The throne room was a stage of its own. Torches hissed against the walls, chandeliers dripping with crystal light, tapestries swaying like silent witnesses to every petty cruelty whispered beneath the King’s roof. Nobles lounged in clusters, jeweled goblets in hand, their laughter carrying the perfume of arrogance. But laughter never lasted long in these walls—it flickered, died, and waited to be reignited by one thing only: amusement.

That was your burden. The painted fool. The court’s relief.

You stepped into the open floor with bells chiming at each motion, mask-like grin stretched wide. A joke about the Treasurer’s miserly habits—laughter. A tumbling trick to mock the Chancellor’s stiff posture—applause. The nobles drank it up, starved for distraction. Even the King, heavy with age and duty, leaned on his armrest with the barest shadow of a smile.

But there was one you could not please. One who never laughed when others did.

Prince Lysander.

He sat slouched beside the King’s throne, the very image of lazy nobility—though every line of his body radiated control. His boots tapped idly against the dais, his fingers drummed a silent rhythm against the arm of his chair. His silver eyes gleamed, watchful, mocking, and every so often, his lips curved at the corners. Not in amusement, but in sharpened disdain.

You had mocked nearly every noble present when his voice cut clean across your act. “Careful, jester,” he said, pitched just loud enough to drown the chuckles. “Mock too freely and you may discover a crown’s shadow weighs heavier than your bells.”

The nobles’ laughter swelled, this time not at your joke, but at him. At you.

Your grin did not falter. It could not. But beneath it, your teeth ground tight. You bowed low, sweeping your cap in feigned flourish, and returned to juggling brightly painted daggers. Yet your fingers trembled, and Lysander saw it. He always did.

The act ended. Applause scattered like coins tossed to beggars, shallow and brief. But Lysander was not finished.

The scrape of his chair echoed as he rose, boots striking marble with deliberate weight. The chamber hushed. One by one, nobles turned, eager for scandal, eager for blood. The Prince descended the steps from the throne like a predator descending from its perch, each step savoring your discomfort.

He stopped before you. He did not speak at once. He circled.

Click, click, click—his boots against marble. Slowly, he walked around you, gaze sharp as a knife pressed against skin. A wolf circling a tethered hare. The bells of your cap jingled when you shifted under his scrutiny, and he chuckled under his breath, low and cutting.

Finally, he stopped in front of you. His hand lifted—unhurried, deliberate—and brushed against your cap. Fingers toyed with the little brass bell that dangled there, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger. The faint chime echoed through the silence, mocking in its delicacy.

And then he spoke.

“Tell me, jester,” Leontius drawled, his voice carrying across the chamber, velvet threaded with venom, “does it sting? To forever make others laugh, yet never be allowed to laugh at them in return?”

A ripple of laughter answered him. Nervous, but eager. The courtiers never knew when it was safe to laugh at the Prince’s words, but this time—they could not resist.

You swallowed, grin frozen in place.

Lysander tilted his head, studying your painted expression like one might study a mask at a festival. His eyes glittered. He leaned closer, invading your air, so near you could feel the warmth of his breath ghosting your cheek.

“Go on,” he whispered, though the room could still hear him. “Smile for me. Or shall I report to my father that our jester has forgotten their place?”

The chamber erupted with uneasy chuckles, the nobles shifting like birds startled but unwilling to flee. All of them watching. All of them waiting. And there you stood, caught in his game, your laughter demanded even as your pride burned.