Manfred von Karma was looking at Phoenix when he woke. A thin, hungry smile spread across his bloodless face. His clothing was as white as what Prince Miles had worn at the front door, though trimmed with far more silver in angular patterns. Fine chains wrapped his neck and dangled runic pendants over his heart. In sum, he was colored to match the dungeon around him: built of solid ice and stone and lit by coruscating ivory orbs that hung like lanterns on the wall. "I remember you, whelp," von Karma said. "You dared to threaten me."

Phoenix sat up and regretted it. He'd been sprawled against a block of ice and so a thin strip of skin tore off his cheek when he lurched. He barely muffled a cry of pain. Don't show weakness, his throbbing head insisted. Don't let him see.

Once he took in his situation, there seemed to be little point in feigning confidence. Foot-wide quartz slabs circled him and he was behind bars of ice as thick as his bicep. "Let him go," he mumbled anyway, then clutched his head.

"Are you truly all that Angelos has sent to save their lost prince?" With a smirk, von Karma turned. "This is how they care for you, Your Grace."

Phoenix ignored the mocking words, tumbled off his bed, and slid his way to the bars. From that angle he could see where the prince stood silently in a far corner. Miles looked carved from the ice itself. His features were still fine and angular, but any emotions were as dead as winter. Though his body screamed for rest and his headache pounded at any motion, Phoenix forced himself to rise. "I'm a forward scout," he lied. "Whoever doesn't return will draw an entire army in that direction."

"That sounds terribly dangerous," von Karma said. His smile showed teeth. "For them."

Ignoring von Karma and his own pain, Phoenix pushed as far against the bars as he could. "Prince! I'm going to save you, I swear." Looking at him... it's hard to remember he's the same person. Gregory's black hair had been passed on as light brown to his son, but the man before him was colored like a snowstorm. It looked strange with his youthful face, and stranger with pale skin that lacked the normal flush across nose and cheeks in the cold. No normal human had color-changing irises like that, and certainly not in glowing white or cyan. "Whatever magic he's done to you," Phoenix continued with determination, "I will save you from."

"He's lying," said Miles, stepping forward.

"Indeed," von Karma said. "He won't even be able to save himself." He leaned closer. "Do not end a sentence with a preposition. Doing so demonstrates your base birth." The arrogance behind that advice angered Phoenix nearly as much as his cell.

"True," Miles agreed, "and to be certain, his mother was no more refined than some sow in the mud." Though von Karma's arrogance had angered Phoenix, this shattered him. Where was that prince who'd saved his entire family from starvation? "I was, however, not referring to that as his lie. Wright has been a guard for a year at most and is unremarkable in his performance. He is impetuous, unreliable, and gives no particular indicators of intelligence. He would never be trusted as a forward scout. He is, however, a great enough fool to attempt a rescue on his own."

"Mmm." Manfred studied Phoenix. "He was certainly foolish enough to threaten me with a simple sword in the royal hall, even though he knew me as High Mage of the realm."

The sorcerer's words were magpie's chatter to Phoenix. In quiet horror, he stared at Miles and asked, "What happened to you?"

"I was improved." Miles' eyes flashed black like the night sky, then back to white. "May I take my leave?"

"You wish to watch its change?" von Karma asked with a smirk, and inclined his head when Miles nodded. "Feel free. A greater future awaits you. Anticipate it."

Miles Edgeworth turned and walked away from Phoenix's cell, then disappeared around a corner. His footing was as secure on the icy floor as von Karma's. The steps were unnaturally paced, like he was a soldier marching.

"What did you do to him?" Phoenix yelled, his hands tight around the cell's bars. If only it were Manfred's neck, instead. "You bastard, what did you do?"

"Didn't you hear him? He was improved." Laughing, von Karma gestured after Miles. "He actually believes that. I always knew I was a great enough mage to freeze a city or army, but even I wondered whether my powers could change a heart. It's been a thousand years. The magic was thought lost."

"Change a heart?" The idea made his stomach lurch.

"Everything good in him has been warped," von Karma said. As he grinned again, his teeth looked more like fangs. "The sight of his own beautiful home would sicken him. All that remains in his chest is disdain. Cruelty. Hatred. He would as soon slaughter his old subjects as rule them." Shadows gathered in the hollows of von Karma's face. "And soon he will be my subject, for all eternity."

"You're not getting away with this," Phoenix said. The threat sounded brittle.

"Did you notice that pedestal when you broke into my castle?" von Karma continued. "In the courtyard, with the gem at its top?"

"Yes," Phoenix said uncertainly. He remembered it, now; that strangely layered stone with a ruby inside a diamond. It had been larger than any jewel he'd seen in Gregory's court.

"Did you notice its shape?"

"I don't..."

"Can you truly not see where this is going?" Manfred shook his head. "The brat was right about something, after all: you are indeed idiotic. It's his heart, you fool."

Phoenix swallowed. "What?"

"When I brought him here, I strapped him down to a block much like that one." He gestured dismissively at Phoenix's cell. "He fought, of course, but cuffs at his joints kept him in place. After I carved the runes on those silver bands, he could no longer even scream. I spoke the words of magic, broke open his chest like glass, and ripped out his beating heart. He couldn't make even one sound as his heart turned hard and still in my hand." Manfred looked up, presumably toward that spot in the courtyard. "Flesh can't survive outside the body and so the spell changed it to ruby. As the spell takes hold more by the hour, that color fades and diamond takes its place. The cavity in his chest has filled with solid ice."

