“So there really were castles and magic, and this fire that told you what powers you had?” Ambrose’s eyes sparkled with wonder as he leaned forward, elbows on the table. His curiosity was as boundless as the sky.

  I smiled faintly as I ladled stew into two bowls. The stew wasn’t beautiful—just a murky brown broth brimming with lopsided vegetables—but it was the one dish that made me feel like myself again. It was rich, earthy, spiced just right. Like sunlight after rain. Like memories that didn’t ache. We ate quietly, the kind of silence that happens when two people are holding too much in their heads to speak. Candlelight flickered across the walls, throwing warm shadows like dancing spirits. For a moment, it almost felt like peace.

  “So... what happened next?” Ambrose asked, eyes wide. “After they said you were Fullvalda?”

  “They took me,” I said. Just that. No embellishment. No ceremony. “I became the property of the crown.”

  “Oh, come on,” he groaned. “I want to know everything, Juniper!”

  I paused, letting the spoon rest in my bowl. Then I let the memory take me.

  -------

  The chamber was silent, except for the king’s words: “Fullvalda.” It echoed through the hall like a declaration carved in stone. The air thickened. Gasps rippled through the crowd. Some clutched their chests. Others dropped to their knees as if Gaia herself had stepped into the room.

  For the first time in my life, I wasn’t invisible. I wasn’t a servant’s child meant to be overlooked. I was the one they were all looking at.

  I was the Fullvalda.

  King Rowen’s hand came down on my shoulder, warm and heavy. I met his gaze—deep brown eyes filled with something that looked like kindness, but felt like duty.

  “You have no idea how long we’ve waited for you to return,” he said. “Welcome home.”

  Then, with a commanding voice that boomed across the hall, he turned to address the kneeling crowd.

  “For as long as the Fae have lived, there has always been the Fullvalda. One blessed with Gaia’s own essence. One who holds the gift of life in their hands.” He paused, glancing down at me. “Today, that child returns. Today, we are saved.”

  The chamber filled with one unified voice. “We are saved.”

  They placed their fists over their hearts and bowed. It should have felt holy. But it felt like being buried alive under expectation.

  The guards led me away, blocking my view of the crowd. I tried to look for my mother—just one glimpse—but she was gone behind a wall of bodies and ceremony.

  The king’s voice rose again as he called the next child forward, as if nothing extraordinary had just happened. From that moment on, nothing felt ordinary again.

  The corridor they led me into shimmered with a soft golden light. Gone were the cold stone walls of the throne room. Here, the floors were polished marble, veined with green like moss frozen in crystal. Sun-crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling, casting radiant beams across the space.

  I recognized them immediately. Sun-crystals—a sacred gift, and unmistakably from Valo, the Realm of Light. The Fae of Valo drew their power from illumination itself. Their realm was woven of prisms and sky, and I’d always imagined their cities glittered like sunlight on water.

  The pillars were smaller than those in the throne room, but carved just as intricately—vines spiraling upward, birds perched in mid-flight. It was beautiful in a way that felt unreal. But none of it felt like it belonged to me. I wasn’t Juniper Blumen anymore. I was the Fullvalda. I was a symbol. A thing to be revered.

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  The guards guided me up a winding staircase and down a long hall, stopping before a massive stone door etched with symbols I couldn’t read. The carvings shimmered in the candlelight, ancient and sacred.

  A shiver ran down my arms. Then footsteps sounded behind me. I tried to tuck myself behind the guards, but there was no space to disappear into. I closed my eyes, heart hammering. The footsteps stopped.

  When I opened my eyes, a frail man in a dark brown cloak stood before me. He pulled back his hood, revealing blue eyes heavy with exhaustion, and hair that was once a deep, burnt crimson—now fading, but not yet grey. He looked... kind.

  “It’s good to see you again, old friend,” he said, voice barely above a whisper.

  I assumed he was speaking to one of the guards, but his gaze never left mine.

  “That’s far too much stress for a child to carry,” he murmured. And then the fear started to melt. Only then did I realize what he was. He was a Ruhig.

  He was absorbing my fear. My tension. My grief. Holding them in his own bones so I didn’t have to carry them anymore.

