King of Alacrya

Prologue

NOTE: This is simply meant to cause intrigue. Everything will only make sense in future chapters.

"I didn't believe it for a moment, you know."

Grey laughs as he sets his wineglass down on his desk, brushing back his palewheat (and wasn't that change a jarring reminder in and of itself) hair when the draft comes that signals Caera has entered, inviting herself in.

"Still didn't really invite you in, but I have a feeling you're never really going to listen, are you?"

Caera walks into his line of view, hands on her hips, head perfectly straight as if open to display her horns as always. Vritra-blooded were always alike. That stupid, self-righteous flaunting that still haunts the back of his mind when he thinks of the man he considered a best friend in one life and a brother in this one.

Nico had it coming, of course, but still- he can't get rid of the memory of Nico being curled around their father's fingers, the man that destroyed the brother that he loved. The resentment, illogical, dark, sits in his chest like a shameful scar and he thinks maybe everyone's right about him.

"You're a good actor, Grey. But you're a better person."

Grey absentmindedly admires Caera's hair, the navy locks that would look innocent if not for the imposing figure. Coupled with the ruby eyes, she's the very image of noble grace. Caera would make a pretty woman, he absent-mindedly thinks. Well, if she had a personal life outside of nagging him (read: saving him from himself) as she seemed to take upon herself.

"Funny. I always scored at the top of my drama class." He quips, not really in the mood for another such conversation with his childhood friend.

When he looks up after a long sip of his wine, he wishes that this damned noble wouldn't fix him with such a- such a- for fuck's sake, he doesn't even have a word for it- he hates the intensity in those ruby eyes, looking at him like he's some sort of wounded child in need of a hug.

He expected anger, he expected some patronizing, but this is worse. This- compassion, he doesn't want it, he just wants to be able to drink in peace to mourn losing yet another family member to some insane manifesto of self-righteous evil.

"I'm sorry."

Grey laughs. "What do you have to be sorry about?"

"Your father." She says it so seriously- still looking at him with that same, too-intense faith, and Grey tries to drown himself in her next gulp of wine.

"He was evil," He says, as if it's as simple as he wishes it could be. "Agrona needed to be arrested. It's not like he is dead."

Caera sighs and leans against his wall, too familiar, too much like Nico used to on days when Grey was being particularly difficult.

"It's not easy when people you love aren't who you thought they were."

Grey has the sudden urge to throw his wineglass across the room, because as much as he hates it, tries not to think about it, it's true- he loves his father from his second life. Through all the disappointment and neglect and betrayal he still loves his father and when Caera looks at him with those big, teary, kind ruby eyes he remembers what the noble said about her own parents and he turns away.

Pity, he can handle. It's all that's been afforded to him by strangers his entire life, after all.

But this understanding? Relating? There's only one other person who's tried to understand him without judgment, and Grey's not sure he's ready to expand that exclusive circle to two people.

"The only time you weren't acting was when you took out your blade."

Grey remembers the moment- unexpected emotion welling up in him, unable to stand the way that Caera was pleading with him, the way that his father finally let him in after he pretended to give into some god-awful cause-