Chapter 181: the hollow king

The scent of wine clung to my skin like the blood I couldn’t wash away. It was thick in the air, suffocating, staining my throat, my hands—my soul. The goblet in my grip was chipped, the wine inside sloshing as I brought it to my lips. It burned as it slid down, but it wasn’t enough.  

It was never enough.  

I had thought returning to Maelstrom would bring me peace. That taking my throne again, surrounding myself with power, would silence the voices in my head.  

But power meant nothing now.  

Not when I had no one to share it with.  

Not when I had murdered the last thing that had ever been truly innocent in my life.  

Lira.  

Her name echoed in my mind, a whisper of guilt that never left.  

I had told myself it was mercy. That I had spared her from a cruel world, from growing up knowing she was a product of betrayal. That her existence was a wound Astra had inflicted upon me, and I had simply… erased it.  

But no lie could make me forget the way her tiny body had curled into itself, the way her small hand had still clutched her doll even in death.  

I slammed the goblet onto the table, the force spilling the last of the wine across the polished wood.  

The great hall was empty.  

My guards were stationed outside, too afraid to enter, too cautious to approach their king in his drunken state.  

Megara had stopped coming.  

She had looked at me with disgust the last time, had told me she could not stand to watch me wither into something unrecognizable. She had accused me of being weak, of letting my grief consume me.  

I had laughed in her face.  

But deep down, I knew she was right.  

I had become a shadow of the man I once was.  

And I didn’t care.  

The throne room was empty more often than not.  

My council would gather, whispering amongst themselves, debating the affairs of the kingdom while I sat upon my father’s throne, silent, detached.  

I didn’t care for their politics.  

I didn’t care for their wars.  

All I cared for was drowning in the wine that never numbed me enough.  

“Sire,” one of my advisors spoke one morning, his voice hesitant. “The Eastern Lords are growing restless. Without your presence at court, they—”  

“Let them rot,” I muttered, swirling the goblet in my hand.  

“Sire,” the man tried again, shifting nervously.  

I lifted my gaze, cold and sharp. “Did I stutter?”  

He flinched. They always did, these men who had once feared my father and now feared me.  

But fear was hollow.  

Fear was not respect.  

I had learned that lesson long ago.  

And yet, I didn’t care to correct it.  

I didn’t care about anything anymore.  

Sleep was a luxury I no longer had.  

When I closed my eyes, I was back in the snow, standing over Yong’s body.  

His blood was everywhere, staining the white beneath us, soaking into my hands. His breath was ragged, shallow, his fingers twitching.  

His eyes—those cursed, knowing eyes—had looked up at me with something I had not expected.  

Pity.  

Not hatred.  

Not anger.  

Pity.  

As if he knew what I had done to myself.  

As if he knew this would break me more than it had broken him.  

His last words rang in my ears, sharp as daggers.  

And then I was in the small house, the wooden floor creaking beneath my boots.  

The air was warm, filled with the scent of burnt candles and fresh linens. A child’s laughter still lingered in the walls.  

And then I saw her.  

Lira.  

Her small frame curled beneath a wool blanket, her silver hair falling across her tiny face.  

She had been beautiful.  

She had been innocent.  

I had told myself it was mercy.  

That was the lie I had clung to as I pressed a hand to her chest, as I whispered the incantation that would take her last breath.  

She had not struggled.  

She had not even woken.  

And yet, when her breath stopped, when her tiny body fell limp, it felt as though I had killed something inside myself, too.  

I woke gasping.  

The sweat on my skin was cold, my body shaking, the ghost of Lira’s final breath still brushing against my ears.  

I reached for the wine before I could think, before I could feel.  

And I drank until there was nothing left.  

I saw him in my mind sometimes.  

Aster.  

The boy who was my blood.  

The boy who now hated me more than anything in this world.  

The way he had looked at me that night—when he realized what I had done—haunted me.  

It was the same way I had once looked at Morgoth.  

My father.  

The tyrant.  

The murderer.  

And now, Aster saw me the same way.  

I had become the thing I hated most.  

A monster.  

I wondered if he had already begun planning his revenge.  

If he trained every day with rage in his heart, swearing to one day stand before me with a blade to my throat.  

I welcomed it.  

If Aster wanted to kill me, then so be it.  

I no longer had the will to stop him.  

The days passed in a blur.  

I no longer attended meetings.  

I no longer spoke unless necessary.  

Megara had left me completely, her chambers empty, her scent long faded from my halls.  

Even my guards avoided me.  

I was alone.  

Just as I had always feared.  

Just as I deserved.  

I had spent my life believing I was different from my father.  

That I would be a better king, a better man.  

But all I had done was repeat his sins.  

And now, I sat upon a throne of ghosts, my crown heavier than ever, my heart nothing more than a hollow, broken thing.  

I lifted the goblet to my lips again, only to find it empty.  

I cursed, hurling it across the room. It shattered against the stone, the sound echoing in the silence.  

I pressed a hand to my forehead, squeezing my eyes shut.  

"How did I become this?"

But I already knew the answer.  

I had lost her.  

And without Astra, there was nothing left of me.  

Nothing but this.  

A broken king.  

A murderer.  

A man waiting for death to come.