ALDRIC
"I suppose you've already figured it out," I began, my tone measured, almost gentle. "Your father and I—"
"No."
The interruption came clean and absolute, slicing through whatever I had intended to say next.
Her voice had changed, stripped of hesitation and sharpened into something resolute, something that left no room for doubt.
"You're him," she said, her gaze locking onto mine with unsettling clarity. "You're him."
I stilled, not because I was caught off guard, but because there was no longer any reason to pretend otherwise.
"Don't insult me by pretending this is anything else."
There it was. Certainty.
The mask, carefully constructed over time, slipped away without resistance. I let the concern drain from my expression, let the warmth I had worn like a disguise dissolve into something colder, something far more honest.
"So," I asked, my voice lowering as I studied her, "did you follow me out here, or was this stroke of insight purely instinct?"
