“Is this your signature, Lady Veris?” the councilman asked, holding the forged document high. His voice echoed like a sentence already decided.
Seren stood frozen at her bench, the weight of the room shifting around her like collapsing stone. Dozens of eyes turned toward her: some curious, some hungry, some already judging.
She didn’t move, not because she was hiding something, but because the paper in his hand was unfamiliar. The signature looked like hers, the seal was almost perfect, but she’d never seen that version of her birth certificate before. She couldn’t even breathe as the question lingered, unanswered.
“I asked,” the councilman said again, more sharply, “is this your signature?”
She opened her mouth, then closed it. Every instinct told her to respond quickly, to defend. But her records were sealed. Even she hadn’t seen them since her father’s legal counsel had secured them in the Dominion Archive years ago. If she answered now, even a single misstep could unravel everything she’d built.
“I don’t recognize that document,” she said finally, voice even but too quiet. A hum rippled through the chamber—doubt, confusion, glee. The Chancellor banged the gavel, once, twice, then called for order.
“This session is adjourned until clarification can be provided,” he declared, though his tone was already uneasy.
Seren stepped down, her movements slow, her thoughts sprinting. In the gallery, reporters whispered behind closed datapads, and aides rushed to send summaries to their superiors. Outside the court, the noise was worse. Protestors—some of whom had once carried her crest—now chanted in confusion.
“Forgery! Fraud! Who is she?”
Placards that once bore #VerisReform now read #ProveIt.
By the time she reached her private chambers, the silence was unbearable. Her aides didn’t follow. Her allies had gone quiet. She stood alone before her mirror, staring at her reflection like it belonged to someone else. Her hair was still pinned, her robe still perfect, her posture still strong. But the expression in her eyes was haunted.
“After everything,” she whispered, voice thin, cracking at the edge, “again?”
She didn’t cry. Not this time. She just stood there, staring at the woman everyone else now doubted, wondering how far the lie had already spread.
Across the city, in a records office two levels below the Tribunal, Riven sat at a terminal surrounded by sealed folders, outdated datapads, and far too much dust. His fingers moved quickly over the keys, bypassing access barriers with a clearance code only three people were supposed to know. What caught his eye wasn’t the document itself—it was the metadata.
“Date-stamped three weeks ago,” he muttered. “But filed under a category retired last cycle.”
The formatting was wrong. The corner alignment didn’t match Dominion standard. The ink tone on the signature tag was newer than the paper itself. Riven narrowed his eyes and pulled up the scan archive’s system log. One entry glowed faintly, misaligned by minutes. Someone had tampered with the file trail, but not well enough.
“Somebody tried too hard,” he said under his breath.
He rose, heading down two levels to the physical archive vault. With the help of a startled clerk, he requested Seren’s sealed lineage file and original property acquisition documents. The file box was still locked, still untouched, the wax seals unbroken since her inheritance transfer years ago. He opened the lid slowly, carefully comparing the birth certificate inside to the one flashed in the Senate chamber.
They weren’t the same. Not even close.
“Got you,” he whispered.
As he turned to leave, something pulled at him—a hunch. He backtracked to the hallway outside the archive’s side door and accessed the security panel. The hallway camera blinked to life. He scrolled backward through the feed, watching a blur of motion and clerks come and go.
Then he saw her. Kaelenna Darion. In heels too tall for discretion, walking too quickly for protocol. She paused by the archive door, glanced over her shoulder, and slipped inside with the archivist who had supposedly been transferred off-duty.
Riven froze the frame, stared at her face, then ran the footage forward until she exited with nothing in hand—but a satisfied expression that told him enough. He snapped a capture of the clip and rushed out of the building.
Minutes later, he reached the Tribunal Office and demanded entry to the High Clerk’s suite. The aides tried to block him, citing scheduling and protocol, but he raised the surveillance image high over his head.
“This can’t wait.”
The High Clerk glanced up from her notes as he burst into the room, breathing hard, thumb drive in one hand, his voice firm.
“You’re about to sentence the wrong woman!”