ill smelle

ors bore faint trails of crimson where the trial had ended, and servants rushed with cloth and sand to scru

bes brushed together, their faces half-lit by torches. Some glanced at Gomen

ay. His scar, freshly drawn by the beast's claw, burned down his cheek like fire etched int

a heavy silence soon settl

igh O

d. Her face was shadowed by the hood she wore, but her eyes glowed with a pale, unnatural light. A st

parted i

by some force greater than herself, her lips already moving in a faint murmur. The wo

carved from stone. "Speak," his voice

ne. Smoke curled from the braziers in the corners, thickening unnaturally, as though answering her

ar fa

g in the air

obles

r falls from the sky... drenched in fire a

man covered her mouth. Someone whisp

fury. "He will unseat the crown. He will split the bloo

here they gripped the throne's

hall but some place far beyond. "Beware the one marked by shadow. Th

ice cr

n she s

s flickered and the braziers nearly died. She fell to her knees, clutching at her che

rantically. Some demanded the Oracle be silenced. Oth

ase crawled across his chest. A falling star. A curse-child. Unseat the

whispered too lou

was like steel, and the man looked away

ainst the stone. The sound si

. "It cannot be stopped. It has already begun. Wh

d back, and she coll

at followed wa

voice a blade cutting throug

ently in their arms. Her lips still moved, forming words, but they were too faint t

s jaw was clenched, his eyes distant. The w

rely hidden. "A curse-child..." "Unseat the crown..." "The bloodl

it all, the scar on his cheek burning,

he shadows at the

efore,he saw the

. Wat

htly, and beneath it, he thought he caught the

urned and slipped

se seemed

, he saw something lying w

eat

as mid

ing against it. It was colder th

was not his own whispered thro

own wil