The sky was so blue.
I hung at Yethyr’s hip. He had wrapped me in bandages as a makeshift sheathe again. Not directly touching him dulled my vision through his eyes, but the sky was so blue!
I was born beneath the night sky and I had glimpsed the dawn, but I could not have imagined how bright the world would be, now that the sun was high above the horizon.
“How long was I in Hell?” Yethyr asked as they walked through Datrean streets.
Jaetheiri walked only a step behind him. “Only a few hours, my prince. It is still morning.”
“So the celebrations are still raging strong then,” Yethyr said sullenly.
They were climbing the steps of the Palace of Songs once more, just the two of them. Yethyr had been very deliberate in not bringing Wes or Flavrir.
He wanted no hint of his necromancy when he stood before his father.
I had gathered that somehow his deathsinging work was shameful in the eyes of the Brinn, but I was a Datrean sword and could not understand it. They were happy to dance over the corpses of Datrea and feast and celebrate, but not honor what they owed their success to?
“Hypocrites.”
I let my disdain bleed into Yethyr’s mind and he immediately rejected it, but curiously not as a foreign thought. No, he believed the disdain was his, but he pushed it away anyway and felt ashamed of thinking it at all.
Demons below, he was a strange man.
Yethyr stepped over Erjed’s body to reach the now torn-open door. As he suspected, the party was still in full swing. People danced to leather drums and bone flutes, and any who did not, were still gorging on food and drink.
Yethyr held in a sigh and stepped in. A herald at the entrance shouted, “announcing First Prince Yethyr, son of King Yevvar Kentheir and the Witch Queen Felnae.”
Yethyr passed him without pause and the herald continued. “The Lady of Dumal Manor, Jaetheiri, 43rd Victor of the Oredreirium, Tezem and Huntguard of the First Prince.”
People paused their revelry to salute them as they passed. It was obvious to Yethyr that the respect and awe were for Jaetheiri and not for him.
It filled Yethyr with pride, with envy, with shame, a boiling pot that he buried deep enough where he could pretend it wasn’t there.
But I took note of it. For a heartless slaughterer of a city, he sure had a lot of tender feelings I could exploit.
As if to prove my point, Yethyr looked upon his father, who now languished in my father’s steel throne up above. Sure enough, all that contradictory anger and devotion surged into him once more.
It did not help that Yugrir sat beside their father on the First Firesinger’s obsidian throne, which came with its own strange emotions.
They had dragged a banquet table up before thrones, along with some chairs so the King could be properly surrounded by listeners to whatever tale he was currently regaling.
The table fell silent as Yethyr reached the base of the stage. He knelt, once again ignoring the agony it inflicted on his knees.
“I know where to search for the Datrean leadership, Father.”
“Excellent. I knew my son would catch their scent of blood; only Maethe knew it would be so quickly.”
Yethyr swallowed back a smile and kept his eyes on the floor. “I will chase them down right away, as my King and Maethe command.”
“Nonsense. Feed from the feast of your hunt before you go. Regain your strength.”
“My hunt?” He looked up. “You said my hunt was not over.”
“Not until you swat the fleas that flee the carcass, but you have killed a great beast.” The King threw back his head. “Datrea is dead!”
The reveling army cheered; the sound rang as loud as Z’krel in that acoustically perfect room.
“Come, my dutiful son. Eat from your kill.”
Yethyr blinked, confused and so was I. This man had only several hours ago publicly told his son off, proclaiming Datrea wasn’t dead until the council was hunted down.
But Yethyr wasn’t going to question. He rose to his feet and climbed the steps to his father.
Yugrir beamed, at the right hand of the King. “We left the necromancer throne for you, brother.”
That had not pleased Yethyr, not one bit. He had sat on my father's throne before the King’s arrival deliberately. But Yevvar had taken the First Steelsinger seat and he was hardly going to get him to move.
“Thank you,” the Prince said neutrally and sat down at his father’s left.
The moment his back hit the bones of the throne, they screamed in deathsong. Yethyr saw white as the composition of Zasha and every First Deathsinger who came before her assaulted the bones moving his body. They were trying to draw him in; they were trying to warp his armor and skeleton beneath his skin to become part of the throne. Yethyr wrangled the music back, attempting to set the bones against themselves. He kept a tight hold on his bone armor, conducting them not to slide into that enchanting melody, not even for a single phrase. He had conquered the city; he could conquer this chair—
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
“Yethyr!”
The King was frowning at him; they all were. None of them could hear deathsong. None of them knew that the furniture had just tried to consume him.
“This is a loud chair,” Yethyr said mildly. “Accursed even. I do not recommend anyone sitting in it.”
“Do you want to move?” Yugrir asked innocently.
And because Yethyr inexplicably took the suggestion as a challenge, he got stubborn. “I am fine. It was made for necromancers.”
Which was both true and not. The throne was made for deathsingers by deathsingers. Yet only a deathsinger could hear the song that was trying to dominate his body.
Only the First Deathsinger was supposed to sit there.
“I was saying, son, that you should try the goat cheese.” Yethyr could smell wine on his father’s breath and swallowed a sigh.
