The words took a moment to settle into him, the way a blow does before the actual pain arrives.
The Imperial Council knew about him.
He had always understood that this moment would eventually come. It had been unavoidable from the start.
Until now, however, the danger had remained distant enough for him to treat it as a future problem. The Sector Seven Council knew about him, but they had been surprisingly restrained. Lysara, Annalise, and the others had treated him better than he had expected.
But the Imperial Council was different.
Those were the people who made decisions that affected the entire Queendom. They did not answer to Sector Seven, and they certainly did not need permission from the high commander Lysara before deciding that Zaeryn was too dangerous, too valuable, or simply too unnatural to be allowed any freedom.
The real powers were beginning to notice him.
