“There was a ring of fire,” a breathless partygoer, who wishes to remain anonymous, said of the bloody clash between royals. “The prince fought valiantly, but he was badly burned. We all thought he was dead until he screamed at us to go home.”
As yet, the state of Prince Kamran’s health is unknown.
Further reports indicate that due to the ghastly circumstances surrounding the king’s death, the noble houses of Ardunia will begin talks today to decide whether retribution against the southern empire is necessary. Should they decide in the affirmative, their decision would mark the end of an unprecedented seven years of peace time, launching what officials say could be the bloodiest war in recent history....
There was more.
More about Alizeh, described as a mysterious blur of a young woman whose name he’d cried aloud—“The prince was rumored to be but days away from selecting a bride”—for all the world to memorize. There was more about historical precedents, stories of other failed kings who’d succumbed to the dark magic of the devil and paid dearly. Most horrifying, though, were the inches dedicated to Cyrus’s altercation with Miss Huda, the latter having apparently found time to give an interview to the press, describing in excruciating detail all that she knew of Alizeh, and taking care to add that she’d heard the southern king refer to Alizeh as “Your Majesty,” leading Miss Huda to speculate on record that perhaps the two had been betrothed for some time.
Kamran wanted to set it all on fire.
It was not among his responsibilities to know the names of every guest attending a ball—it was Hazan who would’ve possessed such a list—but there must’ve been at least onejournalist in attendance, for how else would they have been able to write and print such defamations before dawn?
The timing of it all seemed calculated to throw his days into tumult; he’d hardly had a chance to catch his breath and already he’d need to manage a chaos that could’ve been easily avoided. Had he only been given an opportunity to address the people directly, he might’ve soothed their fears with a show of strength—instead, their minds had already been taught to panic, fertilized by a garbage article. No doubt they’d all cough up their coin for the next printing of horseshit that would profit from his pain.
Startled by a sudden motion, Kamran tore his eyes away from the mirror, where he’d been staring blankly at his own reflection.
Sina had bowed before him.
His heart still thudding painfully in his chest, Kamran compelled himself to be calm, staring just a beat too long at the top of the older man’s head, his graying brown curls. The valet had been with him for years now; always quiet, always thin, always in custody of impeccable manners. With great deference, he presented Kamran with a pair of dark blue kidskin gloves.
“If you wish, sire” was all he said.
As if in response Kamran flexed his left hand, staring down at the shimmering gold veins splitting open the skin along his fingers, then snaking up his wrist, under his sleeve, where he knew they continued branching up his arm—
Briefly, he closed his eyes.
Never had the prince been particularly self-admiring,but neither had he been willfully blind. It was but a simple fact that he’d been a royal who boasted more than just a title; a single glance around any room was enough to confirm that Kamran possessed an uncommon beauty, that he was orders of magnitude more handsome than his peers and elders. Too, Kamran had been well-fed and well-formed; he’d been wielding swords, riding horses, and training in full battle armor since childhood. He was as a result honed to something resembling perfection—so much so that he’d in fact never been much impressed with his reflection, for he’d grown accustomed to the splendor of his face and body.
Now, he hardly recognized himself.
There still remained the template of a handsome young man: his powerful body still stood tall and strong, his olive skin still gleamed, his dark hair remained thick and lustrous. But upon the foundations of his exquisite beauty now lay a grisly veneer. Gone was the gloss of a charming, noble prince; Kamran looked more like someone who might roast children on a spit, set fire to a village in the dead of night, feast upon the entrails of his enemies.
Slowly, the prince lifted his ruined hand to his ruined face.
Just last evening he knew that most women would happily consent to be his wife; even had they disliked him, he did not think they’d be revolted by the prospect of sharing his bed.
Now, he wasn’t so sure.
His fine clothes hid a figure that looked as if it’d been struck by a strange lightning; the gold streak he’d beenblessed with at birth—a mark placed upon him by the Diviners themselves—had once intersected his chest and torso in a tidy, elegant line. It was tradition for an heir of the Ardunian empire to be touched by magic, to own evidence of their birthright on their skin, announcing them forevermore as a true inheritor of the throne.
Never before had this magic been known to mutate.
Now the burnished gold stripe had all but shattered along his skin, glowing branches snaking tremulously up the left side of his body, the glimmering veins growing thinner as they braced the side of his neck, his cheek, and finally pierced straight through his left eye, rendering his iris an inhuman color.
He now possessed one dark eye and one the exact color of gilt, the sight so disorienting it cast doubt upon the original magic itself, which appeared, by all accounts, to be rejecting him.
“Your Highness?”
The tentative sound of Sina’s voice shook the prince from his reverie; he met the valet’s eyes without hesitation, pretending not to notice when the older man flinched.
“No gloves,” Kamran said.
Sina bowed his head once more. “As you wish, sire.”
The valet fluttered around him minutes more, using a coarse brush to remove any lint from his ensemble. The steadyhush hushof the bristles against fabric nearly lulled the uncrowned king back to sleep.
To note that Kamran had hardly slept the night before would be to remark upon the roundness of the earth; statingthe obvious would not help the young man’s mind clear any more quickly. He was presented, in any case, with evidence of his own exhaustion by the sight of his haggard, disfigured reflection: crescents of darkness were smudged beneath his eyes; the cords of his neck were visibly tense; his jaw was set in a perpetual clench. Grief, exhaustion, betrayal—he couldn’t decide which was the worst aggressor.
