The Unwritten Princess

The herb vendor had bad teeth and a worse memory. I'd factored both into my calculations.

"Moonpetal," I said, keeping my voice level. "The whole bundle. Not the ones you've got displayed up front."

He squinted at me. I wore a brown wool cloak, unremarkable, the hood pulled low enough—low enough to hide the honey-brown hair that caused me so much trouble.

Behind us, Thornside Market operated in its usual morning fashion: half-awake, lazy, the air thick with last night's rain-smell and the lingering stench of livestock that hadn't yet been driven off.

"The ones in back cost more," he said.

"The ones in back aren't rotting."

He looked at me for a moment, then reached behind without another word.

This was my third year buying herbs at Thornside Market. I knew which stalls opened earliest, which herb sellers watered down their tinctures, which ones hid their quality goods behind inferior stock—I'd figured it all out. I also knew that no one here recognized me. The people who attended court ceremonies and the people who set up stalls before dawn were two entirely different breeds, and they held each other in mutual contempt. The people moving through these streets looked straight through me and others like me, as if seeing nothing at all.

Perhaps disguising myself in the market was entirely unnecessary—who would expect to find a princess here?

But none of that mattered. For me, this was one of the few places in the city that still carried a sense of reality and freedom.

Herbalism was something I genuinely enjoyed, unrelated to status or duty—purely that feeling when you first encounter something and know "this is mine." The dried petals and roots, the minute annotations, the thick volumes of pharmacopeia—I could spend an entire day among them without growing bored. What truly wearied me were those magic incantations that the nobility so fervently pursued.

Of course, this pure interest now had something else mixed into it, making everything far more urgent.

I stuffed the Moonpetal into my cloth bag and tossed over a small pouch of copper coins. The vendor didn't count them, just weighed the pouch in his hand and pocketed it. This had always been our unspoken agreement—he didn't ask questions, I didn't short-change him.

On the way back, I skirted around a pushcart, squeezed between two pickled fish stalls, and followed the narrow passage inward. A beggar caught the hem of my robe—his eyes were apparently still functional enough to spot the court shoes I hadn't had time to change, the gold thread on the toe that my robe couldn't conceal.

I sighed, dropped a silver coin, and while he bent to retrieve it, I disappeared into the crowd.

I walked more carefully now, head down, mindful not to reveal my identity. I could see patrol soldiers ahead, so I lowered my head even further.

Passing a cargo wagon, I noticed a young woman with a sleeping infant on her back arguing with an apprentice boy.

The boy spoke with a maturity that didn't match his age.

"Last year I had you repair this same wheel, and it wasn't this price," the woman said, her voice low, her body still swaying gently to avoid waking the child in her arms.

"Inflation, ma'am," the boy said matter-of-factly.

I stopped at a nearby stall, pretending to examine fabric, speaking as if to myself but loud enough for those nearby to hear. "Inflation is three percent. The guild's standard pricing has been posted on the South Gate notice board all winter."

The boy turned around—I could imagine his irritation. The woman turned too. I didn't wait for her thanks and had already moved on.

My tutor would probably call this meddling. Father would say haggling with petty merchants was beneath my station.

Mother would just laugh when she heard me discussing axle prices.

The thought surfaced without warning, like all such thoughts did. I set it aside, along with the bundle of Moonpetal, with the same force—I had business to attend to, this wasn't the time for sentimentality.

I was at the third stall—a narrow, slightly crooked stall wedged between a butcher and a vendor selling identical antiques—when I heard their voices.

Two men stood at the mouth of the alley behind the stall. They weren't exactly hiding, just using the tone people use when they think no one around them is listening.

"—the committee has convened three times already."

"Any progress?"

"Progress? Nothing will happen. The King won't act unless absolutely necessary."

An irritating pause.

"That's the King's precious daughter, raised in the palace, never seen anything—she couldn't possibly do what's required. Besides, I heard she knows she's mediocre, probably get herself killed on the road."

"Who cares about that? The prophecy says it's her."

"Prophecy? There are so many prophecies in the world, how do you know they all come true? And some prophecies get twisted beyond recognition..."

I stood motionless, holding a bundle of dried lavender I didn't need, examining it carefully while my mind was elsewhere. The vendor held a fan, waving it so slowly it couldn't have driven away even a fly—he seemed to know I wasn't planning to buy, so he couldn't be bothered with me.

The two men shifted their positions slightly, still not looking at me.

"If she can't close the rift," the first man said, "then the rift simply can't be closed. It's that simple."

"Easy for you to say. Last year monsters attacked my territory, lost half my livestock. There better be a solution to this, or else..."

"Alright, I know what you mean."

The second man said something else in a low voice that I couldn't catch. Then the first man said, "The King knows. I think he's known for a long time. He's just—"

They moved. The alley swallowed their voices.

