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Masculine Monday

Story Reclamation Series 01 – Week 2

The Book of 21 Night Mothers

Chapter 2 – Part II: The Crown Measured Nothing

By Petra Nein

(Has not, and will never, bend to altar or empire.)

The rain hadn’t stopped.

It whispered against the shutters now, softer than before, but it hadn’t stopped.

Petra spoke as if it never had.

“After the feast, there were many whispers. They said the King was ill. Said it was the weight of ruling, the stress of progress. They called in a doctor from the mineral colonies, one who believed in bloodletting and loyalty.”

The girl didn’t interrupt. Her fingers were busy unpicking the frayed edge of her blanket.

“But the King’s strength did not return. His limbs went heavy. His hearing twisted. When servants bowed, he thought they were laughing. When advisors spoke, he only heard his father warning him of softness.”

Petra paused, not to collect herself, but to listen.

Somewhere distant, a tree gave in to the soaked earth.

Its crack and collapse echoed through the valley.

“Meanwhile, the Seamstress’s daughter had vanished. Her name was never in the pleb ledger. Her wages had been withheld for behavior unbecoming. Even the rumor that a lowborn girl could wound the messianic King was outlawed. But her thread remained. In the palace linens. In the banner hems. In the garments of those who dined. Her hand still stitched the kingdom.”

The child looked up.

“She stayed behind?”

“Not behind,” Petra answered. “Beneath. Her silence moved under the floorboards. Her memory in every seam. Some stories live by disappearing.”

The candle burned low.

Petra set her hand flat on the ground.

“And as the King rotted from the inside, a crack formed in the Prosperity Table. Just a thin one, at first. But deep. It ran from one end to the other like a scar. The kind no polish can cover.”

The girl whispered,

“Like a warning.”

Petra nodded.

“Yes. And not just to him.”

She looked at the child again.

“They measured him daily, though none dared say it aloud. Not in inches or age—but in relevance. They polished his robes, adjusted his crown, edited the records.”

“They told him he was immortal because his name was always spoken. But the truth was: only his appetite endured.”

“His scribes rewrote the maps so no other kingdoms existed. His priests rewrote hunger as destiny. And his sons—his sons were taught to inherit emptiness and call it dominion. They never learned to plant, only to consume.”

A pause. A spark.

“But no dominion survives when silence takes root beneath its feet.”

Petra leaned closer.

“The girl was not a warrior. She was a seamstress’s daughter. But she knew how to cut a thread.”

She didn’t begin with rebellion.

She began with the hem of the tablecloth.

And every stitch she pulled—

undid a page in his scripture.

“Even the stars watched men devour the soil, and blinked in disbelief.”

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