Page 51 of Unravelled

Wandered the palace halls in nothing but her nightdress, barefoot. She wrapped her arms around herself, shoulders hunching slightly as she turned down a quieter passage, keeping close to the wall. Each footstep felt like a shout now. The silence didn’t feel gentle anymore, it felt watchful.

Tharion’s rooms were closer. Her feet moved before she thought, her hand rising to knock against the carved wood. The sound was soft, but the door opened almost immediately.

He stood, bleary-eyed, shirt half-laced, dark hair still tousled from sleep. Whatever greeting he’d meant to offer died the moment his gaze dropped, then jerked away just as fast. He turned his head sharply, jaw tightening, the tips of his ears flushing dark.

“Mira,” his voice caught. He cleared his throat, staring hard at the door frame. “What... what are you doing out like that?”

She opened her mouth, then shut it again. He avoided looking at her. Disappointment flared low in her chest.

“I didn’t mean to,” she muttered, arms folding tighter around herself. “I woke up outside. Near the garden. It... it wasn’t on purpose.”

Tharion nodded, still not meeting her eyes. “It’s early. Most of the halls will be empty. Just hold on.”

He stepped back inside, returning with a thick robe draped over one arm. Soft wool, lined in dark velvet. He held it out to her without looking, keeping his gaze turned. She slipped it on quickly, grateful for the warmth, though it didn’t soften the embarrassment fully.

“Thank you.” At that, he finally looked at her. Just a glance, quick and cautious.

“Come on,” he said, stepping into the hall. “I’ll walk you back.” They walked in silence. His steps were careful beside hers, protective in the way she remembered from Anyerit and Seacliffe. He didn’t ask what had woken her. And she didn’t offer.

As they rounded the final corridor toward her wing, Mira heard the low murmur of voices ahead.

Footsteps, measured and deliberate, the scrape of boots on polished stone.

She stiffened before she even saw them. Tharion sensed it too, because he shifted subtly, stepping just half a pace in front of her.

Protective. Not possessive. But enough to shield.

A group of advisors turned the corner. Ren walked at the center.

A scroll half-unfurled in his hand, his voice calm and clipped as he spoke.

He was dressed for court, for duty. He stopped walking the moment he saw her.

The words died in his throat. His gaze flicked over her, Tharion's robe around her, the mess of her hair, the faint smudge of dreaming still lingering across her face.

Mira felt the flush rise, hot and immediate.

She didn’t need a mirror to know what she looked like.

Tharion didn’t break stride. He simply moved a fraction faster than her, his shoulder angling to block Ren’s view as if by accident.

But it was too late. Ren was already looking.

Not with judgment. Not even with surprise.

Just that unbearable, unmistakable heartbreak.

Like gravity had decided she was the center of his orbit after all, but she was already gone.

Longing twisted in her stomach, but something else stirred beneath it.

an almost irresistible pull, old and sharp and terribly familiar.

Sunlight streamed through a high, colored window, casting fractured golds and reds across the floor.

The warmth wrapped around her like a balm, brushing against the chill still clinging to her skin, and Mira straightened without meaning to.

She didn’t look back. Didn’t give Ren the satisfaction of another glance.

Instead, she walked the rest of the way to her door beside Tharion, chin lifted.

Inside her chest, her heart thundered like a secret.

And behind her, she felt Ren’s stare linger like a touch.

???

As they reached her door, Tharion paused beside her, his eyes sweeping the corridor out of habit, ever watchful. The morning sun caught the edge of his profile, gilding the soft edges of his tired expression. She turned toward him, her hand resting lightly on the doorframe.

“Thank you,” she said quietly, voice just above a whisper.

Tharion gave a small shrug, one corner of his mouth tipping up. “You’d do the same for me.”

“I am sure that I have, even if we can’t remember,” she teased, the hint of a smile breaking through the lingering haze of her dream. That a smile and nod.

For a moment, they just stood there. Not in silence exactly, but in a kind of calm.

The kind only shared by people who had faced worse things together and walked through it still standing.

He looked down at her, his gaze steady, not searching, not asking for anything more.

Just… seeing her. For what she was in that moment. Rumpled, shaken, barefoot.

“Sleepwalking?” he said, voice lighter now. “That’s a new one.... you’re okay now?” he said. Not quite a question. Not quite a statement.

Mira nodded, fingers resting lightly over the robe’s lapels. “I’m alright.” His expression softened. He gave a small nod, then stepped back into the hallway .

As she slipped inside and closed the door, she let her forehead rest against the cool wood for a heartbeat longer.

The quiet of her chambers folded around her like a blanket, dim and still, the morning light just beginning to warm the stone floors.

She leaned against the door, the robe still wrapped around her, fingers curled in the thick wool as if it could anchor her there at this moment. In this choice. If it was a choice.

Tharion had come when she needed him. He always did.

He was steady, kind, patient in ways that soothed the frayed edges of her.

A calm she hadn’t known she was starved for.

It made sense to be with him. She could picture a future.

A safe one. But as she stood there, the warmth of his presence already fading, a quiet tug crept back into her chest.

She peeled away the robe and nightdress, folding them neatly despite her distraction.

Her bare feet padded across the stone to the warm bathing pool, steam curling up in soft tendrils beckoning her in.

She slipped beneath the surface slowly, the heat enveloping her like a second skin.

It eased the tightness in her muscles, smoothed the raw edges of the night.

She sank lower until only her face remained above the surface, eyes staring up at the carved stone ceiling.

Her heart beat steadily beneath the water, but her mind wouldn’t quiet.

