Prince Luis Kingston walked with the easy stride of someone who had nowhere to be and everywhere to go. His boots clicked a rhythm against the stone, and his fingers drummed against his thigh as if keeping time with some invisible melody.

He paused at a window overlooking the city below. The streets were already bustling—merchants calling out their wares, children chasing each other through the morning crowd, the distant clatter of cart wheels against cobblestone.

His gaze drifted down the hall, past the towering doors of the throne room, past the study where his tutor was surely already waiting with a stack of dusty books. Toward the servant's stairwell that led down to the kitchens, and from there, to the city.

And further still, toward a certain shop that smelled of lavender and mint.