[BL]Reborn as the Empire's Most Desired Omega
Chapter 206: Shine bright

Chapter 206: Chapter 206: Shine bright

Serathine adjusted the fall of her crimson sleeve with the kind of elegance that belonged to someone perfectly aware of the cameras still roaming the edges of the great hall.

She sat composed in the second row, close enough to feel the reverberation of every step Lucas took, close enough to see the faint ripple of tension when the Emperor himself raised his head to begin speaking.

Beside her, Cressida tilted her chin just enough to get a better angle past the gilded column. Her emerald gown caught the light with a faint shimmer, every pearl at her throat gleaming like a warning to anyone foolish enough to approach.

Her eyes, however, weren’t on Lucas or Trevor.

They were on Dax.

The King of Saha lounged in his seat with all the calculated ease of someone accustomed to watching ceremonies rather than enduring them. His violet eyes drifted from Lucas to the Emperor, then down the line to Trevor, but Serathine didn’t miss the faint, amused twist of his lips, as though he alone could see the threads of tension weaving through the hall.

Cressida’s fan snapped shut softly in her hand. "He’ll need someone," she murmured, her voice pitched low enough to blend with the hum of distant music.

Serathine’s lips curved. "Dax?"

Cressida’s eyes slid to her, the barest spark of mischief lighting her composure. "Who else?"

Serathine didn’t even try to hide her laugh; it was a soft, rich thing that earned her a glance from Lucius, seated on her other side. The Second Prince’s blue eyes narrowed slightly, as though trying to read what amused her so much, but Serathine merely angled her shoulders forward, lowering her voice.

"He’d fight us," Serathine whispered, a predator’s smile curling her lips. "But we’d win."

Cressida’s fan flicked open again, graceful as the wings of some elegant bird. "Of course we’d win. It’s only a matter of finding the right match... something suitably terrifying."

"A hidden dominant omega?" Serathine mused, tapping a manicured finger against her chin. "Or an alpha with teeth sharp enough to handle him?"

Lucius let out a soft, amused exhale, not looking at them directly but clearly listening. "You two are dangerous," he murmured, his tone edged with dry humor.

Sirius, seated on Cressida’s other side, didn’t even try to hide his grin. "I’d pay to see it." His blue eyes glittered with a kind of mischief that matched theirs, though he leaned back as though to distance himself from their plotting.

Cressida arched a brow in Dax’s direction, watching him raise a brow in return, as though he felt their collective attention despite the ceremony still unfolding at the dais.

"Careful, Your Majesty," Cressida murmured under her breath, too soft for anyone beyond Serathine to hear. "We’ve married off harder men than you."

Serathine’s smile sharpened, her gaze fixed on Dax as though measuring him for something far more dangerous than a crown. "And when we’re done," she whispered, rich with amusement, "he won’t even know how it happened."

Dax, oblivious or pretending to be, adjusted the cuff of his jacket and turned his gaze back to the front, watching as Lucas approached Trevor with measured grace. But a faint shiver traced the back of his neck, the kind that came when two predators had set their sights on you and were patient enough to wait for the perfect moment.

—

The afternoon light fell soft and fractured through the high windows, filtered by pale curtains that swayed in the faint summer breeze. The manor was quiet, eerily so, its usual hum of noble visitors replaced by the muffled footsteps of attendants who moved like ghosts along polished floors. Somewhere far off, a clock ticked steadily, the sound carrying into the stillness of the sitting room.

Ophelia sat curled in an armchair too large for her, one leg tucked beneath her silk skirts, her hands folded loosely in her lap. A polished silver tray rested on the table nearby, tea gone cold in a cup she’d forgotten to drink. The only sign of life in the room was the faint, golden shimmer of the broadcast projection hovering on the wall before her, soundless by her request, its images crisp and impossibly distant.

There he was.

Her brother.

Standing beneath the gilded frescoes, wrapped in imperial colors, with every noble in the Capital and beyond watching. The Grand Duchess.

A laugh, sharp and bright, escaped her, startling the attendants stationed quietly by the walls. It wasn’t a pleasant sound. It was brittle, like crystal about to shatter.

"Look at him," she whispered, not to them, but to herself, leaning forward in the chair. Her pale blue eyes, so like his, burned with something that flickered between disbelief and venomous amusement. "All of them... standing for him."

On the projection, the camera swept to catch Lucas’s profile, the golden embroidery catching the light like fire. Applause rose in a ripple, and a sea of faces tilted toward the dais, reverent, eager, hungry for the legend they were building around him.

Ophelia’s lips curved into a smile that was all teeth. "My useless brother," she breathed, voice shaking with something that wasn’t quite anger, wasn’t quite grief. "And now they worship him."

One of the attendants, a young woman with downcast eyes, shifted slightly. "My lady... shall I close the feed?"

"No," Ophelia said sharply, without looking away. Her nails dug into the armrest of the chair, then released, then dug in again as though she couldn’t decide whether to break it. "No... I want to see every second. I want to see what they’ve made of him."

A figure moved in the corner of the projection, Serathine, proud and radiant in crimson, standing as though she had orchestrated every thread of this tapestry. Cressida beside her, calm and commanding, watching the ceremony with a smile that never quite reached her eyes. And there was Dax, kingly and unbothered, already woven into the myth they were spinning.

Ophelia laughed again, softer this time, tilting her head. "They think he’s theirs now. How sweet."

Outside, the afternoon sun glared off the pale stone of the D’Argente manor. Inside, shadows pooled. Ophelia’s gaze slid toward the window, beyond which stretched endless, manicured gardens, quiet as a tomb.

She thought of her mother.

Misty Kilmer, once a queen in every room she entered, now rotting in a cell, her name dragged through courts and broadcasted as a cautionary tale. Execution row. The words were still surreal, almost sweet on the tongue.

Ophelia’s smile softened, chillingly gentle. "Mother," she whispered, her voice low enough that only she could hear, "you would hate this."

Her gaze returned to the projection, to Lucas standing beneath painted gods, speaking vows that echoed across the Empire. Pride and hatred tangled like threads in her chest, tight and knotted.

She sipped her cold tea, the bitterness sharp on her tongue, and whispered again, almost lovingly:

"Shine bright, brother. Shine so brightly... that when you fall, it will shatter the sky itself."