Chapter 33
Illusion [VNV Nation]
The Curator:
At nineteen, Reen, King Ragan, and his two sons left the Kingdom of Flesh to entertain the elemny within the Kingdom of Crystal.
There was a Grand Crystal Ball, where Prince Walkyer sought love (in his mind) and met a woman named Typha Hart.
King Ragan and Commander Fross Hart arranged the event, hoping they could join families.
However, King Ragan had another plan in mind.
A day before they left for the Kingdom of Crystal, King Ragan summoned Prince Reen into the Throne Room. Prince Reen entered without hesitation. His dark hair fell forward, and his almond-shaped eyes were a glossy dark brown.
He stood before his king, his back straight and his head held high, as if waiting for the king’s every waking order.
King Ragan leaned against the throne, his fingers trailing across the armrest. Deep red eyes settled on Prince Reen. He spoke words that made Prince Reen’s stomach sink, causing the relaxed hands at his side to clench with undeniable rage at the prospect of what King Ragan had said.
“How would you like to become king, Reen?” King Ragan spoke with clarity, without a hint of malice or doubt.
It was a thought that caused King Ragan to lose sleep.
He roamed the castle halls, wondering what would happen if Reen ascended to the crown instead of his flesh-and-blood sons. “Would you accept my offer?”
“No,” Prince Reen replied in the same tone and with the same energy his mother held when she declined the King’s offer when they first tethered. “I have no interest.”
King Ragan’s lip curled, and his dark red eyes narrowed when he glowered at the defiant mutt, who exhibited no emotion aside from anger and hunger.
On any other day, he could have entertained messing with King Ragan.
But it seemed he sensed an intense and different energy about the King.
This made Prince Reen think otherwise and decline with as much grace as he could manage instead.
King Ragan tapped his finger on the armrest while he thought of a way to bring Reen to the throne.
The teenager had requested to become a Knight of Eraminia.
Each time he asked, it was another brush of his hand and dismissive behaviour at the thought of the boy he had raised as something other than a king.
He regarded Reen as nothing less than power, and for that power to sit upon the same throne he had occupied for decades.
But it seemed Reen’s stubbornness left King Ragan with another plan for him.
“Very well, I have a mission for you, Reen,” King Ragan spoke, his voice dripping with acid. “Your very first mission as a Knight of Eraminia.”
Prince Reen’s eyes narrowed, and he held a suspicion towards King Ragan’s words as he waited for him to continue.
“While we travel to the Kingdom of Crystal, you will protect my sons at all costs. If they die, you will give up your knighthood and accept the throne.”
Prince Reen agreed to the terms. If he didn’t, he knew King Ragan would still send enemies upon his sons until only Reen was left to claim it. His mother hadn’t spoken to the King since birthing Emmerton for warranted reasons, but this wasn’t the story to tell the tale.
Now, let’s move on to the Kingdom of Crystal for our story.
Prince Reen had trained well under the watchful eye of King Ragan all his life. He could sense an enemy before they made a move. Prince Reen gunned down the first three before they could step towards Prince Walkyer or Emmerton.
Emmerton understood what was happening and holed himself up in his room. Prince Walkyer wandered the ship in amazement at the ice glaciers and the frigid wind, but later complained about the biting cold.
Reen snapped the neck of an enemy when Walkyer moved obliviously ahead of his older brother and spoke of meeting a girl there to fall in love with—a connection filled with empty promises and stray tears in the darkest of nights.
When an enemy came forth as they docked, it caught Reen off guard. He thought he had finished his mission as soon as they entered the lands of the Kingdom of Crystal. He didn’t see the attack coming when they left the ship and stepped onto the snow that crunched beneath their boots.
The elemny came up from behind Emmerton with a dagger laced with venom.
Reen wrapped his hand around her mouth and pulled her away into the darkness to kill, with no one noticing.
Her blade sank into the side of his waist, burrowing near his ribs and scraping against the bone.
He jerked her neck to the side until it crunched, but the blow was too deep to ignore, and crimson dripped into the snow—a bloody trail.
