Lord Marius Arass stood before the court of Threia on a Tuesday, his wrists unbound, his dark clothing exchanged for simple prisoner's garb, his gaunt face bearing the expression of a man who had made peace with whatever judgment awaited him.
The court chamber was packed. Every seat was occupied, every gallery filled, every doorway blocked by officials and observers who understood that this proceeding would define the kingdom's relationship with its own darkest history. Noble families who had lost members to the conspiracy sat beside guild masters whose contracts had unknowingly funded it. Military officers whose soldiers had died carrying sabotaged weapons occupied the same benches as Academy scholars whose theoretical frameworks were about to be demolished by testimony about dimensional mechanics they had never imagined. The air was thick with the accumulated tension of a kingdom that had nearly been destroyed and now demanded an accounting.
