The journey to the Northwest Territory was a funeral procession for a man who refused to die.
The carriage groaned under the weight of its own iron plating, its wheels churning through the thick, black mud of the Outlands before hitting the first flurries of snow.
Inside, Zaliyah lay on a suspended bed designed to absorb the shocks of the road, but every jolt of the carriage made his "mummy" bandages leak fresh, blood.
He was a statue of linen and trauma, his breathing was so shallow that Iruna often had to press her ear to his chest just to confirm he hadn't slipped away in the night.
The twins were his only sentinels. Iruna sat at his head, her eyes rimmed with red, her fingers mindfully tracing the runes on the carriage walls to keep the internal temperature stable.
Harun sat at the foot, his hand resting on his sword, his gaze fixed on the small, unmistakable swell of Zaliyah's abdomen. It was a cruel irony: the body was a ruin, but the womb was alive and active.
A few yards behind them, Xulthas traveled in luxury. His carriage was a moving sanctuary of soft cushions ,decorated with velvet curtains. While the twins lived in a waking nightmare, Xulthas sat cross-legged, sipping a delicate brew of violet tea. In the air before him, a complex, glowing rune hovered, a geometric spiderweb of demonic light. He poked at it with a long, elegant finger, practicing the high-level weaving that made him the most feared warlock in the Underworld.
Xulthas didn't consider this a tragedy or another instance of him cleaning Malachi's dirt , it was a field trip to study the most interesting specimen he had ever encountered.
As they moved, the news of the "Bloodied Banquet" preceded them like a plague. It spread through the realm like wildfire through dry brush.
In every high-class tavern and every noble manor, the subjects of the Underworld spoke of nothing else. The controversy was enough to fuel conversations for decades, the demons were a people of tradition, and the existence of a Celestial in the palace was an affront to their very nature.
They feared Malachi's instability. In a realm where an heir must eventually kill his father to ascend the throne, the subjects looked at Malachi and saw a King who was becoming as tyrannical as the father he had slain.
Deep within the heart of the capital, the tension had reached a breaking point.
Lady Lilith had marched into Malachi's study, her face pale, her hands trembling. She didn't come as a subject or as the wife of the late king , she came as a mother.
She fell to her knees, bowing down so low the ground almost swallowed her , She begged the King, demanding to see the boy he had broken and banished. But Malachi wasn't willing to entertain this family drama. He had flatly refused her request and instead banned her from the Northwest, he had denied her the right to hold the son she had only just rediscovered.
She was to stay within the palace for five years and not venture out.
But while the Underworld simmered in political unrest and controversies, a different kind of horror was visiting the Human Realm.
At the Ruo Han estate, the silence of the afternoon was shattered by a loud agonizing scream which came from Riru's room.
Karas, Riosuka, and Caius burst through the doors, their hearts hammering. They stopped dead. High up on the bookshelves, perched like a raven, sat Kizari.her long black hair dancing in the cool afternoon breeze, She looked down at the trembling young girl with a grin .
Ryuna stood by the door, and with a flick of her wrist, she slammed the heavy oak panels shut and sealed them with a violet ward.
"You... you.....what are you....." Karas yelled, as he recognized the Queen from the banquet. "What did you do to him? Where is Zaliyah?"
He lunged toward her, his fingers clawing at the air, but he stopped mid-stride. His legs felt as if they had been nailed into the floorboards. No matter how much he strained, his muscles wouldn't obey.
"What did you do to him, you demon!" Caius roared, stepping forward to protect his wife.
Kizari looked at him with visible, skin-crawling disgust. "You're not worthy to speak to me, little man," she purred. With a casual wave of her hand, she cast a sealing spell that fused Caius's lips together. He clawed at his mouth, his muffled screams staying trapped in his throat.
Kizari hopped down from the shelf, her silk skirts fluttering. she walked past the frozen Karas and moved toward Riosuka.
Riru dove behind her mother, sobbing and shivering. Riosuka held her daughter's hand so tightly her knuckles turned white.
Kizari reached out, twirling a strand of Riosuka's dark hair around her finger. She used her other hand to tilt Riosuka's face from side to side, examining her like a piece of fine porcelain. "I see where he takes his looks from," Kizari mused. "Such a delicate, delicious little creature."
"Don't touch her" Karas screamed, his face turning purple as he fought the spell holding him. "Don't you touch my mother"
Kizari turned, her eyes glittering. "I was so mesmerized by your mother that I almost forgot about you, little thief."
Riosuka found her voice, though it was thin as a thread.she spoke trembling "Who are you ? We don't know you and We have done nothing wrong to you. Why are you here? We do not offend people. We are a quiet family."
"Yes, darling, you don't offend people," Kizari sighed, leaning in until her breath fanned Riosuka's cheek. "But your son here... he tried to covet something that belongs to a King. He tried to steal the moon from the sky."
"What did you do to Zaliyah?" Karas begged, his anger turning into fear.
Kizari smirked, the expression dripping with malice. "You should be asking 'What didn't we do to Zaliyah?'"
