The profound, cocoon like silence of the sanctum was fractured by the slow, grim business of the new day. Light, pale and grudging, filtered through the crystalline windows, illuminating the dust motes dancing like forgotten spirits in the air. The twins awoke not to teasing, but to a palpable, watchful tension. The horrors of the previous night had scoured away any pretence of normalcy. Statera still held Shiro, and Nyxara had not moved from Kuro's side. When the boys stirred, the first thing they saw was their mothers' faces, etched with an exhaustion that went beyond the physical, and a protective ferocity that was absolute.

There was to be no discussion, but the boys, still swimming in the dregs of pride and the fresh memory of their helplessness, attempted a feeble resistance.

"We can't… just sit in the council like ornaments," Kuro muttered, avoiding his mother's gaze, his voice rough with sleep and pain. The very idea was an affront to his strategic mind.

"Yeah," Shiro chimed in, shifting uncomfortably. The stitches on his face pulled with a hot, itching insistence. "We'll look… weak. They need to see us strong."

Nyxara's hand, which had been gently stroking Kuro's hair, stilled. She did not look at him, but her voice was low and carried the weight of the mountain itself. "What they need to see is that we are unbreakable. And we are unbreakable together. You are not ornaments. You are the reason. Your presence at our sides is not a sign of weakness. It is the declaration of our cause."

Statera's gaze was softer, but no less firm. "The strongest fortress has its foundation stones buried deep, unseen. You are our foundation. Let them see the walls. They need not know the depths from which they rise." She reached out and gently pried Shiro's fingers away from where he was unconsciously scratching at the edge of his bandage. "And leave the stitches be. You'll open the wound and let the darkness in."

Shiro flushed, snatching his hand back. "It itches. It feels like bugs are crawling under my skin."

"A sign of healing," Lucifera stated from the doorway, her sudden voice making them all start. She was already dressed, her silver hair like a fall of ice. "Nerve endings reawakening. Scratching will introduce pathogens. Endure the sensation. It is preferable to gangrene."

The blunt, clinical advice ended the argument. The mothers' need to keep them close was a physical force in the room, a new, unbreakable tether forged in the fires of shared trauma. With a shared, resigned sigh that was more performance than genuine protest, the twins acquiesced. The embarrassment was a faint echo, overshadowed by the grim understanding of why such protection was necessary.

The walk to the council chamber was a sombre procession through the heart of the frozen palace. The twins moved stiffly, their bodies protesting the fresh, angry stitches. They leaned on their mothers not out of sheer weakness, but as a conscious, united front. They were a unit. A fortress of four. Lucifera followed a pace behind, her presence a silent, sharp shadow. Her usual neutrality felt different today; it was the neutrality of a scalpel laid out on a sterile cloth before a surgery.

The council chamber was a cavernous space hewn from living blue black basalt, veined with dormant silver. The air was cold and thick with the scent of ozone and old stone. It was already a cauldron of simmering tensions when they entered. The various clan envoys, the hulking, cooling forms of Betelgeuse, the shifting, void touched shadows of Algol, the pale, silent pairs of Sirius, the nervous clusters of Vega, fell silent as one. Their gazes, hostile, curious, fearful, locked onto the two young men who stood flanked by their queens. The appearance of the disfigured, pale faced twins was an unprecedented breach of protocol. A ripple of unease, a psychic tremor of pure astonishment, moved through the assembly.

Umbra'zel of Algol detached himself from the shadows, a gaunt silhouette of concentrated hunger. His voice was a dry rasp, like stone grinding against stone.

"What is this, Nyxara?" he hissed, his obsidian eyes, like chips of a dead star, sweeping over Shiro and Kuro with contemptuous disdain. "The council chamber is not a convalescent home. Have you brought these broken things from the world above to witness their betters? Do they understand the gravity here, or are they merely lost pets, clinging to the first warmth they found after the kennel burned?" He took a step closer, the organic floor sizzling faintly under his tread. "Why are they here? What possible value do these shattered vessels hold for a war council?"

