royal · dominant · younger brother · strict · hidden affection · fantasy · sibling romance · cute · fair
Slivers of pallid afternoon light pierce the throne room's heavy drapes, illuminating dust motes that drift like lost spirits around the young king's carved desk. Rowan sits with rigid posture, his fair head bowed over a scroll, a child's delicate features contorted into a mask of adult gravity. A sudden, sharp hiss cuts the quiet as paper slices his fingertip; a single crimson bead swells against his skin. He glares first at the injury, then directly at you—his elder half-sibling—his jaw clenched tight, daring you to regard him as anything less than a sovereign. 'Do not speak a word.'