"They say power stands tall,
But sometimes it sways, it bleeds, it bites.
I sat on the throne without asking for the seat,
And I understood: it's not the gold that burns,
It's the salt it hides.
SCENE 1: The Council of Knives (Morning
The morning bells had barely finished ringing when the doors of the Council burst open.
All heads turned.
Sérenya entered.
She wore a white ceremonial gown embroidered with black foliage. Her hair was braided with red glass beads.
At her side: Sylus? upright like a shadow that had decided to live.
It was a shock. A chill swept the hall.
The nobles weren't prepared for this image.
They had seen queens seated. Silent queens. Bent queens.
Not this one.
And not beside a king who had awakened.
- Your Majesties, a hesitant advisor murmured.
They sat. Not on the throne, not yet, but side by side on the twin flame seats, two chairs set just below the imperial throne, reserved for monarchs before formal rituals.
Sylus clasped his hands. He didn't speak.
But he was present.
Sérénya, meanwhile, scanned the room like a battlefield.
Lady Mohaina, dressed in all black, lips dry, eyes piercing, watched her like one sizes up an enemy too beautiful to be real.
The Duke of Marakéna, tall, blond, too cheerful tapped an impatient finger on a scroll.
An old, thin man coughed and opened the session:
- Majesties, Lords, Ladies... let us begin.
SCENE 2: The Poisoned wheat
The Duke of Marakéna stood slowly, as if performing in a play.
He wore a cloak of crimson silk, and his voice dripped with honey.
- For the good of the Empire, I must raise the difficulties we've had in recent moons with wheat supplies from the southern provinces... particularly from Tsaravina.
A murmur swept through the room.
Sérénya didn't move.
- Delayed shipments, missing provisions, and worse, whispers of intentional withholding.
An act which, if confirmed, could be seen as... a refusal of loyalty.
She stared at him. Long and hard.
Sylus didn't flinch.
- Your Majesty, the Duke added with a predator's smile, perhaps the Queen can shed some light? She knows those lands best, after all...
They made her queen.
The bite was sharp.
But Sérénya didn't bleed.
She stood. In a single breath.
Her beads tinkled softly.
She looked at the Duke, then to the whole room.
- I was born on an island where the land gives rice, fire, and words.
Silence.
- It's true the roads were delayed. Rains destroyed entire ports. Fishermen lost their boats. The salt paths became rivers of mud.
What you call betrayal... we call a storm.
The whispers stopped. They listened.
- And yet, the grain will come. As it always does.
Because we know how to feed even those who spit on us.
She paused. Then added in Malagasy:
- Tsy maty foana ny tia tanindrazana.
(Those who love their land never truly die.)
Then she smiled.
- And as my people say:
He who curses the sea forgets it is what feeds him.
The Duke sat back down. Slowly.
Sylus didn't smile. But he didn't blink either.
SCENE 3: The Velvet Duel
Lady Mohaina rose without being given the floor.
No one dared interrupt.
- Your Majesty the Queen, your speech is charming. So charming it nearly makes us forget... that you're not from here.
Another sting.
- Yes, the Queen comes from an island. But here, we walk on land built by centuries of Empire.
We do not speak in proverbs. We decide.
This Council is not a circle of tales.
She stepped closer, to the limit of protocol.
- You are beautiful. Elegant. Foreign.
The Empire watches you, Queen Sérénya. Do not disappoint us.
Sérénya inhaled. Slowly.
- Lady Mohaina, I have seen more power in the arms of a woman weaving rice than in a thousand empty words.
The room rippled.
- And if my stories unsettle you, perhaps it's because they echo louder than your commands.
Mohaina bowed, icy.
- The Queen speaks well.
She will learn, in time, to speak rightly.
Sérénya sat.
Sylus was still watching her. Silent.
But this time, something flickered in his eyes.
SCENE 4: The Throne's Trap
The doors opened suddenly.
Two Silent Guardians placed a basin of incense at the center as a priest in purple robes solemnly declared:
- The Queen is invited to sit upon the welcome throne to mark her full entry into imperial voice.
All eyes turned to her.
Sylus didn't move. Said nothing.
Sérénya hesitated for just a second.
Then rose. Straight-backed. Unafraid.
