Chapter 4 Rhianelle
The lullaby reaches me through layers of sleep, soft and distant. I do not recognize the melody, yet it feels familiar, like remembering a song from childhood.
I know I am dreaming the moment I open my eyes.
One moment I am lying beneath the silver canopy of my bed, listening to the distant cries of wyverns settling beyond the palace walls. The next, I am standing barefoot in a corridor I have never seen before. Cold marble presses against my soles.
Mist surrounds me, swirling in pale ribbons that are neither cold nor warm. This is not my bedroom. It is not anywhere real.
I look down at myself. I am still wearing my nightdress, though the thin fabric offers little protection from the chill lingering in the air. Moonlight pours through a row of arched windows and paints pale rectangles across the floor.
This is a dream.
It must be.
I have learned not to trust my dreams.
I should stay where I am. Better yet, I should find a way to wake myself. Instead, I begin walking.
The lullaby continues, drawing me forward. Its melody grows stronger and clearer with every step, a voice without words humming notes that make my chest ache with a longing I cannot name. Ahead of me, the mist begins to thin.
The corridor opens into an entrance hall so vast that I stop beneath the final archway. My breath catches despite knowing none of this is real.
Twin staircases curve upward along the walls before meeting on a gallery above.
Slender columns of black marble rise toward a vaulted ceiling painted with constellations, their silver stars still gleaming beneath a thin veil of dust. Chandeliers hang overhead, each fashioned from dark metal and hundreds of clear crystals.
“Hello?”
My voice carries down the corridor and returns softer.
No one answers. I take a step forward.
The palace is abandoned, but its beauty remains untouched beneath the dust. It’s as though everyone simply walked away one evening and never returned.
The tall doors stand open. Paintings remain straight within their gilded frames, and the carved tables beneath them still hold silver bowls and empty vases.
Even the long velvet curtains hang neatly beside the windows.
I wander farther into the hall, one hand gathering the hem of my nightdress away from the dusty floor. Everything I pass demands that I stop and look.
The architecture is unlike anything in Aelfheim. Elven buildings invite the natural world inside, allowing trees to grow through open courtyards and flowering vines to climb living walls. This palace was built differently. Every arch reaches high and every doorway is wide enough for a giant.
It should feel cold and severe. Instead, it is magnificent.
I pass through a banquet hall where an immense table stretches beneath three chandeliers, long enough to seat a hundred guests.
Silver plates remain arranged before empty chairs as though a feast might begin at any moment.
Beyond it lies a conservatory enclosed by tall panes of glass.
The plants have long since withered, but their dry vines still curl around iron arches, preserving the shape of the garden that once flourished there.
The lullaby leads me onward.
I should be afraid. This is clearly a place of immense power, abandoned for reasons I cannot begin to guess. Yet fear never comes.
I feel safe here.
More than safe. Welcomed. As though the palace has been waiting for me to return, though I know I have never seen it before.
Where am I?
I don’t know why I’m here. I don’t know whose palace this is or what kingdom it once belonged to. Yet the longing in my chest is so fierce that it feels like a fishhook pulling me forward.
Several portraits along the gallery have been covered with protective sheets. Age has loosened the cloth from some, revealing flashes of painted faces and scenes beneath. Men and women recline across couches in various states of undress.
I quickly turn away, my cheeks warming despite the absence of anyone who might catch me staring.
Another portrait draws my attention. It hangs alone between two tall windows, uncovered and untouched by dust.
A man gazes down at me. His expression is stern, almost disapproving, but a faint softness around his eyes undermines the effect. He wears a dark coat embroidered with silver at the collar, and one gloved hand rests upon the pommel of a sword.
Something about him feels familiar.
I move closer and search the painted face for an answer. The small plaque beneath the frame is covered in dust. I wipe it clean.
The lettering is written in an ancient human language. My fingers hover over the words.
“The prince of Morsvyenn,” I whisper.
The name slips from my tongue before I can stop it. I stare at the plaque. The painted man’s eyes seem to shift.
I freeze.
For one breath, I could swear he is no longer looking past me but directly at me. His expression has changed too. The severity is gone, replaced by something so deeply sorrowful that my chest tightens.
