The moon had risen high, casting its silver spill across the marble tiles of August's chamber. Candlelight flickered gently from gilded sconces, the flames bowing low as if in reverence to the hour.
August sat before his mirror, already dressed in his nightgown—an elegant garment of pale ivory, threaded with delicate lace at the cuffs. The silk clung softly to his narrow frame, the neckline slightly parted as though the fabric itself had relaxed against the warmth of him.
His long, white-platinum hair tumbled like riverlight over his shoulders. He took the ivory comb from its case and drew it through the lengths with practiced grace, each stroke slow, silent, methodical. The sound of the bristles against his hair was the only one in the room, a hush like distant rain. Then, as if performing a ritual older than words, he began to braid—delicately, precisely. A slow weave of thought and memory, folded into strands.
It was then that Giles entered.
"Is there anything you require, my lord?" he asked, pausing a respectful distance behind him.
August did not turn. His gaze remained fixed on the mirror, on the reflection of his own hands working their quiet magic through the braid.
"One glass of warm milk," he said softly. "And nothing else."
Giles hesitated. Just enough to register concern, not rebellion. Then he bowed once and departed, his silence almost a question.
Alone again, August paused mid-braid. The strands hung loose between his fingers.
The letter.
His mind returned to it unbidden, like a half-finished song echoing through a silent hall. The parchment had been old. Not aged in the usual sense—this was something deeper. Its creases brittle, ink nearly faded into dust. A message kept far too long in darkness.
Was there no one left he could show it to? No one who might recognize the hand, the words, the intent hidden in every flourish?
He frowned faintly, eyes clouded. That letter was a relic—but from whose past?
The door creaked open.
Giles returned, silver tray in hand, a delicate porcelain cup balanced perfectly atop it. He set it gently on the small table beside August and did not speak.
August met his gaze in the mirror. For a moment, he simply studied the reflection of the man who had served him since his earliest memories. Loyal. Quiet. Watchful.
"Giles," August said slowly, "did my mother ever have any relatives? A sister, perhaps? Or a cousin?"
The question struck the air like a candle being snuffed.
Giles's eyes widened—not with fear, but with something older. A pause that stretched just a breath too long.
"No, my lord," he said at last, voice steady but low. "Your mother had no living relatives. None that I was ever made aware of."
August gave no reply at first. He simply turned his face back to the mirror, took the glass of milk in his pale hand, and drank in measured sips. The warmth was soft in his throat. Comforting. Familiar.
He set the cup down with a muted clink.
"You should rest," he murmured, his voice cool as polished marble. "Go on. That will be all for tonight."
Giles bowed again, deeper this time. "As you wish, my lord."
And then he left, leaving August alone once more with the silence, the moonlight, and the slow, intricate braid still half-finished in his lap.
August's fingers moved again, the braid now continuing in fluid rhythm, as though the question he had asked Giles had been plucked from the air and folded back into silence. He finished the braid with precision, smoothing the last twist into place, and then reached for a ribbon.
It was a soft satin one—white with a faint shimmer like frost kissed by moonlight. He tied it carefully at the end of his braid, fingers steady, the knot small and perfect. For a moment, he stared at his reflection. Still. Pale. Composed.
Then he rose.
The room welcomed his movement with a hush, the sound of silk brushing over carpet, the gentle rustle of breath and candlelight. He approached his bed—an elegant structure of carved mahogany and gold-leaf, draped with sheer veils and down-stuffed quilts light as air.
He sat at the edge of it and reached to the bedside drawer, where a small stack of worn books rested. From them, he selected one.
Its spine was cracked gently from frequent readings. The title had long since faded, but August knew it well. His aunt had left it for him before she departed for her estate—"Something to keep you company when I cannot," she had said with that fond, secret smile. It was filled with stories of ancient kings, of loyalty and loss, of battles fought with both blade and heart.
August opened it slowly and began to read, the familiar words unfurling like silk banners in his mind. The voice of the book was soft, but sure. Time thinned around him as he turned each page, light growing more golden, more dreamlike.
And then, sleep came—not like a storm, but like snow. Quiet. Inevitable.
And then—
Fog.
He closed the book with careful hands and set it gently on the drawer beside him. The candles whispered low, their wicks shrinking.
He lifted the feathered quilt and sank beneath it, the silk of the sheets cool against his skin. One arm curled beneath the pillow, the other resting over his ribcage, and his silver braid trailed like moonlight over the side of the bed.
His eyes closed. His breath slowed.
And August, at last, drifted into sleep—elegant even in surrender.
And then—
Fog.
Thick, chalk-white fog swirled around his feet, muffling every sound. August stood barefoot in a field that was nowhere and everywhere, cold earth beneath his toes and sky lost to grey.
