The sun bathed the royal palace in golden light, but the little prince didn't care for golden things. Not the glittering tiaras of the noblewomen, nor the polished swords of the palace guards. At barely two years old, the prince had already found his favorite treasure—the endless forest behind the palace walls.
He had white hair like fallen snow and eyes that glowed like fresh blood. The servants whispered he was born under a powerful omen. The king called him gifted. The queen called him lonely.
Every day, when the sun was just warm enough to kiss the flowers awake, the prince would waddle out into the woods, trailed from a distance by anxious guards. They never followed too closely. He didn't like to be watched.
The forest was his world of secrets—swaying trees that whispered stories, mossy rocks that knew his name, and a quiet pond that reflected a boy who didn't quite smile, but didn't frown either.
One day, something changed.
He spotted a shadow, crouched behind a bush near the creek. At first, he thought it was an animal—until he saw the shape tremble. Two thin legs, bare and bruised, poked from under a torn shirt far too big for a child. Hair matted with mud. Skin marred by scars. A child, just like him—but smaller. Broken.
The prince froze.
The other child's eyes—dark, wide, wild—met his glowing red ones. For a moment, neither moved. The prince took a cautious step forward, and the other child flinched, backing away like a frightened creature.
He saw the scars then. Crisscrossed over skin like angry scribbles. Some fresh. Some old.
The prince's little hands clenched. His chest tightened with something he didn't yet understand—something heavy and sharp. Pity? Anger? Sadness?
"I won't hurt you," he said softly, the first words he'd ever spoken to someone his own size. "Are you… okay?"
The child didn't speak. Didn't nod. Just stared.
"I come here every day," the prince said, gently sitting down on the grass, keeping distance. "You can… stay if you want."
The child didn't move. The prince didn't leave.
They sat like that for a long time—two children surrounded by trees and silence. The sun dipped lower. A breeze whispered through the branches. Still, the prince waited.
When his guards called him back, he looked over his shoulder, then at the child again.
"I'll come tomorrow," he said. "You should come too."
And he did.
Every day after that, he returned. With fruit. With books. With little wooden toys. The child never touched them. Not at first. But the prince didn't mind.
One day, the child took an apple.
Another day, he let the prince sit closer.
Then came the day he let the prince touch his hand—rough, dirty, but warm. That was the day the prince smiled. For the first time, truly smiled.
"You don't have a name, do you?" the prince asked, curious.
The child shook his head.
"Then I'll give you one," the prince said. "But not yet. I'll wait for the perfect one."
That day, under the canopy of emerald leaves, something bloomed between them—fragile, uncertain, but real.
A friendship.
A secret.
And the beginning of everything.