“Thank you, I will.”
His gloved hand feebly took a cut of cheese and he nibbled at it, barely tasting it.
I tasted it; I was in awe. It was the first time a wielder of mine had eaten and I treasured it. I had no idea that flavors other than blood could exist in one’s mouth.
Yethyr was too distracted to note my fascination.
With the incessant song gnawing at his concentration, he endeavored to make this conversation short. “How many can you spare in the hunt for the Datrean Council?”
“None,” the King said cheerfully. “I need everyone for the Pride campaign.”
Yethyr blinked. “You want me to fight fugitive arcanists alone?”
“There are not many. I am told that all their sideromancers are dead. Most of their pyromancers died in their attempts to break their siege, and most of their necromancers and lithomancers are dead from exhaustion.”
“Most is not all. There are at least…”
By my count, 36 spellsingers stepped through the Hellgate. I cheerfully fed the number to Yethyr and he assumed it was his own estimation.
“...three dozen arcanists who escaped through the Hellgate.”
“You fought more than that with only Flavrir at your side.”
“He didn’t fight them.” Yugrir piped up on the other side of the King. “He just tired them out. It’s not the same.”
“Do you know how many hunts are won or lost by chasing your quarry until they collapse from exhaustion?” The King frowned at Yugrir. “In the days before we made bows, we used to chase deer for days and feasted with no less joy. Patience is the oldest of weapons, a weapon you could stand to use more, my son.”
Yugrir good-naturedly rolled his eyes, which his father didn’t catch. He had already looked back at Yethyr.
“Wait them out, as you did here.”
“I was able to do that because the army prevented their every attempt at destroying my Death Circle,” Yethyr said through clenched teeth. “An army that will now be with you.”
People were watching them. The whole table was. I only recognized Yugrir and Hunt General Tynir, but Yethyr recognized them all as important for some reason or another.
“Perhaps we should discuss this somewhere else,” Yethyr said quietly. “Such seriousness mars the revelry.”
“We could not possibly leave at the hour of your glory!” King Yevvar cried loudly so all could hear. “You have done what countless have tried and failed. For centuries the walls of Datrea withstood every onslaught, a mockery of Heaven, and now those walls have crumbled beneath the might of Maethe and of you.”
Yethyr hung on every word, breathless and stunned. “Father.”
The King patted Yethyr’s arm. It hurt, but the Prince barely acknowledged the pain. “I know I can trust you to take care of the rest.”
Yethyr swallowed. These scraps of praise were just to manipulate him, he was certain. He hated that it was working.
“I will not fail you,” Yethyr whispered, in reverence and in rage.
“If you locate them for certain, we can discuss bringing an army to deal with a stray few arcanists further.”
Which meant delaying a private discussion. Yethyr buried a scowl. His father was keeping these negotiations public on purpose. The King knew his dutiful son would never argue with him in front of all these men.
Yethyr fingers flexed. “May I take our own arcanists?”
“Of course not. They are needed to cleanse the city, per your recommendation.”
Yethyr wanted to scream.
So did the dead twisting within the throne. They urged him to do so for them.
“Speak with our voice,” they sang. “Kill all who hear.”
Yethyr clamped down on his mouth. He could kill everyone in this room with a word. Truthfully, that was always the case, a reality the Brinn and their king forgot all too often.
“Remind them,” the throne sang and I cheerfully joined their melody.
It would be a fitting revenge, I thought, forcing him to kill his family after his siege on my people had made me kill mine.
“Aeromancers will not be needed to tame Datrea,” Yethyr said with difficulty. “This city had no windsong traditions. Their skills would be better suited to joining my hunt, if you would allow me to take them.”
“If they can spare any, of course you can,” the King cried indulgently like he was being generous, like he could deny him nothing, like he hadn’t just spent the entire conversation stripping his son of every form of military support for a mission he himself had forced upon him.
I was starting to want to kill the King for Yethyr’s sake, demons below. Surely, this would be easier than I thought. The man was practically asking to be violently usurped.
I stoked the frenzy of the throne and through it, I urged Yethyr on.
“Slaughter him.”
He was strong enough to contain me alone; he was not strong enough to contain me while the Throne of the First Deathsinger and I sang together.
His mouth fell open of his own accord. The party raged on, oblivious to the danger. In this acoustically perfect hall, with the voices of the throne in his throat, it would only take one word.
Die. It was on his tongue, almost voiced.
Die. The syllable brushed his vocal cords, tantalizing almost voiced.
His father would die. His brother would die. Their guards and their attendants and everyone else who fawned over them would die.
A chair was scraped against the floor as Jaetheiri finally found a seat to join the meal. The sound cut over our deathly melody in Yethyr’s mind. He looked at her; she saw something in his eyes that made her stand in alarm, and at last, he spoke his one word.
“Break.”
The Throne splintered apart beneath him, silencing the deathsong threatening his family.
Thank you so much for reading! I really appreciate all the support I have gotten during the transition to move this story to Royal Road. Do tell me what you think! I love comments and often respond to them
I will be posting a chapter every day until July 30, 2025. Make sure to follow the story and come back to read more!
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