“Seal the room,” the queen ordered, speaking elvish to the guards. “Fetch the Keeper of the Stones. Immediately.” As the first guard leaped to obey her command, she turned to the other. “Stand guard outside. No one except the Keeper is to enter. No one, do you understand?”

“Yes, my queen,” the guard said, hurriedly bobbing his head with wide eyes.

She turned and switched back to speaking crystal clear Adarian. “Now, Lamyll dear, let’s give the poor boy some room to breathe,” said the elegant queen, guiding her emotional husband away from Thomas.

“Don’t you see the resemblance?” he said, wiping his eyes and gasping anew.

“Yes, of course,” she replied, turning demurely to Thomas. “Despite the obvious lack of elven ears. I imagine you have quite the story to tell.”

And that’s where Thomas began, telling his story from the beginning. Victor, Marie, and Sarah knew the most about his time in the dungeon prison, but no one had an inkling of his sovereign birthright.

Every eye in the room was on Thomas as the tale tumbled out. The battle with the void creature that had sucked the memories right out of his mother’s crystal. His father’s sacrifice to free him from the dungeon. His escape from Malchives fortress and the dragon that had explained how two hundred years had passed. How he and Gina had stumbled into Brogan and saved Victor’s family.

By the time he was done, they were all staring, slack-jawed.

“... and that’s how I recognized Your Majesty,” Thomas said, nodding towards the king. “One of my mother’s memories from the soul crystal was of her hundredth birthday in the Ancient Grove. You gave her a gift of sunburst mountain flowers that bloom only once a century—their last bloom had been the day she was born. They were bright yellow, accented in veins of shining silver.”

“Ahhh, what a wondrous celebration that was,” the jovial monarch said, his eyes glowing with affection as his mind turned over the memory like a spade tilling rich soil.

“Thomas I …,” said Victor, looking around at the group, “... none of us knew anything about this.”

“I still can’t believe you met a dragon,” said Nell with disbelief.

Thomas grimaced. “You probably wouldn’t have liked her.”

“Still, you could have told us you were basically royalty,” said Garen, a little affronted.

The boy shook his head soundlessly. “It wasn’t important. That was all two hundred years ago. I wasn't even sure if my mother’s side of the family were still alive here in Melhendallyn.” Thomas flapped his hands against his hips in a helpless gesture.

“Not important? The fact that your father was the previous king of the country?” said Nell with disbelief.

“Well, I didn’t want it to affect what you thought of me,” said Thomas, shrugging. “My father always said his friendships turned strange once they realized his title.”

“Indeed,” said the king sorrowfully.

A gentle knock sounded on the door, interrupting the moment and silencing the group immediately.

“Enter,” said the queen in elvish, speaking in a commanding voice that carried across the room.

One of the double doors crept aside to reveal a wiry elf with half-moon spectacles standing there. He wore a tidy vest of dark red velvet with a timepiece on a gold chain drooping from a breast pocket. His thinning hair was bright silver and his wrinkled skin belied his youthful eyes, glinting with a playful spark yet hooded by weary lids.

Upon entering, the elf immediately swept into a deep bow, then responded in elvish. “Your Majesties, how may I serve? It was impressed upon me that I come in the utmost haste,” he said, eyeing the guard behind him with no slight disdain. “It was most inconvenient. At my age, ushering a poor elf at such a pace should be a crime!”

The queen nodded to the guard, waiting patiently for him to exit the room and sweep the door closed before she responded in Adarian.

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“For the sake of our esteemed guests, let’s keep this conversation in Adarian if you please.” After the elf bowed in acknowledgment, she continued. “Now, didn’t I hear you complaining just yesterday about a lack of adventure in your old age?” The elf harrumphed as the queen handed him the soul crystal. “Perhaps this will whet your appetite. What do you make of it?”

The crystal was in his palm less than three seconds before he spoke, “Well, of course, I recognize it. That’s my mark there, as expected on a monarch-tier soul crystal. This was Queen Sofialyndel’s crystal if I’m not…” The elf froze mid-sentence, then lifted his gaze to the group of humans.

“Are you certain? There must be no doubt,” said the queen sternly.

He looked up at the imposing queen bearing down on him. Her look was not unkind but taut with urgency.

