The wind howled against the stone walls like a mourning mother.
It seeped through the cracks in the dungeon, wrapping around my skin with a damp, bone-deep chill that no velvet or fur could ever warm. But in the darkness, I dreamed.
Not about escaping this hellhole but what I needed the most, the sunlight.
——
We were in the gardens again.
Late spring. The roses hadn't bloomed yet, but the cherry trees were heavy with soft white blossoms, shedding their petals with every gust of breeze. They clung to our hair, our shoulders and each of our laughter.
Father was laughing.
Not the composed, public smile he wore at court but the full, unrestrained sound that only came when we were alone. His gloves were off, and his swordbelt forgotten. He carried a wicker basket in one hand that was completely unnecessary, of course, since none of us actually picked anything and a half-bitten fig in the other.
"Sera, darling," he said, brushing petals from my sleeve, "you'll ruin your dress climbing trees again. That one cost more than a war horse."
"I didn't climb," I replied, trying not to smile. "I leapt, father. Just like how you taught me!
Aldric let out a whoop from the nearby hedge maze, brandishing a wooden staff he had stolen from the guardhouse. "She leapt, and nearly landed on old Master Corbin's head!"
"I did not!" I protested. "It was a foot away."
"An inch!" Aldric called back, grinning like a devil.
Father shook his head with mock exasperation. "My children," he muttered, "thorns, all of you. I raise roses and get thorns."
"You raised us in a castle of stone, trained us with blades, and taught us politics over lullabies," I said, nudging him. "What did you expect?"
"I expected grace," he said dryly. Then softer, "But I'm glad I got fire instead."
Ellianne was there too. She sat in the shade with a book, a quiet smile playing on her lips. She never liked the chaos, but she never stopped us either. A soft center among our sharp edges.
We stayed until the sun began to dip and the lamps were lit on the eastern terrace. I remember that moment clearly of how the light caught Father's profile as he turned toward the castle, how Aldric threw one last blossom into the air like a battle cry.
I remember thinking that we are unbreakable. We were whole, we should be whole but… what happened?
"Father? Aldric?" I murmured and tried to open my eyes.
Darkness.
No blossoms. No sunlight. Just stone, damp and endless unlike that dream.
The dream left me with a bitter taste. It had clung to my skin like warmth, and now I felt the cold more acutely. My back ached from the uneven floor. My wrists were raw from the iron manacles, though I had long since given up struggling against them.
The oubliette I am at is like a grave that someone forgot to seal.
No torch and sound cannot even be heard. Just a small sliver of light from the barred ceiling high above a trickle of moonlight that vanished whenever clouds passed over.
I did not know how long I had been here.
The days bled into one another. There was no sun to measure them by. No clock to mark the hours. Only the scraping of rats, the slow drip of water down the far wall, and the soft creak of chains every time I moved.
They had not spoken to me. All I can hear is my muffled cries of trying to fight back the cold.
It's like was not meant to answer anything and I was meant to vanish.
Just like Aldric and Father.
I curled my knees to my chest, breathing shallowly to keep the stench of mold and rot from settling deeper into my lungs. Hunger gnawed at me like a second set of ribs. The only thing worse than the hunger was the thirst. It made my tongue feel like parchment. I'd stopped crying. There was no use. The tears only dried my mouth faster.
But my mind? That would not stay still.
I kept replaying that moment. The ballroom. The echoing silence. The inquisitor's words.
Aldric is dead.
I had clung to denial at first. The way you do when someone speaks of death too suddenly. My heart had screamed no. Not him.. no.. not like that. But that scream had dulled.
There was no one left to hear it.
Caelan's voice, too, haunted me. That quiet apology he muttered that day.
I'm sorry.
Hah!
I wished he had said nothing. A lie would've been kinder. Even indifference would've hurt less.
But that small flicker of guilt in his voice, that hint of humanity was like salt in the wound. He had chosen the crown over me, and he wanted to be forgiven for it.
I would never forgive him.
Not for that, not for the silence. Not for standing there while they put chains on my wrists and dragged me from the only home I had ever known.
I rested my head against the wall, the stone slick with condensation. My breath came in slow, shallow puffs as my body ached.
But inside that pain, I made a quiet promise.
If this was my grave then let it be the soil I grow from.
Let them think I'm buried. Let them believe I'm broken.
And when I rise—because I would—I would not come back as the girl they simply just silenced.
I would return as the storm they thought they'd escaped.