Chapter 316: Requested Presence
Celestine stared at the black electronic cards in her palm.
For a long moment, she did not speak.
Her eyes moved from the cards to the open penthouse, then to Kael, then back to the cards again as if the answer might change if she looked at them in the correct order. The massive living room waited beyond the doorway, sun pouring through reinforced glass, furniture arranged with elegant care, the city spread wide beneath the terrace like something distant and harmless.
"This is a joke," she said.
Kael shook his head. "No."
"A rental?"
"No."
"Temporary?"
"No."
"Then whose place is this really?"
"Yours."
She stared at him.
Kael stepped inside first, then turned back toward her. "All of this is your property. I signed the documents under your name, with my account attached jointly for payments, maintenance, and expenses. You have access to the money in it too. The Association handled the legal side."
Celestine’s fingers closed around the cards.
Her face tightened, not with joy at first, but with alarm.
"No," she said. "No, this is too much. Kael, this is too much."
"It’s really not."
"It is." Her voice trembled slightly. "You need to get yourself a wife and settle down here. You need your own life. I can’t be here taking all this from you."
"Not now, Mom," Kael said. "And that wife talk, let’s leave it for later."
Celestine’s expression shifted.
The concern sharpened into something more personal.
"Where is Lora?"
Kael went silent.
That silence answered too quickly.
Celestine’s eyes softened. "What’s wrong?"
"Lora left," Kael said. "Some time ago."
"Why? Did you have a falling out?"
Kael gave a faint, humorless smile. "Apparently, I wasn’t good enough for her. I was, well... too broke."
Celestine looked genuinely hurt by that.
Not for herself. For him.
"You’re not broke now," she said after a moment. "She’s a good kid, Kael. You can..."
"No."
The word came out calm, but it ended the path before it could form.
Celestine stopped.
Kael looked at the city through the glass. His reflection looked too large, too broad, too different from the man who had once tried to hold a relationship together while his entire life collapsed around bills and hospital beds.
"Mom," he said, "she didn’t stick with me when I was broke. I’ll never take her back when I’m wealthy."
Celestine lowered her gaze.
"And besides," Kael added, softer now, "I still can’t remain here for long. I’ll have to go back to the Tower eventually. It would just be cruel."
"Why can’t you just stay here?"
The tears came before she could hide them.
Kael’s chest tightened.
He had faced monsters that tore buildings apart, bosses that could erase men with a swing, darkness that ate flesh, and a master whose idea of correction involved unconsciousness. None of that prepared him for his mother crying in a penthouse he had bought for her.
"Please, Mom," he said quietly. "I can’t handle you crying."
She wiped at her eyes, but the tears kept coming.
"And like I said, I can’t talk about it. But I have to do it. I don’t have a choice in the matter." He stepped closer and took her hands carefully. "I’ll come back, though."
"When are you leaving?"
"One month from now."
The words hung between them.
Too short.
Far too short.
Kael forced a smile. "So until then, how about we enjoy ourselves for the next month?"
Celestine looked at him through wet eyes.
"You say that like you’re going to war."
Kael did not answer.
Because he was.
Days passed.
For the first time in years, Kael let money solve problems without apologizing to it.
They moved into the penthouse properly. Association staff handled delivery, documents, security clearances, and medical accommodations. Celestine walked through each room like she was afraid touching anything too expensive would make it vanish. Kael kept handing her cards, access codes, and explanations until she finally stopped asking whether they were allowed to sit on the furniture.
Then he took her out.
Not once.
Not politely.
Everywhere.
They traveled across the country, not because there was a grand plan, but because Celestine had lost years to a hospital bed and Kael wanted to give her days that did not smell like antiseptic. They visited cities she had only seen on screens. They ate in restaurants where the waiters spoke softly and the food arrived looking like it had been arranged by jewelers. Kael bought her clothes she tried to refuse, then bought them anyway because she kept touching the fabric when she thought he was not looking.
Designer coats. Dresses. Shoes. Jewelry. Comfortable things. Beautiful things. Things she had never allowed herself to imagine because survival had a way of making beauty feel irresponsible.
He bought clothes for himself too, mostly because nothing he owned fit and because his mother threatened to pick outfits for him if he did not cooperate. That threat proved far more effective than any sales assistant.
They laughed more than Kael expected.
At strange things.
At expensive menus.
At how uncomfortable he looked in formal wear.
At the way store clerks treated him like a celebrity athlete because of his size and Association bracelet, then became confused when his mother scolded him for slouching.
