By the time Caspian pulled his car into the garage, the clock on his dashboard displayed that it was exactly midnight. He climbed out from the driver’s seat and closed the door behind him, yawning once again as his body beckoned him to lay down. He’d nearly missed his deadline to come home, but at least his father couldn’t send any of the royal guards to retrieve him in what would have been a humiliating escort back to the mansion. He shook his head at the thought, envious of all the mid-twenty-year-olds who didn’t have to abide by a curfew like a naughty teenager. It was frustrating to still be treated like a child.

Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do about it as long as his father continued to insist that he was safely tucked away inside the manor overnight, so he ambled inside to go to his room and get some much-needed sleep.

The lights in the hallways were almost always turned off by the time he came home. Making his way up the stairs to the second floor, he trailed his fingers along the handrail and slipped his phone from his pocket to check idly for anything interesting in the news or on social media. The blue glow reflected off his face in the dark as he tapped through different pages, sufficiently distracted enough that he didn’t notice the thin line of yellow light coming from beneath his bedroom door.

Pushing the panel open, he nearly jumped out of his skin at the sight of a figure sitting on his bed. He fumbled with the phone in his hand and looked up with a start, shocked to find his father waiting for him with a dour expression on his face. He was sitting rigidly with his walking stick resting across his lap. [color=#b97703]“Dad, what are you doing here?”[/color] the prince blurted out, too confused by the monarch’s unexpected appearance to say anything else.

Atlas studied his son with a frown. He had been waiting for him to return to the palace for almost an hour. It hadn’t been his intention to seek Caspian out this way, but since his heir seemed intent on avoiding him, he’d had no other choice—barring having him arrested for his insubordination, of course. He was still withholding that card though, hopeful that he could reason with the prince before he had to resort to extreme measures. After all, what he had to say would be best received if his son was open-minded.

“Sit,” he ordered curtly, gesturing with one shaky hand at the chair near the window.

Cas swallowed, briefly toying with the idea of turning back around and walking away. He was sure this was about his last meeting with Dr. Foster, and he really didn’t want to talk about that. However, looking at the face of his only remaining close family member, he couldn’t bring himself to ignore the request so callously. Despite his halfhearted grudge against the king, he took a steeling breath and tentatively stepped over to the seat. Hopefully their conversation would be quick.

Once the prince had planted himself in the chair, Atlas nodded affirmingly. A short moment of silence lingered between them before he broke it with a statement, “I’ve been concerned about your wayward beliefs since you returned to me, Caspian.”

Immediately, Cas’s mood soured, knowing they were about to have the same fight all over again. [color=#b97703]“I know, but I’ve told you already. There’s nothing wrong with my beliefs,”[/color] he insisted, crossing his arms defensively. [color=#b97703]“I’m not doing anything wrong. All I did was defend [i]one person[/i] who [i]used[/i] to be part of the Scourge. I never once took their side or betrayed our country. I didn’t tell you to show mercy to the other rebels either. The only one I asked you to let go was Iris because she saved my life.”[/color] He shook his head exasperatedly. [color=#b97703]“I don’t know why we’re still on this anyway. She got away from the hospital, so she’s long gone by now.”[/color]

“But that’s just it,” Atlas rebutted, causing the prince to furrow his brows confusedly. “She was rescued by the Scourge. If she was no longer part of their ranks, then why would they send a team to save her?”

[color=#b97703]“They probably just didn’t want our military to learn any secrets from her,”[/color] Cas shrugged, employing the lie he’d come up with to explain away Iris’s disappearance a while ago.

“I don’t believe that,” the king said firmly, further surprising his son. “If she was a traitor to them, it would have been more efficient for them to merely assassinate her in the hospital rather than go through the effort of smuggling her out of the capital. Because she’s gone, I’m convinced she’s been working with them all along.” He sat up slightly straighter with an air of confidence as he went on: “Caspian, I understand that you believe she’s on your side, but you must accept that she is an enemy. Now that she’s with them again, your loyalty to her is a liability. I cannot allow you to continue asserting that she ‘isn’t a bad person’ because it’s highly likely that the rebellion will use that belief against you in the near future. You need to understand that as the next king of Aspiria, you can show mercy to no one. Kindness is a weakness, and as your father, I have no choice but to make sure you aren’t a danger to yourself.”

