I sat too high,

  too owned,

  too small,

  barely a shape,

  and yet I may burn.

  I may hurt with a word,

  and with all my blood.

  I may sometimes get lost.

  —Berdorf, E. Poems of a Wingless Princess. Unpublished manuscript, Summer.

  Lunch at the palace was a pageant no one bothered to reschedule. The table ran the length of a ballroom. It was so wide Eura could barely see the faces at the far end, just the shimmer of rings and the occasional nervous cough.

  Platters loomed between the centrepieces: silver towers of candied figs, roasts gone tepid, and pyramids of bread rolls nobody would touch until they were dry enough to crumble. Nobles perched along the benches like costumed birds, lips curling politely over private jokes.

  Forced laughter and the steady, nerve-gnawing rhythm of forks tapping porcelain haunted the whole feast.

  Eura sat on the tallest chair at the table’s head, feet barely touching the floor. The cushion threatened to swallow her whole if she shifted wrong. It was a velvet trap for her royal bunbun.

  Across the yawning gulf of linen and cutlery, Finnegan lounged, knife balanced between his fingers, already wearing the crooked half-smile of too much wine and of someone planning to be amused at someone else's expense.

  Beside him, Jaer kept his eyes on the assembled crowd, shoulders taut, one finger idly tracing the rim of his goblet as if mapping escape routes.

  On Eura’s left, Belmond and to her right, Cassion and Thalaton conspired behind hands, laughter soft as two lovers in secret, but not enough.

  The rest were a watercolour wash of noble faces with painted lips, powdered cheeks, too many perfumes swirling to pick apart.

  Behind her, Lolth’s presence settled like a shadow. Each time the Magi breathed, Eura caught the faint sweet scent of her black robe, and she knew without looking that the elf’s eyes were watching her every move, protecting her.

  Eura sat exactly as she’d been taught, back iron-straight, shoulders locked, hands folded in her lap like she was a cupcake on display. The corset bit into her ribs every time she breathed, and something ugly coiled low in her belly, something eager as hunger, hot as shame. But not quite the same. Lolth’s lesson echoed in her mind: Your pain is your blade.

  Across the table, Belmond drifted a little closer, “Princess, are you alright?”

  Eura kept her gaze pinned to the untouched food in front of her. “I’m fine.”

  “You’ve barely touched anything.”

  “I said I’m fine.”

  He let it drop. His hand vanished instead into the folds of his robe with the stealth of a lizard, no one else noticed, but she saw his palm coming back, hovering beneath the table, offering a small, precious hoard of cheese cubes, shielded from the room’s eyes.

  Eura’s lips twitched. She fought it down, but the smirk slipped through anyway.

  Finnegan’s knife came to rest on his plate, a gentle clink, somehow louder than a shout. Conversation stuttered and trailed off. All eyes drifted toward the head of the table.

  “What’s wrong?” Finnegan asked.

  Eura blinked hard at her plate, trying to focus on the swirling blue-and-gold plate.

  Before she could find a reply, Jaer spoke up. “Our Sunbeam’ is going through the change. It’s been a handful”

  Finnegan leaned back in his chair, one eyebrow crooked. “She hasn’t bled yet? By the Green Mother — child, what are you waiting for?”

  His words sounded like a joke. It tasted like threat.

  Finnegan rolled his knife between his fingers, idly testing the point against his thumbnail. “Lolth is lucky,” he mused, theatrical for his audience. “You could cut her from mouth to navel, and she’d hold like a rock. Wouldn’t flinch at all. Not even an autsh.”

  The room shrank, and conversation vanished.

  Finnegan beckoned with a lazy sweep of his hand. “Lolth. Come. Let’s remind our guests, the mighty dragons, what you’re made of.”

  Lolth’s mask tilted, just enough to acknowledge him without surrender. She drew a slow breath, the faint metallic scent of her robe mingling with the soap and steel she always carried.

  “This robe is new,” Lolth replied. “A gift from your Elites. I’d rather not stain it with blood just yet.”

  Finnegan grinned as if she’d paid him a compliment. “Nonsense. If you ruin it, I’ll have a better one sent up before supper ends.”

  The nobles didn’t shrink back. They watched with bored, predatory patience, like cats waiting to see which mouse would break first. Not a flicker of fear, only the mild curiosity of those too used to spectacle to flinch.

