The scent of sandalwood lingered in the royal study.
The late afternoon sun cast golden lines across the carved floor, filtering through high-arched windows adorned with crimson drapes.
Prince Ethan Eldoria sat back in his chair, shoulders tight beneath his fitted doublet, fingers drumming idly on the edge of his desk.
Papers of court reform and trade proposals lay scattered across the polished wood, untouched.
Across from him, his personal maid, Lucy stood quietly, brushing a strand of red hair behind her ear.
Her posture was demure, eyes cast down, but she was always watching.
"You're unusually silent today," Ethan murmured, setting his quill aside. "Are you upset with me, Lucy?"
She tilted her head slightly, then stepped closer.
"Never upset, Your Highness," she said softly, "only… concerned. You've looked troubled for days now."
He leaned back in his chair, sighing.
"My mother continues to pretend everything is under control. That the unrest, the famine, the nobility's dissent, it can all be managed with words and smiles."
"Perhaps what you need is less politics for one afternoon," Lucy said, her voice a silken thread.
She stepped around the desk slowly, each step measured.
Her hands moved to gently adjust the collar of his coat, brushing against his jaw.
"You wear tension like armor."
Ethan caught her wrist.
"And you enjoy testing how far you can go," he said, but the edge in his voice was dulled by curiosity, even need.
She smiled slightly, eyes locking with his.
"You haven't asked me to stop."
The air shifted.
Her hand remained on his chest, fingers grazing the embroidered fabric above his heart.
Ethan's hand slid to the small of her back, drawing her closer.
Their proximity was no longer formal, it was unspoken confession, curiosity, and influence coiled into a single moment.
She leaned in, her breath brushing his neck.
Ethan's patience couldn't hold out any longer.
He grabs Lucy passionately and picks her up and puts her onto the desk.
Lucy moans with excitement and she lets her eyes dance with playfulness.
Ethan's hand caresses her leg as he inches his way closer to the edge of her skirt.
Just as Ethan lowered his head, the door burst open.
"Your Highness," came the cold voice of Lord Vernon Carrington.
Behind him, Lord Larth Rohan stood with arms crossed, both nobles halting in the doorway at the sight of the prince and his maid locked in a breath away from a kiss.
Ethan stiffened, eyes narrowing, and Lucy calmly stepped back, smoothing the front of her dress.
The prince straightened his coat and cleared his throat.
"You two could learn the art of knocking."
Vernon ignored the comment.
"My apologies. We assumed you were alone. Shall we sit?"
Lucy bowed her head and moved to the tea cart, gliding silently across the room like mist.
Ethan took his place behind his desk, jaw clenched.
"We won't waste your time," Larth said. "We've come to speak of the unrest… and the crown's weakening hand."
Ethan exhaled sharply.
"You mean my mother."
"The realm cannot afford pretense any longer," Vernon said. "You've seen the protests. The riots. The Academy's construction has only drawn more ire. There's talk, Ethan, dangerous talk, and if the queen doesn't act decisively, someone else will."
"She's doing her best to hold this kingdom together," Ethan snapped. "You'd see that if you weren't so eager to grab at her mantle."
Lucy returned with tea, setting the tray gently between them.
As she poured, she spoke without looking up.
"And yet, Your Highness… even your best intentions can be drowned by a rising tide."
Ethan blinked, caught off guard by her words.
She met his gaze for only a second, but it was enough.
That look, poised, solemn, imploring, burrowed into him.
"She has good intentions," Lucy said softly, "but people aren't listening anymore. They're starving. They're frightened. They want change… and they want to hear it from a voice they still trust."
Vernon leaned forward, seizing the moment.
"You, Ethan. They still believe in you. But silence will only make you complicit in your mother's missteps."
"You're asking me to betray her," Ethan said bitterly.
"We're asking you to be a king," Larth said.
The words hung in the air like a blade suspended between them.
Ethan stood abruptly, fists clenched.
"I won't be manipulated into some coup. I am her son, not your pawn."
He turned and stormed out of the study, the heavy doors slamming shut behind him.
...
A still silence followed.
Lucy moved to the door, listening to his footsteps fade down the corridor.
Behind her, Vernon crossed his arms.
"That was dangerous."
"Lyra," Larth said coldly. "We warned you about getting too close."
"You walked in. Not my fault," she replied, crossing her arms.
"You're meant to manipulate him, not seduce him."
She smirked.
"And what do you think manipulation looks like? My methods are not your concern."
Vernon narrowed his eyes.
"The prince's trust is fragile. If you compromise that—"
"I won't," she interrupted. "He'll believe what I need him to believe. Besides, there are new orders."
Lyra reaches for the office door and opens it to leave.
