Through the Veil of Whispers[BL]

If there's one thing I've learned about Aurenholt, it's that people rarely say what they mean and even more rarely say anything at all.

I'd been here barely two weeks, but I already felt the layers beneath every conversation. Guards who stood too still. Servants who paused too long. And words like 'the Record', 'the Whisper', 'Lady Elarin', spoken not with urgency but like prayers. Or warnings.

It started two nights ago. I was walking past the servant wing when I overheard two voices behind a partly open door. I'd meant to move on, but something in their tone made me pause.

"She won't speak to him," one said. "She hasn't spoken of the Prophecy in years."

The other whispered back, "She must. The Queen's advisor sees more than any of us. If the prophecy is awakening…he has a right to know."

That was all I caught before the door creaked and I slipped away like a coward. But it was enough.

Lady Elarin, The Queen's advisor who I've heard sees. And the prophecy…always circling back to that.

I spent the next day trying to find out who she was without sounding like a threat. Not an easy task when most of the palace treats me like a glass vase they're not sure belongs on the shelf. One of the older attendants, a woman named Maera, mentioned Lady Elarin lived in the Queen's wing, in the upper library no one dared disturb.

I filed it away, but my heart had already decided. I had to go.

After following the description Maera gave me, I got to the Queen library

The Queen's library is tucked away behind a hallway lined with silent portraits. Paintings of long-dead monarchs who seem to watch me with quiet disapproval. The door itself is tall, carved with ancient runes I can't read but somehow feel. My hand hovers just above the handle.

"What am I even doing? This could be a trap, or worse-"

No. I can't turn back now. Too much has changed. Too much is still hidden.

The door opens with a soft groan. Inside, the room is warm, lit only by candlelight and the amber glow of a hearth. Rows of ancient books line the walls, scrolls piled in wooden crates, parchments spread across long tables like sleeping secrets. And at the far end of the room, was a woman sitted.

Lady Elarin.

She looks exactly how I imagined her. Older, but not old. Draped in midnight blue, silver streaks woven through her long hair, and eyes like carved obsidian. She looked up from what she was reading.

"You found me," she says, her voice calm and even. "I wondered how long it would take."

I blink, stunned. "You…were expecting me?"

She nods slowly. "The threads have begun to move. The Disc chose you for a reason."

I step closer, feeling a weight settle on my shoulders. "Everyone keeps talking about fate, about prophesy but no one tells me 'what it actually means'. What is the Whispered Record? Why does it matter?"

Lady Elarin gestures to the chair across from her, and I sink into it, trying not to look confused because everything that has happened makes no sense.

She studies me for a long moment, then says, "The Whispered Record is not a single book. It's the living archive of our history, of the prophecies that shaped Elyndra…and the ones still unfolding. Your arrival, Minjae, was written. Long before your world ever touched ours."

I couldn't breathe for a moment. "That's impossible."

"And yet," she says softly, "here you are."

I grip the arm of the chair, the candlelight dancing in my peripheral vision. "So what am I? A pawn? A hero? A mistake?"

Lady Elarin leans forward slightly. "You are not a mistake. But your path will not be easy. The Prince will not trust you. The court will not understand you. But the Record…has already mentioned you."

The silence that followed was deafening.

What am I supposed to do with that?

I tried to hold her gaze, but it was like staring into a storm, controlled, but barely. Her words echoed in my chest louder than they did in the room.

"The Record has already mentioned you."

I wanted to laugh. Or cry. I wasn't sure which. I'm a museum assistant from Seoul, not some chosen figure in a fantasy world. This was the kind of thing that belonged in the novels I used to shelve during my breaks. And yet here I was, breathing it in, feeling it in my bones.

"You talk like I'm supposed to be important," I said quietly. "But I'm not. I don't have powers. I don't have status. I can't even speak the language fluently."

She tilted her head slightly. "You don't need magic to change the fate of kingdoms."

That pulled a dry chuckle from my lips. "That sounds like something you'd say 'just before' someone dies for the cause."

Lady Elarin gave me a ghost of a smile. "You're clever. Good. You'll need it."

I leaned back in the chair, staring at the books surrounding us.

"Is there a way to go back to my world?"

She stood and went towards the shelves. "No one has."

She returned, setting the book between us. The leather cover was cracked with age, embossed with a single symbol. Three concentric circles, one bleeding into the next. She didn't open it. She simply rested her hand on it.

"It's not meant to be read like a story. You listen to it. You feel it. When the time is right, it reveals what must be known."