  Jaer’s chair groaned as he pushed it back, the scrape carving a line through the hush.

  “Finnegan. Enough.”

  The Elven King didn’t bother to look up. “You’ve seen this before,” he said lightly. “Takes only a moment.”

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Jaer’s answer came colder, quieter, carrying a threat that didn’t need a raised voice. “Enough.”

  Now Finnegan moved, turning his head with exaggerated slowness. “Who,” he asked, savouring every syllable, “is the King here?”

  The entire room braced itself. Every breath held, every glance fixed, as if waiting for the first stormbolt to fall.

  Lolth exhaled, the sound controlled and faintly metallic behind her mask. She moved with no hesitation, no wasted motion, gliding to Finnegan’s side, posture straight as a soldier. She stopped a sword’s length from him.

  Finnegan stood. His dagger slid from his belt with grace, gleaming as he weighed it in his palm with a craftsman’s confidence, a butcher’s ease.

  “This,” he announced, “will be a spectacle.”

  Finnegan didn’t spare Lolth a glance. He set the dagger’s tip against the first button of her tunic and flicked it free. A gesture clean as clockwork, meant for an audience. The next button followed, steel slipping beneath the fabric with surgical care.

  Eura’s world tightened to a tunnel: vision blurring at the edges, heart hammering high and wild against her ribs. She barely breathed.

  Somewhere by her ear, a loose strand of hair fluttered, an impossibly breeze travelling the room sealed against the world. The air shivered, and only a few could realise the princess was not happy.

  Across the table, nobles pressed forward, shoulders tilting, eyes unblinking. Every whisper died; even the glasses dared not clink.

  Jaer’s hands curled into fists, knuckles whitening beneath the table. He stayed anchored, muscles taut, every nerve telegraphing the urge to intervene, but he didn’t move.

  Eura didn’t dare either, but the warmth in her skin built and built. Her stomach knotted, throat blazing, until her body felt too small to hold the ache. Her mouth opened before her mind could catch it.

  “Enough.”

  The word snapped like a switch. Her chair scraped across the floor as she shoved herself up, hand darting for the nearest weapon, a butter knife. She hurled it, fast and flat, across the expanse of linen. It smashed against Finnegan’s knuckles, enough to draw a curse, and the dagger slipped from his grip, clattering and skidding beneath the table.

  Finnegan stared, as if he’d never seen her before. Rage twisted his face. He lunged, upending silverware and wine; the whole table shivered beneath the force. Jaer’s arm shot out, seizing Finnegan’s shoulder.

  “Don’t—”

  But Finnegan tore free. “I am the King!”

  Eura slammed both palms on the tabletop. The sound echoed through the vaulted chamber, porcelain jumped, spoons rattled, the nobles flinched.

  “And I,” she said, rising, voice cutting clear, “am the Summerqueen. I am the Sun that burns land, sea, and sky. And when I say stop—”

  Above them, the chandeliers began to tremble. Not much, but enough to be noticed by some.

  Finnegan froze, one hand still curled in the air.

  “—you stop.”

  Then, from somewhere halfway down the table, a voice too quiet to claim floated up: “Her Highness is bleeding.”

  Heat bloomed between Eura’s thighs, sudden and mortifying. The silk of her dress darkened, a vivid blue stain blooming outward.

  Lolth reacted before thinking. In a motion, she slipped her robe from her shoulders, swirling it around Eura’s waist in one smooth motion. The rich fabric muffled the stain, turning scandal to shadow before anyone else could add to the tale.

  Lolth couldn't avoid the irony that on this day, she stained her new robe with blood anyway.

  “Finnegan.”

  Jaer’s fingers wrapped around Finnegan’s arm just before the King slipped away. Finnegan shook him off, but Jaer kept pace until they reached their private rooms, slamming the heavy door hard enough to make the lock jump in protest.

  The King didn’t pause. Already, he was waving a hand for the servant, stripping off rings, flicking them onto the nearest table as they’d burned him.

  “A bath,” he ordered, voice flat. “Hot. Rosemary. Wine, too. The bottle stays.”

  The servant bowed and vanished, steps muffled by the thick rug.

  Jaer lingered in the centre of the room, feet rooted to the tile.

  “You humiliated Magi Lolth!”

  Finnegan rolled his shoulders, eyes on the fireplace, as if Jaer hadn’t spoken at all. Then exhaled sharply through his nose. “Don’t start.”

