"DIE, YOU…!"
A man broke out from the crowd, pulling out a nasty looking dagger as he rushed through the open space.
The crowd on the two sides of the royal hall froze in stunned silence. Royal guards jumped, but… The assailant was much, much closer.
Alerted by the shout, Theo stepped to the side, his hand instinctively moving to his hip and grabbing the handle of his sword. He reacted swiftly, but… As the assailant rapidly advanced, it became worryingly clear he didn't have enough time to unsheathe and parry the strike.
And yet, no one got the chance to hear what sort of slur or insult the assailant was about to toss Theo's way before sinking his dagger into the prince's throat.
Swish!
The assassin stumbled, instantly attempting to regain his balance with the next few steps.
Instead, his eyes bulged out. His dagger fell out from his suddenly powerless fingers.
An invisible brush painted a thin red line across his throat.
Cracks appeared in the air, as if there was a panel of glass right next to the prince. And then, just like a glass would, the cover of the illusion shattered, revealing Theo's unseen guardian within.
"Seriously?" Meimei, dressed in the finest silks befitting the prince's consort, looked down at the assassin as he fell down to his knees, his hands wrapped tightly around his bleeding throat.
She then shook her head and turned to the prince the very moment she confirmed the danger was now neutralized.
"Are you okay?" She asked as she drew near, appearing almost as if she glided over the flooring of the hall.
And as her silent words of concern filled the hall, all hell broke loose.
"My prince!" the fastest of the royal guards barely managed to stop before crashing into the young royal, digging their armored heels into the expensive floor mosaic as his colleagues quickly surrounded the prince.
"AN ASSASSINATION!" Someone in the crowd shouted, stating the obvious.
"WHO WOULD DARE…!"
"Are you okay?" Meimei ignored the chatter and asked again, leaning in even closer while lowering her voice to but a soft whisper.
"He didn't even reach me," Theo reasoned before gulping his saliva. "But…" For a second, his mask of perfectly stoic expression faltered. "For a second I thought I would actually have to fend him off…"
Before the prince could even finish his sentence, Meimei wrapped her free hand over his shoulder, using her own body to shield Theo's mouth from anyone potentially capable of reading his lips.
"You really thought I would let him?"
Theo sighed.
"It was…"
"Different?" Meimei allowed herself a small, restrained smirk. "Not like when we trained?"
Theo shook his head.
"It was real," he admitted before gulping down his spit. His eyes then escaped to where a pool of blood formed around the assassin's corpse. "Too real, even."
"Good," Meimei bumped her forehead against Theo before bringing her lips closer to his ear, "that's exactly what you wanted, right?"
All around them, the chaos continued.
Nobles screamed, some in terror, others in shock while some already started to juggle accusations. The royal guards split between those protecting the affected prince and then those guarding the rest of the royal family at the head of the hall, all the while while leaving the corpse of the assailant for the normal guards to deal with.
Then, the dull sound of a metal rod striking the ground commanded silence.
All the eyes turned to the throne, below which the royal shenshal stared everyone down with the look of a stern teacher dealing with an exceptionally rowdy group of students.
It was that old man that wielded the metal rod with which he silenced the hall. But it was the king's own silence that forced everyone to shut their mouths. His gaze floated from one side of the hall to the other, appearing to linger on every face in order and on none of them in particular. Then and only then, his eyes locked in on the the young prince.
"I think you've flirted enough, son. I understand your shock, but this hardly is time or place for that."
The words of Theo's father were short. They lacked any sort of flair or added decorum. As if the king's voice was too precious to be wasted on needless pleasantries.
"But father!" Theo gently pushed Meimei away as he immediately protested. "I just survived an attempt on my life!" he cried out, only to reach out, wrap his arm around Meimei's back before hooking his hand on her waist and pulling her closer. "I don't think anyone could blame if I were to just take my lovely consort away and return only after…" Theo intentionally cut his words short, before clearing his throat, "only once I've regained my composure!"
To others, the king reply was limited to a disapproving look. Theo, however, could see signs of irritation building up in his father's eyes, a perk of knowing the man on infinitely more intimate level than anyone else in the hall.
"But…"
Theo shook his head while slightly lowering his chin and relaxing the confrontational look on his face. A change he concluded by looking straight ahead, but with his eyes turned towards Duke Claudius seat.
"What are we if not servants to our stations?" Theo shook his head. "The moment we forget our place," he once again glanced towards the duke, "our entire system rots." Only now Theo turned his eyes towards the king. "And rather than an exception, I'm the one to hold to those words more dearly than others."
Theo took in a deep breath. He then squeezed Meimei's waist once again before, with a tang of pain deep down at the bottom of his heart, letting go.
From then on, despite the disturbance, the ceremony proceeded as it should… to a degree.
Theo's lone walk towards the special podium just shy of the elevated throne was now completed in the escort of the royal guards and under the watchful gaze of Meimei who stood behind, watching from the exact same spot where she appeared to defend him.
Then, as he approached the cathedral, he finally laid his eyes upon the physical form of his fate, the dynastic codex.
It was the kingdom's most holy book. An artifact most dear to any established dynasty. A massive tome with bindings adorned in gold and jade.
Theo reached out and caressed the book's cover.
'And now, for tonight's climax…'
Holding back a sight, Theo grasped the heavy brace of the tome and swung it open. He didn't where to open it. The tome picked what part to reveal to him instead.
And there they were, the few lines of words that only now, upon fulfilling all the necessary steps, Theo could decipher.
'Looks like they didn't change, huh?'
Contrary to what most of the people in the hall believed, this wasn't the first time Theo went through this process. For all the love his, and any other dynasty had for codex-related ceremonies, its results were too heavy, too important to be ever first revealed in such a public setting.
And just like Theo expected, yet against all of his hopes, those dreaded words were still there, a passage only he would ever be able to read.
A gash for a rot,
A spark in the pyre.
The old must be broken,
To kindle the fire.
Forbidden seed,
Yet-written law.
Breaker of lineage,
Creator of all.
Theo bit down on his lip.
Even now, three days after he first saw the words of his divine fate, he struggled to make sense of them.
Not because it was hard to assign them any meaning. No, it was the opposite.
Those words? They could be understood in so many different ways, they hardly offered him any clue for the future at all!
And when Theo's own ability to understand those divine words failed, his best bet was to refer to the wisdom of the excellent scholars that spend the last three days and night trying to crack the code of this prophetic writing.
"Theodore Quadragon," Marucs Quadragon, Theo's father, spoke the ceremonial words after giving the young prince some time for supposed contemplation. "You've seen your fate."
Thump.
For the second time today, the royal shenshal struck his iron rod against the stone mosaic of the hall's floor.
Then, the king followed with a question, just as written in the ceremonial protocols.
"What is your path?"
Theo closed his eyes.
Then, as he opened them, he took a brief glance over his shoulder, stealing a quick look at Meimei.
For the most part, she was in on the joke. From the staged assassination, through the early readings of the divine codex…
But his divine fate was where Theo drew the line. Just like, with his next words, he would draw the end of their lifelong relationship.
'This is for the best,' Theo closed his eyes once more, before taking a deep breath to steel his resolve and turning to look at his father.
"The path I seek, is exile."