While his family entered the Crystal Ball, he moved across the flames with fire elemny guards drinking and singing into the night. Despite being observed, Prince Reen received no aid. Others even curled their lips in disdain at the illegitimate prince and had hope for his death in their eyes.
With no help from anyone, Reen decided he wanted to die in the darkness. The wound was too severe, and his powers wouldn’t let him burn the injury, only burn the poison that wormed inside him.
He rested against the wall, listening to the thumping of music and the spirited voices of elemny with laughter in their words and excitement bubbling at the tip of their tongues.
Reen wondered if he would ever feel that sort of happiness.
One day, he could be as excited as his brothers and enjoy a day without worrying about protecting his family.
The crunching snow caused Reen to snap a look at a girl no older than fifteen. She stood at the corner of the building. Her bright pink eyes stared at the crimson spilling and melting into the snow. They sized each other up, and hostility leaked from Reen at the thought of her killing him.
As she moved towards him, she frowned.
“You will die,” she stated matter-of-factly.
“Did you want me to die somewhere else?” Reen spoke, his voice low as if he were committed to leaving if she told him to.
Bright pink eyes darken, and her lips curl in disdain. “No, we have to have some entertainment. The dance bores me.”
Reen doesn’t answer. Instead, he watches her bite the corner of her mouth as she struggles with her inner turmoil.
He didn’t tell her to leave, perhaps because of the fear of dying alone.
This young girl knelt beside him, as white as snow, when she could have moved on with her life without a care and left him to die alone in the snow.
“Show me,” she breathed.
Reen hesitated before deciding it would make no difference if she tricked him and wanted him to reveal the wound so she could kill him. Either way, he would die unless he could prevent the bleeding.
She leaned down, examining the cut. “It doesn’t look like it hit a vital organ. I think I can patch you up before summoning someone to help with your recovery.”
“Why?” Reen said, with hostility on his tongue.
The teenage girl shrugged her shoulders before she murmured, “I’ve seen too much death already.”
Prince Reen reluctantly agreed to let her help him.
He watched her scoop snow from the ground as she pressed it against the wound to thicken the blood and harden the skin around the cut.
He didn’t question her actions or expertise.
Instead, he listened to orders from someone other than family or the King for the first time, doing as she said with little pushback.
“I’m going to pinch the ends together. Can you burn flesh enough for the skin to overlap and melt? If you can do that, I can harden the skin quicker with my powers,” she said.
He does as he’s told, and when her nimble hands pinch his flesh, Prince Reen glides his finger across. Reen winces at the surge of pain and the tingling sensation that sparks when he does so. When he finishes, the girl does as promised, places her hands against the wound and presses them to it.
“How did it happen?” she asked.
Reen shifted uncomfortably at how close she was to him. Instead, he tilted his head away and overlooked the drunken fools stumbling in the snow.
“I was protecting my family,” Reen answered.
She smiled when he looked back at her, but he noticed it didn’t reach her eyes. They glistened pink and wavered in the dull light. It briefly captivated him before he averted his gaze to avoid his feelings.
“When do we stop?” she breathed. Her fingers released from the wound, and she rose to her feet. “I will get someone to take you somewhere and have them watch over you. Tell me if they don’t, and I will kill them, okay?”
He knitted his brows at her matter-of-fact promise until she twitched a smile. He smiled, too, and when she turned to leave, he asked her name. Pandora hesitated momentarily as if she weighed up telling him her real name, but her parents’ words rang true, and she told him the name of another.
Prince Reen thanked her, and before Pandora could suppress the urge to turn around and sit with the mutt that she thought was as cruel as King Ragan and for them to understand one another, she left before her heart thumped to the same rhythm as his.
Many would question what would have happened if Pandora had spoken her true name.
What would have happened had Reen asked her to stay or held her gaze longer?
Would he have fallen for her? Found her intriguing enough to converse with?
Would the Kingdom of Crystal have fallen into ruin if they had stayed?
Would Prince Reen have convinced King Ragan not to slaughter the kingdom…
or told King Ragan he would become king if he left the Kingdom of Crystal instead?