112 | deceit; in three days

"The whole time, you've been lying to me?" The words reverberated across the crumbled castle walls, mixed with the raging flames that slowly retreated into oblivion with the disappearance of their master.

There was the sound of the floor breaking, shattering in coiled anger that unraveled in terrible bursts.

Nicola jerked her head in the direction of the nearby sound, her eyes wide. Two swords collided with each other, fury burning in each heavy swing, and when her head turned to the standing window, she saw two figures emerge into the ruined gardens.

One wide, weighted sword and the other an elegant blade that could withstand any force.

The crown prince's expression was frighteningly cold, leeched of all colour and feeling as he gazed ahead, past his raised blade. "Do you want to save him when he bears a new label, or do you want to save him as Kaden Chauvet, the miserable dog of mine?"

He slashed across and Lux slammed his sword down, the air rippling around them, cracks spreading across the ground.

"Do you think he'd want to be saved by you, for either of those reasons?" Reed continued, his voice clear and ringing across the expansive space.

Lux growled and slammed his blade again, over and over.

From beside Nicola, the man standing beside her kneeling figure muttered Kaden's name under his breath, empty gaze staring distantly at the scene outside.

One arm was stretched out wielding a slender knife, casually primed at her delicate throat, the tip nicking her skin.

The other arm clutched a stack of papers with messy handwriting, torn out of the pages of a journal. They were dated methodically.

There was an ugly flap of skin across his youthful face that had been sliced open with a knife, and her hand under his boot, bones crushed as agony pulsed in her body.

She bit her tongue and did not scream.

"He always leaves. He never stays."'

And perhaps, he was never meant to. Decided by fate themselves, realized Skye as he clutched the old, yellowed pages more tightly.

He'd found them in Reed's office in the midst of the chaos, after the collapse of the wall shook the building and sent papers flying to the ground.

One had slipped out the window, landing at Skye's feet.

He'd picked it up. Read it. And then he was upstairs, in Reed's office, tearing through the remaining papers.

Nicola faltered, the wilderness in her cherry gaze settling, the satchel over her shoulder pressed against her tightly. "Would you prefer him if he were dead, Your Highness?" prompted the woman gently, although her words were cruel and unforgiving.

The sky blue gaze looked over, innocent eyes that were more ignorant than sweet. The pressure on his foot intensified.

"Have you ever dreamed," she continued, swallowing back the pain that bubbled in her throat and her thoughts that strayed to her unmoving fingers. "Of his corpse bleeding into the running rainwater?"

"A dead body so far away, you couldn't reach him even if you wished to? A time where even his corpse fled your cruelties."

Skye's eyes widened and narrowed into sharp slits, but she did not stop. Once, she'd been a girl in the slums without a voice. Her voice had been that gentle, proud salvation in that awkward but kind boy.

He was not here, but she was not that same girl.

Bitterness fueled her, rage numbing all other feelings. An ancient rage from many, many years prior.

"I didn't realize it. That it was him. And by the time I did, a fault of my own blindness, he'd already been ruined by the selfishness of you two brothers."

She pressed closer, allowing the knife to dig deeper into her skin. Skye, who was listening with furrowed attention, slipped his hand back slightly at the fearless and beautiful woman.

There were plenty of people in the world with the audacity to toy with others' lives. Nicola just needed more.

She smiled, a light and tender smile across her pale pink lips. Her eyes remained cold as the blade withdrew with her every movement.

"Would you have regretted it, like I did? Knowing it was your fault that the man called Kaden Chauvet died?"

"What—"

Nicola's hand twisted around the retreating wrist, her blood-covered neck and pale gaze a terror to behold. He tried to pry her hand off, but she held it firm, keeping the knife pointed at her.

Her hand grazed an old, fading metal ring around his finger—marked with a K.C. Skye flinched as she pressed around it—that precious treasure of his.

A ring that Kaden and he found abandoned in the library.

Skye had engraved it with Kaden's initials after they fell apart. Because if he could not hold onto that person, he would engrave his name on all their memories.

Nicola's smile became blinding. "Tell me, your highness, do you want to ruin that boy who caught you on that ladder, all over again?"

