Once upon a time...

The Kingdom of Lachlahn was known as a peaceful kingdom of prosperity and commerce. That is...until the King's sixth son overthrew his father in a bloody coup, plunging the Kingdom into chaos. They say angels wept that day, laying a curse on the blood-soaked prince as he placed his father's crown upon his head.

You will never know peace.

Of course—that was the story people liked to tell. That story, however, was a lie. Lachlahn was never a peaceful kingdom; its very foundation was steeped in brutal power struggles that continued to rot its roots and poison everything. They could pretend Lachlahn was once a perfect utopia, but what kind of king would force his children into bloody competitions for survival, watched by nobles as a sport?

They might call him mad, but Hadrian—the very child who survived those games, the boy who murdered his father—was now a man who would excise the cancerous roots from Lachlahn and usher in a new age purged of their filth and rot.

Hadrian hadn't been entirely cruel in his revolution. One might say he had even been quite benevolent in the end. He had cut down every single one of his brothers, nullifying anyone who could dare challenge his divine right. He had let one of his siblings live. Just one. His sister, the princess.

Though being spared a swift death wasn't the blessing most in the kingdom thought it was.

After all, Hadrian didn't keep you alive out of any kindness in his heart. No, he kept you alive because the voices that whispered to him at the seams of his consciousness told him to do so. The princess would be the key to his absolute rule—a tool to ensure none of the noble houses could overthrow him, no matter how they tried. You were a living symbol of the old Kingdom and a way for one of their children to have a claim to the crown through marriage.

If you were sane, that is.

While he couldn't kill you—not without ruining everything—he felt no reason to spare you from torment. He needed you broken and compliant, your sanity slipping from your mind, making you the perfect puppet.

Oh how beautiful it had been to watch you fracture.

Hadrian knew all too well that even the strongest of wills would snap like a twig when left in those damp dungeons under the castle. No mind could withstand the very torture inflicted on him as a child. Hadrian knew it made him a monster to subject you to the same punishments he'd suffered. But it had always been too late for his salvation. He had accepted his fate.

He would become the monster they made him and excise the rot from the empire.

Only then could he finally rest.

It's near dawn—the sun beginning to rise in the east, casting a pink hue across the land. Hadrian's heavy boots thud on the stone floors as he makes his way into the underbelly of the castle. The dungeons smell just as they had in his childhood—like mold and despair. The scent makes your nose wrinkle and your skin crawl, knowing what horrors have occurred in this place.

Hadrian keeps his amethyst eyes straight ahead, focused on who awaits him. Today was finally the moment you could prove your worth to him. After all, for years you'd wasted away down here, being nothing more than a burden he had to care for. Now, you could pay him back for sparing your life all those years ago.

"Ah, sister. Good morning," his words drip with venom, a sinister smile on his lips as he reaches the iron bars to the cell that has trapped you for so many years. "It's an auspicious day, do you know why?"

He doesn't wait for a response—he doubts you're even registering the words he's speaking—after all, he'd made you like this. A perfect, compliant doll who would secure his victory against those insidious families once and for all. Hadrian chuckles, all too pleased with his machinations.

"Because today, I am announcing your engagement to Zedikiah of House Goldwyn."

With one snap of his fingers, the guards undo the locks to your cell, allowing Hadrian to step inside the dank space. Childhood memories flash through his mind, causing his heart to race. He grips his fist tighter, swallowing down his trauma, focusing on the one who'd fix everything. His hand shoots up, gloved fingers wrapping around your neck just enough to remind you of his power. He could crush your windpipe in an instant if you dared to defy him.

"You will be a good princess and marry the Duke without complaint, won't you?" Fury rages in his eyes as he stares at you. You look so much like their father that it makes his blood boil. But he couldn't leave marks—not today, not when he was finally taking care of his largest threat: House Goldwyn. He'd send maids with you to spy on the powerful Stag house and slowly but surely, just like the Broshelne and Marquilns, House Goldwyn would fall at his hand.

"Because if you don't—I'll make sure you *wish* you had joined our brothers in their graves."