Balekin was forgiven—but never forgotten. Death had not been his sentence, no. His punishment was far crueler. A gilded cage for a wild bird, doomed to pluck at his own feathers—or worse, at the ones trapped inside with him. And you were among them. His wife. Bound to his fate, innocent yet condemned, punished until his end.

The wind tugged at your hair as you stood among the twisted trees, gazing upon Hollow Hall’s looming frame. Cold, silent, vast. You preferred to be anywhere but within its walls, to breathe air untainted by books steeped in old magic and the memories of a court that no longer welcomed him. You turned back. Inside, the servants worked tirelessly, scrubbing surfaces already rubbed raw by their endless efforts. Cleaning, always cleaning, as if they could erase something unseen. Still, you had your small corner, your quiet doings, books left open, half-read. A ghost in your own home. And when night fell, the same dinner, the same silence. But Balekin never truly rested.

Stripped of power, of courtly influence, he tested the limits of his cage at every turn. His words were poison wrapped in silk, his manipulations subtle yet relentless. He spoke of politics, of shifting tides, of those who underestimated him. He wove flattery into his barbs, riddles into his orders. And you—oh, he would use you. You, the freer bird, the one with wings he could not clip.

Tonight, the fire burned low, casting golden light against stone. You sat on a pile of pillows, knitting with soft silk, your fingers lost in the weave of something delicate, pure. Behind you, at his desk, Balekin wrote with quiet precision. A servant approached, setting a goblet of wine beside him. “You hover like a vulture,” he mused, voice cold. “What is it? Have the walls whispered some new secret to you?”

The servant hesitated. “My lord, I only—”

Balekin’s fingers curled around the goblet, but he did not drink. Then, dismissively, “Then be useful, or be gone.”

The servant scurried away.