Once, when she was very little and life had been different, Kougyoku found herself in the presence of the First Prince.

She had been nervous to begin with, he seemed dreadfully imposing to her at the time, but this feeling was quick to fade. The magic that whispered through the air around him was calming, like the soft caress of the first autumn breeze. At the time, all she had been able to think was that this person truly embodied their court.

It was a blurred memory now, for it had been long ago, but if she closed her eyes and thought about it she could recall the kind curve of his mouth and the softness of his voice.

His death, the death of his brother and the King along with him, marked a great change in the court. But not as drastic a change as it should have. The reaction to the death, to the sorrow, to the young prince trapped in his bed and branded by flames, was all too contained.

The emotions in Kougyoku's chest had been so big she felt they would eat her from the inside out, and yet everyone around her kept a straight face.

She could remember sitting on her eldest brother's knee as he ran a comb through her hair, readying her for bed. There were sisters and attendants to do this, but there he was anyway, doing it himself. Looking back, Kougyoku wondered if it was really for her sake, or for his own.

A question had tumbled from her lips at that time.

Elder brother En, she had asked quietly, looking at the floor. Is UnSeelie… just a cruel place? Is our court only made up of deceitful people with unkind intentions?

Kouen had remained silent for some time, running the comb through her hair. He braided her hair in silence, and when he was done tying a silk ribbon around the end of the plait, he spoke.

Fae are driven by our own desires. Any fae, of any court, may desire to be cruel, or desire something else and act cruel to achieve it. he had said, resting his hands on her little shoulders. UnSeelie is no more a place of cruelty than anywhere else has the capability to be. What defines us now is the actions of our Queen.

At the time, she had already understood what he meant. A court was influenced by the whims and persona of their Queen, their legacy written in the blood she chose to spill. With the death of the King and his sons, the nature of their court had been decided.

The peace of the court was paper thin. As the schism widened, the cracks in the court became clear.

"Hakuei, can you shut the door please? The chatter outside is distracting."

The elder cousin paused, then set aside the spider's silk she had spun around her fingers and rose from where she sat. She shut the door to the sewing room, silencing the noise from the hall outside.

Kougyoku did not bother with thanks. An act as small as that was hardly going to be considered a debt, but she had always preferred to be cautious. Especially as of late.

Since the disappearance of the Prince, many things had happened. Kouen made contact with the rebellion, and an alliance had been formed between themselves and the lesser half of the UnSeelie royal family. Several lower ranking members of the court had gone missing, replaced with forgettable figures of Koumei's choosing, all carefully beginning to weed themselves into the inner workings of the palace. Kouha had been on several long hunting trips, and each time he returned, it was with a few more fae following behind him.

Kougyoku had perhaps the most important part to play in the unfolding drama. As the Queen's handmaiden, she was placed directly beside their greatest enemy, and thus in the best position to spy on her. The things she saw and heard were all worth noting, now, the littlest changes in the Queen's mannerisms recorded in her mind. Anything may be of importance, anything may be a hidden weakness.

Of course, the Queen was expecting this treachery. Gyoukuen was not a Queen who ruled through love and adoration, she ruled through devotion and fear. It was natural for her to expect threats from every opening in her lifestyle, and chiefly among them her own blood.

The Queen was careful to reveal very little. What she did let slip were all bits and pieces of larger things that did no one any good on their own. Kougyoku didn't mind biding her time, collecting the scraps and knitting them together until they formed a bigger image. She had been a handmaiden for some time, a child of UnSeelie court even longer, and this game was a familiar one.

It was the crescendoing whispers she couldn't stand. The murmurs about Hakuryuu, his whereabouts, whether or not he was dead, if he was involved with the rebellion, a traitor to the Queen—They followed her throughout the halls, growing louder by the day. True or not, she wanted them silenced.

Kougyoku swept her eyes over her cousin. She had settled herself back into her seat, elegant and straight-backed, and returned to the spider's silk.

"…Doesn't it bother you?"

"Hm? Does what bother me?"

"What they are saying. About Hakuryuu."

Hakuei glanced up for a brief moment, then looked back to the glittering threads as she wound them around her fingers.

"It is not the first time speculation has surrounded this family." she said. "I try not to concern myself with the ramblings of the ignorant. You should do the same, Kougyoku."

A familiar well of anger began to fill inside her. Hakuei was always like this, always correcting and chastising her as if she were Kougyoku's mother. Sometimes she went as far as to scold her like a child, like she was still too immature to properly understand the world around her.

