"There are two silences.
The silence one chooses, and the silence imposed.
One is refuge.
The other, a prison without bars.
And between them...
stands my voice,
bare, uncertain, but alive."
Scene 1: The Day Without Gaze
The sunlight in Feulène warmed nothing.
It streamed through tall windows, carving pale squares across gilded walls, but it left the bones beneath cold.
Sérenya awoke alone.
The imperial chamber remained immaculate: sheets pulled tight, cushions embroidered with lilies, floors cold to the touch, scents too clean to be real.
But something... was missing.
She opened her eyes, sought the void, and realized:
There was no more scent of salt.
Not on her skin. Not in her hair.
The sea breeze had vanished.
And with it, the sensation of freedom.
She dressed in a plain gown deep purple, no embroidery, no jewelry.
She wanted her bare hands to be seen. Her palms. Her scars.
In Council, no one spoke her name. Sylus did not meet her gaze. Lady Mohaina rose:
- The High Council has decided to question the Queen in three days. Behind closed doors.
- To what end? she asked.
- To answer the question all Queens flee: do you wish to be loved... or obeyed?
And Sylus... remained silent.
Scene 2: The Weight of Walls
Back in her apartments, she immediately felt something was off.
The silence, usually peaceful, felt too smooth, too pristine. As if the walls themselves were holding their breath.
On the low table lay a note. Placed silently, unsealed. Thick paper, no scent. But her name was inked in dry script: "Sérenya."
She opened it.
"You were not alone in the sea."
No signature. A dried water stain at the edge. Perhaps a tear. Or a confession.
She read it again, her fingers cold. A faint fear shivered at her nape, a hum in the charged silence.
She took her private journal, from its hidden chest under ceremonial fabrics and wrote:
"They want my silence. But I have learned to speak without sound.
They want my fall. But I have learned to fall without breaking.
They want my fire. But I have seen the sea. And the sea made me harder than them."
She looked up. Movement outside, a shadow, a breath. She stepped into the corridor.
The torch wavered. A door at the end opened on its own, slowly, without breeze.
In the tight hush, a familiar, ancient voice echoed in her memory:
"Do not sleep, my child. The Shadow is listening."
She stood long. Then closed the door and bolted it.
Scene 3: The Secret of Dead Queens
At dusk, Kamintha returned, arms laden with infusions and silence.
She set the tray without a word. Her gaze was heavy, but not broken. She watched Serenya as one watches a flame, with hope and fear.
- You know, she finally said, this palace has known other foreign Queens. Three, maybe more, but three I remember.
Serenya listened. The silence between them thick, heavy with old promises and half-buried shadows.
- The first died by drowning officially she slipped into the inner basin. But her gown was torn.
- The second drank a tisane given by mistake, too much artemisia, too many ashes. The healer vanished that night.
- And the third... was never found. Only her ring nestled in a white raven's lair.
Kamintha poured tea, her hand barely trembling.
- They believed silence was protection. A strategic discretion.
- And me? Serenya whispered.
Kamintha fixed her gaze.
"You will not be mere ornament. You speak. You observe. You exist. And for that, they will fear you, more than ever.
Serenya nodded.
- Then I will make it a weapon. My existence will shine a light on them.
Kamintha smiled.
- Then you will live.
Scene 4: The Corridor of Masks
The gallery was closed to the public officially for restoration, but really because it disturbed.
Serenya pushed open the heavy carved door. The air smelled of cold wax and damp stone.
Wall upon wall of faces, funeral masks, each different, all motionless. Eyes closed. Lips sealed. Some malformed by time, others melted by heat or neglect.
Each mask bore an initial, or a date. Never a full name.
At the end of the hall: an empty niche. A rusted nail. Below it, etched in stone:
"She refused to be silent."
Serenya approached, trailed a finger along the inscription.
She understood.
This void had been prepared for her.
But she would not hang suspended in silence.
She would step out of this living gallery.
Scene 5: The Fingers of Fear
Princess Zelya burst into her apartments like an unexpected gust. At thirteen, she had the grace of a cat and a tongue like a storm.
