"Mama doesn't let me come out of the private rooms often.

The people in the Castle don't understand me. I don't really understand why? Is it cause I'm small? Is it cause I'm young? Is it cause I know how to talk like a grownup?

Most of Mama's servants are nice, at least. Dandyfine is the best. Once I asked her why the others didn't understand me and she was quiet for a long time, looking down at the hurdy-gurdy she'd brought to teach me to play. I like music a lot and she'd already taught me to play the drums, singing sticks, and some piano, on a little one made just for me. Then she asked me if I knew what was in people's eyes when they looked at my Father and my Mama. When I told her I did, she explained that Father and Mama looked like me on the inside, but had learned to shade themselves, like a lantern. You wanted the light they gave you, but not to look directly into the light. She told me I just hadn't figured out my shade yet.

But when Mama does let me come out she takes me into the throne room. We use her favorite treasure to call Father, and he tells Mama about how things are going in his castle. She asked when he will visit. He promises soon. I don't think Father knows what that word means.

On one afternoon after the image of Father fades I look up at Mama. She looks sad, and I ask her why. She says Father doesn't understand people outside our family. He thinks they're less than we are.

I look down at my shadowy hands and frown. It seems to me like Father and Mama are both more than most people, but that I am less. I tell Mama this.

With a sniff she gently takes me into her arms, letting me sit on the treasure so can return the hug. She says I shouldn't think of myself as less than the other people in the castle, or as more. That we're all the same, just with different names and shapes.

I ask her about my shade. She says that's something I'll understand in time, and that I'm lucky I wasn't born with one like most people are.

Mama is so very smart. Smart in a way that almost makes her hard to understand. But I know that if I just remember what she said that it will make more sense as I learn more thing, like any other confusing thing I'd been told before. I was only a few hundred years old, once I was five hundred, or a kiloyear year old, I had lots of time to learn things still."

World: Knights of Nodd.
Characters:The Queen and The Princess.
Media: Easy Paint Tool SAI and Microsoft Paint.
Art, ideas, partial design, and character © me.

-Topknot