The blade gleamed like it had been waiting for this moment.
Alarion Vael's knees pressed into the cold marble floor, his wrists bound tight with iron cuffs that dug into his skin. He should've been trembling. He should've been begging. Instead, he lifted his chin and smiled bitterly at the man standing above him.
Prince Zaveren Althar.
The crowd roared his name, their voices echoing through the execution square like thunder. A hero, they called him. Their future king. The man who rid the empire of its "traitor."
Alarion knew better.
Silver eyes, colder than any blade, met his across the platform. Zaveren didn't look away. He never did.
"You should've stayed out of my path," the prince said, his voice carrying effortlessly over the silence that followed.
And yet beneath that ice, Alarion swore he saw it. The flicker of something else. Anger. Regret. Or maybe… something darker.
His lips curved despite the blood drying at the corner of his mouth. "If fate gives me another chance, Zaveren," he whispered, low enough only the prince could hear, "I'll make sure you regret this."
The blade fell.
Darkness swallowed him whole.
When Alarion's eyes opened again, it wasn't fire or endless night that greeted him.
It was sunlight. Warm, blinding, impossible sunlight spilling across the familiar silk canopy of his old bed. The air smelled of spring blossoms, not blood. His lungs dragged in a shaky breath.
No chains. No cuffs. No execution square.
He shot upright, heart racing. The room was exactly as it had been… years ago. His hands flew to his chest, to his throat alive. Unscarred.
A tremor of disbelief ran through him.
He knew this day. He remembered this morning. He'd lived it once before, long before betrayal, long before the prince's blade severed his life.
Reincarnation. The gods had cursed him or blessed him with a second chance.
Alarion's lips parted in a sharp laugh that bordered on madness. "So it's true. I came back."
A knock rattled his chamber doors. "are you awake?"
The voice made his blood run cold. Soryn. His cousin, the one who'd smiled in his face while driving a knife into his back when the empire crumbled.
Alarion's hands clenched into fists, his violet eyes flashing with a fury he didn't bother to hide.
This time, things would be different.
This time, no prince, no rival, no so-called family would stand above him when the blade fell.
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