Judge stared at the figure outside his door, blinking as if he had just seen a ghost. Unfortunately, it wasn't some ethereal spirit coming to offer him peace and quiet—it was Seraphis, standing there like she'd just gotten back from single-handedly conquering a small country. The words "got extra work for you" were practically tattooed across her forehead.
And then, as if the universe hadn't punished him enough today, Eleyn popped up from behind her like an overly enthusiastic stage prop.
"I'm here too, Judge," she chirped, her tone too sweet for comfort. He felt dangerously at ease when he heard that.
Judge's stomach sank. This was bad. This was Mom and her Best Friend Tag-Teaming to Ruin My Day bad.
"By the way," Eleyn added, stepping into his room without any restrictions, it was her child's room after all, "I sensed your spirit earlier. Where did it go?"
Judge sighed deeply, a sigh that carried the weight of every frustration he had ever experienced. "He went into hiding the moment he sensed you both."
Eleyn raised an eyebrow, clearly unimpressed. "Hiding? From me? Judge, for the record— I am loved by the spirits, unless your spirit has the same nasty personality as you"
"Cut me some slack Mom, at least in the consideration of me being your son."
Seraphis, on the other hand, skipped past the niceties entirely. "Cut the small talk." She barged into the room with the confidence of someone who had already decided they owned it.
Judge pinched the bridge of his nose... and sighed (again), muttering something unintelligible about boundaries. "By all means, make yourselves at home, even though we are technically on a ship," he said dryly, stepping aside to let the chaos unfold.
Seraphis flopped onto the couch with the grace of a battle-worn warrior, Eleyn following behind her with far more poise.
Judge, accepting whatever fate had in store for him, sank into the green couch opposite them. Between them sat a coffee table that served no real purpose except to awkwardly fill space.
"Alright," Judge said, leaning back and trying to look anywhere but at the two most intimidating women in his life. The coffee table looked extremely well polished, and it served as the anchor point of Judge's eyes for the time being. "What's this about?"
Seraphis leaned forward, her elbows on her knees, exuding the energy of someone about to drop a bombshell. "I told your mother about all the purple eyes I've found during my travels."
Judge froze for half a second, his mask of indifference almost cracking. Purple eyes. Oh no. He nodded stiffly, hoping to keep the conversation moving before Eleyn's detective instincts kicked in.
"Mhm," he managed, playing it cool. Technically, he was the one who had fed Seraphis that information in the first place. To her credit, she'd done an excellent job of keeping his involvement under wraps. The last thing he needed was his mother interrogating him about how he knew things he shouldn't know.
"And," she said, dragging out the word like it was a rare delicacy, "I also told your mother that you promised to help."
Judge stared at her, his brain stuttering to process what she'd just said. "WHAT?!"
Flora cried out, her voice cutting through the heavy air as she darted toward the massive dome forming ahead. Her wings flapped like a human-sized hummingbird on crack, but as she approached, an invisible force knocked her back like a bad joke that just wouldn't land.
She winced and hovered mid-air, her wings now beating normally because—surprisingly, flapping wings faster takes up a lot of energy. She shook her head to clear the buzzing in her ears.
Around her, other avians were having the same luck—or rather, lack thereof. The air around the dome was filled with the annoying sound of countless flapping like there was some massive immigration campaign for birds going on.
On both sides of her, fellow avians were throwing every attack they could muster at the dome like overly eager moths to a flame. "Nope. Nope. Still nope," Flora muttered under her breath, watching one particularly determined bird bounce off with a grunt that sounded like it came from deep in his soul.
She flapped back a bit, giving herself a breather to think. The dome itself wasn't just some random wall—it felt strong and sinister. And her father, Regent Solis Venthart, wasn't one to sit quietly when he was being swallowed up by a giant dome. Who would sit idly when they are being swallowed up by a giant black dome?
The Venthart family name carried weight—like the kind of weight that made people pause mid-sentence and reconsider their choice of words.
Only the ruling family with direct bloodline ties could use the name, and while branch members existed as a backup plan, in case the current ruling family disappeared overnight, everyone knew the true power rested with Solis, his wife Tserina, and their two daughters, Celeste and Flora.
Flora bit her lip, flapping her wings and looking over to the Luminarii who came to help. Her father should have been lighting up the battlefield like an avian-sized beacon of hope by now, but there wasn't even a hint of the dazzling light skills he was known for.
"Okay, brain," she muttered, tapping her temple as if that would help it work faster. "Let's think this through. Either he can't use light skills right now, or he's keeping his cards close to his chest. But can't he finish this through, the sun is about to disappear, I think."
She chewed on that thought, hovering in place as her mind raced. If the sun had set completely, she could understand him holding back—light-based powers didn't exactly work well in pitch-black darkness. But the sun wasn't gone yet. It was hanging low on the horizon, painting the dome in hues of gold and crimson. Her father could use his powers. Which meant...
"He's up to something," she realized aloud, her stomach twisting with equal parts dread and determination.
Flora's wings angled back, and she pushed herself higher for a better view. She closed and opened her eyes, they now shined like polished gold. This was her principle of perceiving life in the vicinity, now she could even see silhouettes of living beings in the vicinity.