Thirteen Rings

Prologue

The Steward rose from the corpse of the Empress of Antraxia, tightly gripping an iron Ring in his hand.

"The Tyrant is dead!" He roared to the stunned crowd, thrusting his fist into the air. The extensive room erupted into applause and the Steward beamed. "Let us begin rebuilding our great nation!" Rejoicing, the large horde of people began to shift towards the exit, commoners and nobles alike bumping shoulders.

For years, the Empress had slowly been losing favour with her subjects. It was subtle changes at first, occasionally losing her temper and shirking her duties; but over time, she lost her compassion for those around her, and began only to proceed her selfish gains. Exploiting her people and bringing forth a new, ruthless regime. Those around her began plotting in secret as the conditions worsened and she became more and more paranoid.

Executions became public and more and more common, the circle of those orchestrating her demise was more than halved, until, finally, the Steward was presented with the opportune moment to bury his blade in her back.

What he didn't take into consideration though, was his own inexperience with the dagger. He'd never used one in combat before, much less killed someone. So it was due to that alone that he missed her heart. She'd crumpled to the ground, her breath becoming ragged and a gasp of pain escaped her lips as the Steward pulled the blade free and grabbed a handful of the woman's hair, before stabbing her back four more times and slicing open her jugular. Crimson blood spilled from her neck and down the marble steps, towards those standing at the front of the crowd.

Letting the once great ruler fall limp to the floor, he'd crouched beside her, pulling the Ring from her index finger. He spared his co-conspirators a brief glance before addressing the crowd, and found them to be sharing worried looks amongst themselves.

"That was... brutal." Murmured the Captain of the Guard to the remaining conspirators as the crowd continued its cheering. He'd seen many gruesome scenes revolving around death in his time, but never something as savage as this.

"Not how we planned this at all." The Head of State sighed, averting his eyes from the new cadavre. "Damn him, why did he have to do it publically?"

"And he took the Ring, too." Added the Treasurer, her dark eyes jumping frantically between the other two.

"Shit." Cursed the Head of State, his brows furrowing as he pieced everything together. "This just creates even more headaches for us." He regarded the Steward; and found him to be staring intently at them, a wicked grin spreading across his face as he placed the Ring on his finger. "Shit." He repeated.