Viola was probably being like this because Ludger was her little brother, and she didn’t trust people who arrived with too many hidden edges and too much careful silence around them.

That, at least, was understandable. Even reasonable. But when Eclaire’s eyes shifted toward Luna, the other girl looked away again for some reason.

Not rudely. Not sharply.

Just with that same small avoidance she had shown before, subtle enough that many people would miss it, but clear enough once noticed that it could not be dismissed as coincidence. And that complicated things.

Because if this had only been about Viola being protective, then Luna should have been easier to place. Colder, perhaps. More clearly aligned. More openly distant. Instead, Luna’s reactions kept carrying something stranger.

Recognition, maybe. Or discomfort. Or restraint born from some line Eclaire could not yet see. That meant Eclaire wasn’t one hundred percent sure anymore what the full shape of this was.

Moreover, Luna had an aura Eclaire found familiar for some reason. Not in the simple sense of resemblance. Not as if she had seen her before and forgotten where. Something deeper than that.

A feeling.

The way Luna held herself when she wasn’t speaking. The measured stillness. The contained alertness. The particular sort of quiet that did not come from passivity, but from someone who had learned to keep herself gathered inward because there were places in the world where showing too much of what you were invited consequences.

Eclaire had felt that before. Somewhere.Not exactly in Luna. In the shape around her. In the emotional temperature of it. And the fact that she couldn’t place it immediately bothered her more than it should have.

Because Eclaire was good at that sort of thing. Very good. Yet every time she tried to fix the familiarity into something solid, it slipped away before she could name it. Across from her, Luna kept her face calm, but once again did not hold Eclaire’s gaze for long.

That only made the feeling stronger. Strange. Viola, meanwhile, was still looking at Eclaire in that unreadable way, as if she had reached some private conclusion and was now deciding whether to say it, sharpen it, or leave it where it was for later.

In the end, she said nothing. Which somehow made it worse.

Ludger let the last of the earlier tension die on its own, then said, “That’s enough.”

The carriage quieted again. Not awkwardly this time. More like everyone understood at once that the room had shifted from uncomfortable social dissection back into the part that actually mattered.

“It’s time to get serious,” Ludger said.

That line settled cleanly.

Then he looked between them and asked, “What should we expect as defenses for the security of a sealed labyrinth?”

Eclaire answered first.

“That depends on which family is guarding it.”

Ludger nodded once.

“We’ll infiltrate the one under House Valenfar first,” he said. “They have strong ties with General Armandis.”

That made the air inside the carriage tighten again in a different way. Because now the target wasn’t abstract. It had a name. A house. Eclaire went silent for a second after hearing it. Not because she disagreed, but because the choice clearly pushed her mind through a new set of noble associations and implications. Then her eyes shifted toward Jennifer.

Jennifer met the look and, after half a breath, nodded. So she did know something useful there. Ludger looked at her.

Jennifer sat a little straighter and said, “The methods change from family to family when it comes to sealing labyrinths.”

Her tone was controlled, but Ludger could tell she was moving carefully through knowledge she had not expected to use like this.

“Some rely more on ritual structures,” she continued. “Some use bloodline attunement, some use military sealing logic, some tie the outer barriers to authority sigils or inherited magical signatures.”

Ludger listened. Jennifer’s eyes narrowed slightly as she sorted the specifics.

“But the Valenfar are a warrior family,” she said. “That makes them more direct.”

Viola’s attention sharpened immediately.

Jennifer continued, “They prefer brute stability over subtlety. Strong barriers, multiple reinforcement points, fewer elegant layers.”

That sounded promising. Or, at least, less irritating than the alternatives.

Ludger asked, “Meaning?”

Jennifer answered, “Meaning it shouldn’t be that complicated.”

Ludger’s eyes narrowed slightly at the phrasing. Jennifer caught it and clarified at once.

“Compared to the others,” she said.

That was better.

Then she lifted one hand slightly and said, “Most likely, the outer barrier is being fed by several crystal anchors. Not one central source. Multiple crystals positioned around the sealing frame to keep the barrier active and stable.”

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Ludger’s gaze sharpened. Yes.

That fits what a warrior family would do. Not delicate lockwork. Not a single refined keypoint someone clever could bypass cleanly. Redundant feed points. Durable. Practical. Annoying.

Jennifer continued, “If you destroy those crystals, the barrier should fail.”

That part sounded simple. Then she added the part that mattered.

“But it has to be done at the same time.”

The carriage went quiet again.

Ludger asked, “Why?”

“Because if one crystal drops before the others,” Jennifer said, “the whole barrier doesn’t simply weaken. The remaining anchors adjust.”

She spoke more confidently now that she had the structure clear in her head.

“The mana flow will spike and redistribute,” she said. “That creates a vibration through the local magical field. Anyone watching the barrier properly, or any alert structure tied into it, would feel the disturbance immediately.”

Luna nodded faintly at that. So did Eclaire.

