The multi-level ceremonial dais was set up in the Reception Hall. It was an impromptu prep mockup for an imminent ceremony with unspecified parameters. Soleil had not exactly been announced. They rested in the breath-holding phase for media explanation of the new change in the ruling family. People weren’t all sure what had happened. The day was hardly out. But, there was a tea service and cushions waiting on the top platform, and the atmospheric lighting was adjusted to a soft spotlight. The hall was otherwise empty.

The central doors were opened to let in just the two Magus sisters, Soleil and Mireille. Companionably somber, they walked abreast toward and up the tiered platforms. They wore smooth grey attire. Under the spotlight, they each took a cushion seat and arranged their preferred bolster on a serving set.

Once they had each taken a sip, Soleil spoke, confronting the crux of the discussion. “I won’t be accepted well enough for effective rule. I’ve been figuring through this from my newly forged perspective. I was able to take this much this far, but – things are now very different. You know I learned a lot about the job, and about myself in preparation for the job. This is not a scenario, and this cannot unfold automatically.”

“You got to know a lot of people, the people. As much love as they’ve shown you, I feel that if anyone, you would recognize and be able to honestly admit impending error. Still, it’s a thunderous assessment. Soleil, this whole time, nobody really thought that you wouldn’t become Queen. But, I hear what you’re telling me.”

This was like when they play-acted royal court as children. Now, they were acting on royal court matters. It was a long path from childhood to statehood. “My mind is in a different place now, a very different place. I carry too many feelings of mistrust, that may have been rightly earned. I remember when it was easier to know what I would do, but that doesn’t mean I can trade in my experience to restore that. I have some ideas, but not of the long-expected kind.”

“There will be many kinds of uproar,” said Mireille over the edge of her cup, “amongst contingents.”

“Oh, yes. I’ve imagined many of the labels. Some strong ones will include the word ‘traitor.’ The amount of explanation I present may not matter against certain likely unending difficulties, regardless of the necessities I’ve faced.” Soleil eyed Mireille as she set her cup down. “I don’t believe these problems would hound you, as they would me.”

“People haven’t had enough prior notice to carry as many problems with me – though in your protracted absence, I began to feel some weight of expectation.”

The breeze went still, the scent of an indefinable flower floating from the ground far below. Sword balancing out at an angle, as though it may yet come to life and hurt her too in this moment alone, Soleil walked over to the scroll on the floor. The pen lay near it, and she picked it up with her free hand. She examined the details of its fine craftsmanship, then pointed it at the signature frame at the base of the document. With detachment, she traced the shape of a curlicue laid in activated carbon-rich ink. She looked at the pen in her palm, then the blade sprouting from the hilt clasped in the other. Holding both, she walked out onto the balcony and tilted her face up to the light, pupils widening to take in the revelation. She spoke to the painted sky.

What does it mean to be
in a story? One can be
in a story about them,
or not about them.
A story is like a place,
a story is like a time,
but is neither – it could
be a dimension, inasmuch
as a thought has dimension
along an axis; there are
people who have a
dimension for their thoughts,
where changes occur.
Do real things happen in
stories the way stories
happen in real things?
Is a story a form of
transcendence, making us
greater than ourselves?
Does one’s existence carry
more meaning for others
through story? A reflection
for others, if they are
courageous enough to see
themselves in such a way.

Can one get out of a story,
or having been in it, will one
forever have been in it?
If lives are more than stories,
do stories become more
than lives? Do they happen
about us, without us?
Who possesses a story,
the character or the one
who comprehends?
Who makes a story –
universal forces, characters,
the messenger, the recipient –
or all? It seems to me
to be all. There are
characters behind the
characters – we could call them
people, but that may confuse
between the people in the story
and the people outside the story.
People outside the story may
be in the story, as the story
becomes a part of
something outside itself.
Time passes from paragraph
to paragraph, and a story is
part of a life, a companion
that knits time into a single
piece, marking remembrance.

Time is long or short, within
a time that is long or short.
A year may have passed like
a week, or a month, or a day
where we were. Maybe
something shifted while we
sat and perceived.
What is in service to a
story, and how is a story
in service? Is perception
the only thing that links it
all together? Stories also
disappear or die; like people,
they have a life and they fade.
Like people, do they live on
in the ripples they make?
Is there an imprint of this
perception left on reality –
maybe to be reformed in a
new person outside the story,
who sees themselves in
another story? Is a story
what’s left behind? Like a
chalk outline filled with flowers –
but an outline of several people,
or billions, rediscovered
outside of its event like the
ruin of an ancient building,
something for our feet to
stand in, and wonder for
ourselves. When the rain
falls, the flowers open while
the stone melts a little more.
There was something that
made a mark in passing,
like ourselves, something
that briefly was everything.

Acamar replied in reflection.

I know the gate
between places;
I am the gate
between one state
and the next,
in some senses.
A place is not like
another place, and
states of being differ
characteristically.
The between
is not either.
Something happens,
and another state of
being is reached.
Sometimes there is a
somewhere or a something.
We may not know what
it is, though it may be
defined to us by wondering.
There are also nether
betweens, such as myself.
Not even I claim
to know all such matters,
just that I am familiar
with the indefinable.
It is part of my core.
What holds things together
by holding them apart?
Is it a force or a thing?
Am I a thing or a force?

I believe that I may have
been present here on
multiple orders of importance.
The chaos of your crisis
created a circumstance
that made my being call to
itself with exceptional draw.
This occurrence, event –
condolences – adjoined
to my realm, unto
unknown reaches.

There are layers,
and levels, and
boundaries, and walls,
and veils, and gates, and
doors, and there was one
here, and many.
Ways through are
all different.
Sometimes the passage
is what you call time,
elsewise it may be
change in form,
in mind, in state.
It may form itself,
and is also the gate.
I may be the movement
and the moved.

With this, the shifting ebony Dragon circled ‘er architecturally-sized coils once. Indicating direction, Acamar shifted again. Meeting eyes with Soleil once more, the Dragon went and joined the revelation.