The Garden of Whispers was deceptively peaceful tonight.
Mikhail had chosen this place due to the memory of that first day he had bound Gage to his service, tonight he would begin to make good on his promise to the assassin.
Buried here in this garden were memories of a promise made in desperation, when Mikhail was at his weakest and Gage had placed himself in grave peril - a contract, woven with mana, that bound them to a destiny neither could forget - the destruction of House Terra.
He could still feel the faint thread of that vow, a line of pure mana linking him to a man with a burning need for vengeance. How many years had it been since that night?
Aria…
He closed his eyes and was taken back to that night, the air heavy with the scent of old roses and bitterness.
~~~ ~~~ ~~~
Emperor Mikhail sat alone in his private chambers, the weight of his ceremonial robes feeling particularly heavy that evening. The scent of night-blooming jasmine drifted through the open window - his mother's favourite flower.
A soft knock at the door preceded Aria's entrance. His childhood friend, now empress, moved with the fluid grace that years of court training had instilled. In her hands, she carried an ornate silver tray bearing a single crystal vial.
"My Emperor," she said, her voice carrying the warmth that had once meant everything to him. "I can't bear to see you suffer any longer." Her eyes shone with unshed tears as she approached. "This elixir... it's said to repair even the most damaged mana heart. I've spent years searching for it, for you."
Mikhail looked up at her, hope warring with experience in his chest. How many times had he trusted her counsel, relied on her support? She had been his one constant through years of humiliation and powerlessness.
[System Alert: Unknown substance detected. Caution advised. Without a functional Mana Heart, the Host is vulnerable to magical toxins.]
But hope, that treacherous emotion, bloomed despite his caution. His fingers trembled slightly as he accepted the vial. The crystal felt cool against his skin, its contents shimmering with possibilities.
"You've always been there for me," he said softly, studying her face - the face he had known since childhood, the face he had trusted above all others.
Aria's smile was gentle, encouraging. "Always," she agreed. "Drink, my love. Let this be the beginning of your true reign."
The liquid burned going down, a brief warmth that spread through his chest. For one shining moment, he felt it - a flicker of power, a hint of what might have been.
Then the pain hit.
Mikhail collapsed, his body convulsing as poison tore through him. Through blurred vision, he saw Aria's face transform from concern to cold satisfaction.
"Why?" he gasped, the single word carrying decades of trust and love.
Aria's laugh was like shattered glass. "Oh, Mikhail. Did you really think someone like me would waste their life on someone like you?" She moved closer, kneeling beside his spasming form. "The noble houses paid handsomely for this little performance. Though I must admit, watching you trust me year after year... that was its own reward."
He tried to call for help, but his voice failed him. The poison was spreading rapidly, each heartbeat carrying it further through his system.
"You'll be remembered as the Puppet Emperor who finally broke," Aria continued, her voice almost gentle. "A sad end to a pathetic reign. The nobles will tut-tut about your weakness, while secretly celebrating. And I..." she smiled, rising gracefully to her feet, "I'll play the grieving widow perfectly. After all, I've had years to practice caring about you."
The room spun around him as memories flashed through his mind - Aria comforting him after court humiliations, supporting him through countless failures, always there with a gentle word or understanding smile. Every moment now tainted by the knowledge that it had all been an act.
"The worst part," she mused, watching him struggle for breath, "is that you'll die knowing just how thoroughly you were fooled. How completely your trust was misplaced. That's my gift to you, my Emperor - perfect understanding in your final moments."
Only Gregor's desperate arrival saved him that night, ever faithful Gregor, the loyal manservant finding him in time for emergency treatment. But the poison had left its mark, weakening his already frail body. And worse, it had shattered what little faith he had left in the world.
As darkness claimed him, Mikhail's last thought was of how her smile had never wavered - not when she handed him the poison, not when she watched him fall, not when she revealed the depth of her betrayal. His final conscious moment was filled with the bitter taste of both poison and absolute betrayal.
~~~ ~~~ ~~~
Prince Mikhail thought back to House Terra and the twisted history he shared with them.
House Terra was a traditional noble family—ambitious, wielding power in the Empire's mining and infrastructure industries. They prided themselves on their earth magic, carving out influence from stone and iron, and had always been eager to extend that power further.
Aria's engagement to him, engineered by House Terra, was nothing more than another calculated move in their game of conquest.
But the Duke's son—that man was something else entirely.
A shudder ran through Mikhail as he recalled what he knew. The Duke's son was a monster hidden behind a nobleman's mask, a brute with an immunity to a thousand poisons and a long trail of buried secrets.
Mikhail remembered the stories of the depravity that lay beneath the surface, stories only whispered about late at night among the servants. Stories of violence, and of broken bodies left in the darkness.
In his previous life, Mikhail hadn't fully understood the truth of those tales until it was too late. Gage had tried to stop that man once, but his attempt had failed, thwarted by that wretched immunity.
But this time would be different.
Mikhail let out a slow, steadying breath. Gage was waiting, somewhere out there among the hedgerows and flowers within this enchanted garden, he lurked in the shadows, waiting for the signal.
Tonight marked the beginning of a new arc in his life. A reckoning for House Terra.
~~~ ~~~ ~~~
The Garden of Whispers lived up to its name, its enchanted hedges rustling with secrets as Gage waited in the pre-dawn darkness. Ten years of watching Prince Mikhail had taught him patience, though even now, the young royal's true nature remained tantalisingly out of reach.