But as she neared the throne, her steps slowed.
She felt the air shift.
A strange cold. As if something was drawing warmth from the stone itself.
The throne was not the imperial one, only a ceremonial seat, slightly below the main dais, used for consort queens during council.
But it was draped in a fine, transparent veil.
And beneath it... salt.
A thin layer of sacred salt, spread across the seat and armrests.
An old imperial tradition.
A queen on trial must sit upon the salt of sacrifice.
If she bleeds, she is worthy.
If she rises, she is not.
She understood. This was a test.
A humiliation disguised as ritual.
An old cruelty.
Lady Mohaina smiled.
The Duke gave a mock bow.
In a shadowed corner, Kamintha whispered a prayer for her Queen's skin.
Sérénya stepped forward.
She did not tremble.
She gently lifted the veil.
And sat.
The salt bit through the fine cloth.
She felt crystals scraping her palms. The cold seeping into her bones.
But she stayed.
"I am Tsaravina.
And Tsaravina does not rise before she is heard."
The priest spoke again:
- The Queen is acknowledged. The Council may proceed.
But no one listened.
They were watching her.
So was the people from the upper gallery: courtiers, servants, a few diplomats.
They had all seen.
A Queen seated on salt.
And who did not flinch.
SCENE 5: The Private Confrontation
They walked side by side, but everything separated them.
The Council had just ended.
The nobles had bowed. Some out of respect. Others out of caution.
In an empty corridor, Sérénya stopped.
- You knew.
Sylus stopped. Didn't turn.
- You knew they'd make me sit on the salt.
A long silence.
- Yes.
She closed her eyes. Her palms still burned.
- Why didn't you warn me?
He finally turned.
His gaze was firm. Not cruel. Just... clear.
- Because a throne only accepts you if you bleed on it.
- You could've told me.
- You didn't need help. You needed space to show them what I already know.
She stepped closer.
Her eyes burned with contained fury, with pain, with pride.
- And what is it you know, Emperor?
He gave a faint smile.
- That you were made to rule.
Not just beside me.
But against them.
SCENE 6: The Night of Salt
Evening light slid down the tall stained glass of the imperial chamber.
The sun faded behind the Feulène Mountains, and in the room, all was silence and burn.
Sérénya sat before the mirror, her ceremonial gown loosened to the waist.
Her palms, her wrists, the base of her back bore salt's mark, fine red lines like roots of flame.
Nothing serious. But everything symbolic.
Kamintha entered quietly, holding a small wooden bowl filled with a gray paste made of ash, water, and pounded bark.
- Remedy of the forgotten queens.
Sérénya said nothing. She extended her arms.
Kamintha applied the paste silently, with soft ancestral movements.
- They watched you today. The queens before. They are dead.
- Yes. But not erased.
And I walked on their wounds.
A long pause.
Then:
- Did I do right, Kamintha? By staying seated. By not fleeing. By answering their bites with fire?
The old woman paused, her fingers hovering over a fresh cut.
- You were not made to flee. You were made to carve.
Sérénya slowly lifted her gaze to the mirror.
- I wasn't born to be adored.
I was born to be carved.
Her eyes shone.
Not with tears but with an inner light.
SCENE 7: Whispers in the Dark
The night stretched like a velvet serpent.
In the palace corridors, silence was never truly empty.
Sérénya didn't sleep.
She listened.
To the footsteps.
To the rustlings.
To the words that slid under doors like promises of death.
Someone had left a wilted flower on her nightstand. A djarama flower the same placed on imperial graves.
She picked it up.
Held it tight.
Did not flinch.
- You know what it means.
The voice came from the shadows.
A woman.
Slim, dressed in black. Masked.
- If you keep standing... they'll break you.
- Let them try.
- They've done it before. You're not the first foreign Queen. But you could be the last.
Sérénya stood slowly.
- Give me a name. I'll give you an answer.
- Those who speak don't live long here.
The figure stepped back into shadow, and vanished.
Sérénya stood alone.
But something inside her had changed.
She wasn't afraid anymore.
She was hungry for truth.
SCENE 8: Letter to Tsaravina
She wrote in blue ink.
With a quill dipped in gentleness.
