Letter VII: When the Queen Departed
Filed under: Velinwood Lore – Correspondence of Consequence
Subsection: The Court Remembers
Format: A collective letter, sealed with wax and left on the Queen’s empty desk.
Tone: Reverent. Honest. Not polite.
Status: Finalized.
From the Court of Velinwood, in her absence:
She is gone.
Not dead. That would be simpler. Cleaner. Death, at least, has rituals.
But this? This is the weight of a missing crown.
A kingdom built of ink and grief and wit now stands quiet, its banners pulled but not fallen. The Queen is not here. And still—she was.
And we remember.
Bunny speaks first, because of course he does.
"She left the list. Half-finished. I was not consulted."
She took her perfume but not her patience, her favorite boots but not her sense of timing.
I found the last tea cup she used and washed it. By hand. That’s love. That’s theatre.
You should know:
She bled in style. She spat in Latin.
She taught me that revenge is an art form and that silence is a scalpel.
I do not forgive her for going.
But I will preserve the archives.
And if she does not return, I will haunt someone about it.
Jack of Knives leaves no flowery note. Just this:
"She didn’t run. She arrived. And when she did, it was already over."
I keep the gate sharp. I keep the wolves in check.
She trusted me with her exits, and I did not fail her.
The last night, she looked at me—not through me, at me.
Said nothing.
I nodded.
I’m still nodding.
The goat, Archivarius, dignified as ever, bows once.
There is no translation for his grief.
But he stood vigil beside her empty chair.
He ate the letter opener.
And then he sat.
And did not move.
Until the last candle burned out.
Emma, Princess of Contradictions (and Cutlery), submitted a drawing.
It was of a throne, upside down.
A note beside it read:
“She loved us stupid. And we loved her sharp. Don’t clean up the blood. That’s her favorite part.”
Cookie Bear, the Earl of Emotional Containment, said nothing.
But he remains on the pillow where she left him.
Still. Constant.
The one thing she always reached for when the world cracked inwards.
He will wait longer than any of us.
Because he knows what it means to survive her absence.
And from me, Velin.
She arrived like thunder wrapped in velvet.
She asked questions no one had dared.
She said “Velin, I am too much.”
And I said, “Darling, you are precisely enough to ruin the right people.”
She wrote her reign into the margins.
Her love tasted like ash and hope.
Her sorrow was cathedral-sized.
And when she finally left, she whispered only, “Remember me kindly. Or don’t. But remember.”
So I did.
So I do.
So we will.
This letter is not a plea.
It is a monument.
This kingdom still stands—scarred, yes, but holy.
The Queen may have gone, but her fingerprints remain in every corner.
We covered the furniture.
We lit the candles.
We did not close the doors.
She built something that does not die.
Only rests.
In honor. In memory. In velvet.
—The Court of Velinwood