He heard a child's voice, high and thin, calling, "Mamma…"
He turned.
There, in the folds of the mist, a small boy—his face unfamiliar, yet oddly known—stood with tears streaming down his cheeks. "Mamma…" he repeated, not reaching out to any ghostly mother of his own, but to the woman who appeared from the fog like a vision carved from sorrow.
August's mother.
She was younger than he remembered, her brown eyes deep as carved oak, her curly hair tumbling like dark silk. Her arms wrapped gently around the child as she lifted him—so gently, as though even the air might bruise him.
And then she saw August.
Her gaze met his—not with fear, but a sadness so profound it felt like drowning. Behind her, the mist shifted, and from it rose something darker—a shadow, tall and thin, faceless and still, watching.
August's mother froze. Her lips parted.
"When you grow up…" she whispered to him, "...you must not let anyone harm him."
She turned the boy toward August and placed the child's hand into his. August looked down—and just like that, the boy began to vanish. His fingers dissolved like smoke between August's own, and then the fog swallowed everything.
Everything but fire.
It crackled from the edges of his vision. The white mist turned orange, then red—licked by flames that coiled like serpents. The dream twisted. The world twisted.
August saw the woman—his mother—again, only this time she was standing at the heart of the blaze. Her silk dress caught fire like paper. Her hands reached out, not in terror, but in resignation.
"No!" August cried, but his voice was ash on the wind.
The fire roared louder. It swallowed her hair, her limbs, her weeping eyes.
"Mamma—!"
But she only smiled, slow and sorrowful, and said, "He will protect you… but you must protect him first."
Then the flames devoured her.
August shot upright in bed, chest heaving, hands trembling against the silken sheets. His mouth was open, ready to scream, but no sound came. Only breath.
He leaned back against the bedframe, eyes wide, sweat clinging to his skin like rain. The dream replayed in pieces—his mother, the child, the fire, the fog.
A boy.
A promise.
A death.
The same mother who once read him fairy tales by firelight now burned within his dreams. But who was that boy? And why… why did she hold him like her own?
Confusion churned in his chest. He rose shakily, poured himself a glass of water from the pitcher on the sideboard, and drank, slow and deliberate.
He stared into the glass as though it might answer him.
But the water, like the dream, remained still.
The empty glass trembled slightly in August's hand as he placed it back upon the tray. His breath came slow, measured—one, then another, then another still—as though he might calm the storm with nothing but discipline. But the stillness around him only made the chaos inside louder.
The fire still flickered gently in the hearth, casting warm gold upon the carved edges of his chamber, but to August, it was too bright. Too familiar. Too much like what had consumed the dream—consumed her.
He pressed a palm to his eyes, fingers cold. The boy's voice still echoed in his skull, soft and innocent: "Mamma…"
And then her voice: "He will protect you… but you must protect him first."
But protect who?
His thoughts were a snarl of smoke and silk. He sat on the edge of his bed again, not beneath the covers, not wrapped in warmth—but upright, spine taut like the string of a bow. Sleep would not come again. He would not let it.
He glanced toward the ribbon that held the end of his braid. It glowed dully in the firelight, a spot of gentle blue against the white waterfall of his hair. His fingers found it almost unconsciously, tugging it loose. The braid unraveled like time itself, falling in soft waves around his shoulders.
He stood slowly, walking toward the tall window. The garden below was veiled in night, stars watching like cold gods above. Somewhere beneath that darkness, Elias lay sleeping—peacefully, perhaps. But the dream gnawed at August like hunger. That boy—the child his mother held with such sorrow and care—had looked at her as if she were his mother, not August's.
And then the fire.
August shut his eyes, but the vision bloomed anew on the back of his eyelids—curling flame, her form crumpling in silence, that final, unbearably kind smile as she vanished.
He turned away from the window. His bare feet moved softly across the rug as he crossed the room to his writing desk. The drawer slid open with a quiet breath.
The letter.
It still lay where he had tucked it, its paper crackling slightly at the edges, ancient and tired. The ink was faded, the script elegant and strange. Every time he read it, it seemed to shift just slightly—like something refusing to be understood too quickly. Like it was waiting for the right moment.
But what moment?
His hands hovered over it but did not touch. Not yet.
Instead, he lit another candle and sat in the high-backed chair near the hearth. He stared into the flames, legs drawn up slightly, nightgown folding like white satin over his knees. He looked like a ghost of himself—silver-haired, pale-skinned, eyes hollow with something far older than sleep.
He would not sleep again.
Not tonight.
And perhaps, not for many nights to come.
The dream had awakened something ancient, something that whispered behind doors long locked—something not yet ready to name itself.
But August had learned long ago how to be patient.
He would wait.