TRIGGER WARNING: Murder, continued from the previous chapter, one character intentionally murders another, major character death

  Chapter 7

  What Have You Done?

  Grey fights back, finally, when I catch up to him.

  He lays on his side, still in his bird form, trembling and spasming. When he manages to drag in a breath, the sound is wheezing and grating, as if the air drags across sand. It probably does. Sand and dust probably coat the upper part of his airway.

  Grey’s eyes flash as I approach him, walking around the wing that lays stretched out an awkward angle. But before I can decide what to do, the Dove decides for me. The Dove gathers his legs beneath him, flapping his wings and splaying his tail feathers as he struggles to get his balance from the injuries across his body, the myriad both internally and externally. With a piercing shriek, he lunges at me.

  I flinch as Grey’s talons sink into my arm, piercing through my flesh and severing muscle and tendons.

  Fucker, the snake spits.

  We’re trying to kill him. He has every right.

  He’s Grey. He doesn’t fight back.

  He’s fighting for his life. Anyone would, I shoot back.

  I scrabble to shove the Dove away. I pound and punch with my fists, the Soldier training that was beaten through my mind coming back in waves. Except that I learned it against humans, not huge birds. I can see the fear in Grey’s eyes as he flaps his wings and grips my forearm, toes curling tight around my armor and talons digging deep into my flesh.

  With a sharp kick to the abdomen, the Dove lets me go. He cries out, something soft and pleading in his voice. He looks between my eyes, his own silvery gaze pained and scared.

  We should let him go. We should leave now.

  The snake’s presence looms, heavy and hard in my mindscape.

  No. Trust me. We need to kill. This is what Bryant wants. Your duty as a Soldier is to obey and to listen to the orders of the King of Ragdon.

  Grey spreads his wings and manages to take off and begin to fly away. The Dove makes it partway into the sky as blood soaks through his feathers and drips from his body as it splatters on the ground, leaving a scarlet trail of where he goes.

  And see what you’ve done, Dust Devil? Because you made us distracted, the Dove is getting away. The King of Ragdon —Bryant— wanted him dead. Dead, Dust Devil. Because of you, he is getting away. Catch him. Catch the Dove, Dust Devil. Catch the Dove, bring him to the ground, and kill him. I am done helping you. This one is all on you. It’s your fault. I won’t help you any more and do your work for you.

  I never asked to kill.

  You don’t have to. Bryant tells you. He takes the choice out of your hands so you don’t need to make any decisions.

  I sigh and close my eyes, until the snake shatters my mind with a thundering hiss that makes me rub at my ears to see if they’re bleeding. The wounds on my forearm tug with the movement, pulsing in time with the throbbing in my bad ankle, but I ignore the pain.

  Get the Dove, Dust Devil!

  The snake puts so much pressure on my mind, all but consuming me from every angle, that I find myself putting my hands up and calling upon the dust and the dirt around me. I flip my hands palm-side up, curl my fingers into fists, then stretch out my arms and slowly unfold my fingers, sending long tendrils of dust after Grey. He’s gained distance from me, but the magic of the Dust Devil catches up, latching onto one of his ankles. The tendril seizes him, and Grey shrieks, the sound pitching into something high and desperate.

  Please, I beg the snake, just let the Dove go. He has hardly fought back. He doesn’t want to fight. Just let him go.

  Don’t you want to please your King of Ragdon?

  I do, I say, but—

  Then we have to kill the Dove. That will please him. Now let’s work together. We can kill the Dove.

  But I don’t want to please the King of Ragdon like this. I want to do something else for Bryant.

  The snake, through my body, jerks on the thread of dust, and Grey crashes into the ground, landing on his back. He doesn’t move for several long moments that stretch into something concerning. I approach slowly and draw my sword at the snake’s harsh encouragement.

  For the first time, the sight of blood makes my stomach twist.

  I’ve taken lives. I’m… able to take that step. I have killed. I remember how it felt, despite how it kept me up at night with the viciously vivid images. I cannot forget. Yet there’s something different here. Something that I cannot put my finger on, even though the snake claims the death of the Dove is the same as everything else, that it should happen.

  Stop, please, I say. I don’t want to kill the Dove.

  Don’t you want to obey the King of Ragdon? Bryant made this one request of you. Complete it. Carry out Bryant’s request.

  I… I do, but not like this. It’s not right.

