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Three moon cycles passed, each one seemingly longer than the last.

I was starting to forget the familiar scents of fresh grass, leaves after evening rain, and earthy sediment.

The Caprificus Forest was my home, but I was beginning to wonder if I would ever see it again.

I curled up in my tree, admiring a lush fig hanging down.

It taunted me, deliciously appetizing, but missing its sweet ripe scent.

My stomach rumbled, mouth watering as I stared at it longingly.

The instinct to reach up and pluck the deep purpled fruit was so strong that, before I knew what I was doing, I clutched it in my palm.

Thick chunks of glitter scraped against my skin, shiny and abrasive.

I retracted my grasp, watching it plummet and roll across the floor.

A throat clearing tore my attention away from the lifeless fig to the room’s entrance.

“Dear splendor, the Emperor wishes to see you.”

I nodded, climbing down the tree, slipping the last bit of the way since there was no rough bark to give purchase.

Baubles hung around my forehead, neck, wrists, and hips.

They clanged with each step out of the room and into the grand hall.

The detailed murals were blurs now.

I no longer admired them one by one.

They’d all been memorized after just a few sunrises here, when restlessness had pulled me out of the greenhouse.

The fig tree didn’t comfort me like it had back in the forest.

My former home no longer vibrated with life.

With growth.

I didn’t hold it against the Emperor, though.

He’d never lived among nature, staying in the palace had made that clear to me.

He’d truly believed he’d treated me as his honored guest, throwing lavish parties to celebrate me every night.

Monarchs and diplomats traveled across the lands to hear my melodies, to bring gifts, and donations of thanks for witnessing a splendor’s rarity.

It was overwhelming being surrounded by people all the time, but every time I wanted to cower away from it I remembered how lonely I’d been in the forest.

While I missed it, there was no reason to go back.

No one waited for me.

The nymphs that sometimes frolicked in for a visit now that I was grown would no doubt see it as a good thing the next time they went to drop a basket.

Maybe they never even came back to know I was gone.

Not that I’d ever find out.

This was my shelter now.

A place where I was provided for.

I should have been happy.

Grateful.

Every day I was brought plump figs drizzled in honey or stuffed with goat cheese, and piles of bread that wafted with steam fresh from the kitchen.

The baubles that swayed with my hips when I walked glittered golden with navy gems that winked at all who passed.

A ring of flowers from admiring guests were left at the base of my tree each day, sometimes becoming thick floral stacks until the scent of their wilting was cause enough for the servants to come and whisk them away.

It was a strange existence, but it was better than solitude.

The fact that we hadn’t turned off toward the wing of the palace with their bedchambers was a good sign.

The King was not in need of another song.

Last week I’d been summoned urgently to perform my canthymn once again.

My throat had burned for two days afterward, scraped raw by the time I’d finished my nightly entertainment following another lavish dinner in my honor.

I had been exhausted but people had traveled from other territories to hear my voice, and the Emperor had done so much for me.

Weariness was a small price to pay.

The doors to the throne room opened and we passed the gilded pillars, the rippling of feathered fans, and found ourselves before the Emperor and Empress.

Beside them was a man I recognized from the nightly banquets, but I could not remember his name.

He had dark colored spectacles, a long lilac beard and bushy brows that were so thick they appeared to float off his forehead.

Around the outskirts of the room, courtiers stood in their usual clusters, murmuring and pointing at the man and the dark blue drape that hung over what looked like a small, tapered shape set atop a pedestal.

“Go ahead, Councilman Garaut, I have gathered everyone here to share your latest triumph.”

“Oh great Emperor. I have worked day and night for weeks to bring you this gift. An invention to emulate the greatness you have brought our empire as its ruler. Something to last you the next hundred turnings.”

“How thoughtful.” The Emperor waved him forward.

“Bring it here.”

Councilman Garaut pinched the dark blue fabric and tugged it away, revealing a closed flower with oversized petals.

The courtiers and servants gasped as each petal unfurled , revealing a wooden carved bird with a large dark circle centered on its breast.

Two thick wings extended the length of its sides.

The feathers along my shoulders rustled and I held my breath.

A crank was carved into a tail feather and the Councilman began to turn it over and over until a cheery melody echoed through the room.

Smiles bloomed on the faces of the onlookers, a smirk even pulling across the Empress’ lips.

“What do you call it?” she asked, clapping her hands together.

The councilman’s beard twitched.

“I call it the eternal splendor. Eternal for short.”

The Emperor joined his wife’s applause, the room thundering around me, drowning out the rampant beat of my heart and the soft rapping beneath it.

“What a marvelous name!”

He waved his hand for the eternal to sing again, and his councilman turned a dial on the bird’s side and then cranked the wooden tail.

Sweat beaded at my brow.

I lifted a hand to swipe it away but caught on the baubles draped across my forehead.

I untangled my fingers, the chords of a soft ballad glided across the throne room, dragging bodies back and forth as they swayed with the tune.

My heart pounded, a quickening drumbeat behind the eternal’s cadence.

Even I could not refute its beautiful song.

However, it was still missing something , though I seemed to be the only one not entranced by the wooden sculpture.

The crank slowed and the ballad ceased, trailing behind its final notes.

The silence was quickly filled by the roar of applause.

It echoed along the walls and pounded in my ears.

Had they cheered like that when I’d arrived?

Had they beamed so proud when I’d concluded my first song?

It felt like so long ago I couldn’t remember.

All I was certain of was how small I was right now with their thundering merriment caving in on me.

My shoulders hunched forward, chin making its way to my chest.

The Emperor’s voice boomed above it all, turning the loud cacophony into a current of hushed murmurs.

“You have pleased your emperor greatly, Councilman Garaut. But we can’t forget the inspiration behind your eternal. My splendor.” He stood from his throne and beckoned me forward.

One foot after the other, I ascended the stairs, my bare feet jingling with the baubles hung around my ankles.

“I should love to hear how the eternal sings with its muse.”

My throat dried and my gaze locked on the wooden beak that was parted, two beady eyes, dark sapphires, staring back at me.

“Of course, oh great Emperor,” Councilman Garaut replied, grabbing the eternal’s tail and twirling it around one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight times.

I closed my eyes and inhaled sharply, trying to ignore the heavy thud of my pulse ringing in my ears.

The eternal spat out one slow chord, then they increased in speed, a quick and hearty jaunt that had the courtiers clapping along in quick steady beats.

I tried to catch the melody where I could, hoping to foresee some harmony between myself and the councilman’s invention but each note was shoved up my throat, tossed out too late or too early.

My body was rigid, tail wrapping around my abdomen, more and more tightly to the point where it was hard to breathe, to drag air for the upcoming series of melodic chirps.

The eternal finally slurred out its last note, my last one scraping against it, discordant and abrasive.

When I looked out at the crowd their elegant faces were pinned in contorted smiles or pitying winces.

“That was… illuminating,” the Emperor said, his lips grinning but his eyes not meeting the room’s.

When he finally looked up again, he turned to the councilman.

“Thank you again for the wonderful gift. I am truly impressed.” Clapping his hands together, he turned to the hall.

“The councilman shall be honored at tonight’s feast.”

He bowed, then stood up, holding out a hand for the Empress.

She joined him and then they descended the stairs before the Emperor called back over his shoulder, “Guards, take the splendor to the greenhouse to rest. There will be no need for it this eve.”