My mind began to move, slow at first, then with an increasing, inexorable speed.
Names. Titles. Labels. They were never innocent, never neutral. They carried weight: expectation, leash, frame, declaration of essence. I had already named her—Magician. I had already named Helena—Trickster. I had already named Azalea—Lover. Each title had gravity. Each had bent its bearer until their edges fit the mold.
I had reshaped them all.
And now the question came back to me like a mirror held to my face: what am I?
For a long time I let that question fold over me. I sifted through the roles I'd worn like gloves. Kairi—with her mess of contradictions, sharp tongue, brittle detachment. Your Majesty—the mockery Helena liked to wrap around me, half-derision, half-reverence. Doctor. Healer. Apothecary. Masks assigned by necessity or circumstance, stitched into me through habit and survival.
If I could define them—if I could impose identity on others and they obeyed—then what did that make me?