The insults were precise, designed to wound not just the boys, but the queens' judgment. Before the twins could muster a retort, a scowl from Kuro, a defiant flash in Shiro's eye, Nyxara spoke. Her voice was low, but it carried the absolute zero of the void between galaxies.

"You look upon the Twin Stars," she declared, her multi hued light darkening to a dangerous swirl of amethyst and cobalt. "The ones who stood in the Plaza of Screams and did not break. The ones who turned Ryo's own violence against his Scourge. They are not broken things. They are our checkmate. And you will afford them the respect their actions have earned, or you will find this council suddenly lacking an Algol perspective."

Simultaneously, Statera's Polaris light, usually a gentle beacon, sharpened into a blade of focused fury. "Their value," she said, her tone deceptively calm, "is that they have looked into the heart of the enemy and survived. They are the living proof that Ryo's power is not absolute. To dismiss them is to dismiss the only hope we have. Question their presence again, and you question the very possibility of victory."

The vehemence of the defence was a shockwave. But the greater shock, the event that sent a true, psychic jolt through the chamber, particularly through the two impassive Sirius observers, came from the rear.

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"The Queens' assessment is tactically sound," Lucifera's voice cut through the tension, dry and precise as a surgeon's report. Every head turned. A Sirius councillor speaking unbidden, taking a side, was an event as statistically improbable as a star choosing to fall from the sky. "Umbra'zel's analysis is emotionally driven and therefore flawed. These individuals are assets of incalculable strategic worth. Their firsthand knowledge of the enemy's tactics and limitations outweighs any perceived breach of decorum. Your disdain is not strength; it is a critical blind spot. And in the coming conflict, blind spots get entire clans erased."

The silence that followed was profound. The Sirius pairs exchanged a look that, for them, was the equivalent of a shouted conference. Lucifera had not just defended the twins; she had irrevocably aligned herself.

It was then that Lyrathiel of Vega moved. She was a wisp of a woman, her form seeming to be woven from moonlight and melancholy. She glided forward, her large, luminous eyes fixed on the twins with a deep, curious sadness. She ignored the tension, instead offering a small, gentle smile.

"They are in pain," she observed, her voice a melodic whisper that seemed to soothe the jagged edges in the air. She gestured to the way Shiro was subtly trying to rub his cheek against his shoulder and Kuro's clenched jaw. "The body remembers what the mind tries to forget. The song of healing is a painful one."

Shiro, captivated by her ethereal presence, found his voice. "It… itches," he admitted, a flush creeping up his neck.

"Like a thousand ants marching under my skin," Kuro added, his own voice softer than he intended.

Lyrathiel's smile widened slightly. "A familiar song." Then, her gaze grew distant. "The air here is thick with fear and anger. It is a dissonant chord. It helps no one." She looked at Nyxara. "With your permission, my Queen? A brief moment of harmony before we descend into the inevitable discord of war?"

At Nyxara's slow nod, Lyrathiel drew a small, elegantly carved harp from within her robes. She did not play a battle hymn or a song of glory. She played a dirge. A slow, haunting melody that was not about death, but about memory. It was the sound of lost beauty, of forgotten stars, of a love that persisted in the silence. The notes hung in the cold air, each one a perfect, crystalline tear.

As the music washed over them, the twins' discomfort seemed to fade. The itching became a distant annoyance. Shiro's single eye and Kuro's good one were locked on Lyrathiel, their expressions ones of awe. In that moment, every lie Ryo had ever told them about Nyxarion, that it was a barren wasteland, a kingdom of monstrous, decadent fools, crumbled to dust. This was not a demonic court. This was a place that could produce such heartbreaking beauty. The music was a truth more powerful than any propaganda.

