then, because if she had spoken too soon, her voice would have become something ugly.
Instead she had helped him into the tub when he let her, slow and careful, keeping her hands visible.
He had tolerated the washing in stages, allowing her to pour water over his hair only after doing it himself first and discovering the soap did not bite. By the time she reached for the small clay jar of healing oil, he was still wary but no longer trying to bolt.
"This stings?" he had asked.
"A little," Lara had admitted. "Then it doesn't."
He had narrowed those amber-red eyes at her. "Adults lie."
"Yes," Lara had said, opening the jar. "But if I wanted to lie, I'd say it smells amazing."
That had earned the tiniest twitch at the corner of his mouth.
Now, hours later, the smell of that oil still clung faintly to her hands. Rosemary, citrus peel, and that bitter medicinal note demons used for bruises and cracked skin.
She had rubbed it gently into his shoulder, his ribs, the scrape at his knee, and each time he had flinched before forcing himself to hold still. That effort had nearly broken her.
What kind of child learned not to cry that young?
After the bath came the clothes, which had gone better only because Neris had discovered that rejecting lace was not only permitted here but apparently celebrated.
The servants, under Elysia's direct instruction, had brought half a wardrobe's worth of alternatives: soft dark tunics, simple trousers, wool vests, little boots without stiff collars or decorative nonsense.
Lara had not known children could have so many opinions about fabric.
"No blue," Neris had said at once.
"Why?"
He had shrugged, but his face had closed.
So no blue.
He had chosen a dark green tunic in the end, soft at the collar, with simple black trousers and sturdier boots that actually fit.
Lara had helped him with the fastenings only when he'd glared at them long enough to admit silent defeat. Even then, his shoulders had stayed tight.
He still did not trust her.
Lara couldn't blame him.
Now they were walking side by side down one of the inner corridors toward dinner, Lara matching her longer stride to his short determined steps.
She had half-expected him to lag behind or cling to a servant. Instead he walked under his own power, silent and alert, glancing around the demon castle with an expression caught somewhere between suspicion and awe.
Lara understood that too.
Malvoria's home was not subtle. Nothing in it believed in restraint. The corridor walls were dark obsidian veined with molten gold, lit by hanging lanterns shaped like flowers and beasts and impossible things from old stories.
Demon architecture did not try to comfort. It tried to impress, to warn, to seduce. It worked on adults. On children, apparently, it was closer to magic.
When they reached the dining room, Neris stopped dead.
Lara did not need to look to know why. The long table was already crowded with food: roast meats glazed in sweet smoke, bowls of buttered roots and herbs, fresh breads, stewed fruits, cheeses, bright sauces, greens scattered with nuts and berries, little fried pastries that Kaelith liked to dunk in soup until Elysia looked pained.
Demon households did not feed people modestly. They fed them as if every meal were defiance.
Neris's eyes widened.
Good, Lara thought grimly. At least something in this house knows how to apologize.
He said nothing, but his whole face betrayed him.
Lara folded her arms and leaned one shoulder against the doorframe. "Impressed?"
He looked up at her quickly, caught between wanting to deny it and not being able to stop staring at the table.
"No," he said.
Lara snorted. "Right."
At the table, Malvoria and Elysia were already seated. Veylira and Raveth had taken the far end, both looking like women who had spent the last hour sharpening plans along with cutlery.
The first to notice them, though, was Kaelith.
Kaelith practically lit up.
"You're here!" she announced, scrambling half out of her chair. Her own dinner napkin was still tucked aggressively into the front of her dress because she believed elegance and catastrophe were compatible goals.
She looked at Neris with open, immediate curiosity and zero caution, which was either a child's strength or its greatest flaw.
Neris took one half-step behind Lara's leg.
Kaelith, to her credit, did not charge him. She just leaned across the table, eyes bright. "Come eat with me. Don't worry."
That was it. No grand speech. No awkward adult nonsense. Just don't worry, as if that were a spell children knew better than grown people did.
Lara glanced down.
Neris was still wary, but the fear in him had shifted. Adults made him rigid. Children, apparently, he understood a little better.
Maybe because children did not yet know how to hide malice behind smiles. Maybe because Kaelith looked too frankly interested to be dangerous.
Malvoria caught Lara's eye over the table and, wisely, said nothing. Elysia merely patted the empty chair beside Kaelith.
Lara crouched slightly, bringing herself closer to Neris again. "You can say no," she told him. "No one here's going to drag you by the ear."
Neris looked from Kaelith to the chair to the food and finally back to Lara.
"You're staying?" he asked, low enough that only Lara heard it.
The question hit her harder than it should have.
"Yeah," she said. "I'm staying."
He studied her for one long second more, as if weighing the cost of believing that. Then, cautiously, he stepped around her and toward the table.
Kaelith beamed like she had personally brokered peace between kingdoms.
"There," she said as he climbed into the chair beside her. "See? It's not scary. Unless mom Malvoria starts talking about taxes. Then it's very scary."
"Excuse you," Malvoria said, scandalized. "I am delightful at dinner."
Raveth barked out a laugh. Veylira sipped her wine without comment. Elysia, of course, reached quietly for an extra plate and set it before Neris as though this had always been the plan.
Lara remained where she was for one extra second, watching.
Neris sat stiffly at first, hands in his lap, shoulders high. But when Kaelith immediately began explaining which sauces were safe, which pastries were superior, and why adults were fools for making children sleep early, something in him eased by a fraction.
Not much.
Just enough.
And in that tiny shift, in the way he trusted the child before he trusted the adults, Lara saw with painful clarity exactly how little kindness he'd been allowed to assume from the world.
She moved then, taking the chair on his other side.
He noticed.
Of course he did.
He didn't lean away, though. Didn't tense. Didn't speak. He only looked at his plate and then, very carefully, reached for a piece of bread.
Lara picked up her own glass and let out a breath she had not realized she was holding.
It wasn't peace. Not even close. The castle was still full of questions. Sarisa was still across a border she could not cross. The queen was still breathing. The court's judgment still sat like iron in her throat.
But she had to make it better somehow.