"How do you know that—"

"Your Highness. I wish for nothing more than your ruination."

She let go of his hand and Skye stumbled back, his back slamming against the window and horror wrote itself in his face. All his nightmares, all those gory scenes of Kaden's death, filled his mind.

"Have some shame," said Nicola as she slowly stood, her broken hand hanging at her side. "And learn what it means to be human."

There was no kindness, no sympathy, or sweetness seen within the woman who was kind to all those she knew.

Because she remembered.

Nicola remembered. How it felt to know that she lived her life loving Reed Chauvet, the very sinner who ruined her saviour. How it felt not knowing, living under a peaceful joy while his was a life of pure suffering and misery.

Her mind floated, wandering to the revelations of her past.

When she had almost been Queen, before the Grand Duke's noble son had approached her with a solemn gait.

Skye Chauvet," she said in the midst of memories. "We are all contributors to the real death of Kaden Chauvet."

———+++———

A woman sat before a polished mirror, reflecting the image of elegance and beauty woven into the single, thin braid running down her silky hair, cascading over a narrow and thin shoulder.

Her cheeks were brushed with a light blush of colour, and her lips were a natural and soothing pink.

She lowered her cherry gaze, twisting the golden ring wrapped around her finger. She'd ushered the maids outside earlier, and despite their insistence, she'd smiled and convinced them to give her time alone.

It was a bewildering and joyous day. It should've been, with the ceaseless preparations for a grand and glorious wedding.

If her future husband had not been acting strange in the past year, a distant and painful glaze over his eyes. He hardly slept, hiding the darkness under his eyes with an unwavering will.

In truth, she could understand it. The Kingdom was falling apart, and the King would soon die. Reed would've smoothly made his way to the throne, had it not been for the incident that was carefully being hushed.

The incident where the noble dragon's son fled from the royal family's basement.

There, the attack between the two opposing parties began. Somehow, the dragon pinpointed the blame on Reed's younger sibling, a tyrant who had the air of death around him.

Nicola had encountered that man once in the distant past, during her Academy days. It was a brief encounter, but his body swayed like a ghost teetering the edge of life, and his eyes remained a dull, soulless green.

He smiled sarcastically, every bit of his energy summoned into rigid mockery, into sharp and tantalizing murder, but there was so little of that man, in a sense that went beyond his physical body.

She hadn't gotten a good look at his face—he was a man who chose to look away at those he didn't intend to provoke.

Regardless, Nicola knew there were places she could and couldn't interfere. She would not have crawled out of the slums without a certain awareness of her position, and how far to push.

That man had been isolated to an abandoned area of the dragon's choosing, bound by a curse that forbade his leaving without Noah Bellamy's permission.

Although much of the blame had fallen to Kaden, it appeared that the dragon was working behind the scenes to flip the Kingdom upside down.

He never, not once, believed that Kaden Chauvet was to blame.

Nicola didn't understand it, thinking. Why he determined to punish that sinner first, to leave everything else here, leaving Reed with his crown? There was nobody who didn't know that the foundations of the royal family were crumbling. It was a perfect time to attack.

Skye Chauvet had gone missing, and Noah Bellamy hadn't made a reappearance in a year.

And from the day of Kaden's banishment, it had been numerous years.

A gust of wind tangled into her room, and she lifted her head sideways. Her door had been closed, but it was now spread wide, a slender man standing between them.

Nicola recognized him, but she couldn't put a name to his charming face, the lips that curled up in a natural position as if he were made to be smiling.

Her eyes skimmed her dresser for a possible weapon, landing on a pair of embroidery needles that had been tucked underneath a necklace.

She straightened her back, a picture of calm. "And you are?"

"Oh sorry, introductions are important and all." The man took a step forward, hands raised in the air as his cerulean eyes swirled with complexity. "But I can't tell you my name, not yet. I can't trust you."

"There's an irony in your words, considering your strangeness in my room. The maids will be returning soon."

He laughed. "Right, royal wedding coming up, and everything. You look beautiful, Pres."

Her body stiffened and her fingers curled against the white lace of her draping dress. "Who are you?"

