The queen was going to die today. I did not know how I knew that was going to happen, I just felt it in my bones, like the air itself was holding its breath and waiting for something terrible to happen.
The royal archives of Vaelor were already awake when I arrived, with tall stone walls, endless shelves, and books older than my entire bloodline, while dust floated in the golden light like tiny ghosts. This was my world, quiet, safe, and forgotten, or at least, that was what I had always believed.
“Late again, Elena,” Master Aric muttered without looking up from his scroll.
“I was not late,” I said softly. “The sun is still climbing.”
He grunted as if the answer meant nothing, which it usually did. To him, I was just another low-born scribe who should be grateful to even breathe the same air as royal ink. I moved to my desk in the far corner, the same one I had used for five years, with the same cracked wooden chair and the same ink stains that never washed away no matter how hard I scrubbed.
I opened a fresh scroll and began copying court records—names, taxes, laws, and decisions made by people who would never look at me twice. That was my life, writing history while never being part of it, but today felt different.
Outside the high-arched windows, the city of Vaelor was already alive with celebration as the Blood Festival had begun.
Drums echoed through the marble streets, and bells rang from the towers, and even here, deep inside the archives, I could feel the vibration of it all. The Blood Festival was not just a celebration, it was power dressed as tradition, a sacred day when noble houses gathered before the queen, a day of loyalty, a day of control, and a day when secrets often slipped through smiling mouths. This year, something about it felt wrong.
My fingers paused on the parchment as that strange feeling returned, settling in my chest like something alive. It was like colors I could not see but somehow still sensed, where fear was always a cold blue, anger was a sharp red, and lies were a dirty gray that clung to people like smoke. Right now, the air outside felt like a storm of all three.
“Elena,” Master Aric called. “Take these records to the restricted section.”
I nodded quickly and gathered the scrolls, welcoming the movement, anything to stop thinking about the strange weight pressing inside me. The restricted section lay deep within the archives, with fewer windows, thicker walls, and older knowledge, the kind some people whispered was dangerous.
I did not believe in dangerous knowledge, only dangerous people.
As I walked through the long corridors, I passed guards in silver armor whose faces were hidden behind ceremonial masks. Every year, during the festival, they wore them, erasing emotion and identity until only duty remained. Everyone in Vaelor hid who they were because it was safer that way.
By the time I reached the restricted section, my hands were slightly shaking, though I told myself it was nothing, just another long day, just another festival, just another moment I would survive like always. Then I heard a bell, and not the joyful kind, but one that was sharp and urgent, a signal from the palace itself, and my stomach tightened instantly.
I stepped closer to the small window carved into the stone wall, and from there, I could see part of the royal courtyard in the distance, filled with nobles dressed in gold and black, the queen’s colors. Queen Seraphine sat upon her throne at the center of it all, and even from afar, she looked like a painting come to life, with perfect posture, a jewel-covered crown, and a smile that never seemed to reach her eyes, beauty shaped into power.
Today, however, even she looked tense.
My strange sense sharpened, and the air around her felt unstable, like glass ready to break. The thought came again, clearer this time, that something was going to happen. I should have looked away, I should have gone back to my desk, I should have ignored everything like I always did, but I did not, because I saw him.
A figure moved through the crowd, calm and controlled, hidden beneath the chaos of celebration. A nobleman stepped forward from the edge of the courtyard, wearing the black robes of the high houses, his face partly concealed by a ceremonial mask, yet something about him pulled my attention like a hook. I could not see his emotions clearly, but I felt them anyway, cold and focused, sharp like broken glass. He was not here to celebrate, he was here for something else.
My breath slowed as the queen raised her hand, and the crowd fell silent, her presence carrying power even across the distance. “Loyal houses of Vaelor,” she announced, her voice flowing across the courtyard like music, “we gather once more under the blood oath of unity.” The crowd responded with cheers, but I was no longer listening because the masked man had moved closer to the throne, too close.
My heart began to pound as I gripped the edge of the stone window tightly. “Stop,” I whispered to myself, “someone stop him,” but no one did. Everything happened in seconds as the man reached the queen and made a small motion with his hand, revealing something hidden between his fingers that flashed once in the light. It was a hairpin, but not an ordinary one, as it shimmered with a dark silver glow that looked like poison.
Time slowed in my mind as the queen turned her head slightly, as if sensing danger too late, her eyes widening just a fraction before he struck. The hairpin sank into her shoulder, and no scream came at first, only silence, before chaos exploded. Guards rushed forward, nobles screamed, chairs fell, and the calm perfection of the Blood Festival shattered into pieces, yet I could not look away.
The queen’s body trembled, and her hand reached out as if trying to hold onto something invisible, and in that moment, I saw it. The colors around her changed as her golden presence cracked into deep black and sickly gray, and something was wrong, very wrong, something deeper than poison.
“Call the healers!” someone shouted below, but it was too late because the queen had already collapsed, and the courtyard filled with noise so loud it felt like the world itself was breaking.
I stepped back from the window, breathing too fast as my mind screamed at me to forget what I had seen, but I could not, because the masked man turned. For one brief moment, his eyes met mine across the distance, and I froze.
He should not have been able to see me, not from that far, not when I was hidden and safe, but I felt it anyway. He knew me, and the thought made my blood run cold.
A loud alarm sounded across the palace grounds as guards moved everywhere, stopping, questioning, and arresting people. Then I heard footsteps behind me in the archives corridor, heavy and fast, coming closer.
“Elena Salvador,” a voice called out, and hearing my name made everything inside me tighten.
I turned slowly to see two royal guards standing at the entrance of the restricted section, their masks blank and their swords already drawn, and my mouth went dry. “I did nothing,” I said quickly. “I was here the entire time.”
The guards stepped forward, and one of them held a small object wrapped in cloth before dropping it onto my desk. It was a blood-stained cloth, and inside it lay a second hairpin, identical to the one used on the queen, and my breath stopped instantly.
“No,” I whispered. “That is not mine.”
Even as I said it, I knew what was happening, because the air around me had changed, and fear, sharp and heavy, was now pointing at me like an arrow. I stepped back, shaking my head. “I am just a scribe.”
The guards did not answer. Instead, one of them spoke into a small metal device and said, “We have the suspect.”
The word hit me harder than any blade. “Wait,” I said, panic rising. “I did not do anything. I saw it, I saw who did it.”
But no one listened as they grabbed my arms, and I struggled, my voice breaking as I said, “Please, you are making a mistake.”
The stone floor beneath my feet felt like it was disappearing as they dragged me out of the archives, and I saw the other scribes watching in silence, none of them moving, none of them speaking, their eyes filled with fear, not for me, but for themselves. In Vaelor, truth was dangerous, and survival meant silence.
We stepped outside into the courtyard just as the queen was being carried away, her body covered now, though the damage had already been done. The empire was in shock, and I was being dragged straight into its fury.
“Please,” I said again, my voice breaking, “I am innocent.”
A guard leaned closer and said, “The empire does not care about innocence.”
Those words broke something inside me as we passed through the gates, and I looked back one last time at the palace.
For a brief moment, I felt it again, that strange, hidden sense inside me, but this time there was no fear, only something else, something awakening, like something inside me had just opened its eyes for the first time.
And then the doors of the empire closed behind me.
