“Who told you anyone needed to ask?” she says. “Or that your path has to make sense?"

  They arrive together into a hallway that feels, above all else, controlled. The walls do not lean here. The lamps do not flicker. Even the floorboards seem to breathe in unison... as if to say, ‘We are smoother here’ as if it was a space that had already passed judgment and had its paperwork filed away.

  Even the air is less eager here. It carries that faint scent of pressed linen and dried flowers, something polite and preserved, like stepping into a very old book that no longer expects to be read. Or perhaps a grandparent who long ago stopped expecting visits, unless they made the effort themselves. A sentiment Eileen finds herself settling into, just a little. As if the stillness here, curated and deliberate, is a kindness in the way that stopping can be a comfort if one has been moving too long.

  So she exhales slowly, smoothing the edge of her shawl with one thumb as it brushes upon an errant piece, pulled up from the rest.

  “Oh good, doors.” Xozo says, as if that solves something. She doesn’t move. Not right away. Just lifts her chin. Adjusts her sleeves.

  Like the sight of doors is a cue, and she’s the one meant to walk through first. “Okay,” she says, quietly. To herself, maybe. To the hallway, maybe. Just to get the air moving again.

  Then, motion. Turning, Xozo half looks at Eileen, half scans the hall. “Okay. I’ve been here. My family comes often. I come often,” she says, reassuring herself even as she glances back for that particular kind of approval only the elderly can give.

  “So therefore one of these has to be my mother’s salon.” Xozo mutters while tapping her lip. “Maybe the one with the emerald frame? Dark wood was her style once.” She tries the handle. Locked.

  “Ahh, maybe the one with the little curl at the top?” Second door, also locked.

  “Oh! This one is nice. Velvet I think. That was in last year? Right?” The third door opens with a click and as it cracks open, it blasts a puff of warm glitter-scented wind in Xozo’s face. She slams it shut. “Nope. Not that one. That’s... that’s a different kind of design language. Avant-garde. Or maybe it was breathing?”

  “Do you know where we’re going, dear?” Eileen asks gently. “I am manifesting opportunity through initiative.” Xozo replies the words rolling off her shoulder as she arrives at the next door which is a little scuffed at the bottom. The kind of door you’d expect to lead to a mop closet.

  Meanwhile Eileen lingers, drifting down the hall, not hurrying; she is enjoying the pace of the place. Until her fingers brush against the edge of a brass sconce on the wall shaped like a half-melted hourglass. Warm. Like a hug from a child one cares for.

  It reminds her of Thompton. Not the whole city though, just a tucked-away corner shop beside a small cider brewery, where the shop keep, Keith never asked if you were staying long, only whether you liked the shades of the store up or down. So Eileen touches the sconce again. Not to test it. Just to say thank you.

  “Locked!” Xozo calls, then without pause, she moves on, the next door is a polished walnut panel with no markings, except for a name that fades in as she nears. She scowls. “Also locked,” she exhales through her teeth.

  “It’s always the seventh. Or the greenest. Or the one furthest from the shadow.” Her voice mimics confidence, like she’s quoting something she memorized for a test that never arrived. She then gives a small laugh to the hallway which doesn't last.

  Another door. Another. Then she’s moving faster. Handles. Any of them. Just something that turns.

  Eileen stops. The door in front of her is, at first, unremarkable. Soft tan wood. No name. No light. Just a faint bow in the grain... like someone spent years leaning against it, quietly holding the other side. Eileen doesn’t know the door. But she knows the feeling it’s made of.

  Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

  The kind of holding that expects no thanks. Just the ache of keeping something safe. The quiet conviction of waiting until someone arrives. Like this door, bowed not from burden, but from presence. The shape, an echo from the other side... indented by decades of guarding, of choosing, of staying. Of saying I’ll hold this, even when no one’s watching.

  It is feeling Eileen feels knows far too well and so she finds her hand reaching for the handle. But she does not open it right away. Instead, she pauses to adjust her shawl, smooth a corner, and inspect a line. Only then does she feel she can open it while honoring its intentions.