"I'll be in touch."
The door shuts behind her, leaving the nobles in cold silence.
...
From his chamber balcony, Ethan stared across the glowing lights of the capital.
Once proud, now dimmed by civil unrest and noble defiance.
The echoes of his earlier encounter in the study with Lords Rohan and Carrington still clung to his skin like a second cloak.
He'd left in anger, but anger had melted into thought.
Now, alone in his chambers, the flickering fire at the hearth did little to warm the storm within him.
"We're asking you to be a king", Larth had said.
He stepped out and paced the length of the balcony, fists clenched behind his back.
"I'm not a child," he muttered to himself. "I've sat in council. I've studied the histories, watched the decay."
But Queen Adrian was his mother.
She had raised him not only as a son but as a future steward of their line.
He remembered her voice from his boyhood, calm and resolute.
A crown is not given to those who desire it, Ethan.
It is given to those who are burdened by it, and still carry it.
And yet…
He turned sharply, walking back into his chambers, where the firelight danced along the walls.
A tray of untouched food sat cooling on the table.
His mother had always commanded the court with grace and steel, but the steel had dulled.
The riots, the starving outer villages, the nobles fracturing from the throne, everything seemed to be slipping, and her answers, while noble, were not enough to stop the bleeding.
She means well, he thought, dropping into a chair and staring into the fire.
But maybe meaning well isn't enough anymore.
He rubbed his temples, recalling Lucy, how her voice had stirred something sharper than the nobles' arguments.
She hadn't commanded him.
She hadn't pushed.
She'd only said the right thing.
"They want to hear it from a voice they still trust."
The words clung like frost to his chest.
He had always believed his role was to support his mother.
But what if, in clinging to that loyalty, he was failing the very people he was meant to one day lead?
What if I waited too long, and there was no throne left to inherit?
The thought struck deeper than he expected.
He rose again, pacing once more.
It wasn't ambition that moved in him, it was fear.
Fear that his mother's enemies would move faster than her allies.
That while she held to ideals, others would strike with action.
And when that happened, it wouldn't be her they would look to.
It would be him.
He stopped at the mirror, studying his reflection.
He's Sixteen now and he stared into his own eyes, searching for the doubt that had always lived there… and found it beginning to wither.
He stepped back from the mirror, pacing once more.
Each word he'd heard earlier returned, Lord Carrington's silky assertions, Lord Rohan's stern urgings, and Lyra's almost whispered prompt.
At first, he had wanted to dismiss it.
Wanted to think that loyalty alone would be enough.
But Eldoria was unraveling.
The queen, as powerful as she was, could not command unity alone, not anymore.
The nobles were pulling away.
The people cried for relief.
And still, the court moved with the slow drag of tradition.
Ethan's fists clenched.
"I can't be a silent heir," he said aloud, voice firming. "Not if it means watching this kingdom fall while I do nothing."
He turned back toward his desk, where parchments lay scattered, letters, missives, reports he hadn't yet dared to challenge or mark.
His fingers hovered over them now, eyes scanning them as if seeing them for the first time not as the queen's son, but as a man preparing to take hold of power.
"What if it's not betrayal," he murmured, "but survival? Necessity?"
He took a seat, pulling one of the letters toward him.
A noble from the northern provinces.
A formal complaint.
He read it more carefully than before.
Not just for its tone, but for its cracks, the fear in the words, the frustration.
They weren't just grumbling.
They were nearing open defiance.
And what was the court doing?
Nothing swiftly enough.
"What if they just need someone else to listen?" Ethan whispered. "Someone younger. Someone not locked into a throne that can't move without ceremony and counsel."
His pulse raced.
"I could attend the next court," he said to himself. "Not as a figurehead. As a voice."
He imagined the nobles' expressions when he spoke, when he proposed compromise, swift reforms, ration distribution, land reevaluation.
The idea excited him.
Terrified him too.
But in that fear, he felt something else... control.
"This is still our country," he muttered. "Still our name. Eldoria."
Then came the thought that chilled him even as it steeled his resolve.
What if I have to protect it from my own mother's failings?
He didn't want to think it.
But even now, some nobles whispered it.
That she clung too tightly to peace.
That she refused to act with the harshness necessary.
And maybe they were wrong.
But maybe…
"Maybe they're not," he whispered.
He pushed back from the desk, standing again.
This time when he looked in the mirror, he didn't see a boy.
He saw a prince who was preparing to lead, even if it meant stepping into shadows before the light.
Let them speak.
He would attend court.
Not just attend, speak.
Listen.
Counter.
Propose.
And if his mother questioned his boldness, he would answer not as a disobedient son, but as a rising king.