ShadowBound: The Need For Power-Chapter 627: Letting Everything Out (3)

The words lingered in the cool night air long after Percy had spoken them.

They were refining an asset.

Sheila felt her breath catch in her throat, her lungs refusing to draw in air properly as the meaning settled into her bones. For a moment she could not tell whether the chill running through her came from the evening breeze or from the quiet devastation of what she had just heard.

"At first, I told myself I was mistaken," Percy continued, his voice steady, almost detached. "I wanted to be mistaken."

He paused briefly, as though remembering the younger version of himself who had clung to that hope.

"But with each passing year, my doubts faded. The tutors grew stricter. The training sessions lengthened. Evaluations became more frequent, more invasive. The court watched your progress with sharper interest than your well-being." His jaw tightened faintly. "And every time you slipped away to find me, even when I pushed you aside, I still saw it."

Sheila’s throat tightened painfully.

"The fatigue," Percy said quietly. "The strain in your eyes."

Memories rose unbidden.

The long afternoons beneath the sun with hands blistered from repeated casting. The way she had forced smiles when attendants asked about her progress. The quiet moments when she had sought Percy out in hidden corridors or behind the old fountain, pretending she simply wanted company.

"You always claimed you were bored," Percy went on softly. "Or curious about what I was studying. But that wasn’t the truth." He exhaled faintly. "You were searching for something ordinary. Something untouched by expectation."

He paused and glanced at her over his shoulder briefly.

"You were searching for normalcy."

Silence stretched between them, heavy but no longer empty.

"And all of that," Percy resumed after a while, "is what led me to make my decision."

His voice returned to its even cadence.

"I chose to leave the kingdom. To leave everything behind and enroll here in the Dark Knight Academy of Tempest."

More memories began to rise within Sheila’s mind as she vividly remembered her brother’s departure.

"During those five years, I wasn’t only studying at foundation school," he continued. "I was observing. Calculating. Which led to me building what I believed to be a flawless plan."

A faint, humorless smile touched his lips.

"One thing I understood clearly was that Father and Mother still cared about me." His gaze shifted slightly toward the night sky again, eyes distant as if he could see the Crescent palace towers. "Not as they once had, though. Not as parents, perhaps. But as political assets."

Sheila frowned faintly, confusion mixing with unease.

"Our kingdom’s rivalry with Solara and Tempest has always been delicate," Percy said. "Father values dominance—not just in military strength, but in perception. Influence and reputation."

His voice held no accusation. Only analysis.

"Even at a young age, I could see it," he went on. "I could see how much he valued maintaining superiority over the other two kingdoms. And that is when I realized something."

He finally turned slightly toward her.

"If I, the crown prince of Crescent, chose to enroll in the Dark Knight Academy of Tempest rather than Noble Knight Academy in our own kingdom... it would not be interpreted as simple defiance."

Sheila felt the weight of it before he said the next part.

"For anyone else, it would be youthful rebellion," Percy said calmly. "However, for me... it would be a political insult."

The implication settled heavily in the air.

"When I made the decision, it was not impulsive," he continued. "By then, I had studied the inter-kingdom accords thoroughly. There is a clause—one that prohibits any kingdom from interfering with a citizen’s academy enrollment. It is binding and non-negotiable."

He spoke as though reciting law.

"Neither Crescent, nor Solara, nor Tempest could lawfully prevent a student from choosing where to study. Not without fracturing diplomatic balance."

His gaze hardened slightly.

"That meant Father could not stop me without risking public diplomatic fallout. If he attempted to interfere, it would signal instability. It would undermine Crescent’s authority in the eyes of the other kingdoms."

"And you understood all that at fourteen... fifteen?" Sheila asked quietly, disbelief woven into her tone.

"Yes," Percy replied simply.

The moonlight caught in his eyes then, revealing something beyond calculation.

Resolve.

And beneath it, something more fragile.

"But politics was never my true objective," he said.

Those words made Sheila’s breath hitch for a moment.

"My true objective was you."

Her eyes widened slightly.

"I knew Father and Mother were fully aware that you still cared for me," Percy continued. "They knew you continued to seek me out. They knew that, despite the distance I gave you, you had not let go."

He held her gaze now.

"And I also knew they were intelligent enough to recognize that my departure to Tempest would not be the greatest threat to them."

