[BL]Reborn as the Empire's Most Desired Omega
Chapter 200: Stay

Chapter 200: Chapter 200: Stay

The estate hummed like a living thing.

From the highest balcony, Lucas could see the rippling movement of staff darting between the vast halls and the sweeping gardens, like currents feeding an inevitable tide. Florists carried crates of white orchids and dark roses toward the terrace arches, and decorators scaled ladders to adjust silver lanterns that caught the early light. Beyond the lake, a distant drone of arriving cars echoed faintly, the first wave of guests settling into their assigned wings.

Inside, the air was no calmer. Tailors hurried through corridors with pressed garments sealed in protective bags, the muted clatter of silver trays floated up from the kitchens, and every now and then came the low, clipped tones of someone from Cressida’s detail or Serathine’s entourage issuing orders as if this were a battlefield.

Lucas stood in the doorway of his dressing room, jacket still on its hanger, tie draped carelessly over the back of a chair. His hair was brushed, but his cuffs hung open. He hadn’t moved for several minutes, simply watching the controlled chaos beyond the open windows, feeling it press against him like a tide.

And for the first time that morning, a perfectly reasonable thought came to him.

"I could run."

Just... slip down through the east servants’ corridor, past the wine cellars, out through the narrow stone gate that led into the old orchard. The cars wouldn’t find him there. The press would be waiting at the grand entrance, not watching for someone dressed plainly, walking fast, cutting through the lower fields.

Lucas rubbed a hand over his face, stifling a laugh that was half nerves, half genuine temptation.

"Gods," he muttered to himself, green eyes flicking toward the mirror and catching his own crooked smile. "Leave Trevor to the lions... Serathine would relish the spectacle, and Cressida would devour Dax whole before dessert."

The image alone nearly made him snort.

Dax, elegant and unbothered as ever, dodged Serathine’s pointed questions while Cressida sharpened her tone into something that could cut glass. Trevor, stoic, patient, murderous under the surface, trying to field three crises at once while the Imperial photographers kept snapping.

It would be chaos.

Beautiful, horrifying chaos.

And no one would find him until it was far too late.

"Grand Duchess?"

A firm knock, then the door opened with the slow inevitability of a drawn curtain on a stage you couldn’t leave. Windstone stepped inside with the expression of a man striding into enemy lines, composed, his silver hair immaculate, his dark suit without a crease.

"Please don’t try to run now," he said dryly, his voice smooth as polished steel. "It’s far too late for that, and the Imperial family will be here in less than two hours. You need to be dressed and waiting by then."

Lucas turned his head slowly toward the door, caught mid‑fantasy, one sleeve still hanging loose as if he hadn’t fully committed to the act of dressing. Windstone stood there, the faintest glint of mischief tucked deep behind the professionalism in his pale green eyes.

"You heard that, did you?" Lucas drawled, tugging the cuff into place with deliberate slowness.

Windstone stepped further in, closing the door with a soft click like a man sealing the fate of a general who’d considered desertion.

"My boy," he said, voice low, wry, "if you think I haven’t learned to recognize that particular look after serving this family for decades, you underestimate me gravely."

Lucas arched a brow. "Which look?"

"The one that says you’ve calculated precisely how many steps it would take to vanish through the orchard and be halfway to the coast before anyone noticed." Windstone adjusted a stack of folded linen on the chair as though arranging tactics on a battlefield map. "I advise against it. For one, Serathine would track you down by scent alone, and Cressida would have you paraded back in chains just to make her point."

Lucas snorted despite himself. "Morbidly comforting."

Windstone’s mouth twitched, the closest he came to a smile. "Besides," he added, his tone softening with that quiet fondness only he could carry, "you’d only end up feeling guilty and returning halfway through the ceremony, drenched, unkempt, and very likely carrying some obscure pastry as an apology."

Lucas gave him a flat look, though the corner of his lips betrayed him. "You know me too well."

"That’s my job," Windstone replied simply. Then he turned to the wardrobe, lifting the final suit from its hanger with ceremonial gravity. The light caught on the deep violet‑black coat‑cape and the glint of gold filigree along the ivory shirt. "Now. Shall we put this on you before the Imperial family decides to arrive early?"

Lucas stared at the suit like it might bite him. The embroidery shimmered faintly with every movement, the merlot sheen of the trousers shifting in the light, the pearl buttons winking like hidden stars. He exhaled slowly, rubbing his hands over his face as if trying to wipe away the thought of escape.

"Fine," he muttered, stepping forward. "Let’s give them something to talk about."

Windstone’s voice dropped as he settled the coat over Lucas’s shoulders. "You already have."

In minutes, attendants streamed in, silent and efficient, working in swift harmony to fasten, smooth, and adjust. Cuffs were buttoned, the coat flared just so, and Lucas watched his own reflection transform into something imperial, something inevitable.

And somewhere in the back of his mind, he still imagined the orchard gate and the freedom beyond it, sunlight on old stone, the hush of trees, the quiet anonymity of simply walking away.

But he stayed still.

The attendants moved around him with quiet precision, fastening the pearl‑rimmed buttons, smoothing the violet‑black sweep of the coat‑cape so that it draped like power incarnate. Gold embroidery caught the light, blooming across his chest like a crest forged from memory and defiance.

Windstone stepped back at last, his hands folding behind him, watching the transformation not like a servant admiring his master but like a commander appraising a weapon honed for a single, decisive strike. His pale green eyes softened for just a heartbeat, though, as he looked at Lucas, not the Grand Duchess, not the imperial symbol the court would see, but the young man who had once walked into this manor with nothing but sharp wit and stubborn survival.

"You’re thinking of him," Windstone said quietly, almost an observation rather than a question.

Lucas’s gaze met his in the mirror, green eyes unreadable but alive with something steady. "Always," he admitted softly.

And with that, the last cuff was fastened, the attendants stepped back, and the man in the mirror, breathed out once, as though bracing himself for war.

’Trevor would be waiting.’

And that, Lucas thought, was reason enough to stay.