CHAPTER TWO
1117 Words
Ghosts in the Garden
The sun had barely risen, and already, Kiara’s chambers were alive with quiet panic.
Her handmaidens buzzed about—one choosing robes, another preparing a bath, another polishing hairpins as if a glint of dust would offend a royal god. The news had spread overnight, carried on hushed lips and shivering fans.
Princess Consort.
To Prince Rihan .
Cold-eyed Rihan.
The forgotten son returned.
Kiara sat still beneath the rosewood vanity, her eyes not on the mirror, but on the small painting tucked beside her brush—three children beneath a ginkgo tree, drawn in clumsy watercolors. Her, Rihan, and Kaenan. A gift from long ago.
She barely remembered Kaenan’s voice now. Only the shadow of his back as he left the palace—after the whispers of his strange silence, after the mourning of his mother’s death, after—
She closed her eyes.
No. Not today.
“Should we choose the pearl comb or the gold?” asked Su, her youngest maid, voice trembling.
“Neither,” Kiara said softly. “Let it be simple.”
The doors opened with a sudden gust of warm air. Aliyah swept in, robes the color of crushed orchid, her brows drawn tight.
“You haven’t spoken to the Emperor yet?” she asked, brushing aside the bowing servants.
“He summoned me for breakfast,” Kiara replied, rising. “I suppose the Emperor wishes to explain... whatever this is.”
Aliyah narrowed her eyes. “It’s more than a marriage. The Empress is behind this.”
Kiara looked away. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Yes,” Aliyah said, stepping closer. “It does.”
There was silence for a breath too long.
Kiara’s voice came low. “I am to be a princess, Aliyah. And I am to marry a stranger who used to be a boy I once knew. Whatever I feel—whatever I want—has never mattered.”
“You sound like you’ve already given up.”
“I sound like someone who’s learning how to survive.”
---
Kaenan stood at the edge of the koi pond, watching the water ripple. The same pond he used to toss pebbles into as a boy. The same one his mother once sat beside, combing his hair and humming old lullabies from a province he could no longer name.
Everything was the same.
And yet, nothing was.
Servants came and went like shadows. No one dared speak to him. They barely met his eyes. Not even when they brought food. Not even when the imperial physician placed a hand over his wrist to read his pulse—“He sleeps little,” the man said to no one in particular, “and dreams worse.”
Kaenan didn’t care for their pity. Or their distance. Or their obedience.
He cared only for clarity.
And clarity had arrived in the form of a name written in gold leaf across imperial parchment.
Kiara.
His lips curled slightly, the ghost of a smile flickering like a dying lantern. They thought he wouldn’t remember her. The clever girl who once caught a snake in her hands to save a terrified palace maid. The only child who wasn’t afraid of the second prince with his pale eyes and strange quiet.
They were giving her to him.
But was it a gift... or a trap?
He turned as his aide entered, head bowed low. “Her Highness has been summoned to the Vermillion Hall.”
“Her Highness,” Kaenan repeated softly, tasting the title on his tongue.
He looked down at his reflection. He no longer looked like the boy she would remember. He wasn't sure if he wanted her to.
"keep an eye on her, inform me of her every movement "
His aide, Akira, bowed and left .
His eyes returned to the pond, a subtle smile settled on his face .
---
Aliyah stood alone beside the weeping cherry trees, her hands clenched in the sleeves of her robe.
Kiara was slipping through her fingers.
She had seen it in the way the Crown Prince looked at her that morning—so obvious, so raw. And now, fate had taken the second prince, too, and thrown him into the tangle.
Aliyah had always known Kiara was not ordinary. Even as a girl, she carried herself with something brighter than nobility—something sharper. She had once thought it a blessing to be Kiara’s friend. Now, it felt like standing next to a sun she couldn’t quite look at.
Why her? Why always her?
She crushed the flower in her hand without realizing.
Then a voice interrupted her thoughts.
“You should not bruise such beauty. It never grows back quite the same.”
She turned sharply. Prince Kaenan stood in the shade, half his face lit by sunlight, the other veiled in shadow.
He looked at her, not with warmth or mockery—but with calm detachment. As if he were already watching the story unfold from above.
“I... I didn’t know you’d returned, Your Highness,” she said, regaining composure.
"I imagine you know more than most."
Her heart stilled.
He walked past her, eyes trailing the path Kiara had just taken. “Tell me, Lady Aliyah. Is she happy?”
Aliyah hesitated. “She is loyal to the Emperor.”
Kaenan gave a faint smile. “That wasn’t what I asked.”
And then he left her there, among the crushed petals.
---
The Vermillion Hall was quiet when Kiara entered. Only the Emperor remained at the table, stirring tea with his own hand—a rare, symbolic gesture of intimacy.
She bowed low. “You summoned me, Your Majesty.”
He looked up at her with something almost like guilt.
“Come sit, child.”
She obeyed, folding her knees beneath her.
“I know this was sudden,” he said. “But I’ve always done what I believed would protect you.”
“Protect me?” Her voice was calm. Even.
“Kaenan has returned from his years of service. He is no longer the boy we knew. He’s steady now. Focused. Dangerous, yes—but not to you. You will temper him.”
“I see.”
“You are more than a merchant’s daughter, Kiara. You are my ward. My daughter in all but blood.”
She met his eyes for the first time in the conversation.
“Then why do you still treat me like a pawn on a board?”
The Emperor’s face flickered. Not anger. Just age.
“Because that is what we all are,” he said softly. “Even kings.”
---
- Writer