  Do not say that the King of Ragdon is wrong. How dare you, the snake hisses, amethyst eyes flashing dangerously.

  With a heaving shudder, Grey shifts back into his human form. When the shift finishes, I can see just how much damage the Dove has sustained. Scrapes cover his body and bruises bloom beneath his skin. Wounds lay scattered across his body, and blood streaks across his clothing.

  xxxx

  When Grey manages to get to his feet again, I try to back away, to retreat. I try to leave, because I don’t want to do this. I fight against the snake, doing everything I can to hold it back. The snake writhes behind the barrier I try to put up.

  Come on, Dust Devil. He’s almost gone. Just a few more hits.

  No, I can’t.

  Obey the King of Ragdon. Listen.

  The snake presses forward in my head until I feel its control seeping through my mind like a disease, like a fever. The horns on my forehead grow, and the thin skin around them aches as it splits further. Veins splinter further below my eyes, growing across my cheeks like spiders’ webs. I curl my hands into fists, claws digging deep into my palms until my own blood drips from between my knuckles.

  Grey studies me, silvery eyes examining my entirety, and I can see him thinking.

  I try to shut the snake into a tiny little box into the back of my mind. I try to close it away, try to lock it up. I try to push the snake into the furthest depths of my head, away and away and away and away. Only… I cannot. The snake doesn’t listen, and it spreads through my mindscape. I feel the magic of the Amethyst Throne drip, drip, drip into my veins, and I feel the warmth of its power rush through my body, and the feeling is like stretching out to rest after being on my feet all day. It’s like the sun on my skin after days of rain. It’s like taking a deep breath of a crisp, cool breeze. It’s like a hot drink heating my insides on a cold day.

  I try to fight against the Amethyst Throne, but I’m exhausted and the Amethyst Throne is relentless, a steady pressure that never gives. At some point, I slip up, and the snake seizes control.

  Through my body, the snake lunges for Grey with my sword drawn. Or maybe it’s me. Perhaps the snake has convinced me enough that it no longer needs to push.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  But no, I do not want this. That’s the snake speaking, I remind myself.

  Is it? the snake asks. Is it really me speaking? Do you not hold those desires deep, deep inside of you? Do you not hear them whispering to you when you think no one is watching? I thought you agreed to trust me. Didn’t you, Dust Devil?

  I force myself to stop, and I wrench myself backward a step, knuckles paling around the grip of my sword. With my other hand, I run my fingers through my hair, throat dry.

  Come on, the snake murmurs, voice coming from every nook, crevice, and cranny in my head, so loud and all-consuming that I cannot escape. This is what the King of Ragdon wants. Bryant told you to do this, and I know you want it to. Don’t you feel that part of you? Don’t you feel that part of you that thirsts for blood? Everyone has it. Feed it, Dust Devil. It’s what Bryant wants.

  I’d heard similar things in my Soldier training. The level of violence the snake wants me to commit —a murder— was discussed so easily, so freely.

  Maybe everyone does feel that way.

  Yes, the snake replies, everyone does.

  It urges me on, ushering me to attack Grey —the Dove— yet again. But again, I hesitate.

  I don’t want to. I…

  Do it, the snake snaps, losing all of its gentle understanding in a split moment. I thought you wanted to be the Dust Devil.

  I do, but not like this.

  The Dust Devil obeys Bryant. Listen, Dust Devil. Listen to the King of Ragdon.

  Tears prickle in my eyes as the snake sends its control along my nerves and through my veins. It takes control of me, and when Grey moves, the snake locks in like a predator onto prey. I stab Grey in the chest, a little ways below his collarbone, and my sword sinks straight through skin and muscle until the blade grates across bone and I yank it free, speed of my movements amplified by the snake.

  Why? I scream in my mind, unable to voice my shock beneath the horror and the lockdown the snake has me under.

  Because Bryant ordered the death of the Dove, and if you are too weak to follow through, perhaps you were never supposed to be the Dust Devil and we were wrong. I will do this in your stead. When we return to the castle of the King of Ragdon with the malachite medallion of the Dove, we will rethink your status as the Dust Devil, traitor.

  With what I can only imagine is a punctured lung, Grey chokes and stumbles when my sword pulls free, blood blooming across his shirt in a sickening display of scarlet and dripping down his chin as he coughs and sputters. The malachite medallion blazes brighter. Grey hunches over, hands on his knees, and his knuckles turn white as he holds onto his legs.

