Inside the palace, councils grew shorter and tempers sharper. Advisers spoke carefully, choosing words that could bend without breaking if repeated in the wrong ears. Orders were issued, revised, and quietly ignored. Loyalty became performative—a thing to be displayed rather than felt. Those who still believed in it were labeled naïve, then dangerous. Meanwhile, the traitors watched. From balconies, from border camps, from quiet homes where family portraits still hung on the walls like accusations. They measured progress not in victories, but in reactions.
Confusion was success. Delay was power. Every moment the realm hesitated was another moment closer to collapse. Yet satisfaction did not come easily. Triumph, when anticipated too long, often lost its flavor. One of them—the youngest, though none would have admitted it—began to write. Not plans or codes, but memories. Names, faces, moments that refused to stay buried. They told themselves it was insurance, a record to be used if needed.