"I studied with you. Different grades though, and I can't say I was much of a socialist. That's a lie. Listen, I don't have much time." He strode forward and she lunged for the needles, a sharp and glinting tip pointed ahead.

"You must be mistaken, intruder, if you believe I am merely to be the royal family's object."

The man stopped a short distance before her, tipping his hat over his head to obscure the lines of his face. "I'm not. Trust me, I know how capable you are, Pres."

He slowly lowered a hand, holding out a palm. Pressed on it was a silver wing, the broken singular of a butterfly.

"Your blessing. I know what it is. Listen, the basement is locked, right? After the investigations that returned with nothing but baseless rumours, Reed Chauvet reclaimed his position and returned from hiding because they couldn't prosecute him."

"There is no evidence that goes against him."

"Ah, but," The man spun the silver necklace around his finger. "Although you went back to him, painting the perfect romance tale and further winning the crowd, you're suspicious, aren't you?"

At the woman's flinch, his smile widened. "I'm afraid, Pres, that even you have to admit it. That he is not the same man you fell in love with."

Nicola's carefully manicured nails pressed against her dresser, a crack splitting one of them. Her eyes narrowed dangerously, any kindness faded from her expression.

"I'm afraid I would rather believe my husband over the words of a hidden figure."

"Take it." He strode forwards, and before she could attack, he tossed the necklace into her hands. White flashed in her vision and her lips parted, pupils dilating. "Please believe me, Nicola Akasha."

He took a step back as she stumbled to stand, her delicate fingers curled around the dangling silver. The man tipped his head in farewell and stepped back off her balcony.

She rushed forward and a giant gust of wind pushed her back as a giant beast rose from underneath, soaring into the skies.

Her hair unraveled behind her, spinning around her face as she frowned. "Noah Bellamy?" She whispered, but that couldn't be.

The woman lowered her confused gaze to the necklace, swallowing the rush of pictures, of bloody walls, of a room that saw no light. Then, when she grasped onto those memories, she saw further.

The shape of a star-shaped scar.

It was one that she knew; one from her youth that was now merely shapes and blurs, but she remembered it clearly.

She no longer remembered what that boy looked like, although she remembered the words that he said and the salvation they gave her. It was one of the reasons she loved Reed—because a part of her clung to that past.

Reed, too, had frequented the slums in his youth. He reminded her, before his personality slowly distorted, of that charming and confident child from her past.

Kaden Chauvet was nothing like the boy she'd known.

Nicola turned slowly, and soon she was dashing down the halls, passing the bewildered maids. Her dress caught in a table and she tore it off at her thighs.

The basement doors were locked, but she'd grabbed a knight's sword on her way and swung it down with practiced ease.

It slammed against the chains again and again until they fell to the ground. Her hands shoved the door open, frowning at the penetrating darkness that crowded the basement.

Slowly, she descended the stairs. The woman stopped before a closed door, long unlocked.

Her heart pounded against her chest, shoulders rising and falling.

Tentatively, she pushed it open a crack. The light from the stairs offered a sliver of light, but it was vague. But Nicola Akasha didn't need light to see.

Her hands traced against the walls, and upon feeling traces of indentation carved into the wall, her eyes flashed white again.

The misery and agony surged towards her at once and she collapsed to her knees. The entire room, every slight of the wall, bore extreme memories of deep resentment and agony.

She'd made a grave mistake.

In her scrambled years of happiness, she'd forsaken the boy who gave her the chance to live.

Then, in her sorrows, a groan came from the cell beside her. She hadn't paid attention earlier, the focus of her attention on this lonely locked room.

Tentatively, the woman slowly stepped outside, her feet bare and cold against the filthy ground.

There, lying on the ground with bruises bleeding all over his flesh, was the noble hero of the Kingdom, Noah Bellamy.

She rushed to the bars, curling her hands around them with bewilderment. The dragon had escaped, fled, condemned Kaden Chauvet, and worked as Reed's greatest rival to overthrow him.

The war between the two had pulled back and forth, leaning towards Reed's favour after he managed to reclaim his throne.

But Noah Bellamy had the support of many. Most assumed he'd disappeared to unleash a grand attack—then what was he doing here, curled and bleeding pathetically in the very cell he escaped from?

