Sapphrine hesitated.
Not from love. The orb had taken that.
But from something else. Curiosity? Logic?
Her son had been gagged before he could speak. Before he could defend himself.
Justice without testimony is execution without trial.
The staff lowered slightly.
"Speak," she commanded, her voice flat. Empty.
The guards removed the gag.
Darth gasped, coughed, tears streaming down his face.
"Mother—" he choked out. "Mother, please. It wasn't me."
"The blood is on your robes," Sapphrine stated. No emotion. Just fact.
"I know!" Darth sobbed. "I know. But I didn't—I couldn't stop it."
"Explain."
He swallowed hard, fighting for words through the panic.
"Lance. My friend. He... he brought me wine the night before. Said it was to celebrate the peace. After Clandareth's death. After you saved us."
The crowd murmured. Lance stepped forward from the shadows, his face a mask of concern.
"My Prince is confused," Lance said smoothly. "The trauma—"
"NO!" Darth screamed. "You poisoned me! You injected something in the wine. I felt it—a burning in my veins."
His eyes locked on his mother's grey, emotionless gaze.
"I watched myself kill them, Mother."
"I was trapped inside my own body. Screaming. But my hands... they wouldn't stop."
Lance's expression didn't change. "He's lying to save himself. Classic manipulation."
But Darth continued, desperate.
"I remember... fog. Like I was dreaming. My body moved but I didn't control it. The orphans screamed. I wanted to stop. I tried. I couldn't."
He looked at his hands, shaking violently on the cross.
"When I woke, their blood was on me. Lance was there. He said... he said I'd done something terrible. That I needed to turn myself in. That it was the honorable thing."
Sapphrine's grey eyes studied her son. Then Lance. Then back to Darth.
Without love, she saw only logic. Only patterns.
Darth had never shown violence before.
Lance had always been ambitious. Always lingering near power.
And daemon corruption... it could possess. It could control.
But could she trust the word of an accused murderer over a loyal advisor?
Does Sapphrine believe him?