He paused for a moment.

"The greater threat," he finished quietly, "would be losing what they had come to value most."

His voice lowered slightly.

"Not their daughter."

His eyes darkened.

"But your affinities."

Sheila’s breathing faltered, then stilled entirely for a brief moment, as though her body itself needed time to catch up with what her mind was beginning to grasp.

"I knew," Percy continued steadily, "that it would only be a matter of time before you chose to follow in my footsteps."

His voice was calm, but every word felt deliberate.

"You were never the type to remain confined forever. And Father and Mother knew that too. They understood how deeply you cared for me. They understood that if I could walk away from Crescent and choose another path... you might one day do the same."

He lifted his gaze toward the stars, their faint light reflecting in his eyes.

"And if that happened," he went on, "they would lose far more than face."

Sheila listened in silence, her heartbeat loud in her ears.

"You were not merely their daughter in the eyes of the kingdom," Percy said. "You were the embodiment of Crescent’s restored legacy. Three primary affinities awakened in one royal heir. You became public hope. Political stability. A symbol of resurgence."

His tone did not mock the idea. It simply stated it.

"If you expressed even the slightest intention of departing—especially to another kingdom’s academy—it would place them in an impossible position. They could not forbid you without appearing tyrannical. The people would question why their gifted princess sought education elsewhere." His eyes remained on the sky. "Yet they could not permit it freely either. Allowing you to leave would risk losing the very emblem they had cultivated so carefully."

Slowly, understanding began to form on Sheila’s face.

"If they wanted to prevent that outcome," Percy added, "they would have to change."

The word lingered.

"They would have to reconsider the way they treated you. They could no longer afford to view you primarily as an asset. Not if that perspective risked driving you away." His jaw tightened faintly. "Everything would need to shift. The structure. The expectations. The balance between affection and ambition."

He turned his head slightly, though not fully.

"They would need to give you a reason to stay."

His voice softened.

"Something stronger than ambition. Stronger than duty. Stronger than expectation."

Now he turned completely, facing her under the pale wash of moonlight.

"They would have to offer you something real."

Sheila felt her pulse pound unevenly in her chest.

"They would have to offer you genuine affection," Percy finished quietly. "Not love woven with obligation. Not care tied to performance. But something unconditional."

The night felt impossibly still.

"So you left," Sheila whispered, her voice fragile, almost disbelieving. "You left... so they would love me more."

Percy’s expression did not brighten. There was no satisfaction in his eyes.

Instead, his features grew even more subdued.

"I left," he corrected gently, "so they would remember that children are not treasures to be guarded or weapons to be sharpened."

His gaze held hers steadily.

"They are bonds."

A faint pause.

"And bonds," he added quietly, "can break if held too tightly."

When Percy’s voice finally fell silent, the quiet that followed felt almost oppressive.

Sheila did not immediately realize that she was trembling. It was only when a dull ache began to pulse through her fingers that she became aware of how tightly she had curled them into her palms, her nails pressing into her skin hard enough to leave crescent marks. Her body had reacted before her mind had caught up, as though it needed something solid to anchor itself against the weight of everything she had just heard.

His words lingered between them like smoke that refused to disperse—thick, invasive, impossible to ignore.

She stared at him.

Not at the outline of his figure beneath the moonlight, not at the uniform he wore, but at his face. At his eyes.

For a fleeting, disorienting moment, it felt as though she were looking at a stranger wearing the shape of her brother. The boy she had once chased through palace corridors, the one who used to kneel beside her and explain simple myst theory with patient amusement, felt distant from the composed figure standing before her now.

Even after he had explained everything—every reason, every calculation, every sacrifice he believed he had made—she could not bring herself to immediately understand him.

And she certainly could not forgive him so easily.

Because what she felt was not simple anger.

It was not simple gratitude either.

It was a storm of contradictions—hurt tangled with reluctant admiration, resentment braided with sorrow, love strained by years of silence. The emotions crashed against one another inside her chest, making it difficult to separate one from the next.

"You planned it," she whispered at last.

The words were soft, but they did not waver entirely. They were not a question, though they carried disbelief.

The wind caught the faint tremor in her voice and carried it into the garden, scattering it among the hedges and marble columns before it could settle.

"You left," she continued, her gaze never leaving his, "knowing exactly what it would do."