Page 22 of A Courage of the Chosen

She will soon.

She’ll come to understand that my way is better than one where thousands die needlessly. Where darkness is the only thing that exists.

I want to rule over people, not corpses and ash.

My father has dropped all forms of civility, spending more time in his true form than his Seelie one.

Initially, he was pleased that I’d finally taken the Craobh Beatha, but the novelty quickly wore off for him, especially since I refused to give him permission to bear it.

No. This power would be mine, and mine alone.

Elsie will never submit to me if she knows that he has the ability to wear something that belonged to her family, and I won’t take that from her.

“Your Highness?” A guard interrupts my internal thoughts on what Elsie might be doing right now. “We have more for you, sir.”

The face looking at me is devoid of any emotion. Obedient and ready to serve. The perfect soldier.

I turn from where I was observing the units of our armies training, some of them still submitting to their baser instincts as a result of the darkness swimming through their veins.

But the ones I have full control over, the ones I’ve turned since possessing the Craobh, fight with a lethality I’ve never seen. I’m personally training them, turning them into the most brutal of weapons.

“TAVISHHHH.” My name is a monstrous roar that comes from the very heart of the caves.

With a roll of my eyes, I instruct the Seelie waiting for me to keep the others where we usually conduct this type of business. “I’ll be there shortly.”

He nods compliantly and disappears as quickly as he came.

I take my time walking to where Father waits for me, content to let him stew in his anger. When I enter the central chamber, shadows band around my throat and slam me into the stone wall.

“You conniving, deceiving, LIAR!” Dark hazel eyes burn like hot coal from the depths of my father’s magic, shadows masking the features that torment the nightmares of most who look upon him and survive to tell the tale.

I let him hold me like this, let him think that he can subdue me. But the truth is, my power has far outweighed his for a long time.

The monstrous face he so cleverly hid doesn’t come as a shock anymore, and he stopped using the elongated teeth and serrated claws as a way to inspire fear in me. I was a teenager when he first showed me this side of myself, and I was so terrified that I didn’t sleep for four straight nights because every time I closed my eyes, I saw his skin melting away. I was petrified of him for a while after that, a notion which is laughable now.

Elsie had once asked me about the scars that litter my body, and I lied and told her they were from fighting this war. Most of them were gifts from the hands of the one who gave me life.

When the shadows tighten their grip around my neck and air starts to rattle through my teeth, I send out a tendril of raw, dense darkness. It cuts through Father’s power like scissors snipping thread.

He rumbles while remaining hidden away, displeased with how quickly I was able to free myself from his hold.

“Why am I a liar?” I ask nonchalantly. There are many things he isn’t aware of, and I won’t reveal myself without knowing what he does.

“After everything I’ve done for you, everything I’ve given you. This is how you repay me.” My head is snapped to the side as his claw-tipped hand lands a blow, those jagged edges gouging into my skin.

I spit out a puddle of blood and, with a blank expression, look back at the man who has beaten me to within an inch of life on more than one occasion. I learned as a boy that any reaction would only spell more punishment for me. But it’s been decades since he’s actually laid a hand on me. I usually don’t let him get close enough for that.

“I ordered that you send soldiers out to take more Seelie. We need to add to our numbers since you’re too pathetic and weak to ensure the loyalty of those we have already gifted with our might,” he seethes, eyes flaring brighter where he’s obscured beneath roiling shadows.

After my initial demonstration of what I could do with the Craobh, Father demanded that every single one of our soldiers be transformed into the new servants I created. Every Brollachan across the realm was to be summoned here so that I could bring them under our control. We quickly found out that once a Seelie had already reached the point of becoming Brollachan, there was no going back from it, and they withered to blackened corpses when I’d sent my power spearing for them.

We now had a chamber filled with around one hundred dead Brollachan that we still needed to burn.

While it’s too late for those Seelie, and they would always be a slave to the darkness in their hearts, what I’d failed to tell my father is that everyone else could be touched with my new gifts. He assumed the same limitations on the Brollachan applied to all of our existing forces, and I didn’t correct him. However, with the Craobh, I can make them shift at my will. And they answer to me alone.

I’ve quietly been adding to those ranks, slowly but surely building the army that will help me create the kingdom I see in my mind.

“How dare you disobey my command. I am your KING!” he spits.