These Unrighteous Vows

PROLOGUE

THE WARS OF THE DEEP

Death was an exquisite thing for one’s mind to dwell on.

It was a thought that was sweet, malicious, kind; it was a thought that may either have one staring up at the ceiling at night, counting every little splinter of a crack that swept across the plaster distracting away from the consuming whispers of their mind… or it may have one asleep with not a single worry treading across their frail mortal skin.

But either way, death wasn’t something that usually seemed to entangle itself in the crashing waves that wiped away the memories of the past.

The shadowed water thrashed against the withering cliff sides with a silhouette that had the lost souls turning. Bodies, lives, spirits all lurked in the water’s depth, turning with every breath the old King of the East once took.

His body was old, his olive skin aged and wrinkly… except it wasn’t like the wrinkles on any other elderly mortal or immortal, it was like the wrinkles the beloved curse left behind after haunting one’s spirits for several eternities at a single moment in time. Immortality was not kind to him—it had never been kind to him. It was a heavy haze that followed his every breath, a constant agony that pained his old lungs. Yet, because of the amount of wealth it layered onto his jewelled shoulders, the King of the East cherished every little inch of power he got, and he was overjoyed with the power that managed to blindly soothe his aching breaths.

She is alive? his words were haunting, low. A thrum to them that matched the thunder that echoed through the crackling skies since the moment the Realms last living hope had perished alongside everything else the curse nicked. How can that be? You said the curse was sure to kill her. His words formed into a slithering twine of venom, arrows shooting straight towards the heart Adonis Evermore was rumoured to once hold.

She was not meant to survive, he gravely replied, his eyes not once daring to look away from the dark marbled tiles before him. They were cracked, with human handprints engraved into them as if they’d died here just yesterday. It was said that the moment the curse entered into her heart, she would become one that I could experiment on. One that I could use to capture the magick of the Gods—for you, Your Highness.

So, why are there reports of her activity in the Kingdom of Aeonia? Especially when she is meant to be back and beneath the Realm of Harlia—as you said? the King of the East demanded through a thick growl, his fists smashing down onto the throne wrapped and wielded in thorns. Adonis swore that he could see those the curse had captured wielded around every prick, and when it bled, their tears finally flowed.

With fear crawling through the depths of his eyes, Adonis looked up, ignoring how the windows began to rattle. A thick and quick-witted lightning bolt struck the burnt land metres before the palace, and Adonis swiftly closed his eyes with a clench of his bruised jaw. He knew the curse had just claimed another one of its many victims. It wasn’t a sheltered fact that all the Realm’s population had been halved since that fatal night in Harlia—but unfortunately, that was not his problem to deal with, not as he looked back to the merciless King. Adonis swallowed the thick venom of terror that murmured at the back of his throat, pushing away any potential panic that the King, who somehow glared at him, could potentially taste.

Taste but never see—except that didn’t stop him from drinking the blood of those who were meant to be sitting in school learning basic maths and literature.

The King of the East was blind, but that did not stop his other senses from tracking Adonis’ every move. Adonis could tell from the way his white pupils moved with his every movement. He had a great scar that stretched down the centre of his chest, leading to the bottom of his abdomen. It mimicked the electricity of lightning. Rumour has it that he had received that miraculous scar in the same moment he went blind… when the bolt of lightning meant to murder him, struck him in all of his manacled wickedness.

Attempting to take away one of the Gods worst consequences.

Some say they can still hear his roar, his scream, his cry echoing through the Forgotten Realms that now lay burnt to the crisp after the curse confirmed that they would stay forgotten. Others say that it’s in the nights when his agony ripples across their flesh. A forever reminder of what had occurred during the sleepless nights of the Great War.

A reminder that he will reach them soon enough—that those who managed to escape will never actually escape.

Adonis shook his head, but his actions were mere quivers. Useless against a King who had a bloodthirsty hunger for fear. I’m not sure—

You aren’t sure? the King mimicked through a cavernous cackle that sent the seas thrashing and the wind screaming. "Then tell me why, boy, why have I been told by several trustworthy sources that there has been activity in Aeonia for the past several rotten months? You told me a month ago, through the form of a flimsy letter, that she was ‘bolted to the table’ by your side—that you, boy, had everything under control."

