Page 53 of Empire of Wrath and Ruin
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The refugees kept coming. Wave after wave of broken humanity, their flesh marked by dragon-fire, their eyes hollow with trauma that went deeper than any physical wound. I stood in the temple courtyard, watching Mira tend to a woman whose arms were wrapped in blood-soaked bandages, and felt something dark and hungry stir in my chest.
They deserved this pain. The thought came unbidden, sliding through my mind like oil. They were weak. Pathetic. They hadn't fought back when the dragons came. They had simply cowered and burned.
No.I clenched my fists, driving my nails into my palms until I drew blood. That wasn't me thinking. That was the thing inside me, the darkness that grew stronger every day, feeding on violence and rage until I could barely tell where I ended and it began.
"They hit Millbrook at dawn," the woman whispered, her voice distant and broken. "The children were still sleeping. The dragons... they were so beautiful. I thought they were there to help us."
Guilt crashed over me like a physical blow. I should have been there. Should have done something, anything, to stop the slaughter. But instead I had been here, safe in my tower, while innocent people burned. The darkness whispered that it was because I was a coward, that I was no better than the Imperial riders who commanded those dragons.
You could have saved them,it hissed.If you weren't so weak, so afraid of your own power.
I turned and walked away before I could do something I'd regret. The woman's pain, her grief—it was making the shadows restless, making them hunger for more suffering. They wanted me to add to her agony, to show her what real power looked like. The urge to reach out with shadow and simply... squeeze... was almost overwhelming.
The corridors of the temple felt too narrow, too confining. My skin crawled with the need to destroy something, to release the pressure building in my skull. Every face I passed looked weak, fragile, begging to be broken. A young healer carrying supplies—how easy it would be to trip him, to watch the bottles shatter and cut his hands to ribbons. An elderly woman praying at one of the shrines—a simple twist of shadow around her throat and she'd never have to worry about pain again.
Stop it,I told myself, but my own voice sounded foreign in my head, competing with the whispers that never ceased anymore.These are your people, and they need help. They're not your enemies.
But the darkness laughed, showing me images of what I could do to them. How their bones would sound when they snapped. How their blood would look spreading across the stone floor. How peaceful they'd be once I silenced their pathetic whimpering forever.
I made it to my chambers and slammed the door, pressing my back against it as if I could physically keep the madness out. Butit was already inside me, had been growing there for weeks now, turning my thoughts into a battlefield where I was losing ground every day.
The room felt too small, too bright. I paced from wall to wall like a caged animal, my shadows writhing independently of my will. They wanted out. They wanted to hunt, to kill, to feed on terror and pain until nothing remained but beautiful, perfect silence.
Livia.The thought of her was like a lifeline thrown to a drowning man. When she was near, the whispers quieted. When she touched me, the darkness retreated just enough for me to remember who I was supposed to be. I needed her. Needed her warmth, her light, her body pressed against mine until I could forget the monster I was becoming. I sank down on the floor, bringing my knees up to my chest, holding my head in my arms, focusing only on pushing away the voices that seemed to consume me.
Hours passed, maybe minutes—time had lost all meaning. The voices in my head grew louder, more insistent. They showed me every way I had failed, every moment of weakness that had led to more innocent deaths. The refugees in the courtyard weren't just victims of the Empire—they were victims of my cowardice, my inability to be the weapon this kingdom needed.
You know what you have to do,the darkness whispered.Stop playing at being human. Accept what you are. Embrace the power.
By the time Livia returned, I was barely holding on to sanity by a thread. She walked through the door looking exhausted, her clothes stained with blood and soot from tending to the wounded. Beautiful, compassionate, everything I wasn't. Everything I was going to destroy.
"Taveth?" she said softly, and even her voice made the shadows in the room respond, reaching toward her like hungry fingers.
I needed her. Needed to bury myself in her until the voices stopped, until I could remember what it felt like to be human instead of this hollow shell filled with rage and darkness. She was the only thing that could save me, the only anchor I had left.
"I need you," I said, my voice coming out rougher than I intended. "Now."
She looked at me—really looked—and I saw the exact moment she recognized what was happening. The fear that flickered across her face should have stopped me, should have made me back away and fight harder against the darkness. Instead, it fed the monster inside me. She was afraid of me, as she should be. As everyone should be.
I rose from the floor, my movements predatory even as I tried to fight them. She backed toward the door, her hand moving instinctively to the dagger at her hip, and that small gesture of self-preservation sent fire through my veins.
"Don't," I said, my voice carrying harmonics that made the shadows dance. "Don't run from me."
"Taveth, you need to calm down," she said, her voice steady despite the fear in her eyes. "The refugees, the attack—I know it's affecting you, but—"
"Affecting me?" The laugh that escaped me sounded nothing like my own. "They're dying because I'm not strong enough. Because I keep pretending to be something I'm not."
I could see her calculating, weighing her options. The door was behind her, but I could reach it with shadows faster than she could move. The window was too high, too narrow. She was trapped, and we both knew it.
"You're strong enough," she said, taking a careful step forward instead of back. "You saved us in the mountains. You—"
"I tortured them." The memory sent a thrill through me that I hated myself for feeling. "I broke every bone in their bodies while they screamed. And I enjoyed it."
Her face paled, but she didn't retreat. Instead, she moved closer, her hands raised peacefully. "That wasn't you. That was the shadow madness. You can fight it."
“I am,” I said calmly as I moved towards her. “I just need to feel like me again.”
