The snow was falling too softly for a day meant for death.
It drifted down in lazy spirals, catching the pale light of the overcast sky, clinging to the shoulders of soldiers in grey armor. Beneath the wooden scaffold, the crowd murmured in a low, almost reverent tone. No jeering. No cheering. Just the sound of boots crunching in snow and the faint creak of the platform's timbers.
Aldrin Von Veyren stood at the center of it all, the cold wind tugging at the black fur of his high-collared cloak. The heavy ceremonial sword in his hands gleamed faintly, silver runes etched into the fuller. The weapon felt far too large for his fourteen-year-old frame, but his grip was steady.
In front of him, bound at the knees and wrists, knelt the man who had taught him to grip a quill before a sword. Lord Malrik Von Veyren, his father.
The once-mighty lord's silver hair was tangled and matted with dried blood. His proud posture had been stolen by defeat and chains, yet even kneeling in the snow, his presence was like a shadow cast over the world. His blue-silver eyes—the same as Aldrin's—were unblinking, sharp, and heavy with a weight only they could share.
"You will do it," came the voice from behind Aldrin. Duke Ravel Greyheart, dressed in deep iron-grey velvet, spoke as though ordering the slaughter of a lamb. "You will grant your father the dignity of a swift end. Or I will have one of my men do it… poorly."
Aldrin didn't look back. The young lord's gaze stayed fixed on the man before him. His breath misted in the air, faintly trembling in the cold. Not from fear—though anyone watching would believe it—but from the realization that this moment would bind itself to him forever.
His father's voice cut through the silence, low and unyielding.
"Do it, Aldrin."
There was no plea, no comfort in his tone—only command. It was the last order of a lord to his heir.
Aldrin's fingers tightened around the hilt. He wanted to say something—to ask for forgiveness, to promise vengeance, to express even a sliver of the grief that gnawed at his chest—but the words died before reaching his lips. His face was a mask, calm as ice.
He stepped forward.
The crowd seemed to hold its breath.
In a single motion, Aldrin brought the blade down.
The steel bit cleanly, severing life from body with a sound that would haunt the snow for hours. Blood steamed against the frost, curling into the winter air. Aldrin stood still for a moment, staring at the crimson stain spreading in the white beneath him.
When he finally turned to face the gathering of vassals, soldiers, and foreign dignitaries, his expression did not waver. He did not cry. He did not tremble. He simply raised the sword in both hands, as tradition demanded, and declared:
"I, Aldrin Von Veyren, stand as the fourteenth head of House Veyren."
The words were calm, level… yet behind them, in a place no one else could reach, something cold and sharp began to take root.
Duke Greyheart smiled faintly from the dais, a vulture satisfied that the corpse had been picked clean.
Aldrin sheathed the sword, the weight of it now twice as heavy. He descended the scaffold slowly, every footstep deliberate, snow crunching under his boots. His retainers waited at the bottom, their expressions mixed—loyalty, pity, suspicion.
He ignored them all.
For now.