Chapter 35 Boys and Blood
DAGNOTH DRACULIS
I remember the first time Kleon told me I was weak.
We were barely twelve.
The training yard smelled of sweat and iron, the air sharp with the bite of early morning frost. Our hands were blistered, our lungs burning, wooden practice swords clutched so tightly our knuckles had gone white.
I had dropped mine.
It wasn’t dramatic. No stumble. No grand failure. My grip simply loosened after hours of drills, and the sword slipped from my fingers, hitting the stone with a dull crack.
Silence followed.
The kind that makes your skin itch.
Kleon laughed.
Not loud. Not cruel enough to draw punishment. Just a breathy scoff, like I’d confirmed something he already knew.
“You see?” he said, tilting his head. “That’s what happens when you hesitate.”
I bent to pick the sword up, heat crawling up my neck. “My hand cramped.”
“Excuses,” he replied easily. He twirled his own sword, smooth and careless. “If this were real, you’d be dead.”
I looked at him then—really looked.
Same face. Same dark hair. Same blood.
But where I carried my strength like a weight, Kleon wore his like a game.
The trainer barked for us to continue. We circled each other again, boots scraping stone.
“Focus,” I muttered.
Kleon grinned. “Always focused. You’re the one thinking too much.”
We clashed. Wood against wood. He moved fast—reckless, unmeasured—but it worked. He always struck first. Always pushed forward. Pain never slowed him; it only sharpened him.
I blocked. Countered. Thought.
And that was the difference.
When he disarmed me again, he leaned close enough that only I could hear him.
“Father notices these things,” he whispered. “He likes winners.”
Something in my chest tightened.
My father summoned us on a day the palace smelled of herbs and sickness.
The doors to his chamber were half open, heat rolling out in thick waves. He sat propped against pillows, skin sallow, lips cracked. Each breath ended in a cough he tried—and failed—to hide.
Kleon stood straighter the moment we entered. I noticed that. He always knew when to perform.
“Come closer,” Father rasped.
We did.
His eyes lingered on Kleon first. Pride flickered there before it reached me.
“You’re growing,” he said hoarsely. “Stronger. Less afraid.”
Kleon smiled. “I learn quickly.”
Father nodded, pleased. Then his gaze shifted to me, and something hardened.
“You think too much,” he said. “You weigh every step like the world will punish you for moving.”
“I only try to choose wisely,” I replied.
He coughed, sharp and wet. “Wisdom without teeth is useless.”
Silence stretched.
“Kleon acts,” Father continued. “He takes what he wants. He doesn’t wait for permission. That is what a ruler needs.”
My throat tightened. “And restraint?”
“Restraint is for men who lack power,” he snapped. Then, softer but worse, “Learn from your brother. Be like him.”
Kleon didn’t look at me.
He didn’t need to.
I stood there, nodding like a good son, while something in my chest cracked quietly—
the moment I understood I would never be enough unless I became someone I wasn’t.
At meals, when Kleon talked over me and Father listened.
In lessons, when Kleon questioned laws and Father smiled at his boldness.
In training, when Kleon bled and laughed and was praised for endurance.
Once, after I bested him in a spar—clean, undeniable—I waited for Father’s approval.
He only said, “You won because your brother underestimated you.”
Not because I was strong.
Because Kleon was careless.
That night, Kleon found me on the battlements, staring out at the dark forest below.
“You heard him,” he said, leaning against the stone beside me.
I didn’t look at him. “Go gloat somewhere else.”
He laughed softly. “You always think everything is a wound.”
“What do you want, Kleon?”
He studied me for a moment, eyes sharp in the moonlight. “I want you to stop pretending you don’t want the crown.”
I turned then. “I don’t pretend.”
“You do,” he said. “You hide behind duty and discipline and restraint. But you want it. I can smell it on you.”
“And you?” I asked.
He smiled.
“I want it because it’s mine.”
I clenched my fists. “It’s not.”
“It will be,” he said lightly. Then his voice dropped. “Because when the time comes, you’ll hesitate. You always do.”
That was the night I realized something dangerous.
Kleon didn’t fear me.
He never had.
Years later, under the blood-red moon, when steel replaced wood and law demanded only one of us walk away crowned, I remembered his words.
He had been sick. Fevered. Shaking.
And still, he smiled when we faced each other.
“Careful,” he murmured then. “Don’t hesitate.”
I didn’t.
That was the difference.
But even as he fell, blood darkening the stone, I knew—
Kleon never truly loses.
He only waits.
And now, as the crown weighs heavy on my head and whispers of heirs crawl through the palace walls, I understand the cruelest truth of all:
My father taught us both the same lesson.
Only one of us listened the right way.