That name blew across the ballroom like the cold wind from the window. Their silence grew thicker, deeper. Something like fire burned in Cyrus’s chest, and he could not place why it bothered him so. It felt like devotion. It felt like worship.

As for Kaia, she stepped back, and he saw the faintest hint of a smile. It was then he knew. Kaia had played her part to perfection. There had never been any doubt. There were no whispers in Lord Mosau’s ear.

Do you not wear a crown? she’d asked, and in response, Cyrus had done exactly as she desired. No, as Thorda had desired. The time had come, indeed.

“I have returned to you,” he said, acknowledging the whispers and trying not to dwell on such matters. He fought for the words Thorda would have him speak. The path was set, and there was no changing it now. “Know that I will never leave you until the bloody quest is finished.”

Mouths dropped. More whispers. Men and women crowded closer, pinning him. The only way out was the window. Tingles crawled up and down his spine. Their eyes looked to his crown, and they understood it now, its true significance. It was no mockery or decoration, but his birthright. Again the name, the latter half emphasized ever harder.

The Vagrant Prince… the Vagrant Prince…

Must they look at him so? Must they keep murmuring, and speak his name as if it were sacred? Standing even taller, he decided to the Heldeep with all of it. He wasn’t just the Vagrant Prince. He was Cyrus Lythan, son of Berniss and Cleon Lythan. Let that name grace their lips. Let that truth intermix with the legends and tales and lies.

“You see right, and recognize me well,” he said. “For I am… I am the Vagrant Prince.”

He couldn’t say his name. The words would not come out. His tongue disobeyed. He tried again, but his jaw locked tight. To have his body refuse reignited his panic. He could abide those stares no longer. He pulled the mask back over his face. It helped, but only a little.

Cyrus turned and leaped out the window to the grass below. His relief in escaping the crowded room was indescribable. He walked the garden, following no set path but for the gravel beneath his feet. At last he found a bench beneath a dogwood tree, and he collapsed onto it. The frost of his breath floated out from the teeth of his mask. His wide, grinning teeth, promising grim pleasure at the pain he inflicted and the chaos he sowed.

A lie. A lie. A lie.