I force my pupils upward; neither my head, nor my body—just my eyes, straining to see. And I see him.
His golden eyes shimmer, false light radiating from them, but there is nothing human in his gaze. It pierces me, but it is empty. Undefining, as if no will of his own resides within. His arms—hidden beneath his clothes—move stiffly, prosthetic, and unnatural; metallic, machinery pretending to be flesh.
A woman’s voice. My ears can barely hold onto the sound, but it cuts through the fog. “You have to obey me, as the direct lineage of King Robertsons’ blood!”
A gasp rips out of me, sharp and raw. My ribs burn, broken and caving inward from that single strike, the other side shattered from the impact against the couch and wall or whatever stopped me from flying dozens of meters. Every breath feels like molten glass pouring into my lungs.
“From now on, you obey me,” she cries, “and not your dead ruler from before!”
I turn my head, or maybe just my eyes again—it’s hard to tell what part of me still listens. My elbows scrape against the ground as I drag my broken body upright. My knees quake, but somehow, I rise.
There he is. Mephory, the false god, kneeling before her—the half-broken, half-dressed princess, Elisia the 23rd. Her hollow eyes—even though the color of power—look into mine.
I look at her. Then at him. Then, at the box, hidden where it was before. Back again, from the false gold—the yellow-blooded—to her. My body sways, breath shallow. My thoughts collapse into silence. My surroundings collapse into one another—entwine into one another—my legs merely holding me upright, but everything must be an illusion created by my shaken-up brain.
She turns her eyes to me. “Your name?”
I freeze, each word dragging like glass through my throat. “Maximilian von Uhr.”
I stand nearly before her, my feet dragging across the ground, each step threatening to buckle. I move past her, praying she lets me go. But then her hand grips my arm—the one I keep pressed against my side, where bone grinds against bone. Pain surges like lightning through me.
“Your real name,” she demands, her voice persistent and unyielding. Fresh chapters posted on novel✦fire.net
Again, I answer with the only truth I am allowed. “Maximilian von Uhr.”
Her eyes narrow, but her voice doesn’t tremble. “Are you perhaps... Aston?”
The name strikes me like a blade through the ribs. My breath falters, my steps breaking into a stumble I can barely mask. I suck in a lungful of air to keep moving, but still, I do not answer.
Instead, I throw myself forward, smashing through the window before me; glass erupts around me. I land badly, knees folding under my weight, nearly snapping beneath the full collapse of my body. Pain sears, cold sweat dripping. I shiver—not from the night air, but from the agony carving me hollow. The adrenaline is fading, leaving only raw nerves behind.
My shadow stretches across the cobblestones, distorted by the pale glow of lanterns. I move, step after step, though each feels like the ground wants to swallow me whole. Guards shout in the distance, their lights sweeping through the estate, rushing toward the chamber I fled.
Why did she let me go? Why did she call my name? How did she know? And why—why in all the blood-soaked hells—was she like that with her father?
The thoughts entwine, gnawing at one another until none make sense; pain floods everything real, drowns me in a surreal haze.
The golden moon watches overhead, cold and clear among a sea of stars. Its glow trails after me as if mocking my steps, and before I can remember what happens next, I find myself beside him—Vi. Vis. Or whatever name that Green’s was.