"And what if it doesn't want to tell me anything?"

Her expression turned solemn. "Then perhaps you aren't yet ready to hear."

The room fell silent.

I found myself staring at the flickering light on the stone walls. My mind reeled. Since arriving in Aurenholt, I'd been following breadcrumbs, always reacting, always trying to catch up. For the first time, it felt like I was at the center of something, something fragile, and terrifying.

"Is the Prince…part of this prophesy?"

Elarin didn't answer immediately. Her fingers brushed the edge of the book. "He is its shadow…and its light."

What does that even mean?

She seemed to read my confusion, her voice softening. "He carries more than he knows. As do you. Your paths were never meant to cross easily."

I exhaled sharply, leaning forward, resting my elbows on my knees. "He hates me."

"No," she corrected gently. "He fears what you may bring."

I sat with that for a long moment, the fire crackling softly nearby. She was right, in a way. The Prince looked at me like I was a threat he couldn't name. Like I was out of place. Maybe I was. I still felt like it.

"What happens now?" I asked, though I wasn't sure I was ready for the answer.

Lady Elarin turned toward a cabinet in the corner, unlocking it with a delicate bronze key. She retrieved a slender crystal vial containing silvery ink that shimmered unnaturally in the light.

"You begin to listen," she said. "Take this. You'll need it."

I stood cautiously, accepting the vial. It pulsed faintly in my palm, like a heartbeat. "What is it?"

"Memory ink," she said. "The Whispered Record won't speak aloud. But sometimes, in dreams, in moments of stillness…it leaves impressions. This will help you remember what most would forget."

I nodded slowly. It all felt so unreal but so vividly real at the same time.

As I turned to leave, she added, "Minjae."

I glanced back.

"Do not chase the prophecy. Let it come to you. That is how the Whisper works."

I didn't sleep much that night.

Even as I lay on the mattress in my quarters, staring at the carved ceiling, Lady Elarin's words looped over and over in my head. I held the vial in my hand until the candles burned low.

Part of me wondered if this was how it starts, not with a battle or a revelation, but with a whisper, and a book that breathes.

And dreams that begin to speak.

Prince Eryndor's POV

They whisper when they think I'm not listening.

They forget I was raised in silence, trained to hear the weight behind unspoken words. Courtiers and servants alike moving like ghosts through these stone halls, always murmuring just below the surface. As if the walls won't remember.

I lean against the arched window of the east tower, arms crossed, gaze unfocused on the courtyard far below. A drizzle has begun to fall, thin and cold, washing over the stone like it's trying to rinse something away.

There's a tension in the palace lately. A shift in the undercurrent I can't quite place. Everyone feels it, but no one will name it. They just speak softer. Move quicker. Avoid my eyes.

Because of him.

Minjae.

Even thinking his name leaves a strange taste in my mouth. Unfamiliar. Disruptive.

From the moment he arrived, there was something…wrong. Not outwardly. He doesn't carry himself like a threat. No magic, no title, no House to speak of. Just confusion and strange eyes and that damned disc he arrived with. But there's something else, something I can't name. That unsettles me more than I care to admit.

He stares too openly. Like he's looking for something. I don't trust him.

The prophesy resurfaced not two days after he arrived. Priests reciting ancient lines with trembling lips. Lines I've known since childhood. Words that never meant anything. Until now.

"In the age when the moons divide and shadow bleeds into flame,

One born beyond the Veil shall awaken the Crown's fire."

I laughed the first time I heard it. A child's story. Another dusty tale for scholars to obsess over. But now?…Now not anymore.

A knock at the door.

"Speak."

"Your Highness," the guard says. His voice is cautious. "Lady Elarin…has received a visitor."

The breath stills in my chest.

"Who?"

Another pause. "The outsider."

Of course.

I clench my jaw. "Did she summon him?"

"No, Your Highness. He…sought her out."

My fingers twitch against my arm. He shouldn't have known where to find her. No one wanders into the Queen's library. Not without reason. Not without something leading them.

"Leave me," I say.

The door closes behind him. I remain still, staring into the gray clouds.

Lady Elarin will speak to him. She always does when it matters most and when I least want her to.

I try not to let it bother me.

But it does.

Because he doesn't belong here. He doesn't understand this world, its blood-deep politics, its silent wars. And yet he moves through it, untouched, unbent. The palace accepts him. The whispers make room for him.

And part of me wonders…if the prophesy made room for him too.

That should be enough to send him away.

And yet, it isn't.

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