Kaelen stood before the mirror, fingers trailing the edge of the frame. The reflection showed a boy—but in his eyes lived a man twice broken and reborn. He no longer saw weakness in his young limbs. He saw a second chance wrapped in skin and shadow.
The days since his return had been quiet, but Kaelen knew better than to mistake silence for peace. In the courts of Valcarya, silence was strategy.
He had started to move. Slowly. Subtly.
First: the servant routes. He memorized them all, learning which hallways remained unwatched at which hours, which guards lingered and which patrolled with precision. He began stashing supplies in forgotten crawlspaces—maps, keys, scrolls, lockpicks. A miniature kingdom of secrets.
Second: the whispers. Every noble house had its rot. He started with the minor ones. House Nerel, whose son snuck into the kitchens to steal wine. House Vren, whose matriarch hoarded black powder for reasons "unfit for court." House Elvran, whose lord owed debts to men who made people disappear. Kaelen recorded everything. He didn't move against them—not yet. But information was like wine: it grew more potent with age.
Third: the weak points. He watched the princes at mealtimes, in training sessions, in court assemblies. Alric still held the room like a sun, radiant and terrifying. But Kaelen saw the tremors in his fingers after long sparring. He saw the slight wince when he turned his neck. Old injuries. Ones Kaelen now knew the origins of—and how to exploit them.
By the sixth day, Kaelen had mapped more than territory. He had mapped fear.
Elaine followed him into the archives one night, silent as the moonlight behind her.
"You're playing a dangerous game," she whispered.
He didn't look up from the tome he was studying. "So is everyone else. I just remember the rules."
"You didn't used to talk like this. You sound like... one of them."
He turned the page. "Maybe that's the only way to win."
Elaine stepped closer. Her voice trembled. "What happened to you?"
Kaelen looked up then, and for a heartbeat, the flickering candlelight caught something in his eyes—something ancient, something furious.
"I died."
The silence that followed was not empty. It was heavy with unspoken truths.
Elaine stepped back. "Whatever you're doing... be careful. You can't fight them alone."
He almost said, I'm not alone. But he wasn't ready to tell her about the voice. About the dagger. About the crypt.
Not yet.
Later, deep in the north wing where the stone walls bled old magic, Kaelen entered the Chamber of Veins. It was sealed by time and forgotten purpose, hidden behind a broken fresco of the first king.
His blood—cut from his palm—opened the lock.
Inside: rows of glass coffins filled with ash and bone. A shrine to failed heirs.
He stepped carefully through the dust.
A voice stirred again. That same inhuman whisper that had offered him rebirth.
"You step where kings once fell."
"I intend to walk where they could not."
Something stirred behind the walls—stone grinding against stone, breath without lungs.
"Then you must pay. Everything costs."
"I've already paid in blood."
The flame of his torch turned violet.
One of the coffins cracked.
Inside, a scroll lay upon the ribs of a forgotten prince. Kaelen reached in and took it.
It screamed.
Pain lanced through him—not of flesh, but of memory. Visions cascaded into his mind:
—A sword breaking across Alric's throat, only for the wound to close.
—King Orric feeding something beneath the throne.
—Elaine chained in a dungeon that did not yet exist.
—The throne itself... opening.
Kaelen collapsed.
When he rose, the scroll was gone—but its knowledge remained.
The Throne fed on lineage.
The Throne chose through blood.
The Throne remembered.
The next morning, Alric stood at the center of the training yard.
Kaelen watched from the shadows, feigning errand duty. The court watched too. This was a show of strength.
Alric raised his blade.
Kaelen whispered a name. One he had pulled from the scrolls. One tied to Alric's soul.
The prince faltered.
Just for a second. But it was enough.
Whispers spread.
Kaelen smiled.
That night, he returned to the archives.
The masked woman waited by the lanterns. No footsteps. No sound.
"You've started," she said.
"Yes."
"Do you know the cost yet?"
"No."
She reached out and touched his chest.
The Throneblood mark burned.
"You will."
Kaelen fell backward—into darkness, into void. He landed not in the archive, but before a throne made of bone and shadow. Atop it sat no king, only a shape. A thing. Eyes like burning sigils. Teeth like broken crowns.
"Prince," it said.
"Monster," Kaelen answered.
"Pawn."
"Not anymore."
The throne laughed.
"Let us see."
Chains wrapped around Kaelen's limbs. Not tight, not painful—testing.
He pushed back.
The chains cracked.
The laughter stopped.
When he awoke, he was bleeding from the nose. The masked woman was gone. The candles were all extinguished.
On the floor before him, written in blood:
"Round One Ends."
And beneath that:
"You Are Not Alone."