They kept him in a room with clean walls and no shadows.
This alone told him more than any question could have. A place without shadows was not a place meant for ordinary people. It was a place designed for containment. The walls were white stone polished until they reflected light evenly, leaving no corner for darkness to gather. Lamps burned steadily without smoke. Even his own shadow lay flat and thin beneath his feet, obedient and lifeless.
The boy sat on a wooden stool at the center of the room, his hands resting on his knees. No chains bound him. None were necessary. The truth had always been a stronger restraint than iron.
Time passed without announcement. In the kingdom, waiting was a test, and silence was often the first question.
When the door finally opened, three people entered.
The Chancellor came first. She moved with the calm assurance of someone who had never needed to rush. Her robe was simple, its color neutral enough to offend no one and impress no one. Power in the kingdom did not dress loudly. It did not need to.
Behind her came a man with ink stained fingers and careful eyes, and a woman carrying a narrow book pressed to her chest. The boy recognized them at once. Archivist. Examiner. Record keeper.
They were here to decide what he was.
The Chancellor did not sit. She remained standing, her hands folded loosely in front of her.
"You know why you are here," she said.
The boy nodded. "Because I spoke."
"That is not enough," she replied. "Many people speak. Most survive it."
He did not argue. Arguments often relied on persuasion, and persuasion was a cousin of deceit.
The man with the ink stained fingers stepped forward. "We will begin with something simple," he said. "State your name."
The boy did.
The sound of it fell into the room and stayed there, unaccompanied by any disturbance. No tightening in his chest. No resistance from his body.
The man made a mark in his notes.
"State something about yourself that is not true."
The boy inhaled.
Pain flared immediately, sharp and decisive. His lungs seized. His vision dimmed. He pressed a hand against his chest as the familiar sickness rose within him.
The Chancellor raised a hand. "Enough."
The pain receded slowly, leaving behind exhaustion and the dull ache of survival.
The woman with the book spoke for the first time. "It is consistent," she said. "No delay. No variance."
The boy looked at her. "You already knew."
"Yes," she replied evenly. "But knowledge becomes policy only when confirmed."
The Archivist closed his book. "There is no deception tolerance at all," he said. "Not even structural. Not even protective."
The Chancellor studied the boy's face. "Can you lie if someone else asks you to speak their words."
"No," the boy said.
"Can you repeat a lie that you know to be false if you are not the one who created it."
"No."
"Can you remain silent while a lie is spoken in your presence."
"Yes."
The woman with the book lifted her head. "But the lie still manifests."
The boy nodded. "Silence does not stop it."
The Chancellor exhaled slowly.
This was worse than they had hoped.
They dismissed the others with a glance. The door closed, leaving only the two of them in the bright, shadowless room.
"You understand the danger you represent," the Chancellor said.
"I understand that the truth does not wait for permission," the boy replied.
A flicker of something passed through her expression. Amusement perhaps. Or regret.
"You are young," she said. "So you may not yet understand this. The kingdom is not held together by stone or law. It is held together by agreement. Shared stories. Accepted versions of events."
The boy did not respond.
"Truth," she continued, "is not neutral. It has weight. When released without preparation, it crushes what it falls upon."
"Then why does it exist," the boy asked, "if it only destroys."
The Chancellor looked at him for a long moment before answering. "Because lies rot when left unattended. Truth is the rot breaking through."
She turned and walked to the door. "Come. There are things you need to see."
They led him downward again, deeper than before. Past the vault he had already seen. Past the breathing weight of the chained nightmare that lay beneath the palace. The corridors grew older, the stone darker, the air heavier with the residue of long spoken falsehoods.
At last they reached a narrow chamber lined with glass.
Within each pane rested a shadow.
Some were small, no larger than a hand, flickering weakly. Others pressed against the glass as if aware of being observed, their edges thick and restless.
"Unmanaged lies," the Chancellor said. "Extracted before they could merge. Studied so we could learn control."
