Pinnacle Honors Hall echoed with standing ovations. Adrian Stone endured the applause with glacial detachment as Headmaster Thornwood concluded: "...exemplifies Eldenwood's Pentathlon Standard: Scholarship, Integrity, Valor."
The truth festered beneath the platitudes—Holly Frost hadn't been robbed last night. Moonlight had exposed Sergei Volkov's assault behind the boathouse. Adrian's intervention left the thug unconscious with a fractured jaw. The robbery narrative was Thornwood's concession to the Frost family's shame.
"Stone! You medieval knight!" Silas Flynn clapped Adrian's shoulder, flanked by Conrad Bellweather. "Give us the uncensored cut!"
Adrian snapped his calculus folio shut. "Cafeteria closes in twenty."
Silas: (Blocking the door) "Not even a 'the bastard bled like Niagara'?"
Adrian: (Stepping around him) "Save the fanfiction for Lit class."
Conrad: "Flynn's drafting it already. Title: Stone Cold Justice."
Silas: (Chasing him) "Epilogue: Stone's knighthood ceremony!"
Melody Vaughn materialized at the Gothic archway.
Melody: (Fingers twisting cashmere cardigan) "Adrian? Might I... borrow a moment?"
Silas: (Waggling eyebrows) "Flynn-Bellweather Enterprises hereby adjourns!"
Conrad: (Mouthing) She brought roses!
Sunlight through stained glass drenched Melody in cobalt and crimson. Adrian noted the ivory roses clutched behind her back—Vaughn Manor's hothouse blooms, cut fresh daily.
"You're unharmed?" Her whisper fluttered like wounded dove wings. "When the sirens came..."
"Protocol." Adrian's gaze drifted to Thornwood's office, where Sergei Volkov's arrest warrant was being falsified. "Frost's family required testimony."
Melody's relief dissolved into awkward tension. "It's Sapphire. My sister."
Adrian remained statue-still.
Melody: "Mother favors me—academics, deportment. Sapphire resents it. She fixates on anything I value."
Adrian: (Observing her trembling lashes) "Including Honors students?"
Melody: "Especially those." She pressed the roses toward him. "Headmistress Dubois asked me to counsel her. But she despises my existence."
Adrian: (Ignoring the flowers) "No apology required."
Melody: "Still... I'm mortified."
Adrian: "Mortification's a luxury I can't afford. Excuse me."
He left her clutching roses under the martyred saints' stained-glass gaze.
Silas and Conrad materialized outside.
Silas: "Details! Did she weep? Offer her firstborn?"
Conrad: "Or just her trust fund?"
Adrian: "She suggested Sapphire's fixation stems from envy."
Silas: "Envy? Please. Sapphire's the crown jewel! Melody's the... tasteful brooch."
Conrad: "Brooch? She's more like inherited silverware—polished but pointless."
Adrian's silence halted their laughter.
Conrad: "Joking! Though... between the wild sapphire and the cultured pearl..."
Silas: "The pearl's flawless. But sapphires have fire."
Adrian: "Fire burns."
Silas: (Grumbling) "Still salty about her broadcast declaration?"
Sunlight fractured through the wisteria arbor as Adrian's worn Oxfords scuffed ancestral cobblestones. Conrad spotted the frayed stitching—a stark contrast to Silas' Berluti loafers.
Conrad: (Kicking pebble) "Melody's roses died of neglect already."
Silas: "Stone's allergic to privilege. Except his own."
Adrian: "Mine's merit-based."
Silas: "Ouch! Remind me why we tolerate you?"
Adrian: "My criminal record impresses your mother."
Conrad's laugh echoed off limestone walls. "Flynn's mum thinks you're a reformed pickpocket!"
Adrian's lips quirked—the Stone Sentinel's rarest artifact. Silas gaped as if witnessing Halley's Comet.
Silas: "Sapphire was right! Your smile could melt Greenland!"
Adrian: "Tell her that and I'll fracture your mandible."
Silas: (Miming lock over lips) "Vow of silence!"
Vivian Vaughn watched them from the bell tower. Adrian's fleeting smile arrowed through her ribs.
Melody's roses, she noted. Ivory for innocence. Thorns for deception.
Her burner phone vibrated—Cobra's update:
>> Sergei released. Kane paid off witnesses. Frost family recanting. <<
Vivian's fingers flew: >> Redirect Thornwood's warrant to Kane. Attach Sergei's embezzlement files. <<
She tracked Adrian crossing the quad. His posture betrayed nothing, but his right hand flexed—knuckles bruised from last night's battle.
Your war's my war now, Sentinel, she vowed as pigeons scattered from the clocktower.