Chapter 127 The Dying Man's Secret

Chapter 127 The Dying Man's Secret
The prison had been a noble house once.

Kaela recognised the architecture as they approached. High walls. Iron gates. Windows are too narrow for escape. The kind of place wealthy families built when they wanted to feel safe from the world outside.

Now it held the most dangerous man in the empire.

Guards flanked the entrance, their faces uncertain. These weren't the Emperor's loyalists. These were resistance fighters, men and women who had spent years hiding from Lucian's wrath. Now they stood watch over the monster himself.

"He's been asking for you since yesterday," one of them said. "Won't eat. Won't sleep. Just keeps saying the Varn girl needs to hear what he knows."

"Has he said anything else?"

"Rambling mostly. Names we don't recognise. Places that might not exist." The guard shook his head. "His mind comes and goes. Sometimes he's sharp as a blade. Other times, he doesn't know where he is."

Kaela nodded and stepped through the gates.

The interior was dim, lit only by narrow shafts of light from the high windows. Their footsteps echoed on stone floors as they descended into the building's depths. The air grew colder. Damper. The smell of mildew and something worse filled her nostrils.

They found the Emperor in a cell at the corridor's end.

He sat on a wooden bench, his back against the wall, his eyes closed. Without his robes and crown, without the trappings of power, he looked like what he was. An old man. Sick. Dying. His skin had taken on a yellowish tinge. His hands trembled constantly.

But when he heard their footsteps, his eyes opened.

And for a moment, just a moment, Kaela saw the predator he had been. The cold intelligence. The calculating cruelty. Still there, buried beneath the decay.

"You came." His voice rasped like dry leaves. "I wasn't sure you would."

"You said you knew something about my brother."

"I know many things about your brother." Lucian smiled, and it was a terrible thing. "Kieran Varn. Seventeen years old when he entered my trials. Bright. Curious. Asked questions that made powerful people nervous."

"I know all that already."

"Do you?" The Emperor leaned forward. "Do you know why he really died?"

Kaela's hands clenched at her sides. Dagon moved closer, his warmth at her back.

"He died because you murdered him. Because your trials killed him."

"My trials were the weapon. But someone else pulled the trigger." Lucian's eyes gleamed with malicious pleasure. "Don't you want to know who?"

"You're lying. Trying to manipulate me one last time."

"Perhaps. Or perhaps I'm the only person willing to tell you the truth." He coughed, blood flecking his lips. "Your brother discovered something during his time at the academy. Something about the trials. About how winners were chosen."

Kaela's heart beat faster despite herself. "What did he discover?"

"The trials aren't random. Never have been. Certain students are marked for victory before they ever set foot in the arena. Others are marked for death." Lucian wiped his mouth with a shaking hand. "Your brother found the list. The names of students who were supposed to die so that noble heirs could claim glory."

"That's impossible. The trials are—"

"Entertainment. Spectacle. A way to cull the common born while pretending to offer them opportunity." The Emperor laughed softly. "Did you really think a slum rat could defeat trained nobles in fair combat? The games are rigged, girl. Always have been."

Kaela felt sick. She thought of everyone who had died in the trials she'd survived. Mira. The students in the maze. The ones who fell on the bridge.

Had their deaths been predetermined? Had they never had a chance?

"Kieran found the list," Lucian continued. "And he made the mistake of telling someone. Someone he trusted. Someone who went straight to the people whose names were on that list."

"Who?" The word came out strangled.

"General Magnus." The Emperor's smile widened. "Your brother trusted the wrong man. Thought Magnus might help him expose the corruption. Instead, Magnus made sure Kieran was placed against the one opponent he couldn't defeat."

"Dagon." Kaela's voice was hollow.

"No." Lucian shook his head. "Dagon was supposed to kill him. That was the plan. Put the general's son against the troublesome commoner, let noble blood triumph over common filth." His eyes moved to Dagon. "But you refused, didn't you? Threw down your weapon. Tried to save him."

Dagon's hand found Kaela's. His grip was crushing.

"Kieran's death wasn't your fault," Lucian told him. "Magnus had a contingency. If you failed to kill him, the arena would do it instead. The fire traps that activated during your match. They weren't random. They were targeted."

"You're saying Magnus murdered my brother." Kaela's voice shook with rage. "That he rigged the arena to kill Kieran."

"Magnus followed orders. My orders." The Emperor's expression shifted to something almost like regret. "I gave the command. I authorised the assassination of a seventeen-year-old boy because he threatened to expose the truth about my precious trials."

The cell seemed to shrink around Kaela. She couldn't breathe. Couldn't think.

She had spent years blaming Dagon. Years of hating a boy who had tried to save her brother. And all along, the real murderer had been sitting on a throne, laughing at her pain.

"Why tell me this now?" she managed.

"Because I'm dying. Because the secrets don't matter anymore. Because..." Lucian paused, something flickering in his eyes. "Because your brother deserved better than the lies I built around his death."

"You don't get to feel guilty. Not after everything you've done."

"I don't feel guilty. I feel tired." The Emperor slumped back against the wall. "I've spent forty-three years maintaining control. Eliminating threats. Building an empire on blood and fear. And now it's all crumbling, and I'm too weak to stop it."

"Good."

"Yes. Perhaps it is." His eyes drifted closed. "There's more. Things you need to know about the academy. About the generals who remain. About the rot that goes deeper than one dying Emperor."

"Tell me."

"Not yet." His voice was fading. "I need to rest. The tumour... it steals my thoughts if I push too hard. Come back tomorrow. I'll tell you everything."

"How do I know you're not lying? That this isn't another game?"

Lucian opened his eyes one last time. For a moment, he looked almost human.

"You don't," he said. "But ask yourself this, Kaela Varn. What do I have left to gain? I'm dying. My empire is gone. My legacy is ashes." A thin smile. "The only thing I have left is the truth. Take it or leave it."

His eyes closed again.

This time, they didn't reopen.