[color=#b97703]“Where are you going with this?”[/color] Cas eyes him cagily, feeling his hackles rise at the direction of the king’s thought process.

Atlas exhaled heavily, “Since you’re unwilling to cooperate with Dr. Foster, I’ve made arrangements for you to be admitted to Eternity Meadows Psychiatric Institution on Thursday. She thinks it would do you good to have round-the-clock therapy without any distractions, so you can properly recover from your Stockholm Syndrome and let go of your attachment to that girl.”

Cas stared at him, stunned into silence. He couldn’t believe it. For a while, he’d known that his father was determined to “fix” him, but he’d never thought the king would go so far as to ship him off to an asylum. It was insane, and as his initial shock faded, it gave way to white rage. [color=#b97703]“You can’t be serious!”[/color] he snapped, standing up abruptly from his chair. [color=#b97703]“You’re sending me to a fucking [i]mental institution[/i]? What the hell, dad? I’m not a lunatic, and I don’t have fucking Stockholm Syndrome! If you can’t tell the difference between basic human decency and a mental disorder, [i]you’re[/i] the one who should be admitted! Only sociopaths are that fucked up in the head.”[/color]

Atlas’s features hardened dangerously, “You watch your tongue.”

[color=#b97703]“I will not,”[/color] Cas snarled, trembling with fury. In the back of his mind, he knew he should lower his voice and that any passing guards or servants would be able to hear their conversation, but he was too angry to calm down. [color=#b97703]“I’m done with this shit. You know, I’ve tried for years to live up to your impossibly high standards—to earn your approval—but I can see now that I’ve been wasting my time. You’ve never cared about me. You just care about protecting your goddamn legacy. No loving father would ever lock his only son up in an asylum! It’s borderline abusive!”[/color]

“I’m trying to protect you!” Atlas yelled back at him, rising unsteadily to his feet.

[color=#b97703]“Shut up!”[/color] Caspian tangled his hands in his hair. [color=#b97703]“I don’t want to hear your excuses anymore! You’re always telling me that you want what’s best for me, but if that was true, then why do you only ever criticize me and treat me like an incompetent kid? If I ever have an original thought, you try to crush it to ‘keep me safe.’ Well, guess what? I don’t need your fucking protection!”[/color] He pressed a hand to his chest. [color=#b97703]“I’m [i]done[/i]. Done trying to be your ‘perfect heir’ and done letting you control every little part of my life. I will never be the heartless leader you want me to be, and if you don’t like that, then you can just go find somebody else to be king after you’re gone because I’m done with that too.”[/color]

Atlas stared at him, taken aback, before his eyes darkened and he limped forward on his cane, closing the distance between them. “You ungrateful wretch,” he growled. “Everything I have ever done for you has been to make your transition to power as fluid as possible. How [i]dare[/i] you, an inexperienced boy, presume to know better than me, your father and your king?” When Cas said nothing, Atlas ground his teeth and, without warning, raised his hand and struck his son across the cheek. “You will obey me,” he ordered in a diminished tone as he turned to walk away again, made weary by their fight. “I’ll send a servant by your room tomorrow afternoon to help you pack whatever you’d like to bring with you to Eternity Meadows.”

The door closed decidedly behind him as he exited, leaving Caspian alone with nothing but his thoughts and the sting of hot tears in his eyes. He stood silently, staring at the ghost of where his father had just been, unable to bring himself even to move. The blow from Atlas’s feeble hand had been weak, but it had broken something inside of him. With it, he had been shown the certainty he’d feared all along that his father would never accept or love him for who he was. All the monarch could see was a ‘boy’ who didn’t do what he was told. He bit down on his lip until he tasted blood, battling the urge to let loose the despair that welled up inside of him. He wasn’t going to yield to his father the victory of making him cry.

Taking a shuddering breath, he stepped over to his bed and laid down, pulling the duvet all the way over his head to block out the sight of the room and squeezing his eyes shut. He didn’t even bother taking off his shoes or turning out the lights as he curled up, drowning in the misery of knowing that in two days’ time, his father was going to ship him away to an asylum for refusing to obey his every command.