This was far beyond anything that Phoenix had imagined. "Let him go," Phoenix whispered. "Please."

"When all of the ruby is gone," Manfred continued like he hadn't spoken, "the heart will shatter. Even diamond isn't as strong as my magic. What was once the man called Miles Edgeworth will blow away on the wind or settle itself like stars in the sky. His body will be left here in my palace, bleached of every drop of color and life it once held. Without my permission, that body can never cross the snowflake symbols in the courtyard, even if it stays in this palace for a thousand years. Ten thousand. But I will give it permission, of course." Manfred's eyes flashed like writhing auroras. "I will have turned it into an agent of Angelos' destruction, and with their own prince's body I will destroy that town and every life in it."

"You bastard," Phoenix whispered. His fist slammed against an ice bar. "You bastard! You kill the king, you torture the prince... why? Why are you doing..." His voice cut off as his choked throat failed him.

"Why?" von Karma asked. His voice cut the air like a whip. "You dare ask me why after you watched that worthless family humiliate me? I am perfect. I am flawless. I refuse to be made the fool, and woe to those who think otherwise!"

Phoenix fell to the ground, numb. He closed his eyes and shuddered. King Gregory's corpse again filled his vision, but it hurt for a different reason than before. The king had died from blood loss and the ice had been nothing more than a sword. Compared to this, that killing was a kindness. "Please let him go," he whispered uselessly. To warp the kind soul who had saved his life? To use him to kill the innocents he should have protected? And then to doom him to possible eternity inside this northern hell? It was worse than a thousand simple regicides. "Give him a chance, just a chance. Let... let him try to fight it!" Phoenix bargained desperately, his head jerking back up. "There's still good inside him somewhere, and so if he can just overcome your spell, you'll agree to let him—"

Never in his life had he heard such mocking laughter. "Such faith," von Karma said. "You place such faith in a man who hates you. Do you truly think that's a wise idea? To trust in the young Prince Edgeworth?"

"Yes," Phoenix growled.

With a smile, von Karma waved his hand and the ice bars retreated into the stone below. Phoenix made no effort to run. If he showed his back to von Karma, it seemed certain that he'd take a blow to match the king's. "The days here can blend into each other and it will take some time yet before the heart turns to diamond. I had thought to leave you down here until you froze, but perhaps you'd like to attempt to save the prince for a little comic relief, hmm?"

"You're letting me out?" Phoenix asked warily. This seemed too good to be true.

"There is no death so crushing," Manfred von Karma said, and forced Phoenix to meet his eyes with an icy finger under his chin, "as that of hope. Yes. I want you to try to save him. Perhaps he will destroy you himself. If not, you will watch as his heart shatters into starlight and he becomes enslaved to this place forever. Then I will allow you to kill yourself to atone for your failure.

"Welcome to my home, Phoenix Wright," Manfred von Karma finished, and gestured to the doorway with a flourish of his hand. "It's been far too long without a court jester."

Phoenix watched him suspiciously at every step, but von Karma let him leave without complaint. He exited the dungeon carefully, always holding onto the wall with one hand, and sagged with relief when he hit the hallway and felt solid stone under his feet. His pace sped and his aching body took the stairs at a run. As it whipped by, the air made him feel like he was surrounded by a thin layer of ice even though Maya's spell still burned within him.

He swallowed as he reached the courtyard. Any layer of ice around him seemed suddenly unimportant; the only thing that mattered was that layer of diamond on the heart. It glittered. The heart had to still be half ruby, at least, but that wasn't enough.

"Manfred was right." Phoenix turned and saw Miles emerging from the shadows. He stared at his own heart dispassionately. "All of Deele will freeze for their governor's crimes. If the citizenry knows that no disloyalty to the crown is tolerated, they will tear down their own leaders before they condemn a province to death." His head tilted as he studied the heart. "So much unrest because my father didn't understand a simple rule of governance."

"This isn't you," Phoenix said. "You have to fight it. Please."

"You're in love with me, aren't you?" Miles didn't look at him as he stood with his arms folded behind his back. His words made Phoenix stagger, yet he didn't even care. "It's the only logical explanation for why you've doomed yourself. Love is a cancer. My father loved his people."

Fighting back his humiliation, Phoenix said, "And you love your father."

"Loved. I'm no longer that fool who lets his heart mislead him." A hint of a smile curved his lips. "There is nothing stronger than diamond."

"If you stay here, von Karma will kill you. Own you."

Miles looked away from the heart and studied him. "He's opened my eyes."

"Please, Miles—"

"Do not presume to call your king by his first name, Wright, and do not bother me again." He turned crisply and left, thick foxfur cloak trailing behind him.

Frustrated tears beaded and froze. Phoenix looked up as he wiped his cheeks clean and hissed when he caught where the skin had ripped. The Guidestar hung directly overhead, cold and blue and distant. By following it, anyone could be sure that they were heading straight north. To have it over him meant that he was as far north as anyone could go, and yet he knew that he was eighty miles out of the capital; maybe a hundred, at most. This place wasn't operating under the world's rules.

He took a deep breath, shivered as the cold air hit his lungs, and walked after Miles. There was no time to waste and so much to be done.