Adonis nodded, his vision not daring for a single second to give way as he kept his gaze steady. He could feel the King breathing down his back, the curse slipping from his tongue and forcing Adonis to stay still. The many blades in the curse’s hands begging to slice his flesh to oblivion. It was an illusion of some type—it had to be. Could the King smell lies too? Adonis didn’t want to know.

I would’ve thought you were smarter than that, boy—GUARDS! Adonis flinched as his voice echoed through the large abyss of the throne room, and the storm beyond began to fasten too, as if those watching over him, if there were any there, were too trapped inside of their fear. Consume his soul.

With widening eyes, Adonis quickly shook his head. A weak whimper scattering from his lips as the darkness from each corner of the room warped into the silhouettes and figures of guards. Was the death they were sure to bring all a mere deception too? Adonis longed for that to be the case. No! NO! he bellowed in a crumbling tone as he looked for anywhere to flee out of, but the darkness continued gaining on him, squirming around his fingernails, and nipping beneath his bones until true tears of shadowed oblivion ran down his already bloody cheeks. The journey here hadn’t been a nice one, leaving Adonis covered in the blood of those he’d had to murder to survive. He’d had to. "NO! I can help you! Please—please, let me do something, he breathed, anything—"

The King of the East laughed as he turned his thin, bony fingers in a circle across one of the few visible spots of whatever substance the throne was made of. With a flashy grin, he ignored the blood that pooled at his feet from the several thousand wounds to line his skin. It had been centuries now since he had felt any true touch of pain. The last time probably would’ve been when he watched his family burn at the stake. What could you possibly do for me, boy? You are merely a mortal in my eyes.

Mortal or no mortal, I can still help you! Adonis gasped as the darkness began to bend around his throat. He could feel it slithering into his heart with every breath he took. The curse was already in the process of wiping away yet again another soul to a place unheard of. Adonis prayed for their peace. If you spare me my life, I vow to you that I will find Althea Evangeline and bring her heart and soul to you on a silver platter— Adonis struggled against the darkness that weaved across his skin, his fragmented movements trying with everything in them to squirm him out of its quivering and deathly hold.

And how exactly will you do that? the King questioned through an echoing laugh; cruel sounds erupted from the depths of his cursed soul as he cocked his head to the left, forcing any surviving nature or wildlife beyond to burn from the insides out as his magick caressed his own spine. I don’t think you and your little pet will be much of a match against her. If anything, it would be far more enjoyable on her end to watch a squirmy little thing like you… die.

Yes, but I have—I have an insight! Adonis gasped, and the King cocked his head to the left. He wasn’t sure where he was going with this, but at this point, he was grasping at anything.

"Hmm? And what’s that, Adonis?"

Kylen Noxwell, King of Lorundio, Adonis stated with a firm breath. His features were poised, his breaths uncanny to the ones his lungs had been scorching several seconds earlier.

And what can that child of a king possibly have to offer someone like me?

Adonis cleared his throat, breathing easy for a splinter of a second as the ghosts of his past finally loosened their ungodly hold on him. He was so close—so close. Nightshade.

Nightshade? the King echoed sceptically. Boy, if I find that you are making a mockery of me, I will make your death one that is severely painful—and I always keep my word.

"No—no. Nightshade was the Noxwell’s Kingdom speciality back when his parents ruled. It was a poison they brewed in the dungeons of their castle. It was long forgotten, but I dare say that everything is still there, untouched. If I—we get our hands on it, we can use it to our advantage."

Isn’t that where the King of Aeonia lies in his own filth nowadays? In the depths of those dungeons? the King of the East laughed maniacally. Then they would obviously know of the drugs they are growing—especially something of that deadliness.

No, Adonis choked as his vision wavered. The darkness was tightening on him, threatening the circulation of his skin and bones. That old ruination of a king lies in the areas that Kylen Noxwell knows of—that boy doesn’t know of these other sections, Adonis explained, his words bending to his advantage.

And how do you—a boy from Harlia, know of this?

You forget that I am one with the birds. Nature. My crows keep track of what’s being spoken, and what they think I need to know gets reported back to me. By gaining access to Kylen and the nightshade, I can use both against Althea; and I will bring her back to you.

In all its inevitable glory, silence spread across the floor like wildfire. Adonis straightened his spine. His lips and expression were firm as he looked the king in his dark, cruel eyes.

