ShadowBound: The Need For Power

Chapter 779: A Different Atmosphere

Tharionson moved through the palace corridors with the same measured stride people had come to expect from him, but the steadiness in his steps did little to hide the pressure gathering behind his eyes. The royal palace of Ilis had always been a place of controlled grandeur, all polished marble floors, tall archways, golden flame-lamps, and banners bearing the mark of House Magna, yet lately even its beauty had begun to feel strained.

The corridors were clean, the guards were positioned where they were supposed to be, the servants moved with practiced obedience, and the palace still carried the appearance of order, but beneath that surface, something had changed. It was not dramatic enough for anyone to point at directly. It lived in the small things.

The brief silence that fell when he entered a hall. The way maids lowered their heads a fraction too quickly, not out of respect, but as if hoping their faces would not betray them. The way some knights straightened their backs when he passed, while others seemed to avoid meeting his eyes entirely. The way conversations died behind half-open doors, only to resume in softer tones after he had moved farther down the corridor.

He noticed all of it. He had been noticing it for months.

At first, he had told himself it was natural. Fear changed people. A kingdom shaken by unexplained killings, political division, court rumors, and the queen’s worsening condition would inevitably grow tense. Servants whispered because servants always whispered. Knights watched their commanders carefully because uncertainty made men look for signs in the faces above them.

But as the weeks passed, Tharionson had stopped allowing himself that comforting explanation. The fear in the palace no longer felt like fear of events. It felt like fear of one another. Worse, there were moments when he could sense something sharper beneath it, something close to hidden disdain, distrust, and resentment pressed behind obedient expressions. Some looked at him as if he might accuse them. Others looked at him as if he was already guilty of failing them.

And Tharionson, for all his rank, blood, and authority, no longer trusted nearly anyone enough to dismiss the feeling.

That was the part that sat worst in his chest. He had commanded soldiers for years. He had built discipline among men who would have followed his orders through fire, rebellion, and demon-blooded chaos. He knew the names of knights who had risen under him, men and women whose loyalty should not have needed to be questioned.

Yet now, with everything happening across Solara and with every investigation folding in on itself, he could not risk assuming that loyalty was pure simply because it had once seemed so. If someone was truly orchestrating the kingdom’s decline, then influence could already be inside the palace.

A bribed guard. A frightened healer. A clerk who did not know the paper he carried had been altered. A knight who thought he was following a royal command when he was delivering the enemy’s design.

Tharionson hated himself for thinking that way, but he hated the alternative more. Trust, at this point, was no longer a virtue. It was a vulnerability waiting to be exploited.

As he turned down the eastern residential wing, two maids carrying folded linens stopped near the wall and bowed. Their movements were proper, but the younger one’s fingers tightened around the fabric in her arms, crumpling the edge of one embroidered sheet. Tharionson’s gaze flicked toward the movement, then to her face. She did not look up.

The older maid beside her kept her head down as well, but her jaw had gone tight, and there was something in that tension that made Tharionson think she had been speaking before he entered the corridor. He passed them without a word, though his mind marked them as it marked everything now.

Not guilty. Not suspicious enough to act upon. Merely noted. That was what his life had become. A series of observations, none heavy enough to hold in court, all heavy enough to keep him awake.

Farther ahead, a pair of palace knights stood near one of the arched windows overlooking the inner garden. Their armor bore the royal crest, and both men saluted the moment they saw him approach. One did so immediately. The other was a breath too late. Tharionson’s eyes moved to him, not sharply, not openly, but with enough weight that the knight’s face stiffened.

For a second, there was a flicker of fear there, perhaps guilt, perhaps simple nerves, and then the man looked down. Tharionson continued walking. He did not have the time to dissect every heartbeat around him, yet his mind did it anyway.

By the time he reached the corridor leading to the queen’s private quarters, the air had changed again. Here, the palace was quieter. The usual flow of servants had been restricted, and only those permitted by the healers or the royal family could pass beyond the last archway.