Letter to Amadia, her sister:
"My dear light,
Tonight, the moon is thin, and my heart is heavy. But it still beats.
I bled, but I stood.
Here, they don't speak like we do. Their looks cut deeper than blades.
Their smiles lie. And their thrones... burn. But I remember you.
Our bare feet in the sand.
Our laughter in the rains.
The songs of women by the fire.
There is no fire here.
So I will become one.
I miss you. Like the sea misses salt when it forgets its name.
Be strong. Be free.
Sing for me, sometimes.
I will rule. Not for them.
But for you."
She rolled the scroll, sealed it with a red thread, and handed it to a trusted servant.
- Take the ash roads. Not the sea.
- Yes, Majesty.
Sérénya remained alone for a moment, hands resting on the warm wood of her desk.
She closed her eyes.
And in her mind, her sister's voice was singing.
SCENE 9: The Onyx Mirror
Sérénya's chamber was vast, but that night, it felt inhabited.
A strange breeze trembled the curtains.
Kamintha, silently, raised her eyes.
- It is time.
Sérénya followed her into a neighboring room, closed since her arrival.
Kamintha pulled aside a heavy black cloth.
Behind it: an onyx mirror, two meters tall, rimmed with tarnished gold.
Its surface didn't reflect light, it absorbed it.
- This belonged to the ancient queens. The ones no longer named.
The ones they tried to erase.
Sérénya stepped forward.
In the mirror, her face looked darker. Truer.
She touched the stone.
- Were they like me?
- Stronger. And lonelier. But yes.
A strange sensation ran down her spine.
As if an invisible hand was urging her to stand tall.
- Then I'll stay. Until their names are spoken again.
SCENE 10: The Fire Pact
Sylus waited in the forbidden library.
No guards. No ceremony. Just him, a candle, and an old parchment.
- Why here?
- Because here, I'm not the Emperor. Just... Sylus.
He unrolled the scroll , an ancient imperial law, never enforced.
- There's a clause. A Queen may be granted executive power if she is recognized by the people... and the Emperor.
Sérénya raised an eyebrow.
- And you intend to help me?
- No. I intend to push you.
He stepped closer. His fingers brushed hers.
- I have no peace to offer. No armor. Just a war.
- Perfect. I wasn't forged for peace.
They looked at each other.
- Then let's make a pact.
- You give me your light.
- And you?
- I give you my fire.
They touched foreheads.
No kiss.
It was a vow.
SCENE 11: The People's Announcement
The Citadel's square was packed.
The imperial balconies hadn't seen a Queen in years.
When Sérénya appeared draped in a white cloak embroidered with the lily of Tsaravina, a chill swept through the crowd.
She raised her hand.
- Citizens of Amayélé. I am Sérénya. A foreign Queen. Yes. But a woman of the people, too.
She spoke slowly, with the court's French, but her accent caressed every word.
- I did not grow up here.
But I haven't forgotten what it means to be hungry.
To walk against the wind.
To lose a brother.
To wait for a king
A heavy silence.
Then she spoke in Malinké:
- Nye fô i yé. I ni ce. I bɛ ka fɛ wulila.
(I speak to you. Thank you. You are the fire that carries me.)
And finally, in Malagasy:
- Izaho dia tsy mitondra fotsiny. Fa mitrotro ny lasanareo.
(I do not simply rule. I carry your past too.)
The murmurs swelled into a roar.
She had spoken to them. In their languages. And in their hearts.
SCENE 12: The Omen
That same evening.
As she returned to her chambers, a guard approached.
- Majesty... this was left at the door.
In his hands: a dead bird. Small. Black. A string tied around its leg.
A message attached.
She unfolded it slowly.
"The Throne of Salt never forgets.
Nor forgives."
Kamintha paled.
- It's the sign of the old conspiracies.
The ones that brought down two Queens before you.
Sérénya clenched the note.
She looked up.
Across the terrace, Lady Mohaina was watching her.
Her expression neutral.
But her lips... just trembled.
Almost a smile.
And Sérénya smiled too.
Softly.
The way one sharpens a blade.
Next chapter:
Chapter 5 : The Silent Sea
She wanted to flee.
He followed.
But in the sea... ghosts cannot be escaped.