Gage smiled slightly, remembering their first meeting. He'd been prepared to die that day, his assassination attempt on the Duke of Terra's son was meant to be his final act. Instead, he'd found himself bound by a mana contract to a child prince who somehow knew things he shouldn't - including Gage's deepest motivations.
"He was always three steps ahead," Gage mused, his assassin's training automatically tracking the garden's security patterns while his mind wandered. "Even at six, he moved like someone who'd spent decades in court politics."
The past decade had been fascinating to watch. Mikhail's carefully crafted facade of incompetence had fooled everyone - noble houses, military commanders, even the vaunted imperial spymasters. Everyone except Gage's network, who saw glimpses of the truth during their carefully orchestrated missions.
He remembered the first agent he'd sent to infiltrate Mikhail's household. The woman had returned shaken, her initial scepticism replaced by unwavering loyalty. "He looked right through me," she'd reported. "Saw everything I am, everything I could be. Then he offered me a chance to serve something greater than myself." The mana contract she'd signed was different from Gage's own, but no less binding.
It became a pattern. Each agent approached their first meeting with the prince carrying well-justified doubts. How could this supposedly weak fourth prince be worthy of their service? Yet they all returned changed, bound not just by magical contracts but by something deeper - a genuine belief in Mikhail's vision for the empire.
"The court thinks they've just discovered his true nature," Gage thought wryly. "They believe the past year revealed his hidden strength. If they only knew how long he's been preparing, how carefully he's positioned every piece..."
Even Gage's most skilled information gatherers had never penetrated certain mysteries around the prince. The basement of his villa remained impenetrable to surveillance. His frequent "training sessions" defied observation. And that new companion, Aurora - she simply appeared one day, perfect and impossible, as if she'd always been there.
But Gage had never tried too hard to uncover these secrets. The mana contract between them wasn't just about service or loyalty - it was about trust. Mikhail had earned that trust not through magical bindings but through years of quiet competence and unfailing support for Gage's network.
Dawn's first light caught the garden's enchanted flowers, making them glow with stored magical energy. Gage sensed Mikhail's approach before he saw him - another oddity about the prince, how he moved through the palace's security wards as if they didn't exist.
"Your network has been busy," Mikhail said without preamble, materialising from between two hedges. "House Terra's defences are more thoroughly mapped than even they realize."
"Ten years of patience," Gage replied simply. "Though I admit, your recent closeness to Lady Aria had me... concerned."
Mikhail's smile carried edges sharp enough to draw blood. "Aria serves her purpose, as do all pieces in this game. House Terra's fall will be complete - you have my word on that."
That was another fascinating aspect of the prince - how he could shift between masks so effortlessly. One moment the diplomatic young royal, the next something ancient and calculating that made even Gage's assassin instincts prickle with warning.
"The agents are in position," Gage reported, pushing aside his musings. "House Terra's arrogance makes them careless. They trust their earth magic wards completely, never suspecting how many of their own servants now serve us."
"Good." Mikhail studied the garden's shadows as if reading secrets in their patterns. "Your patience will soon be rewarded. Elena and little Maya will have their justice."
Gage's hands clenched briefly at his wife and daughter's names. A decade hadn't dulled the pain of their loss, murdered by House Terra's earth magic to silence Elena's knowledge of the horrors inflicted on others by the Duke's son. The "accidental" landslide that had taken them had been carefully orchestrated, just one of many such "natural disasters" that cleared House Terra's path to power.
"Why help me?" Gage finally asked the question that had burned in him for years. "You gain nothing from House Terra's destruction. If anything, it complicates your position with Lady Aria."
Mikhail was silent for a long moment, his eyes distant. "Perhaps I understand the need for justice delayed but not denied. Or perhaps..." His smile turned enigmatic. "Perhaps I simply believe in keeping my promises to those who serve faithfully."
The garden's whispers seemed to intensify around them as they discussed specifics - guard rotations, servant loyalties, the complex web of intelligence Gage's network had woven through House Terra's structure. Every detail had been carefully documented, every weakness mapped and verified.
"Your thoroughness does you credit," Mikhail observed, studying one particularly detailed report. "House Terra never suspected how deeply you've penetrated their defences."
As the sun rose fully above the palace walls, Gage reflected on how completely his life had changed since that day in the garden party, when a child prince had somehow known his deepest motivations and offered him a path to justice. The mana contract between them had seemed like a formality then - now it felt more like destiny.
"Begin the final preparations," Mikhail commanded softly. "House Terra's fall should appear natural, inevitable. Let them destroy themselves through their own arrogance and cruelty."
Gage bowed slightly, House Terra would never see their destruction coming until it was far too late.
As he melted back into the garden's shadows, Gage smiled grimly. Ten years of watching Prince Mikhail had taught him many things, but perhaps the most important was this: true power rarely looked like what people expected. Sometimes it wore the mask of a scholarly young prince, hiding depths that even Gage's best agents couldn't fathom.
But that was fine. Some secrets were better left undiscovered, especially when they served justice so effectively.
Elena and Maya would have their vengeance soon enough. House Terra would fall, brought down by the very servants and minor nobles they'd dismissed as beneath their notice. And Gage would watch it all unfold, secure in the knowledge that his patron's mysterious power and careful planning would ensure their success.
And that, Gage reflected, was exactly as it should be.