It made her want to lash out. Venomous words piled themselves on the tip of her tongue, ready to leap from her lips and strike for the jugular. But Kougyoku swallowed them all, pushing down on her indignance in favor of pressing on.

"But the things they say, they are paramount to treason if they were true. How can you stand to hear them speak that way about your brother? If it were mine, I know I wouldn't have the same self-control."

The mild compliment drew Hakuei's eyes again, critical gaze dusting over her cousin thoughtfully.

"Every time a tragedy strikes this family, vicious things are said. These whispers at least are not nearly as unpleasant as the ones I have heard before."

Kougyoku bit her tongue a second time. She knew what whispers Hakuei spoke of, she had heard them too. Long ago, when blood had been spilled and a throne stood empty, when Hakuryuu lay mangled by fire. The difference was that those whispers had been fearful, desperate, as if the palace itself were trying to warn them all of what now lounged on the throne of the Queen.

Hakuei hadn't believed those whispers then, and she would not believe them now. Her love for her mother was unwavering.

It was dangerous.

"Are you not worried?" Kougyoku pressed carefully. "About Hakuryuu, I mean?"

"He is a grown man, he will make his own choices."

"But, he really is missing, isn't he? He hasn't sent a letter to the court in so long…"

"If he wanted us to be concerned for his wellbeing, he would come home occasionally."

Kougyoku physically recoiled, as if Hakuei had just screamed her words rather than spoke them. An uneasiness gripped Kougyoku's heart, squeezing painfully as if to warn her about continuing this conversation. That she should not. That this was not something she wanted to know.

After the death of their father, Hakuei had practically raised her younger brother. The Queen had a court to run, or such was the widely accepted excuse, but the truth was that even then Hakuryuu had been loathe to entertain his mother's company. Hakuei was his closest companion, and he had loved her dearly even before tragedy befell their family. After, she became the center of his world.

They were close, close enough that she was perhaps the most important thing in the entire world to him. And he was the same to her, or at the very least he had been, the last Kougyoku knew.

But Hakuei had never spoken like this before. This didn't sound like words from her own mouth.

"You don't mean that, Hakuei." Kougyoku dismissed, trying to clear the unrest from the air. "You are as worried as I am, I'm sure of it."

Hakuei sighed through her nose, her slender fingers ever moving, ever spinning, twining the spider's thread around and around.

"He has been drifting for some time."

"Drifting? What in Sidhe are you talking about?"

"As if you do not notice, Kougyoku. He spends greater and greater stretches of time away, and never stays long when he returns. His letters come from farther distances each and every time."

Kougyoku opened her mouth to protest, no longer sure if she was seeking information or trying to defend her cousin, but paused. Hakuei's words wrote themselves out in silver letters in her mind, and Kougyoku felt dread curl in her belly.

"…How do you know how far his letters come from, Hakuei?" she asked softly. "He always sends the same falcon. His letters come every month."

"He tells me."

"Pardon?"

Hakuei pursed her lips, a pretty frown creasing her brow. Kougyoku could almost see it, the carefully constructed illusion of peace that she lived in fraying at the edges the longer this conversation went on. The pretty words and tailored beliefs the Queen had carefully sewn into place over her daughter's thoughts beginning to come undone.

But it was so much sweeter to live in ignorance, so much easier to live a lie. Hakuei sewed the frayed edges back into place herself, and held them there.

"Hakuryuu has been sending me letters ever since he left home." she said. "To tell me personally that he is well."

"And he tells you where he's been…?"

"He leaves out a great deal about his travels, but yes. He's always been sure to let me know where he is and that he is not alone. So I do not worry."

Kougyoku's stomach dropped. No, her thoughts whispered. Stars, please no.

"These letters… Only you two exchange them? No one else knows?"

"Mother does."

Kougyoku stopped moving.

"It has been so long since he came home, it was really beginning to weigh on her. She misses him, you know? When one of his letters was a few days later than usual, she seemed so distressed, I had to comfort her somehow. My letter had arrived at the usual time, so I showed it to her."

"You… showed it to the Queen?"

"It wasn't as if Hakuryuu and I were discussing anything uncouth. I wanted to reassure her he was well."

Hakuei went on. Kougyoku did not move. She stared at her cousin, her expression frozen somewhere between shock and the casual mask she kept in place day to day. It felt as if someone had scooped her insides out and left her noticeably hollow inside.

Oh Hakuei, she thought, staring at her pitiable cousin. What have you done?