Sienna looked ahead, not at him. "I was busy."

"Doing what?"

"Utilizing my time better."

Phei’s mouth twitched. "Better than what?"

Sienna’s gaze moved lazily across the room, touching the women, the glass, the morning, Maya’s distant mansion, the absurd wealth arranged around them, then returned to him. "Better than wasting it on teenage bullshit."

Several people reacted.

Maddie placed a hand on her chest. "Rude."

Patricia said, "Accurate in principle, unfortunately."

Valentina muttered, "I am not a teenager."

"You were included spiritually," Sienna said.

Valentina gasped. "This child."

"I am older than your whole family line’s self-esteem."

Patricia choked.

Maddie made a delighted sound. "Oh, I really missed her."

Phei did not disagree with Sienna.

He could joke, and part of him wanted to, but another part kept looking at her eyes, at the pressure around her, at the way her presence no longer leaked like something broken but gathered like a throne behind her skin.

Making herself better made sense... too much sense.

Whatever she had done, whatever she had become while the others slept, shopped, raced and worried, it had not been wasted time.

He lowered his voice.

"I am actually scared of you."

Sienna turned her head.

The violet of her eyes met his, and Phei felt it again: that deep, ancient pressure, not directed at him, but present all the same.

’A sea does not need to attack a drowning man to be dangerous.... it only needed to exist.’

Her face remained unreadable.

"What have you been doing, Sienna?".

For the first time since entering, Sienna looked slightly away.

"You stepped back," she said.

Phei stilled and exhaled slowly. "I did."

"Two steps."

"I know."

"From me."

His jaw tightened.

Sienna’s voice remained flat, but something beneath it had sharpened into teasing. "Should I be offended?"

Phei looked at Sienna properly, she was the same girl who had been in his childhood like a shadow no one else understood. The cousin who had hovered at the edge of things, cold, dismissive, always pretending not to care while somehow appearing whenever he had needed someone most.

"You should be," he said.

Sienna’s lashes lowered slightly.

Phei continued, voice softer now. "But not because I meant to. I did not choose to step back. That is what scares me."

Her eyes returned to him.

"My body moved before I did," Phei said. "Like something in me recognized something before I could tell it you were family."

Sienna’s fingers shifted once in her lap.

Victoria’s face had changed too, pride and worry battling badly around her eyes while Delilah looked between them as if she had known pieces of this story but not the weight of this moment.

Phei leaned forward slightly. "You have always been a strange one, Sienna."

"How poetic."

"I am serious."

"That is... worse."

He smiled faintly despite himself. "But you were also my only friend when we were young, that must amount to something."

Sienna’s head turned sharply. "No, I was not."

Phei blinked at Sienna. "You were."

"I was not your friend."

"You spent more time with me than anyone."

"Because you looked pathetic alone."

Phei stared at with a serene smile.

Sienna crossed her arms. "It was unpleasant to see. A boy of our blood who had just lost his parents sitting by himself with that stupid serious face, pretending he did not care. You made the air worse."

Maddie whispered, "Oh my god."

Patricia whispered back, "This is a confession in Sienna language."

Sienna’s gaze snapped toward them. "It is not."

Phei’s smile grew slowly.

Sienna looked back at him and immediately narrowed her eyes. "Do not make that annoying face."

"What face?"

"That one."

"The face of remembering my only childhood friend?"

"I said I was not your friend."

"You brought me food."

"You forgot to eat."

"You remembered that much, they call that care."

"It was so I would not have to hear your stomach making noises like an abandoned animal."

"You sat with me during family gatherings."

"You stood in corners looking like a tragic painting. It was visually offensive."

"You walked me back when older boys tried to corner me."

"I was already going that way."

"They were on the opposite side of the estate."

"I changed my route."

"To protect me?"

"To avoid inefficient architecture."

Maddie collapsed against Sierra, laughing silently.

Valentina had both hands over her mouth.

"You were!"

"You get sentimental when you are scared. It is a documented flaw."

"I do not."

"You once cried at a vending machine."

"It ate my money and I was eight—"

"Mm."

Phei narrowed his eyes. "You bought me a drink after that. From your own pocket."

