That night, the whole stone palace slowly became quiet.
The laughter from earlier had long faded, the bowls had already been washed and stacked away, and even the fire had been fed one last time so it would last through the deepest part of the cold. Outside, the snow still fell without stopping, covering the ground, the roofs, the watch paths, and the outer walls in clean white layers that looked peaceful from far away.
But peace was only what the night looked like on the surface.
Inside the palace, the warmth of sleep had already settled over most of the rooms. One by one, breaths had evened out, voices had gone silent, and the people who lived there had disappeared behind fur curtains, wooden doors, and thick hide coverings. The winter wind could still be heard when it brushed against stone corners or slipped through far cracks, but inside, everything felt heavy and still in the way a place did when everybody sleeping under one roof trusted their home enough to close their eyes.