  “What are you doing?” Grey asks, voice rough and strained and hoarse. He lifts his head to meet my gaze. “I saw you. I didn’t think you’d do this.”

  I scrunch my eyes shut. I’m torn in two— the snake spitting at me to finish Grey off, to kill the Dove and take the malachite medallion as proof, and yet the other part of me wants to let Grey go. There’s no threat to me. Grey has not tried to hurt me like I’ve hurt him. I want to listen to the me part, the part of my conscience. There’s no threat.

  My own blood soaks in around my armor, pulsing from the wounds Grey inflicted in his dove form, but I can hardly feel the pain over the emotional turmoil surging through my veins and my being. I don't know how to wrap my mind around what's happening, and I don't know what to do. The snake is telling me to take Grey's life and I know I should trust it because it's a part of the Amethyst Throne, the very same Amethyst Throne my King of Ragdon sits upon... but my own conscience is questioning the order Bryant gave me.

  Why? I ask. Why would I hurt him? It would be self defense.

  I scrabble with the snake, clawing for every bit of control I have and manage to gain back. If I can just hold out long enough for the snake to tire, I can push it back into the depths of my mind until it sleeps, and I can let Grey go and he’ll live.

  “Why haven’t you fought back?” I ask.

  “You don’t deserve to-to die,” Grey croaks as he hunches over, swaying as he tries to remain standing. “Everyone deserves a… a second ch-chance. You didn’t… you coulda-coulda hurt A-Alex, but you didn’t.”

  He knows I was there? He recognizes me from when I brought the Wolf to the Throne Room?

  “I’m sorry.” My voice is hardly more than a whisper.

  “Say no.”

  “I can’t. It’s the snake.” Tears prickle in my eyes.

  The snake presses forward, and I strain to hold it back, knowing that all the snake has to do is lean its full weight and I will become powerless.

  Grey swallows, panting for breath as more of his blood leaves his body with every beat of his heart despite the healing powers of the malachite medallion.

  “Say no,” he repeats. “You can. The Amethyst Th-Throne can’t win f-forever.”

  My sword feels like it weighs as much as a body in my grip, and I nearly drop it. I feel Grey’s blood drip from my armor onto my shoe. I squirm in my boots, almost feeling the squelch of wet blood between my toes.

  Let the Dove go, I plead.

  No. Bryant said he must die, so his fate is sealed.

  Please.

  Are you becoming a traitor to the Amethyst Throne?

  No! Of course not, I reply, but it’s too fast.

  I begin to question, to wonder. Do I really have to do this? Why did the King of Ragdon tell me to kill the Dove? Why not someone else? Why not do it himself? Why did I become the Dust Devil? Surely I cannot be the only one to have questioned him. Surely there are others like me.

  I try to turn my back, to walk away so I can consider more. My head hurts with all the thoughts, all the realizations that are beginning to come to the surface like a slowly bubbling pot. I cannot think, I cannot sort through everything in my mind. I need time. I need space. I need to be alone.

  I cannot rightfully take a life when I am questioning everything about my existence. I cannot rightfully take a life when they are not attacking me back. Everything about this situation isn’t right. Everything about this situation is wrong.

  But the snake won’t let me. It’s not tiring in the way I wanted. If anything, it might have more energy. Exerting a control at a level I’ve never felt before, it freezes me in place, slowly spinning me back around. My head ticks to the side as it takes control over my legs and walks me forward. I twitch as it draws my arm back, hand curled into a fist. I scream yet again in my mind as I punch Grey in the throat.

  He gasps, stumbling backward until he trips over his legs and crashes to the ground on his back. He lays still for a few moments until he begins to convulse.

  I try to step away, turn around, do anything so I don’t have to watch, but I also cannot leave. The snake spits at me to deal another blow, embed the image of the Dove dying into my memory so I can remember forever serving Bryant, my King of Ragdon, in this way. But I already know I will never be able to forget, because I want this all to stop.

  Grey’s body seizes, glowing with a flashing and flickering silver light as blood slowly seeps from a myriad of wounds, far too many to count. Bruises form beneath his skin. His body shudders and spasms, until he finally lays still after what feels like far too long. Small twitches rattle his body, eyes distant and glazed, unfocused, as if he does not quite know where he is.

  Maybe he doesn’t.

  Grey’s shirt is more red than it is the dirtied off-white it used to be, smeared with mud and dirt to match.

