Sunggyu squinted as he pressed his ear against the door.

“Two straight lines,” commented a passerby named Doojoon as he gave his friend a teasing smile.

Sunggyu’s expression turned into a frown making his eyes disappear even more as he placed a finger in front of his lips. Silently, he mouthed, “I’m trying to listen.”

Doojoon raised a brow and stuck his head on the door next to his friend’s.

“What are you doing?” Doojoon asked with a hushed voice.

“What are you doing?” a voice asked as the door suddenly swung open. A tall girl stood in front of them with a surprised look on her face.

“Ah, Victoria,” Sunggyu stammered. “Well, you see… Hum…”

“Just say it already?”

Doojoon turned to the woman who just talked. “Fei,” he noted. “You were there too?”

Fei was sitting in an armchair inside the room. She cocked her head. “Of course. This is my room after all.”

“Kim Sunggyu, Yoon Doojoon, the fact that you are royalty doesn’t give you the right to spy on others,” Victoria pointed out with a patient smile only a teacher could manage.

 “Well, cousins,” Sunggyu addressed after regaining composure, “I don’t consider myself as such. And I am not as near to the main branch as you are, Victoria.”

The woman gave a knowing nod and raised her eyes to the ceiling. “Why are you there?”

“I heard some very interesting news about some cousin of ours.”

“Which one? We have so many,” Fei interrupted, slightly annoyed.

“You know which one! The whole castle is talking about it. And I figured you would know since you are so close.”

Victoria turned to her friend inside the room with a worried expression. Sighing, Fei stood up and invited them in, closing the door behind them.

Doojoon awkwardly took a seat on Fei’s velvet couch. He scanned the room, noticing it was probably as big as his own and was divided in few specific spaces. More than a room, it was like a suite with its own lounge where they were currently sitting. For a moment now, he had kept quiet, unsure on what the whole conversation was about. Maybe the whole castle was talking about it, but he sure hadn’t heard anything unusual… Maybe he’d gain to actually stay inside more instead of wandering around.

“So is it true?” Sunggyu asked curiously. “Is there really a sensorium behind our walls?”

Doojoon’s eyes widened and he leaned forward to get a better understanding of the conversation. Fei and Victoria exchanged another glance.

“It’s true," Victoria admitted. “But information wasn’t supposed to leak out that way! Who told everyone?”

“Probably a mind reader or someone with very good hearing,” Doojoon hypothesized. “This castle is full of secrets. We can’t blame anyone if they try to uncover them…”

“But this is something else,” Fei explained. “There hadn’t been a sensorium for the last century, at least! Not as long as the truce between both Yong and Beom had been established. Do you understand what it means?”

“War.”

The other three stayed quiet after Sunggyu dropped the last comment.

“We have to protect her. She’ll be sent to Ko, far away from the border,” Victoria kept on informing them.

“Ko is an awful place for a princess!” Sunggyu declared showing his disapproval.

“The world is an awful place for a sensorium,” corrected Fei with a sad smile. “I have to go. You can stay and keep discussing though. Victoria can fill you in. I have work.”

Fei walked toward the door and spun on her heel midway. “Don’t tell anyone. If the information somehow reached Yong…” She left her sentence hanging as she left the room, the possible consequences being processed through the others’ minds.

“What will happen, now?” Sunggyu asked.

“We will keep acting as if we know nothing. I will resume my duties and so will you,” Victoria answered.

While all of them were part of the royal family, only Victoria was close enough to the main branch to be considered royalty. As such, she was allowed an apartment in the castle without having to do anything unlike Doojoon, Sunggyu, Fei and many others who took on various jobs. Nevertheless, Victoria chose to act as a house-manager, or a castle-manager, and take care of the place, directing and dispatching everything that needed to be done. On the other hand, Doojoon and Sunggyu both had came to the castle as teachers for the young royalty. Fei was a special case. Having always been close with the main branch’s younger princess, she had taken the role of a governess and attended to the princess directly.

“I don’t think you can stop the information from travelling. Not something so big. It’ll reach Yong; it’s just a matter of time.”

