Three hundred years ago, the Earth split and the sky trembled. And then the monsters came.
The island of Lowynn is cursed. The Veil between worlds has torn, and now, monsters come with vengeance. They can only be placated by the blood of sorcerers...
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The walls of the Keep were impermeable. The Skaara had spent the entire morning stalking back and forth, searching for a weakness. But the only entrance he found were the gates, and they were solid bars of iron, stretching over one-hundred feet high.
He cursed himself for letting Ciara get inside their walls safely. The Skaara had been so close-- for one itching moment, his sword had been at her chest. But he hesitated a moment too long, almost grateful when she scurried away.
I forgot who I was; I forgot everything that is at stake for me. By letting her go, he had doomed himself, and an impossibly high number of other people. If I could have just fulfilled my damn quest. If I hadn't taken the time to get so confused.
"Will you sit still for a minute?" Dom asked.
The Skaara refused, purposely pacing even faster. "My entire purpose was to kill Lady Ciara before she got military protection. That's the only thing I was created for, Dom. Gods, I'm dead. I'm a dead man walking, Dom. He said he was going to kill me if I failed, and I did--"
"No," Dom said. "I won't let that happen. We won't let that happen."
The Skaara wished he shared the prince's confidence. He had hidden the true horrors of his life from Dom, attempting to shield him. The scars on his back were always carefully covered, and he pretended that the marks on his face came from scaled and clawed monsters, not human ones. He downplayed his hunger, and pretended that his cellar wasn't quite as dark and dank as it really was. Dom didn't know what his father was capable of, or how close the Skaara came to death every day.
"Besides," Dom was saying. "We have plenty of time. If we send word out to my father now, it will take over half a moon for his armies to arrive--"
"No, Dom, don't you understand?" The Skaara cried. It took a moment for him to remember that he had not told Dom of the púca's prophecy. He did not want Dom to understand the doom that stood between him. "This is it," he choked. "I failed in my one purpose. I failed.
It wasn't death that he feared. After everything that he had been through, the Skaara knew that the future was nothing more than an impossible dream. But, when he was still a young boy who expected to be freed one day, he had started hunting in order to survive. And if the King killed him now, he would have become the monster for nothing. He would have unmade himself for a murderer and betrayed himself for a lie.
Though he knew it was foolish, the Skaara's heart was thunderous. He would have happily sacrificed himself to a dragon or monster. He would not mind if death claimed him. Just not the King. Never the King.
And, though the King would undoubtedly arrive with armies in tow, siege was not an ideal solution. It could take weeks, or even months to make it inside the palace. And all the while, a river of bloodshed would be carved around the Keep.
Their companion-- who the Skaara finally learned was named Nial-- appeared. Callum had been hastily bound to the tree, seething, but Dom and him had managed with only one soldier.
