"Hah... hah..."

Julian was wheezing, a thin, whistling sound that he tried desperately to swallow, terrified of alerting the guards stationed just outside the door. He couldn’t let them hear. He couldn’t let them report to Aurelian what they had ’noticed’.

His hand clutched at his chest even tighter, fingers digging into the sore, red skin he had scrubbed raw the night before.

It felt as though his heart were being squeezed by an invisible, iron fist. Tears, hot and uncontrollable, rolled down his cheeks and dripped onto the sheets.

Lucien, he screamed in the quiet of his mind. Help me. I can’t breathe. Please, just help me.

But his voice was a strangled, non-existent rasp to an ear that was miles away.

He pressed his forehead into the edge of the bed, his body shaking with the effort to remain silent despite his suffocation and the agony that was clawing at him.

He missed the Duke even more now. He missed the sound of Alaric’s steady, grounding heartbeat. Without it, the silence of his room was a predatory thing, waiting to swallow him.

By the time the tremors finally subsided, and it did not subside easily, Julian crawled back onto the bed, his movements jerky and uncoordinated.

He lay there with dark, hollow eyes staring at the canopy of the bed above. The [Mental Stability: 25%] warning was pulsing a sickly red light in the corner of his vision.

He was exhausted, and it was only the morning of the first day.

With his mental stability at 25% already, just how many more mornings could he survive?

Lucien, I lied. I... am not fine.

Julian stayed like that for a while longer, his soul slowly fleeing before his eyes, but didn’t go far as it lingered about, threatening to extinguish completely. It was only when the bolt outside the door clicked, and the maids finally entered with a basin, that Julian turned his head.

They bowed their heads and then walked out.

Julian got down from the bed, moving like a marionette, his steps rigid and his body breaking. He stopped in front of the wash basin and stared at his reflection in the rippling water.

He looked like a mess, a hollow shell. A shadow, as the Emperor had claimed.

He dipped his hand into the cool water and splashed it over his face, but the cool water that was supposed to clear his haze ended up stinging the raw, scrubbed skin of his chest.

He hissed and then looked at his reflection again, water dripping from his front hair.

He was a crazy mess. This... must be what the Emperor wished to become of him as he stayed confined in the palace.

Then, breakfast came. He did not dress up and stayed in the robe, feeling the soft fabric smooth against his raw skin.

Anything else would just shaft him, he believed.

Julian tried to force down a piece of dry bread, but the mere scent of the baked flour made his stomach churn. He barely made it to the washbasin before he gagged, his body heaving as he threw up what little was left in his system.

Because of that, he didn’t try to eat again. He had completely lost his appetite.

Instead of eating, he sat by the window with a heavy leather-bound book in his lap that he hadn’t turned a page of in an hour.

His gaze was fixed on the Forbidden Garden. He remembered his last visit—how he had stared at the rare herbs and the very ingredients needed to brew the potion that could grant him a night of peace from the madness. Even if it was just one day.

Now, those same ingredients were only a few dozen feet away, but they were now useless.

Nothing could save him from the madness now.

Then, a sharp knock rattled the door. 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

"Master Astrea," a maid announced, her voice crisp, and then the door swung open. "Her Imperial Majesty, the Empress, requests your presence for tea in the Royal Conservatory."

Julian flinched, his entire body going rigid and the book nearly slid from his knees. The Empress?

Wasn’t the Empress ill in bed? What would she need to see him for?

And... Why now?

"I shall lead the way once you are ready," the maid added, not waiting for his response to the invitation. It was like he was mandated to attend whether he liked it or not.

Julian stood and then gulped. He had no choice, he knew.

The Empress had invited him, and his opinion was of no one’s concern.

Was she just like the Emperor? Giving orders and demanding results despite the other person’s situation?

He clenched his fist, unable to cope with the people in the palace.

Just like the Emperor, he had a feeling the Empress would take a toll on his mental health, draining him far more than he already was.

"I shall get prepared," he said, his voice weak and almost inaudible, but the maid had heard it as she nodded to it.

And so, Julian got dressed, but every slow second he took as he prepared, fastening his cufflink, buttoning his coat, and adjusting his cravat made fresh waves of anxiety shoot through him.

Did the Empress know? He wondered.

Probably.

The palace gossip must’ve already carried the news of what happened at the Solvar, or the ’invitation’ to the bathhouse, to her ears. And that was why she was summoning him.

Julian braced himself for a berating, for the cold fury of a wife whose husband was obsessed with another while she was sick in bed.

Even though he knew this obsession wasn’t of pure longing as it was in the tales, no one would listen to his side of the story.

Once again, he gulped down the bile that had lumped itself in his throat, and then he followed the maid out, ready to face the fury of the Empress.

But what happened next was not what he thought was meant to happen.

He was led into the glass-walled conservatory, the air was warm and smelled of blooming jasmine, not malice.

There was also the freshness of macaroons, chocolate, cake, and refreshing tea.

The Empress, who had summoned him, was not alone either.

She sat at the head of a lace-covered table, her skin so pale it was almost translucent, with dark, heavy shadows beneath her eyes that mirrored Julian’s own.

And surrounding her were high-ranking noble ladies, their silk dresses rustling like autumn leaves and their fans hovering over their faces.

Julian stepped forward, his legs feeling like glass about to shatter. He sank into a bow so precise, so flawlessly executed, that for a moment, he felt the ’Royal Tutor’ mask was the only thing left of him.

It was a silent, desperate armor against the hollow exhaustion in his eyes.

"I greet the Moon of the Empire, Your Majesty," He greeted. "I am honored by your invitation."