Chapter 12 #2
His fingers drift to his mask, tracing the swirling engravings molded into the bronze.
“My parents burned in the fires of Rethmar. I was asleep in my bed, unaware, until my brother shook me awake and dragged me through our bedroom window.” He takes a steadying breath.
“There was this smell. A stench that clung to us, no matter how fast we ran. Even when we reached the mountains, it lingered. We stood there, watching the flames of Rethmar lick the sky, turning night to day. Only then, in the eerie stillness, did I realize the smell was me. My skin, burnt. My bedclothes, fused to my little body. But I did not scream. Even when the pain had me wishing for death, I would not give the Fae the satisfaction of knowing they had broken me.”
His voice never wavers, steady and measured. But his eyes betray him, heavy with the weight of memory.
“How does a little boy become the leader of an army?” I ask.
He scoffs. “He doesn’t. His brother does.
Starving to death was never an option, so we joined the Legion.
Little more than a scattered rebellion back then.
But my brother was ambitious, and that ambition earned him a name among the people.
The Golden Son. The light that would save humans from the Fae. And when he died, the mask fell to me.”
His hand stills over the bronze surface, his breath turning ragged.
“But where he wore his as a symbol of honor, mine is a shroud to hide what the flames took from me that day. Not just my flesh, melted from my bones, but the boy I had been. That was the day the world changed forever. The day I became a man with a divine purpose… and a terrible vengeance.”
Of course. For years, the Fae have asked the same question: Who is the Golden Son? His face has never been seen. Time itself seems to pass him by, untouched, an immortal force of reckoning.
But now, the answer is clear.
He is not the first Golden Son. Only the mask’s newest heir.
He is Ronin. An orphaned boy from Rethmar, stripped of his past, burdened with a future too heavy to bear and now, before me, he is breaking.
“Your brother sounds like a good man,” I say.
“Yes. He was,” he murmurs, his voice hollow. “Far greater than his successor.”
“Did he die fighting the Fae?” I ask.
The Golden Son lifts his gaze. “Ambushed near Lake Vysere,” he says.
“One of his men managed to tear the mask from his face before the Fae could search the bodies. Slipped away, bloodied and half-dead, and brought it back to me.” He pauses.
“The Fae didn’t realize they had killed The Golden Son that day. ”
“And your parents?” I hesitate, gnawing my bottom lip. “Do you… do you remember their faces?”
Something flickers in his gaze, something knowing, something strangely familiar that sets me at ease.
He exhales. “I fear I have forgotten them.”
A small, honest smile tugs at my lips. “As have I.”
Without thought, without reason, my hand drifts from my chest, reaching for him.
He catches the movement from the corner of his eye and flinches. I freeze.
For a moment, neither of us breathes.
Then, slowly, he gives the smallest nod, a hesitant, fragile thing.
Only then do I continue, my fingertips brushing the cold of his mask.
I do not know what drives me. Curiosity, or the aching need to ease his suffering, as I do for all who bear pain. Despite who they are. Despite what they are.
Because pain is the great equalizer. It does not favor, does not discriminate. It takes, it breaks, it brands, and so I must tend to it with the same indifference, the same unwavering touch.
My fingers inch beneath the edges of his mask, curling into the grooves. He shivers. His throat bobs with a hard, audible swallow, but he does not stop me. He does not move at all, save for the tightening of his fists against his thighs.
So I pull.
The mask resists, a final act of defiance, but then it loosens. And with one firm tug, it comes free.
What lies beneath is a battlefield of scars.
Scorched flesh stretched taut, ridges of deep purple and ashen white carved into the left side of his face.
The burns claim his brow, twist into his hairline, consume half his nose and the corner of his mouth, curve cruelly down his jaw before trailing down his neck.
I do not flinch.
I do not recoil.
Because I know what it is to be marked by fire. To be remade by ruin.
The Golden Son does not look at me. His breath is shallow, uneven, his hands curled so tightly his knuckles go white. He is waiting. Bracing. As if he has been here before. As if he has seen the horror, the pity, the revulsion written on another’s face and is readying himself for it once more.
I do none of those things.
Instead, I reach out, my touch featherlight as I trace the edges of his scars, the ridges and valleys of melted flesh. He inhales sharply, but does not pull away.
And softly, barely above a whisper, I say, “I see you.”
I feel the relief well behind his eyes, a dam ready to break, but he does not let it. Instead, he leans into my touch, his breath shallow, as if afraid to disturb this fragile moment.
I must heal him. I must take this pain away.
I close my eyes, reaching inward, summoning the gift that is both my burden and my blessing.
Warmth stirs within me, a familiar golden light unfurling like the first rays of dawn.
It fills me, bright and boundless, spilling through my veins like a river of molten sun.
I have missed this. This sacred power, this connection to something greater.
It is the whisper of the Souls, the caress of my lost sisters, the memory of soft grass beneath my feet. It is home.
For one perfect moment, I lose myself in it.
And then…
Agony.
A burning, searing pain explodes around my throat, raw and all-consuming, as if fire itself has come alive and sunk its fangs into my flesh.
My body jerks, the light within me twisting, turning, rebelling.
I grit my teeth, willing myself to endure it, but the pain only deepens, sharper, crueler, until it rips a scream from my lips.
“Amara!”
His voice booms through the haze of agony, frantic, desperate. “No! I didn’t ask you for this. Stop!”
I try, Souls, I try, but the pain holds me captive, an unrelenting inferno consuming me from the inside out. My vision blurs, stars bursting behind my eyelids, and somewhere through the haze, he grips my shoulders.
“Amara, stop!” The Golden Son shakes me, his voice raw with panic. “Please!”
I gasp, my eyes flying open, the world lurching back into focus. The collar around my neck glows red-hot, no longer just a shackle but a branding mark, searing, punishing.
He pushes my hand away from his face, his own trembling as they clutch at me, as if willing me back to myself.
“Please,” he whispers again, and there is something in his voice I do not expect.
Fear.
Suddenly, the door bursts open, crashing against the wall as a flood of Ithranor Fae swarm the room.
“Ronin! What have you done?”
Even through the haze of pain, I recognize the voice. Anethesis. My vision swims, but I see them seize the Golden Son, ripping him from my bed, dragging him toward the door.
“Get the fuck off me!” he roars, thrashing against their grip. “What are you doing to her, Anethesis? You lying bastard!”
“Take him away!” Anethesis commands.
Even with Ronin torn from me, the agony doesn’t fade. It burns, relentless, consuming. Anethesis is beside me now, his bony fingers pressing into my skin.
“Princess, you must calm yourself,” he urges. “You’re only making it worse.”
But I can’t stop. My fingers claw at the collar, nails scraping, snapping against the metal.
“I can’t…” My breath shudders. My throat constricts. “I can’t breathe.”
“We must release her,” a Fae voice insists.
“No!” Anethesis bellows, his voice cracking.
“Then she will choke to death, and all will be lost!” another voice pleads.
The room tilts, my vision narrowing. Anethesis is no more than a pale blur now, a wraith shifting in and out of focus. His hands close around my neck, and for a moment, I wonder if this is it. If he will grant me the mercy of ending it.
But then, I hear a click.
The collar falls away.
Agony unfurls from my body like a snapped chain, releasing its grip. My mouth opens, a scream tearing free, and the room explodes in a brilliant burst of blinding green light before everything turns black.