Chapter 108 SOUND OF PEACE.

Chapter 108 SOUND OF PEACE.
MADISON’S POV:
If anyone had told me a few months ago that I’d wake up in a palace — a real one, where the windows opened to turquoise oceans and mist-draped mountains — I’d have laughed and told them to stop watching fairytales.
 Yet every morning here, I still half expected to wake up and find it gone.
Azuvia wasn’t just beautiful, it was breathtaking. The air smelled of hibiscus and sea salt, and the skies looked hand-painted, brushed with soft streaks of gold at dusk. The people, my people, smiled like they knew my soul before I even spoke. Every day, I learned something new about the land that birthed me, about the blood that had always quietly pulsed with its rhythm.
Sometimes, when the wind carried the songs of the markets below, I’d close my eyes and think, maybe my heart had always known this place, even when my mind didn’t.
 I was happy. Completely, genuinely, achingly happy.
I’d spent countless hours with my parents, making up for the twenty-three years we’d lost. We’d talk until the candles burned low, trading stories from their youth and the life I never knew I’d been robbed of. Forever wouldn’t be enough to make up for lost time, but we were trying.
 Mother told me how she’d dreamed of the daughter she thought she’d buried, how she still kept the baby clothes she’d sewn with her own hands, the tiny shoes that had never been worn. I saw them neatly folded in a cedar box, still smelling faintly of lavender.
When I saw my nursery, the one I never got to sleep in, I broke down. The walls were painted in soft pastel blues, and above the crib, a golden inscription read "Adanna, Light of the Moon." My true name.
The First Lady—, my mother, insisted I call her “Mama.” She made me handwoven clothes in bright Ankara prints, adorned me with headwraps that carried our heritage in every thread. My father, President Kwame Alade couldn't stop smiling whenever I entered a room. His once-stern face softened; his eyes carried the weight of both pride and regret.
They spoiled me, pampered me. They took me on tours across the country by boat, plane, horse, bicycle, every form of transport imaginable. They wanted me to see everything: the villages, the schools, the markets, the hidden waterfalls. Everywhere we went, people cheered and cried, calling me "Princess Adanna."
And the celebration they threw for me… I’d never seen anything like it. It lasted three days — music and drums, food that never ran out, laughter that rose like prayer. I learned dances from women who moved like water and laughed with girls who called me sister, as if they’d known me forever.
 It wasn’t just a party, it was a homecoming the heavens themselves seemed to bless.
This was home. This feeling; wanted, celebrated, belonging, this was what home had always been supposed to feel like.
Yet even surrounded by everything I’d ever dreamed of, there was a quiet emptiness that tugged at me when the world went still. I longed for one person.
Thane.
I hadn’t seen him all day. He’d been busy with Father, and I’d spent the day walking the palace gardens with Mama, finalizing wedding plans. We were just days away from saying “I do.” I couldn’t stop smiling whenever I thought of it—how far we’d come, how much we’d survived.
I’d even told Mama she would love Eden when they met, how she’d been like a mother to me. Mama smiled, saying she couldn’t wait to meet the woman who’d stood by her daughter’s side all these years.
By the time we returned home, the sun had melted into a deep orange horizon. Dinner was ready.
The dining room was magnificent as always. Long table set with wooden dishes . The scent of spiced jollof and roasted lamb filling the air.
Still, something felt off. The room was too quiet, no laughter, no easy chatter. Even the air felt heavy, waiting.
To ease the seriousness of the atmosphere, I laughed as I hugged Father, his arms strong and warm around me. He kissed my forehead, the way he always did now, before we took our seats.
I glanced around the table, I realized someone was missing.
"How was your day, my princess?" Dad asked before I spoke.
"Perfect. Absolutely perfect." I reached for my spoon. “Where’s Thane?” I asked, still smiling, expecting him to stride in at any moment with that easy grin that melted every ounce of tension.
Silence.
I looked from one face to another. My father’s gaze shifted. He set his fork down, clasped his hands, and met my eyes with a calmness that instantly unsettled me.
“Thane has left,” he said quietly.
"Left?" I laughed. "Left where? Did he go into the city? He should be back soon—"
"He left Azuvia. He called off the wedding." Dad's voice was flat. "I'm sorry, Adanna."
For a heartbeat, I heard nothing , no words, no sound, just the rush of my pulse. My world didn’t shatter; it dissolved.
The laugh burst out again, louder this time. Nervous. "Okay, very funny. You almost got me. But that joke's too dangerous, Dad. My heart can't take—"
I reached for my fork. Started to take a bite. Looked up and saw his face.
Serious. Grief-stricken. Apologetic.
My fork clattered to the plate.
My laughter faded. “Dad?”
He sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “He took the money I offered him and left, Adanna."