He tutted a sound that sent pain through Adonis’ bones, but he didn’t dare break his stance. Very well. You have until two moon cycles from now. I want Althea Evangeline here, and I want the power she holds. He paused, narrowing his gaze as he thought aloud, While you are at it, bring me a batch of nightshade as well. I remember the rumours about it; I know that that has an effect against the curse—it will be fun to experiment on her and on the boy she left empty… bring me Kylen Noxwell too.

Adonis let out a sigh that had been held captive by his lungs, nodding his head quickly as he got to his knees and bowed. Thank you, Your Greatness. You will not be disappointed.

☾

The wind howled beyond, and as the days turned into weeks, Adonis Evermore clasped onto the cursed ship, looking towards the lands he had never dared to travel to.

The sky was dark, but the seas he left had been darker.

Adonis had never wanted to see the seas that the King of the East dumped his victims' souls into. But now he had, and he was sure to do everything in his power to ensure that he didn’t end up there himself.

He would do anything.

ONE

ALTHEA

They noted her frail bones as if they could physically feel how she was withering away as each second ran out of her scarred hands. They noted the Markings that lined her arms, caressing them in the dead of the night while she stared at the memories that had escaped from her seeping mind. They noted her breaths and the beat of her controlled and imprisoned heart, all as if it brought them such malicious joy to make such a mockery of her.

To make her out to be a bloody fool.

The old, weathered cell that was eyeing her every movement had a shadowed slither of darkness running through the air. The darkness of the spirits reached for her with loose hands and over-calculated movements, but the girl did nothing more than simply watch it as she steadied her breaths. She’d gotten used to this process long ago; now… it was effortless. Her tired eyes skimmed through the air with not a single thought to her mind as she allowed her eyes to slowly open and shut; the repetitiveness of each and every day earned her bones to grow dreadfully weak.

There was one single flickering light in the old, weathered cell in which she sat, and that was placed in the middle of the small, squared, white roof that was both a hallucination and a deception of a lie. Because she knew that it wasn’t actually real—an inevitable manipulation, and Althea knew this because every time she reached for the round light, her hand would always go straight through it without an utter thought. Leading her to want to go insane because she didn’t know just what was real and what was not—was she even real anymore? How was she to know that?

Everything about this old room with what looked to be real walls and real floors seemed to be a mere figment of her imagination, and yet somehow… against everything she had ever known, it was all real at the same time—because how else could she be here? Knowing and understanding that she was trapped?

While nothing inside the weathered cell seemed to be real or physical in any way, the force of it kept her imprisoned—and she didn’t know what was possibly worse…

Being contained to a single cell.

Or realising that she was in the abyss of her soul… and it was like a merciless desert.

Althea Evangeline, the girl who once was, had stared at the same ordinary wall before her for three-hundred and thirty-two long days; and she knew that that was accurate because there were three-hundred and thirty-two ignorant lines engraved into the prison wall at her left. The one that was one of four that kept her trapped within the walls of her very own frail soul—or what was left of it, that was.

She couldn’t comprehend in the slightest how her own soul was keeping her a prisoner within it. Althea obviously understood that the curse had a large part to play in this eternal agony, but still… it was her soul, and she was meant to control it, was she not?

However, one of the few things that she did know during these long days was that this world was so tiring—so cruel. Her eyes were seconds away from closing for good every time she blinked—but every time she went to give into the darkness, the visions of what would happen if the curse was to fully claim her soul always flashed before her burned mind… as if there was still an element of her soul that was alive and fearful.

The curse would have full control of her magick. They would butcher the world with the magick of the Gods… leaving all to die…

Despite the factor that the door before her wasn’t an actual or physical wooden door, Althea could still see where the splinters had finally given way after all of her weak attempts to feel the rain melt her burdens and caress her sins once again. Ultimately leading Althea into a downward spiral to wonder just what parts of her soul were physical and which were not. As of that moment, it felt like a clutter of confusion, and she felt like a belittled child with no knowledge of anything.

It was a difficult concept all around to understand that the flesh she wore wasn’t real nor a lie. She was a figment of her mere imagination, and yet she felt as if she was physically stuck within her own body, with the ability to tear at her skin.

Althea didn’t know what she was anymore.

Or where she was.

She had lost beyond everything.

Even her mind.

The clock from somewhere beyond the old room ticked, and Althea glanced up as she heard the final arrogant tick of the day. The one that was awfully louder than the rest. The one that had her head turning up and her eyes burning through the cement that surrounded her, wondering what it would feel like if she were to approach the door and actually find it open for once.