Even the light seemed softer in this part of the palace, filtered through long cream curtains and softened by pale flame-lamps set into the walls. The queen’s chambers stood at the end of the corridor behind a pair of carved double doors, and six knights guarded the entrance in disciplined formation, three on each side.

Near them stood three healers in pale robes trimmed with gold and muted green, their sleeves marked with the insignia of the royal medical order. They had been assigned to Queen Seralyne since her episodes had worsened, and though Tharionson had seen them often enough to know their faces, he still studied them each time as though one day one of them might reveal something different.

All six knights saluted as he approached. The healers bowed immediately after.

"High Marshal," the lead healer said, her voice quiet but steady.

Tharionson inclined his head, his gaze briefly passing across each person present before returning to her. "Lady Virell. How is she?"

The lead healer, Elowen Virell, did not answer at once, and that hesitation told him enough to make his stomach tighten before the words came. She was a woman in her later years, composed and careful, with silver-streaked black hair pinned beneath a healer’s clasp and the tired eyes of someone who had spent too many nights trying to solve a condition that refused to obey the rules of medicine or magic.

She glanced once toward the queen’s doors, then folded her hands in front of her. "Her Majesty’s condition has continued to worsen, my lord. The episodes are becoming more frequent, and they appear to be lasting longer before we can bring her back to a manageable state."

Tharionson’s face remained still, but his fingers curled slightly at his side. "How frequent?"

"She suffered an episode a few hours before noon," Elowen said. "It was severe enough that we had to intervene directly. Her speech became more agitated than usual, and her physical reactions were stronger. She tried to move away from the attendants, though there was nothing visible near her. After that, she began repeating broken phrases again. Most of them were unclear, but the fear response was worse than what we saw yesterday."

One of the younger healers shifted faintly behind her, and Tharionson’s eyes moved to him. The young man went still at once. Elowen noticed but did not turn. Tharionson returned his attention to her, forcing his voice to remain even.

"Was there any change in her Myst channels?"

"No, High Marshal. Not one that we could identify," Elowen replied, and there was frustration beneath the professionalism now, carefully held but present all the same.

"Her core remains strained, but not damaged in any way that explains the attacks. Her channels show brief surges during the episodes, almost as if her body is reacting to a threat, but we can detect no external cause. No curse residue, no foreign Myst signature, no poison, no spiritual intrusion that any of our instruments can confirm."

"That any of your instruments can confirm," Tharionson repeated softly.

Elowen lowered her eyes, but she did not retreat from the statement. "Yes, my lord. I will not pretend certainty where I have none."

He held her gaze for a moment longer, then looked toward the closed doors. There were many things he could say. He could demand better answers. He could order deeper examinations. He could threaten to bring every healer in Solara to the palace and lock them inside until one of them discovered what was happening to his mother.

But none of that would change the truth standing in front of him. They were trying. They had been trying for weeks. Their failure did not come from laziness. It came from the fact that whatever had taken hold of Queen Seralyne refused to leave behind the kind of evidence healers knew how to read.

That realization brought him no comfort. It only left him with guilt, thick and bitter, because what was the point of holding command over armies if he could do nothing for the woman behind those doors? What was the point of being Tharionson Magna, High Marshal of Solara, son of the king and queen, if all he could do was arrive late, ask questions, and receive the same helpless answers while his mother broke a little more each day?

"I want to see her," he said.

Elowen’s expression tightened with concern. "My lord, I should warn you that close contact may unsettle her. It has been happening more often. Familiar voices sometimes calm her, but at other times they seem to pull her deeper into the episode, especially when she recognizes the person."

"I know," Tharionson said.

The healer studied him for half a breath, then bowed. "Of course."

One of the knights opened the door for him, and Tharionson stepped inside. The door closed behind him with a soft, heavy sound that seemed to separate the room from the rest of the palace entirely.