Chapter 307: Home sweet home
The automated glass gates of the Brewer estate parted silently, sliding back into two towering, monolithic pillars of polished white granite.
Edmund Brewer sat in the back of the sleek, dark sedan, watching the rain wash down the reinforced glass windows.
Outside, the sprawling compound sat nestled against the frost-covered hills of the northern district—a sweeping masterpiece of modern architectural excess.
To the outside world, it was the private sanctuary of one of the country’s most prominent industrial dynasties.
To those in the know, it was the seat of power for one of the oldest, most arrogant ice-talented lineages on the continent.
Normally, the estate operated with smooth, silent precision.
Automated security drones glided along high perimeter perches, and the air carried a faint, crisp stillness that Edmund had known his entire life.
But that particular day, the air just felt heavy.
As the car pulled into the underground garage, Edmund stepped out, smoothing the lapels of his dark charcoal coat.
Two armed family guards stood by the private lift.
They scanned his palm, keyed the lift, and stepped aside.
Edmund’s brow furrowed slightly as the lift ascended toward the upper tier.
"Something happened..."
He could feel it deep within him.
When he had been abruptly recalled from Pyreptar Academy days ago, the summons had been characteristically vague.
"Family matters requiring immediate representation," the message had read.
He had assumed it was another tedious quarterly lineage council or a debate over the upcoming Veilrend Games roster.
He hadn’t expected the grand reception hall to be entirely devoid of life, save for a single butler standing outside the Matriarch’s private study.
"Master Edmund," the old man murmured, bowing his head slightly.
"They are waiting for you inside."
"Who is ’they’, Jules?" Edmund asked quietly, stopping before the tall, bronze-inlaid doors.
"Lady Clara’s representatives," Julian replied, his voice dropping to a whisper.
"And your uncle."
Edmund hesitated. Clara.
Clara Brewer was his father’s younger sister—a woman whose frost abilities were so refined she could freeze a man’s blood in his veins without breaking her stride, and whose pride was twice as lethal.
If Clara was involved, it was never a minor matter.
Edmund pushed open the heavy doors and stepped inside.
The study was bathed in the cool, ambient glow of the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the valley.
Sitting behind an obsidian desk was Uncle Robert, the family’s primary liaison to the corporate and political spheres. Standing near the window, staring out into the rain with a dark, uncharacteristic scowl, was Klein.
Klein’s coat was scorched around the hem. The faint, bitter stench of ozone and burnt copper clung to him.
Clara was not in the room.
"Edmund," Robert said, his voice flat as he gestured to a leather armchair across the desk.
"Sit."
Edmund didn’t sit. He looked from his uncle’s pale, drawn face to Klein, whose thick arms were crossed tightly over his chest, his jaw set.
"Where is Aunt Clara?" Edmund asked directly.
Robert closed a leather-bound tablet on his desk with a soft snap.
"Recovering. Her Talent suffered a severe backlash. She will be confined to the medical facilities for stabilization for at least a month."
Edmund’s heart gave a strange, uneasy thud.
Stabilization?
Clara was an elite Talented even among the elite.
There were perhaps a dozen people in the country who could push her to the point of a core backlash.
"What happened? Did she get involved in a fight against one of the Videntis? As far as I know, if it’s not that, then she wasn’t on any mission for the Praesagius."
Suddenly Edmund felt a wave of strange anxiety.
"What did she do?"
Robert exchanged a quick, uncomfortable glance with Klein.
For a moment, the silence in the room was so absolute that Edmund could hear the rhythmic hum of the estate’s generators beneath the floorboards.
"A calculation was made," Robert began smoothly, using the corporate phrasing he always deployed when someone made a disaster look like a policy decision.
"Information reached us regarding the girl—Emily Whizen."
Edmund froze. "Emily? What has she got to do with any of this..."
His eyes widened slightly. Suddenly the Matriarch’s absence made sense.
"She doesn’t want to get involved in whatever this mess is..."
"We received confirmation that her ice manipulation carries distinct structural markers reminiscent of our primary branch," Robert continued, leaning forward and resting his elbows on the polished desk in front of him.
