Seven Sinful Crowns

King Zuhaleen

Beautiful. The kingdom was beautiful. His kingdom, he thought to himself, though he did not know for how much longer that might be true. For over three centuries he had ruled over these lands...these oceans...these people. He had seen it barren and bountiful. Ruined and rising. He had coaxed it in his palm, awakening it and molding it into a paradise and a fortress. It did not happen overnight, oh no. It had taken blood, sweat, tears, sacrifice and an unwavering persistence. It had taken his heart, his soul, and soon his life.

He was not complaining. He had lived a long, long time, and he was tired. His skin hung from his bones in folds, fragile and fraying. His eyes were sunken into their hollows, his lids heavy with fatigue, but his eyes were bright and knowing and very much alive...for now.

Soon it would be his time for the Passing. On the full moon he would be dressed in the traditional white gown worn by every ruler since the beginning of time, and walked down to the Bloodfall, a crimson river that ran its course through the entire kingdom, spreading life to every land within, and thus, to those whom live within its borders.

Looking out now from the porcelain balcony, sunlight shimmering upon the precious stone like starlight, he could just make out the red tinge pressing into the shores of Pyrah, its stone fortress barely visible through the early morning fog. He looked on anyways, imagining his daughter, Sabine, high atop the stone building, looking out on her own kingdom.

You see, the kingdom was indeed built on sacrifice. Seven of them, actually. In the early days of his rule the kingdom was faltering. Its lands were barren, its people starving, and the land, divided into seven kingdoms, fought between themselves. Each had an army of the most gifted mages they could find, and another for brute force, and between them the entirety of the world was crumbling, falling, dying. As the son of Reemus, the ruler of the Western World, Zuhaleen, he was thrust into command when his father was seduced by an infiltrating magess, with lips red as an apple, skin white as snow, and steady hands that pressed a rubied dagger into his heart. They called her snow white, for she was silent as a fallen snowflake, and cold as ice.

It took seven years of blood and blades, but one by one he defeated the armies of the neighboring lands, and each time his kingdom grew, so too did the price on his life. Vengeance, vendettas, threats...they came fast and furious. They were raw and ragged, not at all quiet whispers that slipped like moths from ear to ear, but in screams that held pain and rage and war. He knew it was all too likely that one day he would step out into this very balcony and a dagger may press through his flesh too, crimson life pooling at his feet, eyes hollow...just as his own fathers had been the morning he found him, but there would be no one to take his place.

And so he sent for the strongest magess' within all seven kingdoms, and from them he picked just one from each, to give him heirs. Lilith from Saileen, with swaying hips and full lips. Her hair a sensuous cascade of black waves. Gillian, from Verinah, with heavy breasts and curves like the river of life itself. Greisha, from Tareen, a dress of jewels, spun in gold. Silvana, from Sleera, who gave orders like a Queen already. Wilheila, from Pyruh, her lips as red as the curls falling around her shoulders, rage burning within her eyes. Then there was Evaline of Lyria, her pouting lips and begging eyes. She had demanded a crown on their first meeting, after seeing his, and when she was made queen, she fashioned one in its likeness, if not just an inch taller and a dash grander. Pria came last, though the journey to Zuhaleens castle from Harmon was the shortest – it had taken her longest to comply with the king's demand, her pride stronger than any armor. And so it came to be, One king, one kingdom and seven queens.

Until they bore him a child, of course.

One by one they fell pregnant, their bellies growing beneath their gowns, and one by one they screamed into the world their daughters – every one of them – in the likeness of their mothers. And one by one they fell to the ground by the Bloodfall, their bellies empty save the marks of life left behind like fingerprints, and left those seven daughters with the only lasting pieces of their souls – their magic.

And this is how the king of Zuhaleen came to be known as the greatest ruler in all the world. How he came to be invincible and feared and favored. Through blood, sweat, tears, sacrifice and an unwavering persistence...though perhaps, not his own.