A fine layer of dust has settled over everything. I run my finger along the nearest bookshelf, the top of his wingback chair, the edge of his mahogany desk, leaving a visible trail behind as I make my way deeper into the sanctum. Signs of life slowly materialize: there’s a half-empty glass of scotch sitting beside a ledger; a box of cigars waiting to be smoked on the low table by the fireplace. I notice a pen on the floor, dropped in haste and left behind.
It’s strange to see these lingering traces of Linus. My father was not a man I knew well, let alone understood with any degree of confidence. We were only just beginning to get comfortable around each other when he slipped away from me forever, taking with him any real chance for a fulfilling father-daughter relationship.
The doctors said it was a stroke — one so massive, he likely felt no pain at all when it happened. An unavoidable end, triggered by an arbitrary external stressor: in Linus’ case, the Vasgaard Square attack.
It could’ve happened at any point,the medical examiner assured me.If not today, then tomorrow or the next. He was walking around with a time bomb in his head. It was only a matter of when it would detonate.
I lower myself into my father’s chair with a tentative plop that sends a plume of dust into the air. Sneezing particles out of my nose, I reach out and run my fingers across the page of the ledger in front of me. It’s still open to a half-written page. I notice a splotch of ink on the lower left corner — a spot where the fountain pen lingered just a moment too long, bleeding into the paper. I wonder if this is what he was working on the moment disaster struck.
Am I staring at the last lines he ever etched?
Leaning forward, I scan the sheet for anything of significance, but it’s merely a spreadsheet of names and numbers — a budgetary breakdown of castle employee salaries, from the look of it.
Rather a dry final contribution to society.
Disappointment curdles in the pit of my stomach, sour as spoiled milk. I’m not sure what I was hoping to find by finally coming here. Some conclusive clue into my father’s character? An epilogue chapter for a story cut short? What would offer me the clarity I’m so plainly seeking?
Perhaps a handwritten letter detailing all the mistakes he ever made as a man — chief among them, the neglect of his only child.
I snort lightly.
What delusional world are you living in, Emilia?
This isn’t a Hollywood movie or a fairy tale. This is real life. And the more I experience of it, the more I realize life rarely follows any sort of script. Endings aren’t always conclusive, let alone happy. I may never get the closure I crave when it comes to my father. The sooner I make peace with that, the more content I’ll be.
I spend a few more minutes digging around Linus’ desk, trying my best not to disturb anything too greatly — an archaeologist uncovering clues without altering the integrity of the site. When I leave, I take only two small souvenirs with me: a leather-bound journal I cannot yet bring myself to pry open and an antique silver cigar lighter, engraved with a double-headed lion. The Lancaster crest. I don’t smoke, but that’s not really the point.
Despite my best intentions, I’d gotten my hopes up about what I might discover when I finally worked up the courage to come in here. Feeling oddly anticlimactic, I tuck my treasures against my chest and push the desk chair back in, precisely the way I found it. There’s nothing for me in this place. No new connections to be made. No posthumous glimpses of clarity or comfort.
Be grateful for the few memories you have with him, Emilia.
Few is far better than none.
My slippers are so thick, I barely feel the crunch at first; the slightest crinkle of paper beneath a sole as I step around an ornate end table on my way to the door. Glancing down, I see the corner of something sticking out beneath my foot. When my fingers close on the paper, its glossy surface smooth under my grip, I realize it’s a photograph — the contents of which make my heart lurch inside my chest. Because…
It’s a photograph ofme.
Snapped from afar on the night of my coronation as Germania’s Crown Princess, judging by the gold ballgown I’m wearing, this is a candid angle I’ve never seen before — certainly not one of the official press photos released to the public, where I appear so stuffy and staged I might as well be a mannequin.
In this picture, I’m not looking at the lens. My gaze is trained elsewhere, off-camera. There’s a faraway look on my face, a lazy half-smile tugging at my lips. I wonder what I was looking at when the photographer clicked his shutter down; who inspired that dazed, almost dreamy expression, immortalized forever on film.
Fingers shaking, I flip over the photograph and examine the back side. There are four words written there in a messy, masculine scrawl. As I read them, my eyes begin to sting and all my earlier thoughts about this detour being a waste of time go right out of my head.
“My extraordinary daughter, Emilia.”
The word ‘extraordinary’ is underlined.
Twice.
Knees feeling suddenly weak, I sink into the closest armchair — the one that still smells faintly of aftershave and cigar smoke and fine ink — and press the photograph to my chest. Directly over my heart, as if to absorb the words into my skin.
And there, in a dusty office, for the first time since I heard the words “The king is dead”three months ago… I allow myself a moment to grieve. Not as a subject mourning her monarch. Not as an heir mourning her predecessor. But as a daughter, lamenting the loss of her father.
I grieve for the man I almost knew. For the relationship we almost had. For the future that almost was.
In another life…
It might’ve been extraordinary.