There was something wrong with Arthur.
Rachel didn't need evidence—she could read the signs like a weather map. She'd spent enough time watching nobles lie with practiced smiles and generals pretend they weren't bluffing to recognize when someone was off. And Arthur Nightingale? He was absolutely, definitely, unmistakably off.
Not in the usual ways. His investigation team had produced far more results than all others combined, moving with surgical precision—almost too clean, too fast. As if he'd known exactly where to look.
But Rachel knew Arthur better than most. She'd seen him in more moods than the Southern Sea had waves. This wasn't brilliance at work. This was brilliance hiding something. He was pulling away, subtly, like a planet shifting orbit. Still warm, still present—but distant in a way that made the back of her neck itch.
