There is no love like the love for a brother; there is no love like the love from a brother.

Zane had love inside his heart and most of it belonged to Milo. The rest of the love, it was for Zane to get strength to protect Milo in dire events.

He had brought Milo to the Citadel as he couldn’t have left her alone in the slums.

He had made sure that he showed everyone that he couldn’t care less about the girl that came with him to the Citadel.

He had called Milo his maid. He talked in the rudest way possible. He used force and dragged her around.

He did everything right.

He managed to convince everyone that he really didn’t care about the girl at all.

All of that just because he wanted Milo to stay safe. He wanted no one to harm Milo in case they wanted to harm Zane.

No one should get even a whiff of the fact that Milo was his little sister for whom he could burn the whole world with his hands behind his back.

But he acted so well in making sure of Milo’s safety that it came back to devour him whole.

She wasn’t present in the Cathedral for the prayer and that only forced the Emberlord to ask for her.

For them, Milo was Zane’s maid so when Zane tried his hardest to stop Coin from summoning Milo, it aroused suspicions.

So the Emberlord asked some questions and he got to know the duality that Zane showed right now.

Outside the Cathedral, he was rude to his maid and inside the Cathedral he tried his best to make sure the maid stayed in his room.

Even if she doesn’t have the original relic with her, something still wasn’t right. Zane was definitely hiding something.

The Emberlord went silent for a few minutes and Zane wanted to scream to disturb Coin.

He wanted to scream as his instincts told him that Coin was close. Very close.

But before he could scream, the Emberlord smiled. 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝚠𝚎𝚋𝗻𝗼𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝚘𝐦

And seeing that smile... for the first time since the start of the trial, fear crept inside Zane.

"Not only a liar, everyone..."

The Emberlord spread his arms and with the same smile, he bellowed:

"Zane Atlas is also a great brother!"

Zane’s eyes opened wide.

His heart skipped many beats one after another.

The land beneath his feet turned to water as his legs wobbled.

His worst fear came true.

The Emberlord didn’t just come to the conclusion that Zane didn’t have a maid with him, he directly came to the main thing.

He outright revealed that Zane was a brother.

Not even the people of slums knew that Zane was a brother.

Not even Xavier knew.

And yet after hearing only a few words from the audience, the Emberlord hit the nail right on the mark.

The people in the audience had frowns on their faces but when they saw Zane staring at Coin with wide eyes, all of them figured that Emberlord was right.

But how did he reach such a conclusion?

"How did I reach such a conclusion?" Coin looked at Zane, smiling. "That’s what you want to know, right?"

Zane said nothing but the audience shouted yes. They wanted to know.

Coin stopped smiling and faced the crowd again.

"He said it himself, everyone. He called that maid a child. Meaning she is a kid. She cannot be his daughter. She cannot be his wife or girlfriend. He is not rich enough to afford a slave. That only left two options. The girl could either be his maid or... sister."

The people nodded.

Coin carried on.

"But why did I come to the conclusion that she is his sister and not his maid?" He locked eyes with everyone present. "Because he himself gave us the answer."

The Emberlord pointed at Zane.

"In front of everyone, he spoke to his sister as if she was a maid she couldn’t care less about. And right now, he is willing to give anything to make sure she doesn’t come to the Cathedral. In fact, only after the receptionist mentioned questioning his maid did he say he wished to confess. He was silent before that. What does it mean?"

Coin retratched his hand from Zane.

"If that girl was truly his maid then even now he would have cared less about her and let us do anything we want with her. So that only left us with the option of sister. That maid, everyone, that infidel girl, is none other than the sister of Zane Atlas."

Murmurs ran amok in the Cathedral as Coin made sense.

Everyone understood the logic and they agreed with him.

Zane’s fingers gripped around the barricade, his fingerprints carving in the wood.

But as the people in the Cathedral understood Coin, one more question arose.

"Why did he call her a maid then?" A Halocrat asked.

It was the same Halocrat who had tripped Zane in the stairs.

The Emberlord darted his eyes at the shining young man and nodded.

"I can think of a few reasons for why he lied like that. But only one of them seems prominent enough to me."

Everyone stared at the Emberlord and he didn’t make them wait.

"He lied that she was his maid to all of us because he wanted her to stay safe. He deliberately talked roughly with her because he wanted to show us that the girl has no value to him. He wanted no one to harm her because he knew that he had done something that would make him a target. He wanted to keep his infidel sister safe from his crimes. And what are his crimes? I don’t know. But I am sure it is related to the Original Relic and to the fact that his sister doesn’t believe in the First Flame."

"Enough!" Zane shouted.

Coin jerked his head at him.

"We are nowhere near enough! Why is she not in the Cathedral? Why did you lie she was your maid? Where is the Original Relic? What crimes have those hands of yours committed, Zane Atlas?"

"What crimes have I committed? What about you, Emberlord? Why don’t you answer one of my questions?"

"I am not the one accused right now."

"I am accusing you right now!"

"Of what?"

Zane inhaled.

"When I returned the relic, there was only you in the room. What if just to make a scene, what if to earn more points in the religious game you play, what if to quench your disgust towards me, what if to make sure no one forgets who is filth, what if just to prove my whole kind as a thief..."

Zane leaned towards Coin.

"You replaced the original relic with a fake relic yourself just so you could also make it to the list of the great crusaders who managed to clear the filth from the streets of Dwarkam under the pretense of purging the infidels and passing the absolute wicked judgement in the favor of the shining breed and blatantly calling it justice that pleases the Crowns which you serve?"