"I did not," Sienna said immediately, flatly. "The machine was malfunctioning. I corrected a malfunctioning machine. It was a matter of public order. The fact that a beverage emerged and you happened to be standing there, pathetic and leaking saltwater, is a coincidence of geography."

"You handed it to me."

"I disposed of it in the nearest available receptacle. You are the nearest available receptacle for most things."

Phei pressed; he had located the one game in the world that could make the Nether Goddess defensive. "What about the ping-pong guns."

Sienna’s thumb stopped scrolling.

"Danton’s ping-pong guns he used to shoot me with," Phei continued, slow, delighted. "He left them out on the table. And the next morning every single one of them was ruined. Snapped. Springs gone. He cried for a week."

"They were dirtying the table," Sienna said.

"They were on a table designed to have things on it."

"They were dirtying it," she repeated, with the cold finality of a magistrate. "The table was a surface intended for clean objects. Those guns were filthy. I removed a hygiene violation. Danton’s emotional response to basic sanitation is not my responsibility, and frankly the boy has always been weak."

Brian, who had apparently been standing near the far side and failing to stay out of this like any man with sense, muttered, "I respect that."

Maddie pointed at him. "No one asked you, third place."

Brian recoiled. "Why are we still using the race against me?"

"Because it remains available."

Phei ignored them, his eyes still on Sienna. "Oh, by the way you also switched my seat during tutor lessons."

"You were sitting near Harold."

The name cooled the air.

Only a little but enough.

Phei looked at her.

****

Beneath every insult, beneath every cold explanation, beneath every dismissive line, a pattern had emerged too clearly to be mistaken for coincidence. Sienna had ruined toys because they had been used to shoot him. She had moved seats because she did not want him near someone. She had broken things, changed routes, sat in corners, appeared beside him, fed him, insulted him into standing straighter, and wrapped every small kindness in barbed wire so no one, perhaps not even herself, had to call it care.

Phei’s voice was quiet. "You were my friend."

Sienna looked away. "I was correcting an eyesore."

"You were my only friend."

"I was preventing the Ryujin Tiamat name from suffering secondhand embarrassment."

There was something too gentle about her, and Sienna realized that. Her fingers curled slightly into her sleeve.

"Thank you, Sienna, I never got to say that." he said.

Sienna froze, her throat moved once then she stood up too quickly.

"I am leaving."

Maddie immediately sat up. "No, no, absolutely not. Sit back down. This is the best thing that has happened all morning."

Sienna ignored her.

Phei caught her wrist gently.

Not forcefully but just enough.

Sienna stopped.

That, in itself, said too much.

Phei looked up at her. "You still have not answered me."

"I said I was busy."

"What were you doing?"

"Making myself better."

"For what?"

Sienna’s eyes moved to his hand around her wrist.

Then to his face.

The violet in them deepened, and for one terrifying second Phei felt something behind her. Not a girl. Not even a cousin but a whole realm and a wound.

Then Sienna blinked, and it was only her again.

Maddie let out a low whistle. "Family conversations in your family are awful."

Victoria said, "You have no idea."

Sienna glanced back at Phei. "Let go, dragon."

For one reckless second, Phei wanted to pull her back down but he let go.

Sienna looked at her wrist, then at him.

"I was not your friend," she said one last time.

Phei leaned back, smiling faintly. "Fine."

Her eyes narrowed. "Fine?"

"You were not my friend."

"Good."

Then she turned and walked toward the door with the dignity like she was retreating from emotional exposure under the false banner of superiority.

"Teenage bullshit," she muttered.

Phei watched her go.

"Still my friend," he said.

Sienna stopped at the door but did not turn.

"Still pathetic," she replied but if anyone saw her they would’ve seen her soft smile before she left and the door closed behind her.

For one second, no one spoke.

Then Maddie slowly turned toward Phei with eyes shining in wicked delight. "Your cousin is adorable."

Phei looked at the closed door, his smile soft and troubled. "She is terrifying."

Maya stepped to his side and slid her hand into his.

Phei held it while smile faded by degrees.

Whatever Sienna had been doing, wherever she had gone, whatever she had become, one thing was certain.

She had not returned merely stronger.

She had returned like something else.