The boy stepped closer. One of the shadows reacted at once, drawing itself inward as if in fear.
"It recognizes me," he said.
"Yes," the Chancellor replied. "Truth frightens them."
"And the nightmares," he asked. "Do they fear it too."
The Chancellor hesitated.
"They fear starvation," she said finally.
They moved on.
The next chamber was larger. Darker. The light here was subdued, deliberately uneven.
In the center lay a shape bound with runes and bands of light. It was smaller than the nightmare beneath the palace but unmistakably of the same nature. Its surface shifted slowly, forming impressions of faces that never fully emerged.
"A provincial collapse," the Chancellor said. "A truth spoken too widely, too quickly."
The boy felt his stomach tighten. "How many died."
"Enough to teach us caution."
He turned toward her. "You do not regret it."
"I regret the necessity," she said. "Not the decision."
They stood in silence as the restrained nightmare breathed.
"This is what happens when truth is not guided," she continued. "It does not liberate. It consumes."
The boy's hands clenched. "And lies."
"Lies preserve," the Chancellor said. "Until they do not."
They returned him to the room without shadows.
That night, alone on the stool, the boy tried to sleep. Sleep did not come easily. His mind returned again and again to the glass lined chamber. To the way the shadows had recoiled. To the nightmare that had not.
Something in the depths of the palace was aware of him. He could feel it as clearly as he felt his own breath.
Near dawn, a scream echoed faintly through the corridors.
The door opened shortly after.
"Come," the guard said, his voice tight. "There has been an incident."
They brought him to the lower districts, where the stone was older and the buildings leaned close together as if sharing secrets. A crowd had gathered, held back by handlers who spoke in low urgent tones.
At the center of it all lay a woman on the ground, her eyes open and unseeing. Above her, clinging to the walls and ceiling, writhed a mass of shadow thick enough to block the light.
"What happened," the boy asked.
The guard swallowed. "She told her husband the truth."
The boy looked at the shadow. It pulsed, feeding on the shock, the betrayal, the sudden collapse of a shared story.
"She said she had never loved him," the guard continued. "She said she had married him because she was afraid to be alone."
The boy closed his eyes.
"And the husband."
"He tried to deny it. He told her she was lying."
The shadow surged.
"She spoke again," the guard said. "She repeated it."
The nightmare that formed was small but violent. It tore through the narrow space with blind hunger, killing both of them before handlers could intervene.
The crowd watched in silence.
"Why bring me here," the boy asked quietly.
The Chancellor stepped forward. "Because this is what your existence invites," she said. "Questions. Confessions. Uncontrolled honesty."
"She chose to speak," the boy said.
"Yes," the Chancellor replied. "But you make the choice visible."
The handlers began the slow work of extraction, pulling the shadow away piece by piece. The air grew colder as it weakened.
As they worked, a child slipped through the crowd and approached the boy. She could not have been more than eight years old. Her face was streaked with dirt and tears.
"Is it bad to tell the truth," she asked him.
The question struck harder than any command.
The boy knelt so they were level. He felt the familiar pressure rise in his chest, not from falsehood but from the weight of what was true.
"No," he said. "But it is dangerous."
The child nodded solemnly, as though this confirmed something she had already suspected.
As she turned away, the shadow above them shrank slightly, as if unsettled.
The Chancellor watched the exchange with narrowed eyes.
That night, she returned to the room without shadows and stood in the doorway.
"You cannot stay here forever," she said. "The kingdom will not tolerate a living fracture."
The boy looked up at her. "Then why am I still alive."
She considered him for a long moment.
"Because we are not yet certain," she said, "whether you are a disaster or a remedy."
When she left, the lights dimmed slightly.
For the first time since he had entered the room, a faint shadow appeared at the edge of the wall. It was thin and uncertain, as though unsure it was allowed to exist.
The boy watched it closely.
It did not approach him.
But it did not flee either.
And deep beneath the palace, something shifted again, more fully awake than before.