And look at her, wearing a tattered wedding dress, ready to wed the man she thought she'd loved. That she didn't want to doubt with all his dear promises and noble confidence.

Her hands trembled around the bars, and she spun around, eyes darting around the room for the sword she'd brought in.

When she found it, her hands lingered around the hilt before she swung towards the chains binding the cell and struck down. Her strength wasn't poor, but it wasn't enough either.

Nicola gritted her teeth, slamming it again and again as red spread over her palms, and her nails splintered and cracked with the effort.

Was Reed lying to her this entire time, under a facade of love that wasn't even real?

Did his reassurance mean anything?

And for her, did she really become blinded with affection, clinging to the romance of a luxury life that she'd dreamed of as a child, that she would overlook her saviour?

The image of the young boy seemed clearer in her mind now, his rugged pink hair covered in filth, and his sharp green eyes that comforted her awkwardly.

The blade slammed down once again and her palms were scraped raw from the effort, the door slamming open.

In the center of the cell, the beaten body rolled over with a low groan. His dark eyes cracked open, slit and venomous, and Nicola instinctively took a hesitant step back.

"Wake up, Noah Bellamy," said the woman softly, despite the fear that seized her heart as his gaze settled onto her. "I'll help you escape."

The dragon sneered, slowly rising although his movements were lumbered and reeking of pain. "Help from you? Nicola Akasha, the crown prince's lover. I'm not interested in your performances."

Distrustful, disdainful, there was nothing but pure hatred directed towards her. She remembered that even in the Academy, the dragon had often been alone. There were those who tried to get close to him before dashing away at his coldness.

She gritted her teeth. All she could do right now, with her thoughts and life in a mess, was to free this beast.

The sword was heavy in her hands, the only weapon available.

Swallowing, she swung it across the cell and it skidded against the ground, lying at his feet.

"Then, if I appear to be betraying you," she said calmly as her heart trembled but her cherry gaze remained steady. "Kill me. I wouldn't be able to resist you even if I wished to."

He slowly stood, a sharp-clawed hand blackened by wisping ink curled around the hilt as he dragged it towards her, every step slow but certain.

He stood before her and his hand lifted.

Nicola squeezed her eyes closed, heart thudding erratically as her breath caught and she waited for death to come.

A loud clatter fell on the ground.

The dragon passed her coldly as if regarding her as nothing. "If I need to kill you, even that sword won't be enough protection."

Before he could ascend the stairs, a shadow appeared in the open doorway, tall and elegant and frighteningly cold. The pair of frosty eyes swept over the scene from the height he stood.

In a calm, reassuring voice, he wondered, "Are you fleeing, dragon?"

Then, his gaze flickered to Nicola and froze. His expression softened, lighter, knowing. "Are you leaving, Nicola?" Leaving me, his tone seemed to wonder.

He took a step down, and Noah suddenly swung his head to his open cell. In the next second, the sound of flapping wings was heard, and the wall exploded.

Reed leaped down the stairs, yanking Nicola, and twisted her behind him, furrowing his eyebrows as blood ran down his leg.

A long wing curved around Noah's body, blocking him from debris.

A young man with cerulean eyes emerged from the rubble and smoke, sliding off a young dragon's back. He looked at each of them quietly, closing his eyes for a second.

"It has been seven years since the exile of Kaden Chauvet."

He took another step, a ragged cloak billowing over his shoulder. There was a deep sorrow plagued with guilt in his eyes.

He stood before the three.

"In three days, he will meet his end."

"Kaden Chauvet will die."

———xxx———

Lukiyo says,

And the past slowly makes itself known! People are so complicated, what sways them, what motivates them, how they feel and why they feel it (if any of these things even have clear answers to begin with) also... exploding the castle wall seems to be a common interest in a certain dragon-human duo??

Additionally, happy birthday to any dear leap year children! I forgot it was the leap day until a couple hours ago, so here's a little special gift ^^

I've been calculating how many chapters is left. I can't give an estimate because I have no idea, but I think it may be shorter than I initially assumed? But we've passed 300k words, longer than my other works of 270k, so hello! This is my longest reader-author relationship haha.

All the best to you all, have a lovely day/afternoon/evening~