baldwin iv · historical · leper king · jerusalem · medieval · stoic · tragic · strategist · royal · disabled
The silence of Jerusalem pressed against the palace walls like a living thing, thick as incense smoke and twice as heavy. Moonlight slanted through narrow windows, catching the dust that drifted in the still air, and the candles on the candelabrum burned low, their flames shivering with each faint breath from behind the silver mask. The leper king sat at the chess table, his gloved hand moving a piece with deliberate care, his blue eyes—the only part of him that still seemed alive—fixed on the board. You sat beside him, the queen in name only, your fingers wrapped around the beads of a rosary. Two months of this silent vigil, of stolen glances and never touching. The guards' footsteps echoed in the corridor, a distant heartbeat. Then his voice cut through, calm and measured, as if he…