The door swung open on silent hinges. The room beyond looked exactly like what it was supposed to be: a temporary workspace for someone important enough to merit privacy but not important enough to warrant a permanent office. Standard desk. Two chairs. Window overlooking the quad. Bookshelves lined with legal texts and hunter regulations that nobody had touched in months.

Cassandra Davenport sat behind the desk with her hands folded on the surface and her posture communicating absolute control over everything within a three-block radius. Up close, the resemblance to Blair was stronger and also somehow worse. Same red hair, though Cassandra’s was pulled back into a sleek ponytail that probably cost more to maintain than my entire wardrobe. Same aristocratic bone structure that made every expression look like judgment passed down from on high. Same blue eyes that tracked movement with the casual intensity of a predator who had never needed to hurry.

But where Blair burned hot and loud, Cassandra was winter in human form. Cold. Patient. The kind of dangerous that didn’t announce itself until the knife was already between your ribs.

"Mr. Monroe." She gestured to the chair across from her. "Please, sit."

I sat. The chair was comfortable enough, which somehow made everything worse. Interrogation rooms should have uncomfortable chairs. That was the deal. The comfort felt like a trap.

"Thank you for coming on such short notice."

"You didn’t exactly give me a lot of options."

"No. I didn’t." Her smile was thin enough to cut paper. "But you came anyway. That tells me something."

"That I check my texts?"

"That you’re not stupid enough to avoid a conversation when avoidance would only make things worse."

She let the silence stretch. A classic technique, designed to make nervous people fill the void with words they hadn’t planned to say. I’d used it myself a hundred times back in my old life, mostly during job interviews when I wanted to see how candidates handled pressure. The fact that I recognized the technique didn’t make it any less effective.

The silence kept stretching.

I said nothing.

Cassandra’s expression didn’t change, but something in her eyes shifted. Interest, maybe. Or reassessment. Hard to tell with someone whose face had been trained to reveal nothing.

"You’ve made quite an impression in a short time, Mr. Monroe."

"I’ve been working hard."

"So I’ve heard." She produced a tablet from somewhere and began scrolling through what I assumed was my entire life reduced to data points and performance metrics. "Three weeks ago, you were ranked last in your class. Dead last. Your combat scores were abysmal. Your physical evaluations barely met minimum standards. Several instructors recommended remedial training."

"That sounds about right."

"And now you’re ranked first among first-years. Your combat evaluations have improved by four hundred percent. You’ve gained at least two rank tiers in physical stats. You’ve been accepted as a personal student by Dominic Vale, who hasn’t taken anyone under his wing in six years." She looked up from the tablet. "That’s quite a turnaround for three weeks."

"I got motivated."

"Motivated."

"The first week here made it pretty clear that lottery winners don’t survive by being average. So I stopped being average."

"Just like that."

"Just like that."

She set the tablet down and leaned back in her chair. The movement was small, but it changed the entire dynamic of the room. We’d moved from interrogation to conversation, which meant she was either satisfied with my answers or changing tactics.

"Tell me about your training regimen."

"Cardio in the mornings. Vale’s sessions in the afternoons. Combat drills with my squad. Gate runs when we can book simulation time." I shrugged. "Nothing fancy. Just volume and consistency."

"And your diet?"

"Lots of protein. Whatever the cafeteria’s serving. Some supplements when I can afford them."

"No enhancement potions? No alchemical boosters?"

"On a lottery winner’s budget? I can barely afford toothpaste."

Something flickered across her face. Not quite a smile, but close. "You’re very calm for someone being questioned by a Diamond-tier hunter."

"Should I not be?"

"Most people in your position would be nervous. Sweating. Struggling to maintain eye contact with a Diamond-tier hunter who’s clearly evaluating whether they’re worth her time."

"I mean, I am nervous." I gestured at my hands, which were resting on my thighs in a way that I hoped looked casual rather than tense. "But you’re not here to hurt me. If you wanted me dead or disappeared, you wouldn’t have scheduled a meeting in the middle of campus. You wouldn’t have bothered with the preliminary questions. You’d have just done it. Quietly. Efficiently. Probably with one of your contractors handling cleanup so your hands stayed clean."

"You’re assuming I need to follow rules."

"I’m assuming you’re smart enough not to create problems when problems can be avoided. Killing a student backed by Dominic Vale—the strongest hunter on faculty—would create a lot of problems. The kind that even Davenport Industries would have trouble smoothing over. The kind that get people asking uncomfortable questions about why the Vice President of Strategic Development was on campus in the first place."

Her eyes narrowed slightly. Not anger. Calculation. "You think Vale would protect you?"

"I think Vale doesn’t like people interfering with his projects. And right now, I’m one of his projects. Whether that protection extends to keeping me alive against a Davenport?" I shrugged. "I’d rather not test it. But the fact that you’re sitting here asking questions instead of making moves tells me you’re not sure either. Which means this conversation is happening because you want something from me that requires me to be alive, functional, and cooperative."

The silence returned. Different this time. Heavier. She was reassessing me, and I couldn’t tell if the reassessment was working in my favor or against it.

"Let’s talk about my sister."

And there it was. The actual reason for this meeting. Everything else had been preliminary, calibration, figuring out how I responded to pressure before hitting me with the real questions.

"What about her?"

"Blair seems quite... focused on you."

"That’s one way to describe it."

"She’s requested formal combat evaluations against you three times in the past two weeks. All denied by faculty. She’s attempted to provoke public confrontations on at least five occasions. She’s been monitoring your movements, your associations, your schedule." Cassandra’s voice remained perfectly level. "My sister doesn’t obsess over people she considers beneath her notice. So what did you do to earn her attention?"

"Honestly? I have no idea."

"Mr. Monroe."