Chapter 6 The Hidden Room
“It is death if anyone sees it!” the woman had whispered harshly, looking frantically toward the closed door as if guards were already standing outside. “People are terrified of things they cannot control, Elara. They will destroy you if they find out!”
“Is it dangerous?” Elara had asked, tears falling down her cheeks.
The old woman had gone deathly quiet. She had pulled Elara into a tight, desperate hug, her old body trembling. “Only if the wrong people find out what you truly are,” she had whispered into Elara's hair.
Elara opened her eyes in the cold, dark cell. All these years, she had assumed the old woman was simply paranoid, protecting a small child from being cast out for having a strange birthmark. But now, after what had happened in the hall, Elara realized the old woman had known the absolute truth.
The heavy iron bolt on her cell door suddenly creaked.
Elara jumped up from the cot, instantly pulling her sleeve low over her wrist as she backed away toward the far wall.
The heavy iron door swung open with a harsh groan. A burly guard clad in dark leather and iron armor stepped inside, carrying a small wooden tray containing a wooden bowl of stale broth and a piece of hard bread. He set the tray down on a low wooden stool near the entrance.
“Eat,” he mutteredgruffly, refusing to make direct eye contact with her.
Elara took a timid step forward. “Please... can you tell me what is happening?”
The guard turned his back to leave. “Eat your food, maid.”
“Please!” Elara called out, her voice desperate. “Where is the king going to take me? Am I going to be put on trial?”
The guard stopped at the doorway, his hand resting on the heavy iron lock. He turned his head slightly, his expression heavy with pity and caution. “If I were you, girl, I would save my breath and stop asking questions.”
Elara’s heart sank. “Why? What are the people in the castle saying?”
The guard hesitated, glancing nervously out into the empty hallway before lowering his voice to a quiet whisper. “The entire palace is in an uproar. The nobles are saying you are an illegal mage, sent here from the outer wastes to assassinate the royal family with forbidden magic.”
Elara felt a wave of nausea hit her stomach. “That isn't true! I've worked in the kitchen for years! I wash pots!”
The guard looked at her plain clothes, then down at her trembling hands. His tough face softened just a fraction. “It doesn't matter what you used to do, girl. Magic has been outlawed in this realm since before you were born. Anyone who possesses it is considered an enemy of the state. You need to prepare yourself.”
Without another word, he stepped out of the cell and slammed the iron door shut. The heavy key turned in the lock with a loud, final clack.
Elara sank back down onto the cold cot. She looked at the wooden bowl of untouched soup, her throat far too tight to swallow anything. She was trapped, framed as a monster, and entirely alone.
While Elara sat in the dark dungeon, Prince Kael was moving quickly through the upper levels of the palace, far away from the gathering storm in his father's council chambers.
He slipped into the vast, quiet expanse of the Royal Archives—a massive hall filled with towering wooden bookshelves containing centuries of kingdom history, dusty legal ledgers, and old maps. The air in the archives was thick with the scent of dried parchment and old leather.
The elderly head librarian, a frail man named Master Tobias, looked up from his desk, his wire-rimmed spectacles slipping down his nose as he recognized the prince.
“Your Highness,” Tobias said, rising to offer a low bow. “It is late. How may I serve you?”
“I require the official registry records for royal artifacts,” Kael said directly, walking past the heavy wooden desks. “Specifically, the history of the blue stone necklace in Lady Liora's family.”
Tobias frowned, scratching his thin grey beard. “Lady Liora's necklace? I believe there is an old entry regarding its acquisition, Your Highness. Though it was logged many years ago.”
“Find it for me. Immediately.”
The old man nodded quickly, disappearing into the dark, towering aisles of the library. Kael waited in the quiet room, his boots pacing back and forth against the polished wood floor.
He could not shake the unsettling feeling that had taken root in his mind the moment the necklace had glowed. His mother, the late queen, had been a deeply knowledgeable woman who often read ancient texts. He faintly recalled her telling him stories when he was a small boy—stories about jewels that were not mere decorations, but keys forged to interact with specific bloodlines. At the time, he had dismissed her words as simple fairy tales meant to entertain a young prince.
Now, he wasn't so sure.
Tobias returned after several minutes, carrying a heavy, leather-bound ledger covered in a thick layer of grey dust. He set the massive book down on a reading table and carefully turned the yellowed pages.
“Ah, here it is, Your Highness,” Tobias said, pointing a thin finger at a column of faded black ink. “The blue stone pendant. It was logged into the royal treasury records roughly twenty years ago.”
Kael leaned over the table, scanning the tight handwriting. His eyes stopped on a specific phrase written near the margin.
Recovered during border patrol from the northern ruins.
Kael’s eyes narrowed. “The northern ruins? Which ruins?”
Tobias hesitated, looking around the empty library as if afraid the walls themselves were listening. “The records refer to the fallen city at the base of the mountains, Your Highness. The ruined capital of the old empire.”
Kael looked up, his gaze locking onto the old man's face. “You mean the Forbidden Kingdom?”
Tobias swallowed hard and nodded slowly. “Yes, Your Highness. The kingdom that was destroyed during the Great Cleansing.”
A cold chill ran down Kael’s spine. The Great Cleansing was the dark war his father had fought twenty years ago to wipe out the ancient magic-bearing bloodlines and unify the realm under one ruler. Virtually all official history books regarding that kingdom had been burned on the king's strict orders.