For such a small place within her soul—her mind, she felt as if she was freezing to death… as if the cold air around her was going to be the one thing to drive her to pure insanity and beyond. Everything was so dreadfully cold, so ice-like that every time Althea held her hands to her arms she felt like her flesh was about to wash away with the memories of her tears.

Remember me, Althea, don’t let them take away who I am, who you are~

The final echo of the clock rumbled out, and Althea’s eyes peered down to the deathly pale hands that were so ghost-like. Maybe she was a ghost; it would help her understand why she had a ghostly mind with no thoughts in it whatsoever.

I am not insane, not insane, not insane.

Althea ran a steady finger down her veins before releasing one of the many sighs that haunted the depths of her once lively lungs. Her scars were still there, her Markings too. Her flesh looked relatively normal, other than the fact she looked awfully pale.

With a small heave of her chest, Althea reached forward, her fingers curling around the charcoal that had been mockingly left behind by the cruel shadows every time they dared to pay her something of a visit. It crumbled beneath her touch, but enough was there for her to coat her fingers with it, watching as her very touch left a fingerprint of pure darkness behind, the only shade that didn’t appear to be washed out by the abyss.

With a small breath that wasn’t actually a proper breath, Althea finished writing the message she had written herself just hours before—a message that had her mind craving sleep. Peace. Anything that was close to freeing. Or anything that was close to real life.

In soft, delicate letters, the words: Happy Birthday Althea, were written across the aged floor that was already covered in drawings of forgotten and lost memories. They were memories she knew the curse was wiping from her, yet never knew exactly when—would her birthday be taken next? Or did they know that this was torture, knowing that she was aging without actually aging? Her eyes scraped over each and every letter, a delicate pain in her heart that had her mind aching beyond compare. There was a tremble to her gaze, one that appeared as she reached forward and brushed the dust away, the very sight of her name becoming too much to bear.

Don’t let them take your name away from you—

Now her hands were completely covered in the sins of the darkness, the ash coating her flesh as if it was toying with reality an inch before her mind. Was she their pet? Their entertainment? She heard them cackle in the depths of the ‘night’; they always seemed to be watching. Except, of course, the darkness lasted no longer than a splintering second as it was flustered away into the depths of the wind, leaving her hands to look just as they had seconds ago. They wanted her to react—to weep—to scream—they wanted her to do anything other than just stare, because they knew how she longed for something of control.

Was this a punishment? A punishment set on her for all of the wrongdoing she had done?

Or was this merely her punishment for being born? For giving her mother a burdened life to cradle before allowing it to drown.

Althea didn’t know anything anymore, not as she tucked her long white curls behind her ears, sighing heavily as if the constant lie that echoed through the melodies of the air wasn’t driving her to the brink of insanity. Her heartbeat could be heard in the distance—and yet, at the same time, it was heard at the ends of her fingertips. It was a constant echo that repeated, all until her mind couldn’t take it anymore. But Althea couldn’t react—she wouldn’t risk reacting, as the spirits were watching her every move.

And Althea knew that they were using the beat of her own trapped heart as leverage.

She could feel the spirits, the lives of the cursed… laughing at her, watching her. Mocking her for the way she no longer fought against the darkness every day. They called her weak, a fool, a disgrace of a daughter. They wanted her to pity herself, to allow the tears that she felt torturing her heart to win the battle that she had grown tired of so long ago. But the truth was that each time Althea did try to fight, each time she did try to breathe, they took something from her.

They took her mind.

Her memories.

They made her forget the reasons why she was fighting.

Why she hadn’t given up and allowed the spirits full control of her body altogether.

At first, Althea hadn’t realised that that was what they had been doing; it took her until the fourth night to realise that her mind was full of visions of a boy she could remember and yet not name.

She could remember his eyes, the curve of his jaw, the bump of his nose…

But everything else was like a haze that she had seen from the window of her tower in the Kingdom she too could not remember the name nor lost details to.

Althea wanted to know why her heart hurt when it came to those distant memories. Why her heart pained for a girl she no longer wanted to care for. In fact, she wanted to slit her throat and watch as her own blood ran across her skin as she fell to the floor lifeless, only for the darkness to take her away instead. She was a girl that deserved to live while also toying with death—true death that she knew would find her sooner than later.

Althea didn’t want to forget anymore.

