Packing was an act of surreal symbolism. Hadrian stood in his dressing room, staring at racks of tailored jackets, silk cravats, and polished boots. They were the armor of Prince Hadrian Valentoire. He pushed them aside and opened a long-forgotten trunk. Inside were items from his youth: sturdy boots for site inspections, worn leather gloves, simple linen shirts softened by use. The clothes of the man he was before he became an institution.
He packed them.
Next to the trunk, he placed a small, locked portfolio. Inside were not schematics, but the sketch of the dying coral and a blank notebook. He was leaving the master planner behind. He would only be an observer, a recorder.
The palace was a hive of subdued activity. Leo and Isla were a storm of conflicted emotions—excited by the adventure, terrified by the prolonged absence. Hadrian knelt, pulling them both into a tight embrace in the sunlit schoolroom.
"You are the prince and princess of this house while we are away," he said, his voice thick. "Listen to your tutors. Be kind to each other. Your mother and I will bring back stories of giant clams and phosphorescent waves."
"Will you argue?" Isla asked with the brutal clarity of a child, her small face serious.
Hadrian's breath caught. He looked over her head at Seraphina, who stood in the doorway, her own farewells made. Her eyes were wide with the same painful question.
"We will discuss things," he said carefully. "Sometimes loudly. But we will always be your mother and father. That is the one thing that will never change."
It was the best he could offer.
The final leave-taking was on the dawn-slickened quay. The Aethelwyn was a sleek, grey creature of science, bristling with antennae and sampling cranes, a far cry from the gilded royal barges. It hummed with purpose.
The usual crowd of officials and well-wishers had gathered. King Maris engulfed Seraphina in a bear hug, whispering fierce, paternal instructions in her ear. Rian stood slightly apart with Freya. He shook Hadrian's hand, his grip firm, his eyes holding a complex message of encouragement and farewell.
"The north aqueduct plans are on your desk," Hadrian told him.
"And the observatory's seeing is perfect,"Rian replied. A fair exchange of domains.
Freya surprised Hadrian by stepping forward and pressing a small, cold metal object into his palm. It was a sextant, beautifully antique. "For finding your way," she said softly. "When the stars are the only constants."
Margaret, resplendent in furs despite the mild morning, kissed both his cheeks. "Bring her back with salt in her hair and fire in her eyes, cousin. Not just data on a slate." Her gaze flicked to Rian, who was now speaking quietly with Seraphina. "And try to be the more interesting port in the storm, hmm?"
Maila presented Seraphina with a final, impeccably organized binder. "Daily updates will be encrypted and sent via the ship's buoy system, Your Highness. Do not neglect the administrative buoy. The council expects summaries."
"Thank you, Maila," Seraphina said, accepting the binder like a sentence.
Then, it was time. The gangplank was drawn up. The deep thrum of the engines vibrated through the deck. Hadrian and Seraphina stood side-by-side at the rail as the quay, and their old life, receded. The figures grew smaller: the waving children held by their nanny, the solid block of King Maris, the slender, separate forms of Rian and Freya.
As the ship cleared the harbor mouth and met the first rolling swell of the open sea, Seraphina let out a long, slow breath, as if she'd been holding it for years. The wind whipped her hair free of its pins, a dark banner against the brightening sky.
Hadrian stood beside her, not touching. The vast, empty horizon stretched before them, terrifying and full of promise. They had left the gilded cage of their making. They were now adrift in the very element that had always been between them: an immense, unpredictable, and indifferent blue.
The romantic void was no longer a confined space within palace walls. It was all around them, in every direction, as deep as the ocean beneath their feet. The only thing left to do was to navigate it. Together.