The second time Thalric woke, it was quieter.
No shrieking healers. No frantic servants. Just the dull pulse of pain ebbing from the walls, each heartbeat echoing like a war drum in retreat. He lay still, too drained to rise, staring up at velvet canopy folds that loomed like the ribs of some great sleeping beast.
The air stank of tonic and old perfume.
This time, he did not struggle. This time, he watched.
The room was opulent, but stale—curtains shut against the morning light, furniture polished but untouched, as if staged for a life long since abandoned. A table had been knocked over in the chaos. Sheets half-torn from the mattress bunched beneath his legs.
He moved his fingers.
Fat. Trembling. Soft.
An ache bloomed between his shoulders where muscle should've been. His chest rose like bellows left out in the rain—unwilling, unsteady.
This body was not built for war.
Not for kingship.
Barely for survival.
He remembered the portrait.
The one across the room.
When he found the strength to turn, it remained there—halflit in shadows, mocking him. The soft round cheeks. The watery eyes. The curled blonde hair tamed too neatly.
"So this is who you were," he rasped. "Percival Worthing. Second-born. Soft-spoken. Forgotten."
The name settled into his throat like dust.
A knock at the door. Light. Measured.
Before he could speak, the door creaked open and someone stepped inside.
Gray hair pulled back into a tight knot. Wrinkles carved deep, but not soft. A uniform polished to sharpness, though frayed at the seams. The man moved with a limp and a tray in hand.
The steward.
"My lord… Prince Percival. I—I thought you might be hungry."
His voice cracked halfway through. Not from fear. From hope.
Thalric said nothing.
The man approached slowly, balancing the tray with the nervous grace of someone who had spilled one too many meals and never been forgiven. He set it on the nearby table, hands shaking. The silver clattered.
Then silence.
Thalric turned his head fully to meet the man's gaze.
The steward's breath caught.
Those eyes—sunken, once watery blue—now held something colder. Older. Focused like polished steel.
"…You're awake," he said softly. "You weren't supposed to wake."
"Neither were kings supposed to die in silence," Thalric meant to say. But his throat worked against him.
He lifted an arm, slowly, barely. It fell back onto the bed with a soft thump.
"I—" The steward stepped closer. "Forgive me, your Highness. You… don't have to say anything. The physicians said… after the fit, that you might never speak again. We… we were making arrangements."
The words turned over like rocks in Thalric's mind. Arrangements. For burial? For succession? He clenched his jaw.
"They buried you already, didn't they, boy."
"You stopped being their prince long before your heart gave out."
His fingers drifted toward the tray.
Broth. Lukewarm. Cut apple slices. A soft roll. Spoon placed just so, as if for a child.
Pathetic.
He forced himself upright inch by inch, bones screeching with every motion. By the time he sat, the steward was already crying.
Tears, not sobs. Just two slow lines across weathered cheeks.
He tried to kneel. Failed. Stepped back instead, hands clenched against his coat.
"I—I don't know what changed," the man said. "But thank you. For coming back."
Thalric did not correct him.
He simply nodded, once. Like a lie spoken too well to unweave.
When the steward left, Thalric sat in the silence again, staring into a cup of weak broth, mind spiraling.
No magic.
No strength.
No answers.
But the room still breathed.
The world still turned.
And he was still here.