As it was, she was barely holding on.

She leaned her head back against the cold white wall, picking up the charcoal once more before scribbling out the plan she had been hoping with everything in what was left of her heart to be true and not another deceptive lie.

Althea had hoped that the man in her mind who had a mixed bundle of emotions to his memory would save her—the girl who always claimed to never need saving. She knew that on any regular day that she was strong and did not need someone to save her—but today wasn’t any regular day.

She hadn’t lived through a regular day for a long time now.

The curse and the spirits… they wanted her to give up. To give into this emptiness and float away in the wisp of the wind as if she never truly existed.

That was their plan.

To see how long Althea Evangeline laughed in the abyss before she slowly allowed insanity to claim her life.

But Althea was stubborn.

And she had hoped that the man who was somewhere in the world she too was beginning to forget would realise that the only moment he would inevitably be able to access some entry into her soul would be on the day that she was born.

But that memory of a boy hadn’t appeared right as the clock struck twelve, and that was the only opening she knew of in the multiple realities of the Realms.

Althea shut her eyes slowly, feeling as the world in her mind slowly formed.

She imagined herself opening her eyes… truly opening her eyes and not the eyes of her soul. The boy who did not have a name, would appear before her with a gentle smile, one that she knew would be able to calm the seas on a stormy day. He would step forward, his hands rising to cup her cheeks before wiping away the tears she had still not been able to spill because of how numb her heart felt.

His touch would be soft and gentle, and she was sure if she focussed enough, she would truly feel some warmth.

One that she knew would be able to calm the raging seas.

TWO

KYLEN

The sea wanted to welcome his body into its depths. To taste the pure blood that ran through his haunted veins. To feel the agony that coated his heart in a cruel blanket. It wanted to swallow him whole so that his life in all of its glory would not be remembered—so that his life would not be burdened anymore.

Because that was all he wanted.

And the sea and him were beginning to share a soul.

His eyes were fixated on it all; watching with a lost gaze as the waves and skies mourned alongside his dull heart; watching as the sea remembered the nights he had taken for granted—the nights where he had danced with her in his hands, wishing that tomorrow would never come as he knew that blood was bound to follow. Except it wasn’t only that the sea was remembering. It was also recalling all of the taken-for-granted years that Sayah had spent her precious time teaching him the ways of the sea.

It remembered it all.

Every.

Little.

Thing.

Kylen Noxwell looked down at his calloused palms, looking down to the dark and healthy skin that glowed with a glistening gleam despite it all.

It was a joke.

One fucking sick joke.

His hair got caught in the wind as he turned. It was slightly longer and curlier—the scent of the sea hiding within each lock because of all the long hours he spent out here, sitting on the edge of the ship with his legs hanging overboard. Practically teasing the world and the monsters below the surface to taste his burdened skin.

But it was time.

And he knew that.

Kylen needed to return to his Kingdom; it had only been a month, but still, it had been too long. And he knew that. The King of the East had officially declared war, and Kylen did need to get some of that anger, pain, and ache out of his lively veins. His current victim had withered away too much, and he knew he had to wait a month or two before he revisited him—else the King of Aeonia would die before Kylen could fully get Althea’s revenge, Sayah’s revenge.

But those were two names he no longer allowed himself to hear.

Because each time he did, he killed something—someone.

Rising to his feet, Kylen turned and walked across the bare deck as the rain began to fall from the weeping clouds. His cabin was dull and quite gloomy—the lack of the siren's touch evident through the way everything was left frozen in place; books were scattered across the floor, bed, and desk: all of which opened onto pages that were no use to him.

In the very beginning, before he had fully moved on from the stage of denial, Kylen had spent so many long hours simply reading. Trying to learn how he could possibly revive a soul of the torturous curse. Yet he found nothing on it—the curse was almost completely unspoken about, the only partial mentions of it being within the myth of Astaria, but even then, it was brief.

Time had passed in slow stretches, eating at his skin as his eyes grew weary of the words he’d read so many times. And when he’d finally started to give up on it all, the cruel world decided to force another burden into his tremoring hands.

So now… he too was left to figure out how to resurrect someone from the dead, as well as cure one’s soul from the curse because Kylen Noxwell would be damned if he didn’t get Sayah Linix back—or Althea Evangeline.

