Chapter 83 Permission
Permission
FIVE WEEKS WITHOUT COLSAR
The next morning I wake with the weight of fatigue still lingering, though it feels different now, earned rather than imposed.
Maridale enters with my tray and something else clasped carefully in her hands.
“A letter, Princess,” she says, and there is a hint of restrained excitement in her voice.
“From Lady Nyara. His Majesty permitted it.”
The words strike me fully awake. I sit upright, taking the parchment before she has fully extended it. The seal is unbroken, Nyara’s familiar crest pressed into wax, and I do not hesitate before breaking it.
My eyes move quickly across the page. The theater opens tonight.
She writes with breathless delight, describing musicians returning from the coast, a troupe newly arrived from the southern provinces, lanterns being hung across the square.
She says her uncle and cousins will attend, that the reopening is meant to restore morale after weeks of tension.
She mentions that Yvara will be there, and that it seems only fair that the Princess should attend as well.
They will send a carriage with soldiers in escort. After the performance, for safety, I may remain at her family’s residence and return at first light. For several moments I simply sit there, the letter unsteady in my hands.
The theater. Music. Laughter not forced through clenched teeth at a royal table.
The thought of stepping into a room where the air is filled with something other than obsession and calculation makes something inside me rise so quickly it almost hurts.
I imagine velvet curtains parting, the swell of instruments tuning, the hum of a crowd waiting to be entertained rather than controlled.
I imagine sitting beside Nyara, whispering commentary under my breath, free to smile without being studied for meaning.
I do not stop to think. I do not consider the layers of permission or the danger of appearing too eager. I am already on my feet.
“Send word that I request an audience,” I begin, and then I shake my head before the sentence finishes.
I cannot bear the delay. I gather my skirts in my hands and move for the door myself, heart racing in a way that has nothing to do with fear.
I know I should wait. I know I should approach this with composure.
Instead I hurry toward the King’s chambers, the letter clutched against my palm, hope rising in me fast enough to drown caution.
I pause only long enough to calm my breath before pushing forward, knowing I should request permission, knowing I should behave as the palace expects. But I am too excited to care.
I knock.
The excitement that carried me down the corridor gathers into something more careful as I stand outside his chambers, pressing the letter flat between my palms. When I am granted entry, I compose myself, though I cannot quite smooth the brightness from my expression.
He is dressed already, gloves on the table beside him, a map unfurled across his desk.
He looks up when I enter, and for a brief second I imagine he will be pleased to see me animated about something other than survival.
“Majesty,” I begin, stepping forward, unable to hide the hopeful edge in my voice. “Lady Nyara has written. The theater reopens tonight. Her uncle and cousins will attend, and Yvara is going as well. They have offered escort. I could return at first light.”
He does not smile. The silence stretches longer than I expect, and something fragile inside me begins to brace.
“No.”
The word is not cruelly delivered. It is calm. Absolute.
I swallow. “Please,” I say before pride can intervene. “It would make me happy. I will return the next morning. There will be soldiers.”
He folds the map with deliberate precision, then looks at me in a way that feels less like affection and more like calculation.
“As you know, we reopened the ports,” he says evenly.
“Ships are docking. Strangers enter and leave the city without proper familiarity. Threns move more easily through crowds.” A public theater event where royals are known to attend, where the Princess would be expected…
” His jaw tightens faintly. “It is too dangerous.”
The letter trembles slightly in my hands now, though I try to hide it.
“It is only an evening,” I say, and I hate the pleading in my voice even as I hear it. “I have not been anywhere. I have not—”
“I am leaving shortly,” he interrupts, not raising his voice, but ending the argument all the same. “General Halvar awaits me in the south quarter. I will return in the morning.” His voice leaves no room for argument.
“I have something for you,” he adds, and the tone shifts into something almost anticipatory.
For a moment I foolishly hope it is a compromise.
He gestures for me to follow him through an adjoining door I have not entered before. The space beyond is vast, far larger than I anticipated, its ceiling arched high above us. At first I do not understand what I am seeing.
Then my breath leaves me.
Every wall is covered. Not with tapestry, but with me.
Murals rise from floor to ceiling, layered across every surface.
In one I am veiled, eyes downcast, hands folded demurely at my waist. In another I am seated beside a horse, fingers buried in its mane.
In another I stand in profile, holding an infant I do not recognize, my expression maternal and serene.
The paintings are meticulous, romanticized but unmistakably me.
The golden hair. The golden eyes. Even the ceiling holds a rendering of my face, my eyes and lashes painted so large they seem to watch from above.
I turn slowly, absorbing it, my pulse uneven.
“The most celebrated painter in Veynar,” he says quietly behind me. “Commissioned months ago.”
“I had the windows removed,” he continues, stepping closer. “There was not enough room for you otherwise. And it seemed fitting. You do not require windows. What lies outside is irrelevant. Only what is inside matters.”
My grip on my skirt tightens without my permission.
He moves further into the room, walking along the wall as if admiring his collection. I realize with dawning horror that he has likely slept here. That he has lain beneath the painted ceiling and stared up at my eyes in oil and pigment night after night.
“It was finished yesterday,” he says. “But I was not prepared to show you. I wanted time with it first.”
Time alone. With hundreds of versions of me.
He stops and looks at me fully now, something bright and fevered behind his composure. “Do you like it?”
My throat feels dry. My heart aches not only from fear but from the memory of how excited I was moments ago about the theater, about music and laughter and shared light. The contrast is so sharp it leaves me unsteady.
For a moment, I almost understand him. A world reduced to something you can hold. Something that cannot leave.
“Yes,” I say, because I understand the stakes. “I do.”
Relief crosses his features, not gentle relief but vindicated satisfaction. “Good,” he says softly. “Because you will remain here until I return.”
The meaning does not register at once. He steps backward through the doorway, eyes still fixed on me. Before I can speak, before I can ask, the door closes. The lock turns. The sound echoes. Silence fills the room, thick and airless.
I stand beneath the painted version of my own face, surrounded by a hundred iterations of myself, and for the first time since entering the palace I feel truly, completely alone.