Jennifer continued, “If all of them break at once, the barrier collapses faster than it can send a clean warning. But if the destruction is staggered…” She shook her head slightly. “Then it sings.”

That was an ugly but useful way to phrase it. Ludger could picture it immediately.

One anchor shattered. Mana surges. Remaining crystals overfeed for an instant. The whole structure thrums like a struck wire and every half-competent watcher nearby feels the wrongness ripple outward.

Very bad if the point was infiltration.

“How many crystals?” Ludger asked.

Jennifer thought for a moment.

“For a the most common seal? Probably three,” she said. “Possibly six if the labyrinth is considered especially important.”

“That’s a wide difference.”

“Yes,” Jennifer said. “Because they favor overbuilding when they think the contents justify it.”

Of course they did. Warrior families always loved the kind of solution that looked honest while secretly being expensive. Ludger leaned back slightly, already turning the shape of it over.

Three or six crystal anchors.

Destroy simultaneously. Or the barrier alerts everyone around it. That meant coordination. Timing. Positioning.

And suddenly the idea of bringing more people to the opening phase stopped being a philosophical debate and became a practical necessity.

One person could maybe hit two in rapid succession with enough speed and a good route.

Maybe.

But three? Six? Not cleanly enough to trust. Not if the whole point was to avoid the warning pulse.

Eclaire looked at him and said quietly, “That’s what we meant.”

Ludger gave no answer to that. He didn’t need to.

Jennifer continued, “The crystals themselves probably won’t be obvious from far away. They’ll be hidden in fortification points or embedded into the barrier structure’s outer geometry. But if we know the family style and the likely layout, then we can predict where they should be.”

Rowan finally spoke again, his tone more grounded now that the topic had shifted into systems instead of social tension.

“And if we’re wrong?”

Jennifer’s mouth tightened slightly.

“Then the barrier alerts everyone,” she said. “And this stops being infiltration.”

Ludger nodded once. And exactly the sort of thing he needed to hear before stepping into a plan like this half-blind. He looked between the six of them.

“All right,” he said. “Then that’s the opening problem.”

Three or six points. Simultaneous destruction. And afterward the route inward before the defenders fully realized the wrong thing had happened.

Luna asked, “Do you think the crystals can be broken with force alone?”

Jennifer glanced at her.

“Yes,” she said. “They’re feed anchors, not treasures. Durable enough to hold flow, not built to survive siege damage. The issue isn’t whether they break. It’s whether they all break together.”

Ludger’s gaze stayed forward.

That part, at least, sounded manageable. Not easy. Manageable.

He looked at Viola. Then Luna. Then Eclaire, Jennifer, and Rowan.

A six-person infiltration team into a sealed imperial labyrinth had sounded absurd in one way before. Now it sounded absurd in a more organized way. Which was, annoyingly, an improvement.

He said, “Fine. Then the first step is simple.”

No one interrupted.

“We locate the anchors,” Ludger said. “Then we make sure they die together.”

And once that happened, everything afterward would depend on how fast the Empire’s hidden teeth could bite.

Ludger thought through Jennifer’s explanation for a moment, then said, “We should expect six crystals positioned around the labyrinth. I will look for them and tell you where to go.”

Jennifer looked at him.

He continued before she could argue the number immediately.

“If the Valenfar style is direct and built around redundancy, then three outer feed points is the most efficient balance for a site they want stable but not absurdly expensive to maintain.” His eyes narrowed slightly. “Six if they’re being careful. More if they’re scared. But I’d prepare for three first. So, split up in two groups while I act as decoy to get their attention, if there are six, move alone and assume positions.”

Jennifer considered that and gave a small nod.

Ludger folded his arms.

“And given their ties to Armandis,” he added, “we should also expect not just ordinary family guards, but underworld guild members there as well.”

That made Viola frown at once.

“Why?” she asked. “And where did you hear that?”

Ludger looked at her.

“I’ll explain that later.”

That answer annoyed her immediately. But this time she only clicked her tongue softly instead of pushing, because the shape of the problem in front of them mattered more than digging at that answer right now.

Ludger went on.

“The crystals will probably be too far apart for us to signal and destroy them perfectly at the same time,” he said.

That was the real issue.

Inside a moving carriage, it was easy enough to say simultaneous destruction like it was a clean tactical condition. In practice, the crystal anchors would be placed to avoid exactly that sort of easy collapse. Spread wide enough that one saboteur couldn’t just pivot between them. Hidden or defended enough that a clean synchronized strike would require more coordination than a first infiltration deserved.

So he said, with complete seriousness, “We might as well just destroy them and smash anyone around.”

That got a reaction from nearly everyone. Viola looked like that sounded exactly like the part of the plan she had expected him to arrive at eventually.

Luna looked like she had been hoping he would pretend longer.

Rowan and Jennifer both stiffened slightly. Eclaire was the one who answered first.

“The sound of the barrier breaking will echo for tens of kilometers,” she said.

That dragged the conversation back toward the ugly practical side.