“I would stake my life on it,” he said before turning his head and narrowing his gaze to Thomas, standing there listlessly, sporting reddened eyes. “Your Majesty, what is going on? This is hardly the audience to be speaking of such delicate matters.”

“This young man is named Thomas,” said the king. “We have him to thank for the crystal—”

“—We shouldn’t bother the Keeper with the finer details,” interrupted the queen, gently raising her hand to her husband. The king was divulging far more details than necessary and this knowledge held grave implications. She found her eyes boring into the aged elf. “I’m afraid there is one more task I must ask of you. I require a blood oath that you will never mention this to anyone outside this room unless by my express permission.”

The elf’s eyes went wide with shock. “Your Majesty, I would never dare to—”

“I must insist. I trust you implicitly, Dareneth. You have been my mentor since my youth and also to my mother before me. Yet I would do your teachings injustice by allowing otherwise.”

The elf closed his mouth with a short clop before frowning, suddenly persuaded. “Hmph. The only acceptable answer,” he said, nodding with the frown still deepening the sides of his mouth. “I agree, of course. I am unreservedly yours, Your Majesty.”

Queen Lystrith broke her stern face with a warm grin and leaned over to hug the elf. When she pulled away, his cheeks were visibly rosy and the corners of his mouth were curled upward.

“Ugh, you always know how to manipulate me. Shameful!... and truly annoying.” He pricked a finger with a short dagger from his belt and applied the teardrop of blood to the queen’s signet ring. “I swear by blood to never speak of the existence of this soul crystal to anyone outside this room without Queen Lystrith’s express permission.”

A tiny puff of red mist was expelled from the ring as the drop of blood was absorbed.

“That will do. Thank you, Keeper. You may take your leave,” she said.

The king frowned at the rude dismissal of the elf but said nothing. The Keeper merely raised his eyes to them both before exiting with a bow and closing the door firmly behind him.

“I apologize for interrupting you, darling,” said Queen Lystrith gently, “but I felt the need to assert my authority with a matter as delicate as this.”

The king merely smiled in response, but Marie raised a tentative finger with her mouth open in puzzlement.

The queen answered her unspoken question. “In elvish lands, it is the queen who rules and her husband who plays the supporting role. A matriarchy. The opposite of the Adarian Kingdom and many of its neighbors.”

Now it was Thomas’s turn to be confused. “But, that would make my mother the heir apparent?”

“Yes, she caused quite the stir when she abdicated the throne to marry your father,” said the king. “We eventually came around to the idea when she was so adamant about it. She could be quite stubborn about the things she wanted,” he said with a sad smile while staring distantly through the floor.

“I had no idea,” said Thomas. The look on his face glazed over momentarily as he pieced together the consequences of this revelation. “From the few dreams I experienced, I never saw any resentment between you,” he said, looking up at their faces to check how his statement had landed.

“Once we finally came to terms with her decision, there was no use fighting over it,” said the king. “Besides, we were equally wooed by Robert’s gracious temperament.”

Victor scratched his head as he spoke up. “If I understand what you’re saying, Queen Sofialyndel, Thomas’s mother, was heir to the throne. So how does the Crown Prince fit into all this?”

“We had a daughter, Sofialyndel, and a son named Grandlyn,” said the queen softly. “Our son perished when he was a mere hundred and fifty years old, killed by a mythic-level beast terrorizing our northern borders. Or so the story goes,” she said, giving a strange look to the king before she continued. “But years before he died, he sired a son himself: Prince Moranon.”

“Unfortunately, there is no small amount of bad blood between us,” said the king, an unsightly frown stretching between his bright cheeks. “We’ve endured no less than three assassination attempts in recent years, and all facts point to Moranon being the one behind them. We now believe the story of Grandlyn’s death may also be fabricated.”

The king and queen paused with their faces downcast.

“Pardon my ignorance, Your Majesties,” Victor said, carefully broaching the sullen silence. “With Thomas’s mother having passed, wouldn’t that mean that his claim to the throne surpasses Moranon’s…”

“Indeed,” said the queen, throwing Victor a sly grin. “Thomas’s appearance comes at a most auspicious time.”

As the pieces clicked together in Victor’s mind, his colorful cocktail glass fell to the floor, smashing all over the exquisite marble floor tiles.

Queen Lystrith, however, didn’t bat an eyelid at the smashed glass, deeming it an entirely appropriate reaction.

“Thomas is heir to the throne.”