Chapter 13
The child-sized ring stayed in my desk for three months.
I did not return it to the vault immediately.
I needed to decide what it meant now.
One evening Olivia came into my office.
“Can I see it?”
I handed it over.
She turned it between her fingers.
“It’s pretty.”
“Yes.”
Then:
“I don’t want it.”
“I know.”
“What happens to it?”
I thought.
“What do you think?”
She placed it on the desk.
“Make Leo decide when he’s bigger.”
Simple.
Correct.
No ceremony required.
The ring belonged to his history.
Not his destiny.
That distinction mattered.
I had grown up in a family where objects came with instructions.
Rings meant duty.
Seats meant rank.
Names meant expectation.
Maybe Leo could inherit something without inheriting the command attached to it.
I returned the ring to the vault with a note.
For Leo, when he asks.
Not when he turns eighteen.
Not when the council approves.
May you like
When he asks.
For once, inheritance could wait for consent.