Kael also managed to track down his father’s car.
That took more effort.
The old family house had been foreclosed on while Celestine was sick. Everything attached to it had been liquidated, auctioned, or swallowed by the machinery of debt. Their father’s old 1969 Ford Mustang had gone with it. Kael remembered the car more clearly than he expected. The color. The smell of old leather. His father’s hand on the steering wheel. The way the man had cared for it like it was less a vehicle and more a stubborn piece of his soul made metal.
Finding the current owner was not difficult with Association resources.
Buying it back was easier once Kael explained the truth.
The owner was an older man with soft eyes and a garage cleaner than most apartments. He listened as Kael spoke of the foreclosure, the hospital, the lost house, the father who had cherished that Mustang, and the mother who had just woken after years of sickness. The man looked at Celestine, then at Kael, then at the car sitting beneath a cover.
He sold it for less than it was worth.
Kael paid more anyway.
When Celestine saw the Mustang, she covered her mouth and cried again.
This time, Kael did not ask her to stop.
He simply stood beside her and let her hold the hood with both hands, as if touching the car meant touching a time before everything had gone wrong.
The last week of summer, they went to Florida.
Celestine had wanted warmth.
Kael had wanted distance from New York, the Association, Vylan’s name, the Tower’s shadow, and the quiet countdown no one else could see.
Florida gave them sun, beaches, expensive hotels, and a ridiculous amount of people who stared at Kael like he had been built in a lab for poor decisions. His body had become monstrous in the cleanest way, wide shoulders, dense muscle, red hair, and the kind of controlled movement that made people look twice before deciding whether to be afraid or interested.
Women catcalled him on the beach.
Loudly.
Often.
Celestine found this endlessly amusing.
Kael found it mildly exhausting.
It became worse when people saw Celestine beside him. The Elixir had restored her to a vitality that made her look far younger than she was, and with her healthier face, defined features, and graceful posture, most strangers assumed she was his partner.
The first time it happened, Kael nearly choked on a drink.
Celestine laughed for five minutes.
After that, she started teasing him whenever someone gave them a confused look.
"You should introduce me as your mother faster," she said one evening as they walked along the beach.
"I do."
"You hesitate."
"I’m usually recovering from horror."
"You fight monsters."
"This is different."
She laughed again, and Kael decided the embarrassment was worth it.
He gave her the best time he could.
No budgets.
No rationing.
No turning away from something because money needed to be saved for tomorrow’s emergency. He still kept most of the funds untouched, because he was not stupid, but for the first time in their lives, spending money did not feel like bleeding. It felt like reclaiming.
Through all of it, Kael trained.
Every morning before she woke.
Every night after she slept.
Weights when available. Body conditioning when not. Internal energy circulation in silence. Footwork on balconies, beaches, hotel gyms, and private training rooms. He kept the rings on. He never let his body forget burden. Comfort was good for his mother. For him, comfort had to be measured carefully, like medicine with a dangerous dose.
The month moved too quickly.
Eventually, they returned to New York.
The penthouse felt like home now, at least enough that Celestine had begun placing flowers near the windows and moving things around when Kael was not looking. He pretended not to notice. She pretended not to know he noticed. It worked well enough.
Two days remained.
Less than forty-eight hours before the Tower would take him back.
Kael spent those final days making arrangements.
He paid for additional security through the Association. Not obvious bodyguards standing in his living room, because Celestine would hate that, but climbers embedded in the building’s existing protection detail. Rotating shifts. Emergency response protocol. Reinforced access checks. Private alert tied to his bracelet and the Association’s security branch. A year paid upfront.
He also left funds separated.
Living expenses. Medical follow-ups. Emergency care. Property maintenance. Legal access. A ridiculous amount of backup money, because if Kael disappeared, he wanted problems to hit a wall of money before they reached his mother.
Celestine did not like the implication.
She liked the protection even less.
But she did not argue as hard this time.
They both knew the clock was running.
Kael was in the penthouse training room, tightening one of the rings around his wrist after a morning session, when his bracelet lit up.
The holographic panel opened.
Association contact request.
Kael accepted.
"Mr. Ardent?" Lloyd’s voice came through.
"Yeah? What’s going on?"
There was a pause.
Too long.
Kael straightened.
"Your presence is requested at the Association."
Kael’s eyes narrowed. "Requested by who?"
Another pause.
"Asher Vylan is here," Lloyd said. "And he wants to meet you."