  “You put a blade to her chest,” Jaer tried not to raise his voice. Bare toes curled against the cold tile, grounding him in the only comfort left. “In front of everyone. She is your Captain!”

  Finnegan barely turned. He raised his arms, letting the loose sleeves fall away, waiting for the servant’s careful hands. “It wouldn’t have harmed her,” he said, as if explaining a stage trick to a stubborn child. “Lolth doesn’t feel pain. You know that.”

  Jaer’s mouth pressed thin. He watched Finnegan’s back, jaw clenching and unclenching, trying to keep all the things inside. Words swirled behind his teeth, but most of them tasted bitter, pointless.

  “That isn’t the point,” he managed, and it landed between them with a dull weight. Meant nothing.

  Finnegan’s laugh was bright and brittle. “Oh, Jaer. You worry too much. I was proving a point—showing the dragons our strength.” He glanced over his shoulder, eyes glittering with self-satisfaction. “The dragons need to know who we are. Lolth is a spectacular reminder.”

  Jaer stepped in, close enough that Finnegan had to shift his gaze, no longer able to pretend indifference. “What we are?” The tiefling asked. “What world are you living in?”

  A shadow flitted behind Finnegan’s eyes, gone almost before it formed. His face, all perfect angles and impossible youth, stayed a mask.

  “I am the father of the Sun,” he said at last, each word lacquered with certainty. “That is my reality.”

  Jaer let his hands fall, knuckles brushing the side seams of his black robe, fingers flexing just once before he forced them into stillness. He looked not at the King, but through him, at the man he loved, or had loved.

  “And yet,” Jaer said quietly, moving closer, “you’re terrified to be alone with her. You don’t know your own daughter. You never played with her, never read her poems, never even bothered to learn what she likes for dessert. Do you know her favourite colour, Finnegan? Or is she only yours when you can hold her up like a banner of power?”

  Finnegan stiffened, his shoulders squared, and his mask cracked for a heartbeat. Then, in that practised, pleading tone he’d used for as long as Jaer could remember, “Don’t you love me anymore?”

  The old line, thrown like a rope, hoping Jaer would catch it. A thousand times before, Jaer had let himself be pulled back by it.

  But this time, the absurd image slipped through his mind, a joke he’d once shared with Yeso on a boat back to Ormgrund: the Elf King, arrogant brick with a broom stuck halfway up his royal arse. Jaer almost laughed, but the ache in his chest made it hollow.

  Who did he love more now? The arrogant elf in front of him, so brittle, so afraid of falling, or his Sunbeam, the only light left in this stone-walled palace?

  For the first time, the answer didn’t feel like a joke at all.

  But Jaer’s thoughts were suspended in a halt. From nowhere, time stopped. Jaer’s mouth was frozen. Finnegan’s arm stopped and never reaching the table. Servants around were as if statues. One held a pitcher, water poised in a perfect arc that never broke, never fell. And never splatch. A single drop hovered inches above the bath, motionless as glass. Not a chest rose. Not a blink disturbed the stillness of this muted picture. Dust that should have drifted hung in place, each particle suspended in the lamplight. Even the steam over the bath stood still, twisted in the air like frozen smoke. Nothing moved. Not a sound, not a shiver, not a sigh. In that instant, time held its breath, dodging almost forever the fight of two lovers.

  

  At the time of these events, the temporal stasis that occurred took me completely by surprise. I had no prior record—personal or scholarly—of time halting in such an abrupt and localised manner. My initial inquiry focused on determining whether the phenomenon constituted a natural temporal anomaly or an induced magical effect. Subsequent investigation, including an examination of my own family archives and cross-referencing with documented Saat-aligned disturbances, provided preliminary evidence that the ability may possess a hereditary component.

  My mother, whose assertions I had previously categorised as unverified, can now be classified with confidence as the preceding Time Master. The data available from this first incident indicates that a new Time Master emerged at that moment, selected by the entity known as the Spirit of the Howling Night. The identity of the individual responsible remained uncertain for several Summers and became a matter of personal academic interest, particularly given that no comparable temporal disturbances were reported elsewhere on the Map during that period. I seemed the only one to noticed.—The Hexe – Book Three by Professor Edgar O. Duvencrune, First Edition, 555th Summer.