I AM A MAGE BUT WITH MILF SYSTEM

Chapter 704: Louisa’s cunning

"The king’s visit," Louisa said, watching his face in the mirror as he worked. "The plan as it stood depended entirely on Kraven being what the reports said he was. A young man whose only notable qualities were his worst ones."

She paused.

"We cannot present Marcus as the preferable heir against an archmage. The King will ask questions we cannot answer without revealing things we cannot afford to reveal."

"I know," Liam said.

The last tie was secured. He dropped his hands and stepped back.

Louisa looked at herself in the mirror. The new dress was better—darker, more structured, the kind of thing that suited a serious afternoon in a contested castle.

"So what do we do?" she asked.

Liam moved back to the table and sat.

He looked at the backyard again, at the gardeners and the afternoon light falling all over the duchy.

"We find out what he wants," he said. "He came back for a reason. The king’s visit is not a coincidence. His father going to receive him personally is also not a coincidence." He paused. "Nothing about his return is coincidental, and he knows that we know that."

Louisa sat in the chair opposite from him.

"He is investigating something," she said quietly.

Liam looked at her.

"Yes," he said. "I think he is."

"The question is what."

"The question is what," Liam agreed.

They sat across from each other in the afternoon light with the mirror behind Louisa reflecting the room and the window behind Liam reflecting nothing. The duchy continued its quiet afternoon outside, and neither of them spoke for a while.

Then Louisa said, "Marcus."

Liam looked at her.

"Marcus needs to train," she said. "Whatever happens with the King’s visit, whatever Kraven is planning — Marcus needs to be further ahead than he is. The gap between Supreme and Arch is too large. It makes him look insufficient standing next to his cousin, and we cannot afford that."

"Agreed," Liam said.

"And Kraven," she continued. "Someone needs to get close to him. Someone capable of reading him without being read in return."

Liam looked at her steadily. "What are you suggesting?"

Louisa smiled.

"The whole castle knows why Kraven was exiled," she said. Whatever blessing he received, whoever helped him reach Archmage, the man inside him cannot have changed that fundamentally. Cultivation changes power. It does not change what a person is built from." She paused. "We simply need to bring what’s underneath back to the surface."

Liam raised a brow. "And how do you propose to do that?"

"You don’t need to think about it, dear," Louisa said pleasantly. "Let me handle this."

Liam stood.

He looked at his wife for a long moment. Then he crossed to where she sat and looked down at her with an expression that was warm and entirely serious at the same time.

"You know my habits," he said quietly. "I don’t like failures."

He held her gaze for a moment longer.

Then he smiled—brief and genuine—and walked to the door. He opened it, stepped through, and pulled it closed behind him without looking back.

The room remained silent.

Louisa sat at the table and looked at the backyard window for approximately ten minutes without moving. She went over her plan again, examining it from every angle. She looked for any weak points or places where it might fail and worked through them one by one. Only when she was satisfied did she finally set it aside.

Then she rose, walked to the small writing desk, and wrote a single line on a piece of paper.

A knock came to the door perhaps ten minutes later.

"Come in," she said.

The door opened.

The woman who entered was not castle staff. That was immediately apparent from the doorway. She wore the uniform of Liam’s military faction, and a sword was tucked at her left side.

She was in her late twenties. Her dark hair was cut short in a strict, practical way, as if she had once decided that usefulness mattered more than appearance. Her face was sharp and defined, and her eyes were very dark and very direct. Her body was lean and athletic, yet unmistakably feminine.

She stepped in and immediately dropped to one knee, her head down.

"My lady," she said. "You summoned me."

Louisa rose and walked slowly toward her, stopping just in front of the kneeling woman. She looked down at the bowed head for a long moment, enjoying the sight of perfect obedience.

"Cathy," she said.

"My lady."

"Rise."

Cathy stood in a single clean movement, her back straight, her eyes finding Louisa’s face immediately.

"I have work for you," Louisa said, a slow, dangerous smile curving her lips.

"What kind of work, my lady?"

Louisa’s smile deepened. "The kind you have always been very, very good at."

Something shifted in Cathy’s expression. Not surprised—her face didn’t seem built for that. Instead, her focus changed. What had been a professional kind of attention became more personal.

"The young lord," Louisa continued. "Kraven."

Cathy stayed perfectly still for a heartbeat, then the corner of her mouth twitched upward in a small, predatory smile. Her tongue flicked out, touching her lower lip briefly.

"The exile," she said.

"The returned exile," Louisa corrected, stepping closer. "Who is no longer what anyone expected him to be. Which is precisely the problem."

Cathy’s dark eyes gleamed with interest. "And my role?"

"Is to remind him of what he was," Louisa said, her voice low and intimate. "Underneath all the discipline and composure he has built, the man who was exiled was ruled by very specific appetites. Those appetites don’t vanish. They wait. Your job is to find where they’re hiding... and give them a reason to come roaring back to the surface."

Cathy absorbed the words, her sharp gaze never wavering.

"You want him compromised," she said.

"I want him readable," Louisa replied, stepping even closer until the heat of her body brushed against Cathy’s uniform.