Tharion offered her something safe, something dependable.

But Ren was fire. She didn’t want him to be but even when she turned away, the spark of him never quite went out.

She hated herself for it. How her thoughts still lingered on the sound of his voice, the weight of his gaze, the way her pulse leapt when they had locked eyes in the great hall.

She dried off, dressed quickly. A simple dark green dress.

Her hands moved with quiet purpose. By the time she stepped out into the hall, the palace hummed with activity.

The day was already moving. Mira walked forward, but her heart remained behind, caught somewhere between the comfort of what could be, and the fire of what still might.

Hallways echoed with the sound of moving feet and low conversations, banners catching the wind from open windows.

Mira made her way toward the altar, weaving through the growing rhythm of the day.

She found Cleric Perrin at her worktable, surrounded by scrolls, half-used ink pots, and several open books.

Her sleeves were rolled, her hair tied back in a loose knot, and she looked up through her veil only briefly when Mira approached.

“You’re earlier than I expected,” Perrin remarked, though her tone held no annoyance, only surprise.

“Nerra cleaned up for me.” Mira said simply.

Perrin studied her for a moment, then nodded to herself and returned to scribbling something into a ledger.

“Good. The gardens need attention.” Mira blinked.

“The gardens?”

“Specifically the reflecting pool,” Perrin clarified, not looking up. “The leaves are clogging the stone beds, and the water’s begun to scum over.”

Mira nodded. “I understand.”

“Good,” Perrin murmured, already moving on to the next line of script. “Take the gloves from the lower hooks. And Mira.” She paused, finally lifting her eyes. “Don’t rush.”

Mira nodded her head, then turned toward the door. The stone hallway felt cooler somehow, the weight of the morning settling around her shoulders like the memory of velvet. And outside, the light continued to rise.

???

Mira’s hands had been wrist-deep in the cold waters all day.

The last water-lilies of the season brushed her fingers, fragile as breath, as she trimmed back into the overgrowth.

Silverleaf vines coiled like serpents across the shallows, their roots tangling in the stone beds.

The day had been crisp with a hint of autumn’s chill, but as the sun began to set, its last rays still gently warmed her neck and the backs of her hands.

The air smelled of damp leaves and mint, the sweet decline of fading summer buried beneath it.

She moved methodically, letting the sounds of the palace stir around her, boots scuffing stone, the soft clatter of buckets, voices rising and falling in the rhythm of routine.

It was the background. Noise she had long since learned to ignore. Until a name cleaved through it.

“Hallen…” someone whispered.

Mira froze. Her fingers curled involuntarily around a lily, crushing the petals. White bruised into pink. The bloom floated free in the rippling surface, a small, broken thing drifting on the water.

“The Kharador’s came in the night,” said Harwen, voice hushed and frayed, as though speaking it too loud might summon the same fate. Her sleeves were pushed to her elbows, arms dusted with flour. “Fires. Screams. The whole town’s gone.”Mira didn’t move.

“They slipped through like smoke,” Garrick added, stooping beside a cart of mulch, his gnarled hands stained with earth. “No alarm. No warning. Just... gone. ”

The name thudded in Mira’s chest again, and this time it dragged something with it.

A memory. The Festival of the Final Sun.

Velvet and wine and laughter sharp as crystal.

She hadn’t paid attention. A noble’s bored murmur.

Her mind twisted around the edges of the memory, fingers searching for the seams.

A whisper, half-drowned by music and clinking glasses.

Someone had mentioned the Hollow, offhand, careless.

She couldn’t place the voice, not clearly, but it had been male.

Sharp. Familiar. A laugh edged in cruelty.

She felt the cold of realization crawling up her spine.

If someone had fed the Kharador information, if someone had marked Hallen’s Reach for ruin, then it had come from within the palace.

She stood, water dripping from her hands, her breath shallow.

She moved fast, weaving between the hedgerows and garden walls, her damp hands leaving ghostly prints on sun-warmed stone.

Her pulse beat too loud. She reached the palace doors just as a pair of guards passed her, but neither stopped her.

The cold marble of the hallway hit her like a slap. She paused, just for a breath.

She should warn someone. Ren flickered at the edge of her thoughts.

A gnawing unease settled. Ren, who stood at council tables.

Voice calm, eyes sharper than steel. Ren, who had always asked the right questions.

The kind that left no doubt. The kind that carved the truth out of silence.

But what if that wasn’t all he carved? A Regent bore the weight of choices that protected the many not the few.

Her breath snagged in her throat as the thought formed fully.

What if Hallen hadn’t fallen? What if it had strategically unprotected?

Mira rushed through the halls, the cold marble under her feet echoing the drumbeat of her heart.

Past the carved pillars, past the tapestries, past the whispers that clung to the edges of the halls like smoke.

Brahn had told her to speak to Dren, the Kharador officer. He’d told her what to wear. What to say. Tell him we’ll be in the Harrow’s Hollow. Harrows Hollow, the nearest trade route to Hallen. Her mouth went dry.

Not they. We. Mira stopped short in the middle of the corridor.

She hadn’t given Dren a lie, she hadn’t fed him misdirection.

She’d confirmed a plan. Brahn’s plan. He hadn’t needed to tell her more.

He’d counted on her not to ask. On her loyalty.

On her belief in him. He’d used her voice like a knife, her body like a lure.

Dren had taken the bait, and Mira had smiled while he swallowed it.

And Hallen had burned. She gripped the edge of a stone archway, fingers digging into the carved sigils like they could anchor her to this moment, to this realization that bloomed sharp and hot behind her ribs.

Brahn had set her up.