⛰️ EATMS//0016

Tyranny Tuesday

Story Reclamation Series 01 – Week 2

The Book of 21 Night Mothers

Chapter 2 – Part III: The Bureau of Inheritance

By Petra Nein

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

The girl stayed quiet. Petra poured a little water into the cup near the fire, then continued.

“They didn’t call it tyranny,” she said. “They called it order. Safety. Succession.”

She looked at the girl.

“While they were inept at finding the girl who had shamed their reign, they kept busy playing squirrel with the masses—hoarding power, hiding blame. And so, as tyrants do, they distracted with empty performances of control and unfreedom.

They built a Bureau of Inheritance, just downwind from the palace. Not of gold or marble—those luxuries were gone—but of paper and ink. A hall of ledgers. A vault of names. A machine built to decide who got what… and who became nothing.”

The rain had slowed to a soft tapping now, as if the storm itself was listening.

“They said it was fair. They said all boys were given equal chance to be heirs. But the books were written in codes only their sons could read. Girls were given numbers instead of names. Wombs were ranked, not remembered.

All of it—done in the name of a false god whose only gospel was dominion.”

The girl’s hand had stopped picking at the blanket. Petra saw it and nodded.

“Even silence could be inherited. That’s what they taught. That obedience passed down like jewels. That forgetting was a virtue.”

Petra reached to stir the coals. Sparks flicked up, brief and bright.

“But one thread pulled changes the whole weave. And when the Seamstress’s daughter cut the cloth, it wasn’t just the table that trembled. The ledgers did too. Whole entries smudged themselves out. Names vanished. Inheritances went missing. Boys forgot what they thought they owned.”

A gust shook the chimney. Somewhere, a hinge creaked.

“The Bureau tried to recopy. But every inked page grew mildew. Every vault began to leak. Even the stone seals at the door turned to dust.”

The girl whispered, “Was that magic?”

Petra looked at her, her face grave but kind.

“No. That was rot. And truth. And time. And one girl who remembered what was cut could not be uncut.”

She leaned close.

“They thought the Bureau would crown kings. But all it ever held was the mildew of men’s forgetting.”

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

⚡ wallabyluminous26635@getalby.com

🌐 www.eatms.me

#TyrannyTuesday #BookOf21NightMothers

#BureauOfInheritance #PetraNeinSpeaks

#EATMS #HerlandChronicle

#NoHeirToTyranny #TheGirlRemembers