  He walked past me to the door and traced his fingers along the etched symbols. “This door leads to the chamber of the Fullvalda,” he said. “Every one of your lives has passed through it.”

  The language looked ancient, like time etched into stone.

  “The language of the gods,” he explained, his voice reverent. “Only Gaia’s chosen can read it. Even we Ruhig cannot understand it—but the Fullvalda can. If Gaia chooses to open your eyes.”

  I didn’t respond. I couldn’t. My throat had closed. He turned back and crouched so we were eye to eye.

  “Try tracing the markings,” he said gently. “If Gaia believes you’re ready, the meaning will come.”

  I reached up with trembling fingers and ran them over the carvings. They shifted beneath my touch—lines curving, twisting, reshaping themselves into words I could somehow understand.

  When one controls life, theirs is not their own. I didn’t say it aloud. I didn’t have to.

  “You mustn’t share what it says,” the Ruhig told me. “Each message is for you alone. A whisper from Gaia. Every Fullvalda receives a different one.”

  I nodded.

  “Now,” he said. “Speak the words—not in your tongue, but in hers.”

  I took a breath, brushed my fingers across the stone once more, and let the strange syllables rise from somewhere deep inside me.

  “Secta hasha tomptrar li, ektar feil ne ekta hast.”

  The door lit with gold, and the carvings shimmered. A low hum filled the air. Then it opened. The room behind it took my breath away.

  The floor was a living carpet of moss, soft and cool beneath my feet. Above, glittering stalactites sparkled like frozen stars. A shallow stream wound through the center, and from the middle of a towering oak tree, a bed hung suspended by vines.

  Bookshelves carved into trees pulsed with quiet magic. The scent of lavender and rain filled the air. It wasn’t just a room. It was a sacred place.

  “This is yours,” the Ruhig said behind me. I hadn’t heard him step inside. “Or rather—it will be. Once you come into your power.”

  “My room?” I breathed. I couldn’t even imagine having something so... mine.

  He nodded. “They say Gaia creates a sanctuary that matches your soul. No two Fullvalda rooms have ever been the same.”

  I wandered toward the library, running my fingers along the spines of leather-bound books. But before I could open one, he gently pulled my hand away.

  “One day,” he said. “For now, the crown wishes you to stay in the main castle.”

  I felt my shoulders drop, my purple dress dragging lightly against the mossy floor as I turned from the shelves.

  “I don’t want a new life,” I whispered.

  His silence was kind. Not empty—just knowing.

  He led me through more corridors before stopping at a modest stone room with a tall window draped in elegant green curtains shaped like hanging vines. A bed piled with soft pillows waited in the corner, and the scent of cedar hung in the air.

  “It may not be enchanted,” he said, “but it is yours.” He knelt beside me once more.

  “You are destined for great things, Juniper. I have no doubt your story will echo for generations.”

  He turned to leave. “You never told me your name,” I said softly.

  He looked back, smiling. “My name is Jabez Vishalya. And I’m here to help you understand your power. When the time is right.”

  The door closed behind him with a soft click. And then, I was alone. The warmth he’d given me drained away. The fear returned. The enormity of it all crashed down.

  I climbed into the massive bed and curled into myself, knees to chest. The pillows muffled my cries, but I couldn’t stop them. I wept until I couldn’t breathe.

  -------

  “Why were you so scared?” Ambrose asked, blinking up at me. “They weren’t going to hurt you.”

  I didn’t answer.

  I looked toward the window. The sky had deepened into indigo. A few stars had begun to blink through.

  “That’s enough story for tonight,” I said gently. “You should get some rest.”

  “Promise you’ll tell me more tomorrow?” he asked, already standing.

  I smiled. “Of course. When we’re both ready.”

  He disappeared into the spare room. I gathered our bowls and brought them to the sink. Cool water rushed over my hands. The dishes faded into background noise as my mind drifted.

  When one controls life, theirs is not their own.

  Even as a child, I had known the truth. The Adair family were not divine. They were manipulators. And I had lived beneath their throne long enough to know—they didn’t need to raise a hand. They just needed someone else to do it for them.