  I kneel down beside Grey, shaking like he is, but not from blood loss and shock. I’m shaking from what I’ve done. Every injury on his body that the malachite medallion is working so hard to try to heal —his entire body glows the brightest silver I have ever seen— has come from my hands, and I know there are more injuries on the inside that I cannot see. I know that Grey will not heal from this, and from the look on his face and in his eyes, he knows it too.

  “I…” I trail off, words catching in my throat.

  What have I done?

  I push Grey to his side. He flinches away from my touch, but he’s too weak to move. Maybe it will help. Maybe he’ll survive. It’s something, but I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.

  There’s nothing, the snake says. It’s done.

  Grey’s side rises and falls in rapid, shallow breaths. I watch as the wounds across his body try in vain to knit themselves back together. I see one begin to heal over, the edges crawling together, trying to find the other side to meet once more. I can feel the blistering heat of the malachite medallion as it hits a fever pitch of desperation. The worst of the wounds continue to pump out blood, and I push Grey onto his back again without thinking and press down on two of them on his chest and shoulder.

  He looks at me, pain in his eyes and shakes his head before his body goes limp and he slumps to the side, falling into unconsciousness, though his eyes remain half open.

  I hold pressure on his wounds while begging him to wake up.

  Stop it, the snake chastises. Let him go. He’s dead. He is going to die. You have killed the Dove. Your job is complete. Let him go. Let Lucius do their job.

  I can’t. He didn’t fight back. Not really. What did he do to me?

  He was going to kill you.

  Was he? I ask. I don’t think so, or at least I don’t find that likely.

  I feel a wash of cold, dry air blow past me as Grey’s eyes turn a pale silver. He has gone still beneath me. Too still.

  “Grey?” I ask.

  I tap his arm.

  No response.

  “Grey.” I push on him.

  “Grey?” I try once more, shoving him.

  He doesn’t respond, because he has met Lucius.

  Grey’s blood coats my body. It covers my hands, blankets my armor, soaks through my shoes until I swear I can feel my toes squishing the soles.

  He lays beneath me, unmoving, in a sleep he will never wake from. His chest doesn’t rise with breaths. The blood begins to dry on his skin, and his fingers remain slightly curled, as if he was about to lift his hands. I distantly wonder what he’s looking at through his half-opened silvery eyes.

  One more hit, the snake insists. One more hit, just for good measure. Make sure the Dove is real gone.

  I cannot. He is already gone.

  The malachite medallion still shines. Hit him until the malachite medallion goes out.

  Silver light glows and dances on Grey’s body, but I know it won’t be enough to save him. Grey has already met Lucius. Still, his malachite medallion tries so desperately to heal the wounds to his flesh. Wounds that I dealt.

  Some the snake dealt, but most came from my hand.

  I wheeze a ragged breath, covering my mouth with my hand as nausea roils in my gut and builds in my throat.

  Stop it, Dust Devil. You killed him. You followed the requests of the King of Ragdon. You did your job.

  How can this be my job? Grey did nothing to me. He was not attacking me. It was not self-defense.

  Bryant requested that you do this. It is not your place to question the King of Ragdon.

  Tears drip down my cheeks as my vision blurs. I feel like I can’t breathe, and I can’t get enough air, and my body goes numb and fuzzy, and my legs go weak, and I feel like my entirety is buzzing, and everything begins to turn to dust, and everything begins to go white.

  I’m just about to let myself fall into the blank nothingness, to escape the snake for just a little while because I don’t know how to deal with what I just did and I cannot wrap my mind around the fact that I just took a life —I just committed a murder— and it wasn’t in self-defense, when I hear footsteps behind me. They’re slow, staggered, falling in uneven footfalls, but they come closer.

  I don’t turn around, in part because I cannot get my legs to cooperate and move.

  “What did you do?”

  My body kicks into gear, I whirl around, and I'm greeted by Alex's demanding stare fixing me in place.

  Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed this chapter of The King's Remorse, although it was certainly a sad one! Please comment your thoughts and consider a vote-- I'd love to hear your thoughts!

  Up top is Alex. I haven't drawn her in a while, so this was a fun challenge!

  Grey is now dead. What does that mean for Luke?

  For the prophecy of the Wolf and the Dove?

  For Alex and the rest of the group?

  How will this affect Luke? He's certainly having a very tough time...

  I hope you're having a nice day and if not, I hope tomorrow brings something nice for you!

  -Werewolf14- :)