  And just as the door swings wide, Eileen witnesses on the far end of the salon, another door clicking softly shut.

  “Xozo. Can you come here for a minute?” Eileen asks in that curious kind of way. Stepping in, she is greeted by the scent of roses, dried, not fresh, which curl around her like an old memory of Daniel, of course. The memory bends toward him the way this room bends toward stillness. The salon is uncomfortably vast. Circular. Still. The furniture within is plush and heavy, each piece embroidered in gold thread with a sigil she doesn’t recognize. There are no attendants, no music and the only other door across the room had already clicked softly shut behind someone she hadn’t seen.

  “Oh, my. Wow.” Xozo’s voice cracks up from behind, one octave away from panic, like her voice is chasing a thought she hasn’t caught yet. “How…?” she stammers, slurring slightly.

  It takes Xozo several more seconds before her words make sense. “How are we in this salon? My grandmother hasn’t even been here. No one in my family ever has.”

  She nearly pulls back her hood in disbelief, then thinks better of it, clutching the edge instead. Her whole body practically vibrates, visible even under her cloak. “I don’t even know if Countess Whisperbane has been in this place, and yet I’m… I’m on a first name basis with a VIP who has access to it?”

  Eileen hums politely, stepping further into the salon. Toward a colossal mirror stretching impossibly high. Hundreds of feet, maybe more, vanishing past the curve of the room, like it’s reaching into another architecture entirely. Its edges covered in rose gold. Faint. Bloomed. Filigree that is impossibly thin, like it’s not meant to be seen, only remembered in dreams of the place.

  But it’s not the size that draws her. Not the way it vanishes into the ceiling, or the way the filigree sings at the edge of understanding. It’s something beneath it. Beneath the shimmer. Beneath the gold.

  There's a tension here. Like a thread pulled too tight. A story half-mended, half-hiding. A story that draws Eileen towards it tenderly, her gaze not drawn to the height, or grandeur, or impossibility. But rather to the cracks. The thin ones just beneath the outermost layer of filigree, added as if to cover the imperfections.

  “Why do you think Countess Whisperbane has never visited this place, dear?” Eileen asks, her voice slow, candid, as she rises from the mirror.

  Xozo scoffs. “Please. She would tell us. She tells everyone everything.” Then she launches into a speech, half memorized, half panicked. “Sure, technically, there’s that obscenely distant cosmic relative. Duchess Inomé. But even that wouldn’t get her in here. This is bloodline-level. Orrynthal-level. And the family’s so bloated, so mythically tangled, she probably isn’t even a footnote of a footnote. She’s noise in the margins of a record no one reads even within the Ebony Quill archives.”

  “So yeah. She would give anything to step one foot inside. And as my downline distributor, I am going to do everything to help you secure your first deal.”

  She begins rearranging the tea set without thinking, cups askew, one plate upside down. Because, if she were being honest, this place was a bore. All this opulence. All this embroidery. And for what? Frivolous drivel. There were children at the entrance who barely had enough to eat, they didn't even have proper bandages.

  But something in what Xozo said catches her thoughts. It felt important and weighty, even if she wasn't sure what it was, and so she replies, the best she can, unsure if anything was even asked. “Do I need to sign something?”

  Xozo doesn’t answer, instead she begins to pace. “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god!” she chants, her cloak nearly sweeping a polished vase from its pedestal. “This changes everything. Once they see us come out of here, once she sees me, sees me with you, she’ll have to recognize me."

  "She’ll have to listen. I have ideas. Good ideas.” Xozo stops pacing. “No, I have great ideas,” she reaffirms to herself.

  Xozo then turns toward the far door, the one that clicked shut when they arrived. Pausing before she leaves she takes one last look towards the mirror, her face still hidden within her cloak. Then she turns away.

  “Stay here,” she says, breath catching like she’s holding in a final thought.

  “Don’t move. Don’t touch anything else. I’ll be right back!” She’s gone before Eileen can respond. And for a moment, the room is still again.

  Still and listening.