The Second Sad Ending

The Second Sad Ending
Sebastian’s POV

The night split with the sound of war, reverberating eerily through the whole castle.
“Finally. It is here. They are here,” I breathed, returning immediately to muttering aloud to myself, whispering those nonsenses in my head, strings of meaningless details even I couldn't comprehend.
The madness pulled me deeper and deeper into its abyss, while sanity clawed at me too, trying to have me concentrate on what was inevitably our final moments. And like always, I teetered between the brink of sanity and insanity.
I had fought relentlessly for years—against the madness and against the darkness—and yet I couldn't defeat them. When finally, the universe gave me hope of defeating them, she ripped it off from me by chasing off my only hope of defeating them, making sure she never returned after she left—my wife, Emilia.
I stared down at her limp form in my hands as I stood at the center of the throne room, waiting for my end, my inevitable demise. Her skin was pale, her breath shallow, almost nonexistent, and her soul gone somewhere far from me to her own world, never to return. It’s been three years now since she left this world with her friend Gabbrielle and never returned.
Three years in which the enemy had slowly grown in numbers and strength while I decayed in sanity, trapped by the darkness hosting itself in me. Lord Aaron of Lancaster and the chiefs now had the regency of my throne and had the army. Even the palace guards and maids obeyed their commands instead of mine. My kingdom was practically theirs to take. 
A dull thud screamed against the palace walls from outside, echoing in the night—then another, then a thunderous crash that shook the palace foundations. I staggered on my feet in the throne room, almost knocked to my knees, but I held back, cradling my wife’s limp form in my arms and pressing her tight to my chest. The ground shook beneath us as if about to split, the walls vibrating, echoing the thud from outside.
The shouting began. “Open the gates!” a voice roared from beyond the courtyard. “By order of the Senate, tear down the Everhart’s crest!”
The great wooden doors of the palace shuddered under the weight of battering rams, splinters raining down from the iron hinges.
I shut my eyes tight, holding off the guilt, pain, and rage crashing through me as I heard the cries of my loyal guards fall one by one under the enemies' weapons, steel clashing as they tried valiantly to defend their mad king. I held back the tears burning hard like a furnace behind my eyes and held back the bile rising to my stomach as the metallic smell of blood wafted into the air. The smell of the blood stung my nostrils—blood of the fools who stood to defend a mad, useless king like me. My legs wobbled beneath me, giving way under the weight of my heart shattering inside of me, the pieces of which fell to my stomach, sinking me on my feet.
But I held tight, I held back, cradling my wife's limp form to my chest. The end was already here. The end I knew was coming. The end I had tried to run from for years, but it had promised to always catch up with me, no matter how fast I ran.
The throne room vibrated as the battering ram slammed against the double doors, the walls shaking terribly. The battering ram slammed again, and the whole room shook harder than before. The doors broke open, and they all spilled in.
Torches lit the night in a fiery sea, shadows of hundreds pressing forward, armed with pikes, rifles, and swords. Aaron and Harrietta led the charging force, with Nathan just behind them with his soldiers, walking with Brian, who kept grinning devilishly like always, brushing his thumb on his lips.
I held Emilia closer, whispering into her unhearing ear. “The end has finally come, wife. I am sorry I couldn't protect you from it. I have no idea what they would do to your body, so we have to face it together.” I leaned low and kissed her forehead, her skin cold against my lips. “I am sorry, wife.” I whispered.
I refused to look up and kept staring at her limp face, though their boots kept ringing on the marble floors from ahead. My eyes traced her face carefully. I had no regret about dying. For a mad king like me, my death was long overdue. The only thing I regretted was that I would never get to see her face again before I die. I would never get to see her beautiful smile again, see the life shine bright in her pale green orbs.
Aaron and Harrietta stopped just a few feet from the dais, which I stood on, holding Emilia's limp body in my arms, her hair trailing like a dark waterfall down my chest. Their forces froze to a halt behind them, and the noise of marching boots died, giving way to a deafening silence that claimed the whole room.
Aaron pranced forward, his sword made crimson with blood dangling in his hand. “I am sorry it came to this, Sebastain. I have nothing against you and Emilia. You both just have something I and my wife want.”
Harrietta's face darkened, and she hissed. “He’s speaking for himself.” She snarled, throwing her heated eyes my way. “I have always hated you since we were little, hated you since Father had to abandon his real family, me and his queen, just to sleep with a mad slave and give birth to a mad son like you. He was so charmed by her he even abandoned his sane and legitimate child and made you, his mad bastard son, his heir.” She growled, her eyes tightened to a hard snarl. "I hate you and will always hate you. Nothing will change that. Not even your death."
I just listened to her, saying nothing. I wished I could hate her too, but I promised Father on his deathbed that I wouldn't. I had promised him I wouldn't hate her or use my power to get rid of her, because no matter what happens, she was my blood, my sister. So though a thousand responses breathed in my stomach for her, I just said nothing and watched as Aaron flexed his sword in his hands.
He grinned at the outburst like he's heard it so many times, and he climbed the dais to me.
I could have run, attempted to flee, but it would only be prolonging our death for a minute or maybe two. Death was here already, cloaked in the body of the very man I had hated since I was little, my rival since I had known how to breathe.
I looked into his eyes, seeing them brightened with the satisfaction of knowing I was going to die by his hands. My heart shattered, crumbling as I held his gaze. It hurt me beyond words that I would give him the satisfaction of taking my life, but fate has its joke, and I was just a piece of it.
“Goodbye, Sebastian.” He stared down at me, with a triumphant smile stretching his hard lips. His thick fingers folded tighter around his sword, and he raised it high in the air.
I turned to stare at my wife's limp form as I awaited death. Even if I couldn't see her smile again, at least I could see her limp face before I…
The sharp sting of a sword split the air, and my throat rippled with intense pain, blood spraying out of my neck like a punctured hose. I wobbled on my legs, staggering in my arms, my arms growing weaker around her, but I held tight to her, never letting her go, even as I dropped to my knee. Another wave of agony jarred up my thighs as my knees crushed hard against the hard marble working of the dais.
My eyes swirled about, bouncing around in my head, the world blurring fast to nothing while blood still continued to pour out of my throat.
“Goodbye, sister.” I heard him grunt again, his voice tinged a little, and then the sword sliced the air, loud and hard, and this time, she fell from my hands. I tried to move to reach for her, but my hands wouldn't move, and neither would the rest of my body.
My death was supposed to be the end of the bloodshed, but an uproar roared around me as death pulled me slowly into its cold embrace, and I thudded against the hard marble of the dais.
Swords clashed against swords around me, steel grinding steel, and bodies dropped, thudding against the marble floor of the throne room, making it shake.
Aaron's voice filtered through my dying senses as it sliced the air, a furious growl that seemed to have rung out from deep in his lungs. “What the hell are you doing, Brian and Nathan? Why would you bastards kill Harrietta, kill my wife? Why…”
He didn't get to complete the words, because it was suddenly replaced by a gaggle and groans of pain, and a thunderous noise echoed against my eardrums, the ground shaking beneath me again, harder this time, as it claimed his own corpse.
“Now, I am King, Aaron.” Brian screamed. “Now, I rule Duchester.”
I grinned then with my last dying breath, smiling at myself. At least we didn't go alone, wife," I told her in my head if she could hear me. My eyes shut close, and then there was nothing—an abyss of nothing that seemed to never end.