Luca Kirigan hadn't realised how much of a monster his father was until he was facing down Novokribirsk with chains around his arms. With the city wiped out by his father's own shadows, he fled the country alongside the Sun Summoner and her tracker...
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LUCA KIRIGAN COULD hardly recall the first horror of his life, and if he was being honest, he was glad his feeble mind shrouded that night in mystery. What he did remember was enough, making his skin crawl and feel too tight for his body. He hated it and wanted to peel every layer of it away until only his flesh and bones remained, exposed to the world.
He'd been fourteen when the King forced him into his bed for the first – and thankfully only – time, and Luca remembered slowly feeling the last remnants of his youthful ignorance and naivety be ripped out of him. The King's large chubby hands were forever imprinted on his pale skin, his frail and thin body, and the stench of herring and wine made him heave every time he smelled it even years later.
No one but a few people knew, and even less could understand. David's eyes were wide when Genya Safin, the Queen's gifted Tailor, dragged him back to their shared room within the Little Palace walls. She was the one who found him, who kept him from crumbling down on the floor as every piece of his identity was smashed into a million tiny fragments. And she was the one who took him back home, because they both knew that was the only place he could be even a little safe.
He vomited for hours, but after the first two times he was only dry-heaving, and even Vanya's Corporalki abilities couldn't help him. His own Heartrender powers seemed far away, as if they never existed, and he wondered manically and with tears in his eyes if this was how the otkazats'ya felt. Empty and powerless.
"Why would he do this?" Vanya asked, and Luca couldn't help his bitter laugh. It tasted like nightshade on his tongue. The King's words echoed in his mind. This will teach Kirigan who holds the power.
He decided right then and there that his father would never know. He wouldn't be used as some tool for the King's power move, and he had no wish to be tangled up in his and his father's constant political battles. And so he told Vanya to heal the bruises, asked David to forget everything he saw, and begged Genya – his father's spy – to not tell him anything. It was pathetic and humiliating, but he pleaded with her on his knees. Genya looked at him with eyes clouded with tears, but she agreed, so disgracing himself in that moment was the least of his worries.
And the next day when he couldn't get out of bed, his father came to him, demanding to know why he wasn't attending his classes. Grisha didn't get sick, so that wasn't a viable excuse. So Luca didn't say anything, only stared at the wall as he got berated. Until the tears came, unstoppable as the floodgates tore open. He could tell his father hadn't expected that, because he stopped talking entirely and only gaped at him with wide eyes. Luca didn't dare look at him as his breath came shakily, stuck in his throat and his face twisted.
It was the first time in so very long that his father embraced him, pulling him to his chest and letting him bury his face in his shoulder. Luca gripped onto him tightly, relishing in the minute comfort that his father's fingers in his hair brought, the whispered words of comfort that he couldn't make out, and the rapid heartbeat beneath his ear.
His father left him alone after that. Even when it took an entire week for Luca to even dare leaving his room. In the meantime, his mother or David brought him some meals. David never met his eyes, though his treatment of him never changed beyond that, and his mother didn't question anything. Katya Kuznetsov only smiled and asked him if he enjoyed his day, to which he'd manage the tiniest nod, and that was enough for her.
When Luca finally pushed himself to attend his classes again, he was surprised that no one questioned his absence. Instead, they piled onto him and asked about the private training the General offered him, wanting to know what it entailed. He was so stunned the first time that he hadn't been able to answer, and the bubbly Inferni named Marie only giggled.
"I get it, you're not allowed to tell!" He used that very excuse afterwards whenever someone asked. Even to his own friends, ignoring the way Zoya grumbled and Freya looked at him weird. He was fully aware that the famed Sound Bender received multiple private training sessions, and she was allowed to talk about them. She and Zoya spent countless hours nitpicking them apart. But the pale haired girl didn't question anything out loud, and he breathed out a sigh of relief.
The next time he saw the King, he wished he'd never left his room two months prior. His father escorted him and the rest of the King's family into Botkin's training hall, and Luca's entire body froze up. His sparring partner got the jump on him, using his averted attention to his advantage. The sound Luca let out as he got knocked the the floor was something akin to the growl of a rabid dog. No one ever got the jump on him. He was one of the best, if not the best, in Botkin's class.
He worked far too hard his entire life to let that all go to waste for some cruel and disgusting man who called himself King. When he fought like a caged beast, there were two mantras running rampant in his mind. The same old 'fight fight fight, father's watching'. And then a much stronger 'don't let that fucker win'.
He barely felt it when his opponent struck him and his nose cracked, bleeding all over his already red kefta. He won the fight – just barely – and a fetal sort of satisfaction set into his bones. Even as the pain in his nose became blinding, he couldn't care about anything other than that he'd won. Vanya pressed a handkerchief to his nose, and Zoya and Freya knelt beside him to make sure he was fine, but he waved them off. He was more than fine.
His father was approaching him, but he looked over the General's shoulders instead. Directly into the King's eyes. They widened and he looked away, the man's face painted red with embarrassment and uncertainty. A different sort of rage spiked within him as realisation bloomed in his belly like rot. The King was ashamed. He couldn't even look him in the eye. It wasn't the kind of shame that told Luca he regretted what he did. No, the only thing the King regretted was that he had to come face to face with Luca, and that word of his actions hadn't actually reached his father's ears. Or maybe he did regret it, in which case that horrible night happened because of a little bit of wine. Luca couldn't decide which was worse.
When the King left and Luca stood in the corner of the training hall, handkerchief still pressed against his nose, he sneered and turned to Vanya. She was the only one near enough to hear him.
"My face," he hissed. She turned to him questioningly. "It's the last thing he'll see before he dies."
A/N
I finally wrote a version of the prologue that I kinda like. It genuinely took so long bc i want to write Luca's mind space perfectly.
The first chapter of this book will correlate with the end of chapter 15 'Scarlet Blooms' in These Shattered Hearts.