- Are you the one who doesn't bow her eyes? she asked, hands clasped behind her back, gaze unwavering.
- And you, Sérenya replied, the one who walks in unannounced?
Zelya chortled.
- No one lets me in. I walk in when the walls doze off.
She drew from her sleeve a small, round silver object, worn and nearly blackened, engraved with a faded word.
- It belonged to my mother. She said true Queens don't build thrones. They plant ideas. In hearts. In minds.
- And do you think I am that kind of Queen?
Zelya shrugged.
- I think you terrify them. And you don't even know why yet.
She placed the trinket on the table, turned, and vanished as swiftly as she'd come.
Serenya stood alone, but the trinket felt heavier than gold in her hand.
Scene 6: The Awakening of Ink
The silence had grown too vast. She needed to fill the void, not with shouting, but with measured, chosen, engraved words.
She fetched her writing set, seated herself by the window, the distant sea barely visible through hazy panes.
Letter 1: to her people
"I am standing. And thinking of you.
I remember the rain on Tsaravina's rooftops.
Your voices in the wind.
I have not left you. I carry you."
Letter 2: to a missing maid
"They silenced you. But your disappearance speaks louder than a thousand presences.
I will place your name in every corner of this palace.
Those who made you fall will end up slipping themselves."
Letter 3: to Sylus
"You left me alone. That wasn't the first time.
But I will not wait for you anymore.
If you wish to walk with me, do so at my pace."
She signed all three with one word clear, unadorned: Queen.
As the ink dried, she felt a drop on her hand, no tear, but a promise.
Scene 7: The Keys of Stone
The wind rose in Feulène.
Not a storm wind, something discreet, determined. A wind that slipped between columns, stirred dust, awoke hidden roots. A wind searching for something.
Kamintha led the way, silent. She knew these corridors, gardens, hidden alleys behind official quarters.
She opened a low, stone-masked door; Serenya stooped to enter.
Behind it: a corridor of shadow and moss, cracked stones, faded symbols. An ancient gallery of the palace, abandoned since a Queen fell ill... or prayed too long.
- Where are we? Serenya asked.
Kamintha said nothing until they reached a cracked stone slab.
- Dig here.
- What am I looking for?
- What the Palace tried to erase.
Serenya knelt, fingers tracing warm earth among fine roots. She scratched gently, smelling memory: nameless graves and secrets refusing to stay buried.
After minutes, she felt a box. Small, charred wood, corners eaten by damp.
She lifted it. Inside: a carved bone trinket, a white egret's feather... and a copper plaque engraved:
"Nothing is more alive than what they tried to erase."
Serenya handed it to Kamintha, who read aloud.
- Who did this belong to? Serenya asked.
Kamintha hesitated.
- A Queen who dared to think too loudly. She wrote hidden. She questioned the walls. She believed words could survive ash.
- What happened to her?
- Officially, she vanished. But I believe... her words remain. Under the stones. In the maid's throats. In the nobles' fear.
Serenya closed the box.
- Then I will write too, not so they hear me, but so they know I was not silenced.
Kamintha crouched beside her, eyes shining with fierce light.
- No, Serenya. You will not just write. You will engrave. You will tattoo your voice into every seam of this palace. You will make your existence a slow blade.
- And if I'm stopped?
- Then they will have engraved your name themselves out of fear.
As she climbed back to the surface, the wind brushed her neck. But this time, it did not chill her, it pushed her. An invisible hand opening a door.
Scene 8: The Glass Table
Dinner was in the low-Mirror Room, a lavish hall built to dazzle.
But tonight, everything glittered too brightly. Silverware flashed like blades. The glassware vibrated with each word. Beneath the ivory cloth, the table was transparent.
Serenya noticed as soon as she sat. Beneath her crossed legs. Her delicate sandals. Above and around, nobles watched her from below.
A power architect might call it artistic choice. She understood:
"A throne of glass. An inverted cage."
Lady Mohaina wore a gown of pearly gray, almost translucent. Her gestures, controlled. But her smile... thin as thread.
- We are delighted to see the Queen among us. The Council's trial seems to have left its light upon your brow.
