Chapter Text
The palace was too quiet for a building filled with liars.
A silent figure moved down the marbled corridor with practised steps. The torches flared blue for a second as he passed, flickering in the wards. No one else seemed to notice anymore when that happened. They had stopped looking too closely at him long ago.
There was ash in the seams of his cuffs, no matter how many times the servants washed them.
Outside these walls, there was talk of rebellion, of bonfires rekindled on old borders. But within the palace, everything was soft-edged. And Renjun, now a relic of bloody history. He dared not speak of things he knew.
He was simply biding his time in a land he had no place in.
“You’re late,” another voice called.
Renjun didn’t startle. Of all people, His Highness Jeno was allowed to appear unannounced.
The crown prince of this land stood just inside the doorway, eyes dark and unreadable as ever. He didn’t wear ceremonial armour tonight, just simple leathers and a blade strapped to his waist. He wasn’t here for duty, at least not the kind anyone else would assign him.
“The council’s still fighting?” Renjun asked, voice low.
“They’ve moved on to bloodlines,” Jeno said, stepping closer. “Your name came up.”
It always does, Renjun thought, closing his eyes. There was a long silence.
“You should be careful,” Jeno said eventually. Not quite a warning but not quite a plea either. “If they think you’re hiding anything—”
“They already do.”
His body ached. The magic beneath the palace walls was pulsing again in ways that never boded well.
“Jeno…” Renjun hesitated. The words stuck in his throat, then fell. “If I asked you to get me out of here, really out, would you?” The moon casts shadows across Jeno’s face, hiding him from the obvious answer. He did not speak.
Not a yes, but not a no either.
1
It had been raining that day too, the day Jeno found him.
The storm tonight didn’t rattle the windows, not in this part of the palace. It hummed against glass and stone, just enough to remind him he was still inside the gilded cage he had been placed in.
They all called him ‘Injun,’ here. No surname, no past, just the half-dead boy the crown prince had dragged out of the mud.
He turned another page of the worn leather book in his lap. The script was old and from the Western Lake District. Its contents are complicated and lyrical. The kind of text that would bore a noble stiff in minutes, but Renjun would trace each word. It was safer to be the quiet, clever one here.
The prince’s favoured pet. Harmless, so long as he stayed out of watchful eyes.
“You’re still up?” came the familiar voice from the doorway.
Renjun didn’t look up. “You’re out of uniform, Your Highness.”
Jeno frowned at that. “Why the sudden formalities? I told you just call me by my name."
Only then did Renjun lift his gaze. When their eyes locked, Jeno leaned against the threshold with a faint smirk twitching at his mouth. The heir to the throne swayed in the doorway, still damp from riding through the rain. Every inch of the royal court wanted him for many reasons, but his eyes only ever softened when they landed on Renjun.
"Why are you reading state-texts for fun?" Jeno questioned, trying to get more of a conversation out of the boy before him.
“The border’s worse than they’re admitting, isn’t it?” Renjun replied, ignoring the prince's questions in light of his own.
Jeno’s silence was answer enough.
He crossed the room and dropped something onto the desk: a battered leather satchel, stained at the edges.
Renjun stared at it. He felt his throat tighten as his hands reached for the leather. He didn’t realise he'd even misplaced it. When did he become so careless?
“Found it in the archives. One of the scribes was going to toss it, thought you’d want it back.”
It had once held field notes, maps, medicines, a ruined diary and a book in a foreign script no one at the Palace cared enough to decipher. The only thing he'd had on him when Jeno’s patrol found him years ago, barely breathing, blood in his hair, salt on his skin and ash on his clothes.
“Thank you.” The words were quieter than he meant.
Jeno studied him for a long moment. Not with suspicion, never that, but something gentler.
“I noticed you’ve been dreaming again. When you're out in the garden.”
Renjun flinched. It wasn’t a question.
“You talk in your sleep when you do,” Jeno says.
“And what do I say?”
“Names. Some I don’t know, some I wish I didn’t.”
Lightning flashed outside, carving Jeno’s expression sharply. Concern morphed his features, maybe even doubt.
“Tell me the truth, Injun.”
“I always do.”
A lie of course.
But it had kept him alive this long.
~
The practice yard stank of sweat and pride.
Steel sang in the air as sharp, rhythmic clashes sounded as trainees moved in formation beneath the instructors’ eyes. Jeno wiped a smear of blood from his cheek, not his this time and handed off his practice blade to a page before slipping around the back gate.
He’d had enough of sword drills for one morning. There was something else tugging at his focus.
“You’re leaving early again, Your Highness.”
The voice was familiar and mildly amused. Jeno turned just in time to see Sir Johnny emerge from behind a rack of training pikes, arms crossed loosely over his chest, eyebrow raised.
“Didn’t think you’d notice,” the Crown Prince retorted.
“You say that every time and yet, here we are.”
Johnny tilted his head, a lazy smile pulling at his mouth. It never quite reached his eyes, not when he was wearing the Knight’s insignia. Though the teasing was genuine enough.
“Let me guess…” he said, walking alongside Jeno without being asked. “Off to visit our quiet little scholar again?”
Jeno didn’t answer, which was as good as admitting it.
“They’re placing bets now, you know. On how many days a week you’ll vanish to go find him.”
“They should find better hobbies.”
“They don’t have royal secrets to sneak off with,” Johnny said dryly. “Or excuses to loiter around the archives without being questioned.”
“I’m not loitering. This is my home!”
“No, of course not.” The knight replied, laughing lightly.
Jeno tried to scowl, but it didn’t stick. Johnny clapped a hand to his shoulder and then peeled off toward the armoury with a wink.
“Tell him I said hello. Or don’t. I’m sure he’ll pretend not to care either way.”
~
The archives were always quiet.
Cold light filtered through the stained glass high above and dust floated in the stillness like half-spoken thoughts. Rows upon rows of old tomes and scrolls lined the high shelves neatly, except for the table near the back, where chaos had once again found its favourite companion.
Renjun stood surrounded by open maps and brittle scrolls. His expression was unreadable, but Jeno could see the tension in his shoulders, the way his fingers gripped the edge of the parchment like it might vanish if he let go.
“You’ll make the scribes cry,” Jeno said as he stepped closer. “They spent all week reorganising this section.”
“They filed it wrong.”
Renjun didn’t look up. He was scanning over a drawn ridge line on a curling old map labelled Eastern Rise – Pre-Unification. The ink was faded, with the notes on the border half-smeared.
“What is it about the outer regions?” Jeno asked. “Every time I come here, you’re buried in their history. Half of it’s a myth anyway.”
Renjun finally looked up, eyes unreadable.
“Not all of it.”
“You know what I mean.” Jeno stepped beside him, scanning the scattered texts. “Why this obsession? What are you trying to find?”
There was a beat too long of silence.
“I’m just curious,” Renjun said.
Jeno's brows furrowed. It was a flat and practised answer, one that just about grated on the prince's nerves.
“That’s not an answer.”
Renjun turned away, gathering up a scroll with forced care.
“It’s the only one I have.”
“No, it’s the one you’re giving me,” Jeno snapped before he could stop himself.
The words hit the table like a dropped blade.
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
Jeno exhaled, stepping back. He didn’t mean to sound angry, not exactly, but he was tired of circling the same walls the other had built between them. He was tired of the way he always looked half ready to run, even now.
“You trust the King,” Jeno started, quieter now.
“He never asks me questions he doesn’t already know the answers to.”
That stung.
But Jeno didn’t press further. He just nodded once, the way one does when dismissed politely from a room without ever being told to leave.
“I’ll be back tomorrow.”
“You always are.”