Time moved differently inside the palace.
At first, I tried to follow the morning light spilling through tall windows, the steady rhythm of meals, and the routes my nanny took while carrying me through the halls. But repetition dulled the edges. The palace didn't change all at once. It shifted gradually, quietly, until I could no longer tell when the transition had begun.
It started to feel crowded.
Not in the sense of noise or disorder, but in pressure. The corridors remained wide, the ceilings impossibly high, yet there were more people with each passing day. New colors appeared among the robes of the court. New scents lingered in the air: foreign incense, treated leather, metals polished to a dull gleam.
Languages overlapped, some sharp and clipped, others flowing and melodic.
The world was gathering here.
My nanny carried me as she always did, her movements practiced, unhurried. Where she went became my entire horizon. I learned the palace through fragments: the echo of footsteps against stone, the way sunlight warmed certain corridors while others remained eternally cold, the subtle change in air when we crossed from one wing to another.
Elves passed us in small numbers, their expressions composed, their pace unhurried. They did not pay me any particular attention. Nor did the beastmen, who tended to remain in groups, their conversations low, their presence grounded and physical. Dwarves appeared less frequently, moving with an unspoken certainty that made others step aside without comment.
Humans filled the spaces between them all.
Nobles, envoys, attendants, guards.
Most eyes were not on me.
They were on my parents.
My father's name surfaced often in passing conversations, never spoken loudly, always accompanied by pauses that felt deliberate.
Neutral.
I didn't yet understand what that meant here, but I recognized the tone that followed it. Caution. Frustration. Interest.
When my father held me, none of that reached me. His hands were steady, his presence unyielding in a way that felt grounding rather than imposing. My mother's warmth was constant, her voice softer when she spoke to me than when she addressed the court.
They were nothing like the people I remembered.
That realization did not bring relief.
It brought resolve.
As the palace filled, some paths vanished.
My nanny adjusted our routes without explanation, turning away from corridors we had walked before. Guards appeared where there had once been open stone. Certain doors remained closed at all hours now, watched by men whose armor was not ceremonial, but reinforced.
Once, as we passed near one of those sealed halls, I felt a pressure in the air.
Not heat. Not sound.
Restraint.
Beyond a partially open passage farther down the corridor, light flared briefly, unnaturally bright. Stone darkened, fractured, then smoothed over as if undone.
Magic.
Not the gentle kind my mother had shown me before. This was controlled, regulated, and monitored closely.
Magic here was not wonder.
It was infrastructure.
That unsettled me more than I expected.
Fragments of conversation began to reach me soon after.
Never full debates. No explanations.
Only pieces.
"Abolishment would destabilize."
"You speak of ideals, not consequences."
"Our people will not be reduced to commodities."
"Peace demands compromise"
The language was familiar.
I had grown up surrounded by words shaped to justify decisions already made. I recognized the cadence, the careful framing, the way moral weight was shifted until it sounded reasonable.
What I didn't understand was this world's balance of power. Its history. It's fault lines.
I understood politics.
I did not yet understand this continent.
And that made listening strangely disorienting.
The word that surfaced again and again carried weight regardless of context.
Slavery.
Sometimes spoken sharply. Sometimes with uncomfortable ease.
Each time I heard it, I found myself growing quieter, more still. Not because I didn't know what it meant, but because I knew exactly what it did.
As time stretched on, the palace grew colder.
Servants whispered more often. Guards doubled in number. Laughter echoed less freely, and when it did, it sounded rehearsed. Even the nights refused to settle. Lights burned in distant windows long past the hour they should have gone dark.
Lying beneath silk sheets that felt too soft to be real, I stared at a ceiling that vanished into shadow.
I thought of the king's arms when he held me firm, steady, without scrutiny.
I thought of my parents walking these halls, calm expressions masking the weight they carried.
They weren't shaping me.
They weren't demanding anything.
Not yet.
For the first time, that realization frightened me.
Because I wanted to be worthy of what they gave freely.
Not out of obligation.
Out of choice.
Once, only once, I misjudged myself.
My nanny paused near a balcony overlooking an inner courtyard, momentarily distracted. Below us, several envoys stood in discussion, their voices low but tense.
I turned toward them instinctively.
Too quickly.
My attention aligned too sharply with the flow of conversation, my focus settling where it shouldn't have. For a brief moment, I was not reacting as a child should.
Then my nanny adjusted her hold, humming softly, and the moment passed.
No one noticed.
I made sure it wouldn't happen again.
By the time I stopped trying to mark the days, the palace felt like it was holding its breath.
Nothing had happened.
And yet, everything had already begun.
They spoke of unity. Of alliances. Of peace.
But peace, I was learning, was not the absence of conflict.
It was preparation.
Outside, the lights of the palace burned on through the night.
Somewhere beyond these walls, decisions were being weighed.
And someday, this place would ask something of me.
When that time came, I would not be dragged forward as I once had been.
I would stand.