"You give up your future, lose your dream, and are stained with despair, yet at the same time you shake off your past, fight reality, and never lose your nobility." --Black Butler
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A/N (again): For those of you who skipped the author note, important note, and/or prologue, y'all may want to go read 'em. They're important. Especially the one labeled "Important."
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Red.
Why is everything red?
But then, the red turns to orange. The orange turns to yellow. The yellow turns to...
Red.
Dark red. A crimson bloodstain splattered across mahogany floor.
The red is no longer just red. It is everything. It's is many changing colors, flickering all around. It's sparks popping off the flames that lick the walls.
The red turns darker. It's no longer red.
It is deep brown locks of hair, spread out around a ball.
No. The "ball" is a head.
A head. A face. The head has a face. Dark brown eyes, open and glassy in death. Blood flecks mark on snow white skin.
But the head isn't a head anymore.
The head is a ball.
It's a small, black ball, no bigger than a little finger.
Hurling towards my face.
The flames aren't flames. The flames have become dead soldiers, lying unmoving on a battlefield. All are dead. Husbands, sons.
Brothers.
"I'll be gone one year. One year only, then I get a break."
A smooth, deep voice. It's familiar. Comforting.
"Zara, it'll only be one yea--"
And it is silenced forever by the stray black ball.
Everything is red. The only words are the ones last spoken that echo through the silence.
One year.
*****
My eyes sprang open. The remnants of the dream still echoed in my mind.
One year.
"Oh, ga--" I mumbled. My knees found their way to my chest. I pulled them close to me, trying to draw comfort from something.
Apparently, my knees were "comfort."
Everything echoed loudly in my head, reminding me of the scene I had endured all night.
YOU ARE READING
Inside the Beast's Castle
Fantasy"As soon as you believe you are a monster is when you become one." After many years of war, the kingdom of Edria is finally in an era of peace--peace obtained by one thing and one thing only. A deal. King Regol has made a deal with the devil, or r...
