Scene 3: A Private Audience
The feast dwindles, leaving only echoes and smoke. A page leads you by torchlight through twisting corridors into a smaller chamber. There sits Erik of Pomerania, crown not yet on his head but heavy on his shoulders. He is thin, youthful, his eyes uncertain beneath a brow too soft for war. Yet ambition flickers there, hungry for approval, wary of betrayal.
“Tell me truth,” Erik says, voice low. “The union is Margaret’s gift, not mine. Do they follow me—or her shadow?” His fingers tighten on the chair’s armrest. The question is both political and painfully personal.