The evening was heavy with the scent of rain that had not yet fallen, the air still warm from the sun that had fled hours ago, and Kaelen paced the stone corridor outside the library, boots scraping lightly, heart thrumming, hands clenching and unclenching as if the motion alone could squeeze away the anger that had lodged itself deep in his chest after the events in the courtyard.
Elenya's voice—the one syllable he had sworn never to hear—still rang in his ears, soft and childish, impossibly casual, and the truth of it refused to leave. He remembered it exactly: Kaelen. Spoken aloud, careless, curious, innocent, and yet carrying the weight of everything he had fought to contain for years.
He could not forgive it.
He could not forget it.
The problem now was simpler and crueler: Who had told her?
Only a handful of people knew his true name. The King, of course, and Eldric. A few trusted attendants who had served the royal children for years. A handful of scribes, never close, always distant, who might have accidentally overheard the name in a ceremonial recounting or during the rare moment when the King had spoken it aloud, the one evening Kaelen had slept poorly and his father had leaned close enough to whisper what he could not say in daylight.
But Elenya had spoken it freely. She had called him by it as if it were hers to say, and that was impossible. It could not have been mere luck. It could not have been happenstance.
His hands curled into fists at his sides, knuckles white.
"Who?" he muttered to no one, pacing again. The library doors loomed behind him, windows faintly glowing with candlelight. He imagined her small face, eyes wide and curious, and felt the contempt surge anew, tinged with something darker, a question that had no answer yet: who betrayed me by letting her know?
Eldric appeared then, moving silently, as he always did, calm and steady, a tether in the storm Kaelen refused to be part of.
"You're pacing," Eldric said. Voice low, careful. "It won't help you."
Kaelen stopped, pressed his palms to the stone wall. "Do you know who told her?" he asked, voice sharper than intended. "Eldric, tell me. Who spoke my name to her?"
Eldric's brow furrowed. "I do not know," he said. "Kaelen, there are only a few who could have known. And I do not believe it was done deliberately."
Kaelen laughed, hollow and bitter, the sound bouncing off the corridor like a warning. "Deliberately or not, she knows. She knows. And now… she moves freely, carrying my name in her mouth like it's something precious, like she has a right to it, and I—" He broke off, letting his breath catch. Rage, frustration, grief, and humiliation tangled into a single, tight coil in his chest.
Eldric did not try to soothe him. He waited. Let Kaelen's storm settle enough for words to form again, measured but quiet. "Kaelen. Stop. You will not find peace by blaming her. She is a child. We are the ones who failed in protecting the boundaries of our secrets. That is all."
Kaelen's jaw clenched, back still to his brother, voice low and trembling with an intensity he did not bother to hide. "A child? You speak as if that absolves her. You speak as if I should care that she is naive. Naive. Foolish. That is nothing. She is a reminder, Eldric. She is a symbol of what my mother took from us, from me, from the King! And now… now she carries my name."
Eldric placed a hand lightly on his shoulder. "Kaelen, the name is not hers to keep. But neither is your anger hers to bear alone."
Kaelen wrenched away. "Do you understand? Do you see it? She is everything my mother chose over us, over the Kingdom, over duty, over loyalty! And her existence mocks all of it. She is a living echo, and I cannot—will not—allow anyone to make it seem ordinary."
Eldric's eyes softened, and yet his voice carried the weight of a command, a warning he could not sugar: "Then be careful. You already know few know your true name. That means there is someone—someone who has chosen to betray that trust. And if your anger blinds you, Kaelen, you will turn it into a weapon that hurts more than just them."
Kaelen said nothing. He did not care about caution. Not yet. The seed of suspicion had rooted, coiled around his thoughts like a serpent. He would know. He would find out. And when he did, the answer would carry consequences far heavier than a child's curiosity.
He turned and stalked back down the corridor, boots echoing, mind weaving through possibilities, every familiar face now a question mark. Who had dared? Who had spilled the secret? And when the answer came, no mercy would suffice—not for the one who betrayed him, and not for the one who reminded him of what he had lost.
Meanwhile, somewhere beyond the courtyard, the candlelight flickered against stone walls, and a child in pale robes clutched her own ribbon, blissfully unaware that the name she had spoken so lightly had drawn the first line in a war of silence, secrecy, and wrath that would outlast her laughter, her innocence, and perhaps even her life.