Riru grabbed her mother's robes, her voice small and trembling. "Mom... mom, what is she saying? Is Brother Zi with her? Where is Brother Zi?"
"Zaliyah belongs to the Underworld now," Kizari said. "You will move on, or I will reduce your whole generation to ash and salt."
"We are his family" Riosuka urged, tears finally spilling over. "We can not just abandon him , he belongs with us....he belongs here at home with his family, I don't know what he did, but please... let him go. He is still a child!"
Upon hearing the word child, Karas went into a frenzy. The realization hit him like a physical blow. "The... the child... how is the child?"
Kizari slowly walked toward him.
THWACK.
The slap was so hard Karas's face was whipped to the side, his lip splitting instantly.
"BROTHER!" Riru yelled.
"KARAS" Caius tried to scream, but only a desperate, muffled grunt came through his sealed lips.
"You vile bitch!" Riosuka yelled, lunging toward Kizari. "How dare you!"
"I'm not here for you, honey, so stand back," Kizari said. With a snap of her fingers, Riosuka was also glued to the floor, her feet fused to the rug.
Kizari focused her gaze back on Karas. She stared at him intently, noticing the shock of white hair that marked his lineage. She smirked. "A piece of ass could not be that good for you to sell your soul, could it? No."
Riosuka quickly covered Riru's ears, her eyes burning with hatred. Outside, the sounds of guards and maids banging relentlessly at the door echoed, but the ward held firm.
Kizari sighed, looking bored. "Humans are so annoying. What does Malachi truly see in this realm? It's so... dusty, fragile, pathetic Uhhhh He's so weird"
"The execution is about to begin, My queen" Ryuna reminded her from the door.
"Right," Kizari said, leaning close to Karas's ear. "Listen to me, boy. You are too weak to protect Zaliyah. You cannot be with him. He's a property of the royal family . The more you try to 'save' him, the faster you push him into the mouth of death. If Zaliyah dies, it will be your fault. Every drop of his blood is on your hands."
She pointed a long, manicured nail at Riru.
"Isn't she worthy of your love? What about this delicious lady?" She gestured to Riosuka. "Your life is alread shortened. You cannot race with a king , never in this life or in your next life , Do you understand?"
She turned to the muffled, struggling Caius.
"If I have to come here again, I will feed you all to the void. Well..." she looked back at Riosuka, "I might spare the delicious lady. Come to me whenever you are tired of this boring man, honey. I would cherish you."
Ryuna's jaw tightened, her hand white-knuckled on the hilt of her sword. She had lived in Kizari's shadow for years, craving even a sliver of that attention, and here Kizari was, offering it to a human woman.
Kizari vanished into a swirling black portal, followed by Ryuna.
The spells broke instantly. Caius stumbled forward, his mouth finally opening, he took in a deep breath like someone who had just escaped drowning.
The guards barged into the room, swords drawn, but it was too late. Karas fell to his knees, his forehead hitting the floor as he wept. The day he feared the most , the day Zaliyah was truly lost had arrived.
As the sun set in the Human Realm, the bell at the Executioner's Tower in the Underworld rang three times. The sound was a heavy, bronze toll that vibrated in the bones of every demon standing in the square below.
Thousands had gathered. Malachi and Kizari entered the balcony, dressed in royal attires that shimmered like oil on water. The "traitors" were brought out, nobles and commanders who had survived the banquet only to be hunted down in the nights following.
One by one, they were forced into the guillotine.
THUD. THUD. THUD.
The blades fell with clinical precision. The heads were cleanly chopped off, their blood painting the stones red. This was the warning , Malachi was no longer playing at diplomacy.
The bodies were unceremoniously shoved over the edge of the tower, falling into the pits below where the lowly, starving beasts of the abyss scrambled and fought over the meat.
The demons shivered. They had thought they were free from the tyranny of Malachi's father, but the son was proving to be a more efficient monster.
Back in the Human Realm, the silence in the Ruo Han estate was louder than ever.
Karas stepped out of his room for the first time in twenty-four hours. He looked older, his eyes hollowed out by grief. He found his mother in the garden. "I will try," he whispered. "I will try to live. I won't speak of him. I will... forget."
Riosuka hugged him, but her heart was breaking. Caius watched from the window, relieved that the "scandal" was being buried, even if it meant burying his son's soul along with it. The family began to mourn Zaliyah as if he were already dead.
Across the realms, the tragedy was a mirrored echo. In the royal palace, Lady Lilith fell to the floor of her chambers, weeping bitterly, her tears soaked her royal silks , She had found her son only to lose him to a exile that was a living death.
Two people, separated by the veil between realms, were broken for the same reason.
Karas and Lilith were two halves of the same mourning song, one losing a lover, one losing a child , both paralyzed by the shadow of the King.
The carriage final stopped.
Harun stepped out first, his boots sinking into the thick, freezing snow of the Northwest Territory. The air was so cold his black hair almost froze.
The sky was a bruised purple, and the mountains loomed over them like the teeth of a giant.
He looked back at the carriage where Zaliyah lay, still silent, still bandaged, still carrying a child that would be born into a frozen wasteland.
"We're here," Harun whispered.