Blake dragged his brother through the bloodied streets and up the broad steps of the Sun Palace. Cain's two new slaves and the girl trailed close behind, their chains whispering against the marble. The palace itself still stank of death. Though a full day had passed since Khair's fall, the stench of slaughter clung to its gilded halls like rot beneath perfume.
The corpses had been stripped bare long ago, men and women alike taken for spoils, especially the imperial guard who have been treated as diamonds admist a sea of iron.
Those that killed one of them had earned their right for their mask which they eagerly showed by either putting them on their face or on their cloth, for all to see.
Blake had 9 of them hanging around his hips.
The bodies may have been burnt outside but the blood was still there.