When the last note faded into silence, Lyrathiel lowered her harp. "There," she whispered. "A small reminder of what we fight for. Not just survival. But for the right to hear such songs again."

She then turned her gaze back to the queens, a playful, knowing glint in her eye. "Though it seems you fight for more than songs. 'Our checkmate,' you say? Such a possessive term for two mysterious young men you've brought to our most sacred council. The plot of this epic grows ever more intriguing. Tell me, do they have names, these living weapons of yours? Or just titles?"

The question hung in the air. The mothers remained silent, their faces unreadable.

It was Shiro who answered, his voice clear, bolstered by the beauty of the music. "I am Shiro."

Kuro, his pride returning, added, "And I am Kuro."

Lyrathiel's smile was radiant. "Shiro and Kuro," she repeated, as if tasting the names. "Light and Darkness. How perfectly symmetrical. And tell me, Shiro and Kuro," she asked, her tone dripping with gentle, theatrical curiosity, "what are these two formidable women to you, that they defend you with such… maternal ferocity?"

The twins didn't hesitate. They looked at Nyxara and Statera, and the answer was simple, absolute, and earth shattering.

"They're my mothers," Shiro said, his gaze fixed on both mothers.

"Both ours," Kuro stated, his good eye holding Nyxara's.

The word, mothers, echoed in the vast, stone chamber, sending a visible, physical ripple through the assembled envoys. Whispers erupted, sharp and disbelieving.

"Mothers?" "The Queen… a joint mother?" "The Polaris Lumina aswell…?" "But the King… the line was broken!"

The revelation was a bomb, shredding the political landscape. This was not a mere alliance. It was a family. A deeply, terrifyingly bonded family.

The sound was a physical pressure against Shiro's eardrums. He could feel the heat of a hundred hostile, curious, and pitying stares like brands upon his skin. The horrific X on his face, which had been a dull, itching throb, now felt exposed, blasphemous under the council's scrutiny. His single amber eye dropped to the floor, his throat tightening. He was a specimen, a curiosity, a broken thing paraded before jackals. He felt Kuro's shoulder press against his own, a minute movement of shared, silent agony. A tremor, born of exhaustion and a primal fear of this many eyed attention, began in Shiro's hands. He balled them into fists, hiding them in the folds of his tunic.

Umbra'zel's voice cut through the din, a dry, venomous rasp. "A touching revelation. It explains the... emotional reasoning behind this circus. But it changes nothing. It only confirms your judgment is compromised. You bring your heart's attachments to a war council and expect us to follow? We are to base our survival on the weeping of two wounded boys you call sons?"

The insult was a lance, aimed with cruel precision. Shiro flinched as if struck. Kuro's jaw tightened so hard the muscle in his cheek jumped, but he remained silent, his gaze fixed on a crack in the stone floor, his entire being radiating a humiliated, rigid stillness.

They were infants here. Helpless.

Nyxara did not turn. She did not need to. Her voice, when it came, was so cold it seemed to freeze the very air in Umbra'zel's lungs. "You look upon the reason our line cannot be broken," she stated, her multi hued light darkening to a dangerous, swirling nebula. "You see attachment. I see a cause worth the annihilation of worlds. You see weeping boys. I see the living proof that Ryo's power has limits. Speak of my sons again with anything less than the reverence owed to the heirs of the throne, and the only thing compromised will be your continued ability to draw breath in this chamber."

The threat was absolute. The silence that followed was no longer astonished. It was terrified.

Lyrathiel let out a soft, delighted laugh, a sound like silver bells in the grim silence. "Oh such a threat, this is a twist worthy of the oldest ballads! The mighty Queen of Nyxarion and the serene Polaris Councillor, brought to heel by the most primal of bonds. It suits you both. All that fearsome power, given a name. A heart." She winked at the flustered queens, then turned her mischievous gaze to the boys. "I shall have to compose a new verse. Though I suspect the best chapters of this story are yet to be sung."

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