[POV: Otos Exemplar | Otos: Age 28 | Vanitas: Age 19 | Aretia & Justitia: Age 22]
Otos Exemplar... a man governed by principles. So they echo.
But what are those principles, really? Are they pre-cast molds I inherited along with this heavy title? I am not Vanitas. He knows exactly what he wants from this world, while I... deep down, I feel that I am nothing but a copy—a pale, repetitive copy of my father, Motus. This is the truth that slaps me across the face every time I stand before a mirror.
Tonight, I will not be "Otos, the Perfect Knight" who hides behind armor of honor without feeling the contours of his own soul. Tonight, I will just be Otos. With no sword at my waist, no pretentious titles, and no mask.
I stepped out of the bathroom after washing my face and hands very slowly, as if trying to scrape off an unseen weight clinging to my skin. I roughly dried my palms with paper towels, took one last look at my reflection, and set off into the silent darkness of the corridor.
My destination was clear from the start... I wanted to go to Justitia's room.
I walked down the dim hallway and stopped before her wooden door. I raised my hand. My fist rested in the air, a mere inch away from the polished wood. I hesitated. My fingers slowly uncurled, and my hand retreated to rest in my pocket.
I drew a heavy breath and turned my back to the door, fleeing a confrontation I did not have the courage to face tonight.
I altered my path and headed toward the grand family library, seeking to occupy my mind with anything.
The library was drowning in an oppressive stillness, the scent of old paper filling the space. I bypassed the large reading tables and began wandering between the towering wooden shelves. My eyes fell on a thick, leather-bound tome detailing Eastern swordsmanship and dueling arts. I reached out to grab it, but my movement froze halfway.
I closed my eyes. I pulled my hand away from the military manual and blindly ran my fingers along the bottom shelf, leaving it to chance to choose what I would read.
My fingertips brushed against a thin, soft cover. I opened my eyes to read the title: "Tristan and Iseult."
A faint prick of embarrassment ran through my chest. I, Otos the Knight, reading a novel about lovers?
I randomly opened the book under the warm yellow glow of the oil lamp, and my eyes landed on a single line on one of the pages:
"Neither you without me, nor I without you."
A warmth I had never known before settled in my chest; the words pulsated with tender emotions, pure innocence, and a chaste love that I had never experienced or witnessed in this cold palace.
Is this how humans feel when they truly love?
I closed the book and stood up.
I walked down the corridor once again until I reached Justitia's room. I stood before the heavy wooden door.
This time, my hand did not freeze in the air. That strange warmth I had borrowed from the words of the book compelled my fingers to touch the dark wood directly, right before my resolve betrayed me and I knocked lightly.
(Thump).
"Justitia?"
Silence. Not a sound of movement from within.
I raised my fist again, lowered it, then raised it a third time and knocked with a faint urgency: "Justitia..."
No answer.
I squeezed my eyes shut and rested my cold forehead against the polished wood. I took a ragged breath and began speaking to the deaf door:
"Justitia... my beautiful... little sister..."
I stopped. I swallowed a bitter lump that tore at my throat, squeezing my eyes tighter as I tried to gather my scattered words:
"Do you... do you remember? When you were a little girl... when I used to carry you on my arm and run with you through the garden corridors?"
From behind the door... the faint sound of barefoot footsteps crept closer, moving very slowly toward the threshold.
My voice trembled, and I stuttered: "You used to... you used to laugh so fully, looking so incredibly happy... I thought you felt safe because I was by your side... but the truth is... I... I was the one who felt a million times happier than you did."
(Tap).
The sound of a small, soft palm gently rested against the other side of the wood.
A hot tear rolled down my cheek, followed by another that fell onto my shoe:
"I wished that time would freeze... that the world would stop at that laugh, and I wouldn't grow up, and you wouldn't grow up... just so I could keep seeing your pure face laughing." My lower lip trembled with a painful quiver: "But your brother... your brother failed to protect you from the cruelty of this house. I betrayed you when I remained silent... I failed to be a true brother. I left you to drag your soul into the darkness, locking the doors of your heart until you became a silent doll afraid to breathe."
I sighed, exhaling with a burning ache that shook my chest:
"I... I heard from Aretia... what Vanitas did."
The last ounce of composure in my throat shattered, and I broke down crying. I lifted my head, staring at the dark ceiling of the corridor, tears washing over my face:
"I'm sorry... I'm sorry I closed my eyes all those years and left you alone in this frost... but I am here tonight. Open the door... scream in my face, beat my chest with your fists, pour all your reproach over my head... but please... just look me in the face."
(Click).
The sound of a metal latch sliding cut through the silence.
The door opened painfully slowly, revealing Justitia in the sliver of dim light. She stood barefoot, her skin pale, and her bloodshot eyes drowning in a dead silence as she stared into my crying eyes without uttering a single word.
I didn't hesitate for a second. I stepped toward her and pulled her small body into my chest, wrapping both my arms around her with such force, as if I were snatching her from the jaws of an abyss.
She stiffened at first for a brief moment... then her walls crumbled. She buried her face into the fabric of my shirt and erupted into a bitter, childlike wail that tore at the heartstrings:
"Brother..."
I tightened my embrace, rested my chin on her trembling hair, and whispered with a hoarse voice: "I'm sorry, Justitia... I'm here now... and I will never leave you again."
I lifted my gaze over her weeping shoulder, looking into her room, which had transformed into a sterile, terrifyingly cold space. And there, on the opposite wall facing the bed, stood a massive wall mirror with an obscenely opulent gilded frame.
And deep within its reflective glass... my eyes became transfixed.
Vanitas was standing there.
It wasn't a reflection of his actual physical body in the room, but a specter lurking inside the mirror, staring directly at me with features warped by shock; two dilated pupils trembling with a shattered disbelief, where a bleeding, hateful reproach mingled with a suffocating, icy fury.
The blood froze in my veins as I read the words that formed on his ghostly lips in the mirror in a deadly silence—words his voice never spoke, but which echoed in my mind like the edge of a knife:
(You... have never apologized to me... not even once).