CH. 34 The Trial of Spirit, Part IV
The hellhound keeps walking — slower now, like it knows what’s coming next.
Its claws scrape the ground in a rhythm that almost sounds like a heartbeat.
Or a countdown.
Farro’s been silent since Gavin’s memory. Too quiet. His usual swagger is gone, replaced by something brittle in the way he moves — a smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes.
The tunnels twist again, opening into another hollow chamber.
This one feels colder, though fire still burns along the walls.
The ground glows faintly underfoot — patterns like veins pulsing in blue and gold.
Farro stops. “I don’t like this.”
“Good,” I mutter. “That means it’s working.”
He shoots me a look, but the tension in his jaw betrays him.
The air thickens. The glow brightens.
And then, just like before — light spills across the cavern wall, forming a doorway made of reflection.
Farro freezes. “No. Not this one.”
The doorway opens.
And out steps a child.
Not a prince — not really. Just a little boy with messy curls, dragging a wooden toy horse by its leg.
He’s running through a garden — all sunlight and laughter, at first.
Sorien and Gavin are there too, older, practicing with wooden swords while their father watches.
But no one’s watching him.
“Wait for me!” the boy calls. “I can play too!”
No one answers.
He stumbles, scraping his knee on the stones. He looks toward the Queen, sitting on a marble bench, fanning herself.
“Mother!” he says, running to her. “I fell.”
She glances down — not at his bleeding knee, but at the stain on his clothes.
“Go inside,” she says sharply. “You’ll ruin the embroidery.”
He hesitates. “Can you— can you kiss it better?”
The Queen frowns. “You’re not a child anymore.”
“But I’m only—”
“Enough.”
Her voice is final. Cold.
She turns back to her maids.
The boy stands there, trembling, lip quivering. Then he turns and walks away — limping slightly, clutching the toy horse tighter.
The scene shifts.
He’s older now — twelve, maybe. Alone in a vast dining hall, table set for five. Only his plate is empty.
He sits anyway, pretending to eat. Pretending someone’s there.
“Mother says we’re too loud,” young Sorien says somewhere offscreen.
Gavin laughs. “She said you’re too loud. I’m the heir. I get to be loud.”
Their voices fade down the corridor.
The boy stays.
He stares at the untouched plates, his throat working as if he’s trying not to cry.
Then he stands, grabs a goblet, and hurls it at the wall. It shatters.
“Look at me!” he screams. “Just once! Look at me!”
No one does.
The hellhound whines softly beside us — low, uneasy.
The flames dim, flickering like breath.
The next scene is worse.
Farro, now a teenager, leans against the doorframe outside his mother’s chamber.
Inside, she’s speaking softly to a visiting noble — a man who laughs too easily.
“She doesn’t love him,” older Farro whispers. “She loves the way people love her.”
He knocks, once. “Mother?”
She turns, startled. “Farro. What are you doing here?”
“I wanted to talk. About—”
“Later,” she says, smiling tightly. “I’m entertaining a guest.”
He hesitates. “You always are.”
She sighs. “Don’t be dramatic. You have everything you need.”
The nobleman laughs again.
Farro’s expression changes — that familiar, brittle smile twisting across his face for the first time.
“Everything,” he echoes. “Of course.”
He leaves.
The door shuts behind him.
The older Farro — the one standing beside me now — looks pale. His voice is rough when he speaks.
“That’s when it started,” he says quietly. “When I realized love’s just a transaction. You smile right, you touch right, you say the words they want — they look at you for a while. Then they move on.”
His reflection — the teenage Farro — appears again, this time in a ballroom.
He’s surrounded by women — laughing, dancing, flirting. Every smile looks painted on.
He looks happy.
He’s not.
When one woman turns away to dance with someone else, his smile fades instantly.
He looks lost — desperate — before he forces another grin.
Gavin’s watching him now, jaw tight. Sorien looks away.
I cross my arms. “So that’s why you flirt with everything that moves.”
Farro lets out a hollow laugh. “You make it sound so cheap.”
“It is,” I say softly. “But it’s also sad.”
He gives me a sideways glance — sharp, defensive — then exhales. “It’s better than being invisible.”
The words hang in the air like ash.
The vision fades. The garden, the hall, the ballroom — all dissolving into smoke.
Only Farro remains, standing in the molten dark, eyes shining with unshed tears that he’ll never admit to.
The hellhound bows its head and starts walking again, claws dragging slow across the stone.
No one speaks.
We just follow — down, deeper still — into the next circle of this endless pit.