The cold had long since become a constant companion in the depths of the royal dungeons, yet tonight it felt crueler than usual. Like fingers of frost curling around his spine. The stones beneath Caius were damp and slick, bitter with mildew and time, and the air hung heavy with the stench of rust, old blood, and something sour that clung to the walls like breathless secrets. Rats crept closer now, bolder with each hour, drawn not by fear, but by the scent of inevitability. They could smell it on him. The rot of fate.

Tomorrow, his body would be thrown into the earth like refuse, no ceremony, no honors. They would not bury a traitor with dignity. The rats, it seemed, had come early to stake their claim. Chains bit into his wrists and ankles, thick iron things that chafed with every movement. But it was not their weight that pressed down on him. No, that burden lay elsewhere, in the hollow of his chest, in the pit where shame and sorrow had made a home. The weight of failure far outweighed the weight of shackles. He had failed her. His queen.

He tilted his head up, the motion stiff, a subtle tremor betraying the exhaustion in his muscles. High on the far wall of his cell, a sliver of the world waited behind rusted bars, too narrow to crawl through, too high to reach. Beyond it, only darkness. No stars. Not even the moon dared witness what the dawn would bring. He wondered if Aldric would come. But the older knight, his mentor, his friend, had not visited. Not once. Shame, perhaps. Or cowardice. Maybe even disgust. The boy he had once raised to knighthood had become the realm's most whispered disgrace.