What Remained After

"It's already been two weeks, huh?"

 

That thought surfaced quietly as I stared at the ceiling above my bed.

 

Sunlight spilled through the open window. Dust drifted lazily in the air. Everything felt calm in a way that still unsettled me. Calm had become something I could no longer trust.

 

Two weeks since the banquet.

Two weeks since the darkness.

Two weeks since I had faced her again.

 

On the night of the banquet, the darkness had not been her power alone. It had been a barrier, one constructed from the outside. It was a complete seal that isolated the banquet hall from the rest of the world. No sound escaped. No mana flowed freely. Nothing could enter or leave. Even now, when I closed my eyes, I could still remember the pressure of it pressing down on my skin.

 

While I was fighting her inside that sealed space, someone else had been sustaining it.

 

The third traitor.

 

A maid.

 

She had worked in the castle for nearly a year. Quiet. Efficient. Forgettable. She was exactly the kind of person no one ever looked at twice, someone I had passed in the halls without ever remembering her face.

 

She was the one feeding mana into the barrier, maintaining it while I clashed with the black robed woman inside.

 

The knights only realized it because our court mage felt something wrong. There was a constant stream of mana flowing from somewhere it should not have been. He traced it, followed it, and found her hidden in a service corridor.

 

She tried to run, but she was cut down by the knights before she could escape.

 

The moment her mana supply was cut, the barrier collapsed. Light returned. Sound returned. Chaos followed.

 

By then, the black robed woman had already vanished, and I had fallen unconscious from blood loss.

 

People woke up one by one. Confused. Panicked. Alive.

 

I was carried to the infirmary. The healers had found it was nothing fatal. I had lost too much blood, that was all. They stabilized me and later moved me back to my room.

 

I remained unconscious for almost two days.

 

When I woke up, it was night time.

 

The room was dark and there was a burning sensation in my chest.

 

I torn opened my shirt and looked, one of the rays of the star on my chest had vanished.

 

Was this a sign I had broken free from fate?

 

Or did it indicate something worse?

 

For the first few days after that, I feared sleeping. I feared closing my eyes and waking up back in the burning throne room. I feared opening them and realizing this world was nothing more than a dream born from my final wish before dying.

 

But this world did not fade.

 

The people here were real.

The pain was real.

The weight was real.

 

I still could not believe I was back.

 

I did not care anymore who or what had granted me this chance. A god. A demon. Something worse. If rewriting fate demanded a price, then I would pay it without hesitation, even if that price was myself.

 

After the banquet, fingers were pointed everywhere.

 

The Grand Duchy became the primary suspect. Accusations flew. Voices were raised. Diplomats whispered behind closed doors.

 

But even politics had limits.

 

None of the Everwinter delegates had died. None of the major nobles had been killed. And the simple truth stood firm. If we had wanted them dead, why would we attempt it during a banquet on our own land?

 

Eventually, reason prevailed. Prince Alexander Everwinter helped with that.

 

He was a decent man in that regard. While many of his diplomats tried to push blame onto us, he did the opposite. He thanked us publicly. He acknowledged that our intervention saved their lives.

 

He said he would try to prevent this from escalating into a larger diplomatic issue when he reported back to his father.

 

I did not trust that promise.

 

In politics, words were tools. Gratitude was temporary, interests were eternal. I engraved that truth deeper into my mind.

 

Still, things calmed down.

 

We did not tell the guests that some of the assassins came from within the Grand Duchy. The men involved in capturing them were ordered to keep silent. The truth would only weaken us right now.

 

It was finally quiet. I knew it would not last.

 

The sun was high today. Warm. Bright. Mockingly peaceful. A knock echoed through my room.

 

"Lord Julius. The Knight Commander is requesting your presence in the prisoner tower."

 

So it has begun.

 

I stood and prepared quickly. My body still felt lighter than it should. Younger. Less worn.

 

I left the room and made my way through the castle halls. The prisoner tower stood apart from the rest of the castle. Thick stone. Narrow windows. Built to endure.

 

When I arrived, two figures were already waiting inside. My father and the Knight Commander.

 

The Grand Duke stood tall with his hands behind his back. His face was stern, controlled, and unreadable. The Knight Commander stood beside him. His posture was straight and his expression was calm, but I could feel it beneath the surface.

 

Betrayal.

 

William had been his responsibility, his failure.

 

We entered the chamber together.

 

William sat bound to a chair at the center of the room. Chains wrapped around his arms and legs. Two guards stood behind him with their hands resting on the hilts of their swords.

 

He had been roughed up. Bruises darkened his face. His lip was split. One eye was swollen nearly shut. The confident look he once carried was gone. He looked small.

 

The Knight Commander stepped forward. "What is your real identity?" he asked.

 

William raised his head slowly. Despite everything, a bitter smile crept onto his face.

 

"William Vane," he said. "First born of Count Gilbert Vane of the Highvale Kingdom."

 

His eyes locked onto my father.

 

"Although you will never remember that name. After all, you burned many territories like mine while acting as a dog for The Aurelian Empire before."

 

The air shifted. The Knight Commander took a step forward in anger. My father raised a hand and the Commander stopped.

 

My father’s voice was calm.

 

"Which organization is aiding you, and what is their objective?"

 

William laughed weakly.

 

"The organization is called The Nameless Order. I have no idea what their true objective is, but from all the information I have been provided till now, their current objective is to destroy the Grand Duchy."

 

"And how did you join them?" my father asked.

 

William’s gaze flickered.

 

"After I was taken in by the Commander, all I could think about every day was killing the Grand Duke. One day, one of the Nameless approached me. They offered me a place in their grand plan, to burn the whole duchy to the ground."

 

His smile twisted. "How could I miss that opportunity after you all burned my home?"

 

Silence followed, heavy and suffocating.

 

"How did you receive orders?" my father continued.

 

"Every new moon, a man covered from head to toes in black robes would approach me. He would tell me my next objectives." William leaned back slightly. "But do not be hopeful. The news of me missing would have already spread. The only person coming now would be a killer, to silence me."

 

My father nodded once. "How many people from the duchy have you killed till now?"

 

William did not hesitate. "Five. Or maybe more."

 

The Knight Commander’s hands trembled.

 

"Do you feel any guilt or remorse?" my father asked. "If you wanted to kill me and my blood, did you really have to kill them?"

 

William met his gaze.

 

"No, I do not. If innocent people of my territory died, why should yours be spared?"

 

The Knight Commander stepped forward again. Rage burned in his eyes.

 

"I hereby announce," my father said calmly, "William Gilbert Vane to be executed on the grounds of treason, espionage, and the murder of five residents of the Grand Duchy."

 

William did not scream. He only laughed.

 

The guards dragged him away. I left the prison grounds with my father. Neither of us spoke for a while.

 

"My son," he said at last. "I am sorry."

 

"Why, father?" I asked.

 

"If only you had been born into a normal family. You would not have needed to worry about matters like this."

 

I said nothing. He smiled faintly.

 

"When I was young, I used to have such thoughts too. But as I grew older, I understood something." He looked ahead. "If it were not me, someone else would have been forced to make the same decisions, to bear the same consequences."

 

He stopped. "But I have one request."

 

I turned to him.

 

"If one day I were to die, do not turn like William. Try to save what you have left instead. Do not get consumed by the flames of revenge."

 

He smiled gently. Then he turned and walked away.

 

I stood there under the sun, watching his back. The quiet did not feel peaceful anymore. It felt fragile.

 

And I knew.

 

This was only the beginning.