The Iron Skeleton

Prologue

Young Emil sat in the shadowy depths of his study, a solitary candle serving as the only source of light. He bit his lip and sipped at the savory beef broth contained in his mug. As he waited for his scheduled guest to arrive, he reflected on the turbulence of the past couple years. 

Upon the untimely death of his father Pietrovo, eleven-year-old Emil had been snatched away from his mother and forcefully crowned emperor of the Alcontean Empire. And now, two years later, the thirteen-year-old youth felt no more qualified or willing to hold the position than he had upon coronation. For father and country, he reminded himself. 

Presently, a sharp rap on the door snatched the young man from his thoughts. He uncrossed his legs in the chair and planted them on the floor, recovering his propriety. "Come in." he called, his voice authoritative, despite its high pitch. 

With a slow creak, the oak door swung open, and a tall figure in white robes strolled in. The man possessed a square-jawed, clean-shaven face, with his hands held behind his back and his posture perfectly straight. He shut the entryway before bowing low before the youthful emperor. 

"I humbly present myself before thy imperial majesty." the man said, his enunciation impeccable, "And I apologize for my tardiness." 

Emil shrugged and sipped his broth, peering at his guest in the dim light of the flickering flame on his desk. "You're forgiven. Although I remind you, your antiquated speech bothers me greatly." 

"I intend no disrespect towards thee, but doth not eloquence befit one who is in fact, a god?" 

"You're not a god yet, Zoko." Emil corrected with narrowed eyes. "And until your transformation is complete, my word reigns supreme." 

The white-robed man bowed again. "I understand." 

The young emperor slowly nodded in satisfaction. "Now, we're both men with little time to waste in dilly-dallying, so tell me, what'd you come to see me for?" 

Zoko sighed and took a seat across from the emperor. "I hath received terrible tidings from Jasmidian. Our forces' assault on the insurgents' stronghold there hath failed, and worst of all, Falcon hath failed to return with our survivors." 

Emil gasped. Then, realizing such a reaction wasn't befitting for an emperor, he scratched his chin and regained his composure. "Have you tried to contact him?" 

"Indeed I have. We all have. He hath not reciprocated our attempts to communicate with him, and the passive signal that we do receive from his communicator is admittedly weak." 

"Well, you'd better find him." Emil ordered sternly, "The Divine Flock is not to be broken up." 

"I wholeheartedly agree, thy majesty. I shall search diligently, even to the very ends of the earth." 

"You'd better. I'm counting on you." 

Zoko chuckled. "Well, I, Dove, god of peace and mercy, am not one to disappoint." 

Emil narrowed his eyes and tilted his head. "As I said, you're not a god yet. But since that's what you will be, you'd certainly better start striving for that." 

"I certainly shall." 

With that, Zoko spun on his heel and exited the room. Emil sighed and picked up his cup again. As he sipped the broth, he perplexedly pondered over how Falcon of all people, had lost himself. 

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A/N: Well, there you have the prologue! I hope you enjoyed reading it, and if you did, don't hesitate to click or tap that "vote" button. That'd really help me out, haha. 

Now, I typically write longer author's notes, and try to make them super fun and all, but considering this isn't exactly a proper "chapter", per se, I'll make this brief. (And not only that, unless you're literally reading this the day of posting, the next chapter's already up, and you have some questions lingering in your head you need answers to...like now. 😉) 

So if you ARE reading this the day of posting, come back tomorrow morning, and I should have the next chapter up by then. My update schedule will be Friday and Saturday mornings, or at least, whenever it's morning on those days where I live. Washington State in the US. (For some of ya'll, morning to you would mean me getting up at 3 a.m. or something like that. No thanks. 😂) 

Anyway, this is longer than I thought it would be, but thanks for reading this prologue, and I hope you stick around to enjoy the rest of the story with me. It'll be a crazy ride, so you've been warned.