It felt as if Kylen had been tortured and forced to flee back through time. To visit the past he so desperately wanted to forget—to visit that time all those years ago when he had spent so many long hours under the cold moon, looking for answers regarding anything on the curse and his brothers.

Now he was looking for answers on just about everything.

Sayah was dead. She had been murdered.

Althea was dead. She had been murdered.

And the very whisper that the wind carried of their name sent his anger spiralling, his heart burning.

The only things Kylen had really learnt about were the curse’s origin and the myths of Harlia. Perhaps if Althea were here, he would laugh with her at the girl known as Astaria—one of the lost Gods who was too taken away too soon by the curse. Or if Sayah were here, he would mock Erwin and his nameless brother because of the stupidity of their greed that had turned their world into a withering graveyard. One where the darkness was always watching, feeding on a new soul each time the lightning struck.

He never intended to sound so cruel, so angry. He didn’t want to push away the only ones he had left, and it hurt his already wounded heart to realise that that was exactly what he was doing. But Kylen didn’t know what to do anymore—how he could stop these incredibly consuming emotions.

His soul was hurting.

His mind was screaming.

Without even realising it, Kylen subconsciously entered the rough harbours of his Realms before leaving the ship there to drown in the depression and emptiness that was his Kingdom. What a lie it was.

The people that were once loud and joyous towards him and his every breath now stayed silent as they slyly watched him out of the corners of their eyes. They didn’t dare talk to the King who was rumoured to scowl at anyone who looked his way. They didn’t dare cross the path of the King who was rumoured to take their lives if he so felt like it.

Kylen figured that he should care—that he should try to do better.

But Kylen didn’t know if he could.

He was tired. So inevitably tired.

The walk through his kingdom was slow; however, since it was the same path he walked every time, it went in an utter blur. The halls of his castle weren’t any better. They were just as ghostly as anything, holding onto the whispers of the past and breathing down his spine as if they wanted him to suffer. To feel something, anything that wasn’t sheer rage.

Only three out of the six ghosts that had once waltzed down these halls remained. Two out of the five that were once deemed as his family. His court. But even then, one was a whisper during the days and the other a whisper during the sleepless and dreamless nights.

Neither Khatri nor Atticus spoke to him or interacted with him in the slightest.

Whether they were afraid or simply didn’t care for him anymore, he didn’t know. They just pretended that he was also a ghost and ignored his presence entirely. They forgot that he existed, all because he preferred to be drowning himself in liquor and quietness instead of dealing with life itself. Was that truly such a crime?

So, since he hadn’t seen either of them in weeks now, one could only guess how his feet abruptly halted with such shock, worry, and idiotic fear, when he found Atticus sitting inside Kylen’s quarters, waiting for him beside his study with a flimsy old letter in his scarred hand. He didn’t look at him at first, and Kylen couldn’t help but notice how aged he’d become.

The storm beyond the window seemed to quicken and harshen; the rain pooling against the glass panels was beginning to send a rattling eeriness through the depths of the air, chilling Kylen’s breaths and the blood that had long ago been ‘cured’. The storms hadn’t stopped since his boat had entered the harbour of Lorundio after his wondrous visit to Harlia. Constant rain. Constant thunder. And constant lightning. Sayah had said it was because the world was mourning for the last of its Gods—but Kylen found it easier to block out any memories of that fatal time.

The two locked eyes for not even a second before Kylen peered down to his feet, moving to hang his coat on the rusty fishhook before clearing his burning throat with the anticipated question that had his bones riveting. Who is dead? Kylen asked, his mind reminding him of all the guilt that was buried within his bones. "I take it that it’s not you—or perhaps I am truly going mad."

Atticus sat up from where he leaned against Kylen’s desk, moving to approach him before halting and abruptly sighing as if there was an invisible war on his tongue. No one, he breathed, "but that’s not to say that no one is going to."

Kylen looked up to him then, swallowing the anxiety that laughed in the echo of his bruised heart. What is it, Atticus?

The King of the East is heading towards Aeonia.

Aeonia… no one had dared so much as to even whisper that name here in months now.

The thunder mocked him in all of his power as the crows that stood perched outside of his window laughed at him in glee. Laugher was a common thing, apparently. Especially to those who had once still cherished the ground they walked on as if it wasn’t constantly throwing daggers after their heart. What does that have to do with us? That kingdom is a ghost town, and he will probably end up leaving mere minutes after arriving. Kylen’s voice was rough and yet so