The king was coming home today. He'd been gone for a little over a month at war. The castle was bustling, servants running to and fro to begin the preparations. Lunch needed to be ready and served when he arrived, for him and his loyal knights. Not for Yuichiro's eighth birthday. It was unlikely the staff remembered, let alone his father. This was simply a coincidence. Yuichiro gazed out his window, watching the sun rise from behind the far hills in the east. It was mornings like these, after another night full of tossing and turning, that he longed to hold his mother's hand. His mother had been kind and always looked at Yuichiro with a smile, but she passed away some odd months ago. While Yuichiro didn’t know exactly what was wrong with her, he understood something was wrong. He wished the doctors told him what, because two weeks later, she was gone.
The king remarried four months later. Yuichiro's stepmother looked at him as if he were vermin before ignoring him completely. Now Yuichiro would be pleased with such a look. At least she'd be looking. Yuichiro had a little sister due in less than three months.
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One of the staff would be coming soon to wake Yuichiro up. They’d make him bathe, and they’d groom him only enough to be presentable to the townspeople. His tutor would be the one to accompany him to town after breakfast. The current queen would not be there. He would climb up onto his father’s horse and greet a few townspeople with his father, who would smile at him. They did this every time the king returned from battle. It’s their routine, and after the death of his mother, Yuichiro wondered how long it would take for the king to look at him the way his stepmother does. Yuichiro, with his mother’s