"A rare, uncatalogued mutation, or perhaps a lost offshoot of the family line. Clara felt it was our duty—and our right—to secure her for analysis. To ensure our bloodline’s secrets weren’t being improperly used by outsiders."
That piece of information fell into place with a sickening, heavy weight in Edmund’s stomach.
Damn it. He hated the fact that he was right.
"You tried to take her," Edmund said softly. "She was staying at HaleCrest’s estate..."
His eyes widened further, his mouth falling open in shock, then he quickly closed it as the weight of that realization dawned on him.
"You sent Clara to break into Merlin HaleCrest’s home?" He asked quietly.
"It was meant to be a swift extraction," Klein growled from the window, his deep voice carrying a gravelly tremor.
"A show of overwhelming force to force a negotiation."
"Negotiation?" Edmund turned on Klein, his eyes wide with a mixture of disbelief and sheer horror.
"With the Black Meridian?! Are you out of your minds?!!!!"
The title hung in the cold air of the study like a curse.
Edmund bit out a curse, clenching and unclenching his fingers in rapid succession.
Idiots!
Fools!
The floor beneath his feet slowly frosted over, a thin layer of ice spreading outward. A moment later it vanished, his usual placid demeanour returning.
Every child raised in a Talented family of renown grew up on the stories.
They were told of the old wars, of the monsters that walked in human skin, and of the handful of living legends whose names were carved into the very foundation of the modern Talented hierarchy.
Merlin HaleCrest wasn’t just an eccentric, retired grandmaster living in a secluded estate. He was a survivor of an era where men fought gods and won.
The man responsible for Modern Chronotechnology, and while it wasn’t publicly acknowledged, even the exalted Videntis had to tread carefully when it came to him.
"You thought his reputation was exaggerated," Edmund said, looking back at his uncle, a sharp, bitter laugh escaping his lips.
"You actually thought because he spent his days in deliberate solitude and taking on a single apprentice, he’d grown soft. Are you completely insane? Have you quite frankly gone mad? Lost your pebbles?"
"Do you realize what your foolishness has done? What your lack of foresight has conceived? You thought that he was growing old..." he said bitterly, shaking his head.
"That he was simply just another pompous old fool, is that it?"
"Watch your tongue, Edmund," Robert warned, though the edge in his voice lacked its usual bite.
"Or what?!" Edmund retorted.
"What could possibly happen to make this situation any worse than it already is?"
Robert remained silent.
"Clara had reason to believe his defenses were weak. And for a moment—"
"For a moment, she thought she killed him," Klein interrupted sharply.
He finally turned around, his face pale, his eyes wide with a lingering, visceral fear that he couldn’t hide.
"I saw him take a frost spear through the chest, Edmund. I saw his blood freeze on the floor. His heart stopped. The light left his eyes."
Klein swallowed hard.
"And then he started clapping."
Edmund stared at the man. Klein was a veteran, a man who had fought to the death several times in his life without batting an eye.
Seeing him visibly shaken sent a chill down Edmund’s spine that had nothing to do with the frost around the estate.
"He played with her," Klein whispered, looking down at his scarred knuckles.
"He let her deploy the highest tier manifestation of her ability just to see what the Brewer bloodline could do."
"And when he was bored... he tore her defenses apart effortlessly. It wasn’t a fight. It was child’s play for him, it was a reprimand. He let me carry her out only because he wanted us to deliver a message."
"What message?" Edmund asked quietly, closing his eyes.
Here it comes...
Robert cleared his throat, adjusting his gold cufflink with a trembling hand.
"That the Brewer family has used up its lifetime allowance of courtesy."
Silence returned to the room.
Fuuuuuuu
Edmund closed his eyes, taking a slow, deep breath to steady the anger rising in his chest.
Emily wasn’t a research subject.
She was a quiet, painfully disciplined girl. She’d been through a hell even he couldn’t possibly fathom Tenebris and now that she was finally back.
When everything seemed to be going so well...his family had marched into the place sge had made her home, slaughtered her guardian’s guards, and tried to drag her away like a prize.
"So," Edmund said, opening his eyes and looking dead set at his uncle.
"Why am I here? You didn’t recall me from the academy just to tell me how badly Aunt Clara failed."