The walls of the Vlora palace stood eight meters high, enclosing forty thousand square meters of history. Inside, the air was thick with the scent of old paper and the sharp metallic tang of his father’s firearm collection. Eqrem sat in the selamllek —the men’s quarters—watching the shadows stretch across the garden. To the world outside, he was a servant of the Ottoman Empire, but in his heart, he was the son of a land on the brink of change.