I set down the lavender. I bought another bundle of something I didn't need, paid for it, then left the stall at the same pace I'd walked all morning.

This city was full of prophecies, just like rumors—most of them incomplete, like riddles waiting to be solved. After the rifts appeared, everyone craved a savior. This was the capital; most of these people had never seen a monster. Prophecy was the only thing they could rely on.

Who doesn't want a peaceful life? I thought as I walked toward the castle.

I made the rounds of several herb stalls in the western section of the market—none had Silverthread. It wasn't just one shop's problem. I noted it in my small journal, adding "Eastern route" in parentheses—supply disruption, trouble on the eastern road. My journal was filled with dense writing: herb varieties, tincture sources, names of useful physicians. For two years, I'd even recorded every formula I could find in the court archives, yet none had solved the fundamental problem.

But I hadn't given up, still writing, still recording.

Rendell found me at the East Gate, looking like he'd been searching for a long time. After all these years of knowing me, he still couldn't predict when I'd return from the market.

He wore civilian clothes, but not convincingly enough. Rendell carried himself like a knight no matter what he wore—posture too upright, gaze constantly scanning for potential dangers, his whole bearing suggesting someone ready to take a blade at any moment. He recognized me from a distance and walked over unhurriedly, maintaining a respectful distance at my side.

He was half a year older than me and had followed me like a shadow since we were seven. He was handsome, but not in the carefully groomed, powdered way of courtiers. His bone structure was strong, eyes a deep brown, hair casually tied back with a few strands falling across his forehead. But he paid little attention to his appearance—he probably spent a hundred times more hours maintaining his sword than looking in mirrors.

"You could tell me when you're going out," he said, matching my pace, his tone softer than he used with most people, something I'd never quite liked—as if speaking to a child who needed coaxing.

"I knew you'd follow anyway."

"Of course, because you're a princess, you need—"

"I need quiet."

Perhaps my tone was too sharp. He fell silent for a moment, then changed the subject. "His Majesty has scheduled a garden inspection for noon today. The head gardener is already nervous."

"He's always nervous."

"This time is different. There are some things you need to know."

I adjusted the bag on my shoulder—the Moonpetal had shifted and was digging into my ribs, much like this conversation. "I'll return."

He seemed relieved and nodded. Lecturing me was pointless, that much was clear.

"I heard something at the market," I said once we'd passed through the palace gates and I'd pushed back my hood, my flattened hair spilling free. "People talking about the rifts, about prophecies, about the princess who's supposed to save the world."

"The marketplace is crowded and full of gossip—people say all kinds of things," he said.

"They said time is running out, that the council has met three times with no results."

His expression didn't change, as if discussing the weather. "Those words are meant to calm the populace, nothing to worry about."

"Easy for you to say when it's not about you."

We passed through the shadow of the East Gate into the morning light on the other side. Serving maids curtsied when they saw me. The palace's central district began here—wider roads, taller buildings, and far more tedious.

"You don't have to do anything you don't want to do," Rendell finally said, his voice carrying concern I could detect. "Besides, His Majesty's advisors know what they're doing."

That wasn't an answer. We both knew it. Some things don't disappear just because you don't want them.

"No matter how many meetings they hold, the time mentioned in the prophecy is approaching. No one can stop it—not you, not my father," I said quietly, not with resignation but with determination. "I have to do this."

His jaw tightened slightly. He said nothing more.

He had patrol duty and couldn't follow me into the palace proper. When we parted in the corridor, his hand brushed lightly against my wrist, as if he wanted to say something, but I walked away without looking back.

"Farewell, Your Highness," his voice lingered behind me, carrying a note of melancholy.

Mother's room was on the third floor of the east wing, facing the garden so she could see the light when she woke.

I didn't go in. I stood against the corridor wall, clutching my cloth bag, listening through the door crack to the silence inside—soft footsteps, something being poured into a cup, the physician's low voice devoid of any emotion.

I stood there for a long time. Mother's soft cough came from within, and my grip unconsciously tightened.

Finally, I left the wall and returned to my own room.

I spread the newly purchased herbs on my desk alongside what I hadn't used before. The Moonpetal went into a paper sleeve, the Silverthread entry was marked delayed, and as I was recording the total inventory, I suddenly noticed the Moonpetal bundle.

I had put it in the paper sleeve an hour ago. Fresh, dry, aside from some pressure marks on one side, perfectly intact everywhere else.

Now its edges were black.

Not withered—the pitch black of rot, as if something had passed through the plant's fibers, taking the color with it. I touched the blackened edge with my fingertip.

The flower disintegrated completely.

I sat there, hand still extended, fingertip stained with dark powder, staring at what remained before me.

I had paid full price for that.