Then the light shifts and he is only a painting again. The portrait remains still, but I cannot shake the feeling that its gaze follows me as I hurry from the gallery.
The pull of the lullaby grows stronger. I have learned not to fight dreams. They show you what they want to show you. I keep walking. My footsteps echo in the dark.
I pass a library with shelves climbing three stories high. Narrow iron staircases twist between the levels, and rolling ladders rest against rows of books bound in black, crimson and deep blue leather. At the far end, a collection of smaller figures rests inside a glass cabinet.
My attention catches on a dragon.
It is no longer than my palm, carved from dark green stone veined with silver. Its wings are too small for its body, and one sits slightly crooked. The little creature is poised mid-pounce, its tail lifted for balance. Amber chips form its eyes, glowing faintly beneath the moonlight.
Coral.
It looks exactly like Coral.
The resemblance is so perfect that a laugh escapes me.
I open the cabinet. The hinges do not make a sound.
It has the same stubby proportions, the same determined little face. Even its pose reminds me of Coral when she launches herself at a butterfly.
I pick it up before I can talk myself out of it. It’s warm in my hands and the amber eyes seem to blink at me once before going still.
Taking this would be stealing.
I know it’s wrong. I glance around the empty gallery. No guards appear and no ancient spirits rise from the floor to object.
This is a dream, and the palace is empty. The little dragon looks like my Coral.
Mine.
I tuck it into the fold of my dress and press my palm flat over it. The weight knocks against my thigh as I walk, a small reminder of my crime.
The corridor beyond the gallery splits in three directions. I hesitate, uncertain which path to choose.
Something pulls me toward the center passage.
I follow it. The feeling beneath my ribs tightens.
The farther I go, the more the palace seems to gather itself around me. Tattered banners hang from iron brackets overhead, each one marked with a black sun encircled by five silver stars. The air feels heavier here, as though I am walking into the heart of something ancient and sleeping.
Sadness settles over me where fear should be. This was once full of life. People argued in these corridors, someone chose every painting and planted those flowers in the dead conservatory.
Now there is only dust.
A pair of bronze doors waits at the end of the passage. They tower over me, covered in images of dragons, wolves and strange creatures crawling from a pool beneath a darkened moon.
One door stands slightly open. The pull in my chest becomes impossible to ignore. I slip through the gap.
The chamber beyond is enormous.
My breath catches. It is a throne room, but also something grander than that.
The ceiling disappears into shadow so far above me that I cannot see its end.
Columns of black stone line both sides of the hall.
The floor is black marble veined with silver and polished so brightly that my own reflection stares back at me from beneath my bare feet, silver hair unbound, nightdress pale against all that darkness.
Moonlight spills through windows two stories high and turns the stone to glass. At the far end, broad steps rise toward a throne.
A man sits upon it.
I stop breathing.
He leans back, one elbow resting against its carved arm. His clothes are dark and simple. No crown rests on his head, but there is something unmistakably regal in the way he occupies the seat.
A mask covers the upper half of his face. It is unlike the masks worn at Aelfheim celebrations. Those are meant to decorate and entice. This one is made from a dark material. It covers everything from his forehead to his upper lip.
A fae mask, perhaps. Those are enchanted to conceal everything. It doesn’t just hide the face but the nature beneath it and the essence that should tell me what manner of creature stands before me.
I remain behind the door.
He has not noticed me. Few people do when I do not wish to be noticed. This is my gift. My secret. The thing that kept me alive in Astefar. I could cross an entire room of sleeping predators without disturbing a single one.
So I don’t move. I don’t breathe. I press myself against the nearest pillar and watch.
The masked man appears to be staring into the empty hall. One hand rests loosely over his knee. His fingers are calloused, the knuckles marked with faint scars.
A warrior’s hands.
The longer I watch him, the stronger the pull becomes. My heart lurches without warning. The feeling spreads outward from my chest until my fingertips tingle and my knees feel unsteady. It is not fear. I know fear too well to mistake it for this.
This is longing.
A deep, impossible ache for a stranger whose face I cannot even see. Every part of me strains toward him as though distance itself has become unbearable. Gods, the pull makes no sense, but resisting it feels worse.