The Dagger's Wrath (BOOK 1)

Chapter Nine

A/N: Another kingdom to be worried about. Also another king. Also there's some flames in here and some magic and well, a whole lot more expanding on the world of Questeria that I've created. Within the series - as it progresses - more locations are explained and revealed, as well as characters. There are literally 22 POVs in Book Two so far... Yeah. So... um, with that in mind, enjoy!!

King Darren, Hills of Daerr, the Darklands Island

Darren was the sort of person who judged a man, woman, child by their cover and not by their personality. He loved the Dark Queen for her beauty, for her darkness, and for her looks. He was basically obsessed with her, and even though they fought and fought and felt like everything was a lie. He was a king, but felt more like a squire. He felt like he was pushed around by everyone—even though he knew he was doing all of the pushing, and just mentally thought inside his mind, his gritty, dirty mind, that he was the best ruler in all of the Darklands. King Ganison II did not need to pay any attention to any of the villagers, for Darren could be the one to be the king, and to be the ruler. He was the one with the Dark Queen.

He had shaggy brown hair the colour of a strawberry dipped in melting chocolate, with some of the red and pink parts showing, sparkling in the sunlight as he rode on horseback, his eyes gleaming off into the distance every now and then to keep a clear sight of where he was going, where he actually was, and how long it would take to get to the Forges of Daerr—hopefully it wouldn't take too long, judging on the pace that they were taking.

He was thinking it would be around a day or two, but hopefully they would take some breaks, as well, especially since one of his guards (Sir Adam) went into a fit of coughing about every hour, so taking a break would obviously be the most necessary thing to do.

King Darren I of House Gramsion was starting to think that the Dark Queen really didn't like him anymore, seeing how many times he had been visited by her (which, to be honest, wasn't much) compared to how many times he had visited her a few days after marrying him (almost every hour would be them chatting and gossiping and talking), but now it was just them seeing each other as little as ever.

Of course, the king was excited to see the Dark Queen Arnaressa, but the thing was... was she? It felt like she just looked at him, and instantly both of their hearts shattered into an eruption of glass, blood, and darkness, showing everything together that they didn't need. What was wrong with him, with her, with them, together? Were they shattered—like everything that felt to him? Shattered... broken... mended.

All was a blaze, all was flames, and they were burning. They were burning, and melting—it was their love that was making a joke of them. You're not with me, you're drifting away, where are you? Where... are... you?

But their love was breaking, and the only thing that was here was them and them and—

King Darren frowned. Nothing was going right. He wasn't feeling the magic in him, like he wasn't feeling the guards were watching his presence—it seemed that they didn't even care for their king, even though he had done plenty for them (killed lots of their traitorous friends, who died in battle because of him). He had done too much for them, so why should he be bothered with fixing them?

Burning, burning, burning into a forest of darkness, he was.

His horse, with his other men, galloped across mountains and thick-with-mist forests, while the horses screamed and moaned for food, only to find out that there was no food to give, and even the men were getting starved. They could even eat a man or two, no jokes, but kept the thought to themselves as they wandered off through the forests and mountains.