Victoria eyed Doojoon and sighed, agreeing to his point of view.

“I know. This is why it’s so important to keep her away from the border.”

“Still,” Sunggyu commented. “Sensoria are supposed to appear during times of need. They were the ones behind the construction of most cities as well as the ones who brought peace on the continent. Why would there be a need for a sensorium now? We aren’t at war.”

“We don’t know much about our own government let alone Yong’s,” Victoria said. “But which country wants war exactly?”

“I don’t want to go,” Suzy complained. “I don’t want these powers either.”

Fei sat down on the bed of Beom’s royal family’s third child. The room was situated in a tower near the middle of the castle that was only accessible through a spiraling staircase. The only other exit was the window. This tower was truly a prison.

The eighteen year old girl seemed on the verge of tears. Fei wrapped her arms around her frail body, pulling her close to her chest.

“I don’t know what to do, Fei. I never wanted to be different. I never looked for power! And now they want to make me go train in Ko and they said I would be the heir to the kingdom. It shouldn’t be me! What will my brother think? Or my sister…”

“It’s going to be okay,” Fei tried to soothe her while caressing her hair like a mother would. “I know you are confused, but it’s going to be okay.”

Suzy let herself be comforted by her favorite cousin before pulling out.

“I’m scared,” she said looking at the older woman. “I can’t be what they expect me to be.”

“You are the most capable girl I have ever met. You are kind, honest and respectful. You never wished for power so there is no one more perfect to become a sensorium.”

Suzy lowered her eyes under the compliments. “But I lied,” she whispered softly. “I didn’t want to be a sensorium so I kept quiet while in fact, I knew for few years now.”

Suzy had hoped the powers would go away if she didn’t acknowledged them but they only grew stronger. She had only been discovered because she managed to stop time accidentally as she fell off her horse, last month. It had taken her parents many days to decide the best course of event. And there she was, about to be sent off to another city, away from the people she loved and cared about.

The sun had set for quite a few minutes and Suzy slipped under the covers. Fei stood up beside the bed, rubbing the younger girl’s hair affectionately.

“Everything is going to be okay. I will be with you every step of the way if you want. Your family won’t let you down.”

“Thanks,” she said as the governess was walking away.

“Fei?” she called her back. “I can see what you are willing to do for me. Thank you, really.”

“You can see my future?” the older girl asked curiously.

Suzy nodded briefly before drifting to sleep.

Fei looked down at the girl with tenderness. Such a big fate for such a young girl.

As soon as the older woman was gone, Suzy opened an eye. Pushing back the blankets, she swung her legs on the edge of the bed. Reaching the carpeted floor, Suzy pulled herself up. With a sigh, she slouched over to her mirror.

“I want to see my family,” she said in a soft voice.

Images appeared on the surface of the looking glass. In the left corner, a boy carrying a bag, walking in the middle of the Yongian forest, in the right corner, a girl playing harmonica sitting in her casement window all the way back in Mae and in the middle, her dear old parents, both sitting on their thrones leading what seemed to be a reunion. “About me, most likely,” Suzy reckoned.

She passed a hand on the flat surface of the mirror, shivering when she felt how cold it was.

“I’m sorry Dongjun, I never wanted to take your place. You’d be the better ruler, we all know it. I’m sorry for taking away your birthright and make you go through so much worry all the time.”

“I’m sorry Hyunju. We were never close but that’s probably my fault. I wished I knew more of you. I’m sorry for the fact we’ll be even further apart.”

“Mom, Dad… Don’t do this to me. Don’t make me even more of a prisoner than I already am. I never wanted to be different, all I ever wished for was to be free.”

She sighed and took a step back. There was so many things she wished to say out loud, all the time, but she never managed to speak the truth. She could only stand here, in front of their images, hoping they’d hear her but knowing it would never be the case.

“Show me the future,” she asked the mirror that complied without fault.

Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. If Suzy could find at least one sliver of a better life ahead for her, she’d accept the decisions from the choices that weren’t hers.