- It is not the Council's light. It is the light of fire I passed through alone.
Murmurs wine glass cut by a man's breath. A suppressed laugh somewhere.
Sylus remained silent, observing her, but not touching. Not even with his eyes.
The conversation shifted to foreign peace, internal reforms, heirs' safety.
Then Lord Vael, beard trimmed sharply, spoke:
- Certain foreign voices, even well-intentioned might endanger the fragile balance of our foundations.
His words were soft. His tone polite. But the blade was there.
Serenya raised her glass, studied it through the light, and replied:
- If your foundations crack at the voice of a woman... then it is time to rebuild.
Silence.
Then Zelya's laugh, echoing bravely from a corner. The only one unafraid.
Serenya slipped a discreet message in ink on her napkin:
-What you call tradition is a tomb. And I am alive.
She placed it before her plate.
Sylus read it. Said nothing. But Mohaina... barely furrowed her brow. She understood.
Scene 9: The Trial of Shadows
The Council met in an underground hall no windows, no echoes, no faces. Ten seats. Ten shadows. Their voices emerged from a well.
- You were summoned to weigh the worthiness of your place.
- You mean: decide if I deserve to breathe among you.
- What is the source of your loyalty, Serenya of Tsaravina?
She inhaled.
- From my dead. My lands. Those silenced.
- Not the Emperor?
- He did not possess me. He listened, and that is enough.
A shiver in the air.
- And toward the Council?
She lifted her chin, palms open.
- I will not bow before those who fear their own reflection.
- You are insolent.
- No. I am standing. That's all.
They answered nothing.
After a long silence, one voice said:
- You may leave. But know this every gaze now cast upon you... will bear weight.
She bowed.
- Let them bear it. I have learned to carry fire.
Scene 10: The Golden Cry
That night, the dream returned.
Serenya stood in the throne room naked. The Council circled her. Sylus stood still.
Someone tore out her tongue.
But instead of blood, it was molten gold that poured forth.
Gold on her hands. Arms. Floor.
She screamed without a mouth, and the Palace melted.
Upon waking, she stood naked among rumpled sheets.
She grabbed a piece of charcoal and scrawled on her chamber wall:
"I will speak. Even if my voice burns the world."
Scene 11: The Extended Hand
He came in the dead of night. Not as a king, but as a man seeking truth in an incomprehensible room.
Sylus entered. Closed the door. Said nothing.
Sérenya was already awake seated, upright.
- You left me alone.
- I know. I have no excuse.
- Then why are you here?
He knelt. Slowly.
- Not to make amends. To tell you... I want to walk with you. Not ahead. Not behind. Beside you.
She studied him.
- Don't kneel. I don't want a suppliant. I want an equal.
He rose. They remained that close, an unspoken promise.
- If you choose me... it will be without chains.
- And if I fall?
- I will reach out. Without ever closing my fist.
She answered with silence, but did not look away.
Scene 12: Between Two Silences
Dawn broke over a slate sky one that promised neither rain nor light.
Sérenya rose silently. A letter waited on her table:
"You will remain. But under watch. Under questioning. Under silence.
The Palace observes you."
She crumpled it. Burned it in an incense bowl.
Then, slowly, she dressed.
No black. No white. Red. A deep red, like Tsaravina's warm sands.
In her hair, a feather, the one from the box.
She opened the curtains. The sun hadn't shown itself yet, but she had.
She stepped into the corridor.
Servants lowered their eyes. Guards gave way.
She walked.
And in her silence...
was a song.
As she passed the last steps of the East Hall, Serenya felt something slip under her door.
She paused. Nobody there.
She retrieved it a rough piece of paper, folded.
Inside, in shadow ink:
- We have lifted the stones. And now we await your voice.
At the bottom: an ancient symbol, a circle pierced by a line.
The sign of the vanished insurgents...
those the Empire claimed to have crushed long ago.
To be continued Chapter 7: The Stones Raised
"Some silences feed fear.
Others... feed rebellion.
And in Feulène's soil, forgotten hearts begin to beat."