It was meant to be a celebration.
A few days after her arrival, the city of Vartis declared a formal holiday. Markets were shuttered, flags raised, the streets swept clean. Her name — Duchess Frances Elarion — had been printed on banners in tight, gold-trimmed lettering.
It was all choreographed. Dignified. Inevitable.
And wrong.
Preparation
She slept three hours the night before.
The rest was spent bent over ancient ledgers, whispering tax codes to herself by candlelight, and trying to recall which hand gesture meant “modest acknowledgment” and which meant “arrogant dismissal” in ducal etiquette.
The dress she wore — soft blue, structured, embroidered with mountain lilies — had been selected by three separate women over two hours of pinning and debate. It looked stately. Regal. Uncomfortable.
As the carriage waited in the courtyard, she caught her reflection in a polished mirror and thought:
You don’t even look like yourself anymore.
The Procession
The carriage began its slow descent through Vartis.
First, the upper city — clean stone avenues, tall balconies, perfumed nobles watching with narrowed eyes and knowing smiles. Their applause was light. Controlled. The kind of sound one makes for a performance they did not request.
“That’s the Candlekeep girl?” someone murmured above her.
“Does she even own land?” another whispered. “Or just books?”
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Fran waved anyway. Polite. Reserved.
The nobles didn’t look at her like a ruler.
They looked at her like a placeholder.
In the merchant quarter, the mood shifted — not kinder, just different.
Artisans lined the walkways, flanked by apprentices and stockboys. They cheered, but their eyes were calculating.
How will this one tax us?
Will she support the guilds or the nobles?
Can she even read a shipping charter without help?
A pair of jewelers smiled up at her — bright, charming — and immediately returned to whispering behind their hands.
One baker bowed too deeply. Another didn’t bow at all.
Then the lower streets.
Closer to the river, past the docks and granaries, past soldiers standing at attention and longshoremen loitering near the alleys.
They didn’t cheer.
They stared.
Some waved. Most didn’t.
A few turned away altogether.
A boy shouted, “That’s the new one!” and was immediately hushed by his mother, who glanced at Fran’s carriage with the unease of someone not sure which eyes were watching.
Someone laughed too loud.
Someone else spat into the gutter just after the wheels rolled past.
The City
Vartis was massive — old, layered, scarred.
From her seat in the carriage, Fran could see fragments of history in every broken arch and rebuilt wall. The shadows of the old empire clung to the city like ivy.
She tried to absorb it. To be moved by it.
She tried to enjoy the moment.
But the longer she watched the faces along the road, the more she saw it:
The wariness.
The silent contempt.
The waiting — for her to stumble, to fail, to vanish like a passing scandal.
And worst of all: the few faces that didn’t doubt her at all.
They believed in her.
Or at least wanted to.
And she didn’t know what to do with that.
The Return
The parade ended at the foot of the palace, where the guard captain saluted her with crisp formality and the banners snapped in the wind.
“Duchess Frances Elarion,” the steward intoned.
The gates opened.
Fran stepped out of the carriage.
She felt the stone beneath her boots, the weight of the silk at her back, the ache of the ring pressing into her glove.
She walked inside.
Not proud.
Not confident.
Just determined not to look like she was flinching.
In her chambers, she unpinned her own hair.
The letter sat on the table.
Still unopened.
She looked at it.
Then at her hands. At the dress wrinkled from sitting. At the edge of her reflection in the mirror.
They all think I’ll fail. Or that I’ll succeed and become someone they can control.
She touched the envelope.
Didn’t break the seal.
Not yet.
