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Hak’s hands clenched tight around his glaive—tight enough that they throbbed with every heartbeat, that they ached with a heat that burned this moment into his soul.
*“Lord Soo-won,” Hak’s voice rasped. “Where is King Il?* Where…” His hands throbbed as he looked around the courtyard, taking in the soldiers and the strangers and the blood that stained his friend’s clothes. “Where is Princess Yona?!” he roared.
Soo-won closed his eyes and looked away. Seeing this, the black-haired man at his side sighed, but straightened his own shoulders.
*“You are looking at the new King of Kouka,”* he announced. “King Soo-won, sole heir to the throne after the deaths of King Il and Princess Yona.”
Hak’s hands tightened impossibly further. “What.”
Nothing.
“Soo-won!”
Nothing.
“Look at me, Soo-won!” Hak cried, and his voiced cracked in unison with the stones breaking under the staff of his glaive. “Look at me!”
And Soo-won did. The new King of Kouka looked him in the eyes, and said, *“A moment ago… I sent them to hell.”*
Later, Hak would clean the blood from his clothes in a mountain river. He would tear strips off to bandage the wounds slashed across his skin, and dip his face beneath the water to wash away the mud. He would run, and run, and he wouldn’t stop for anything until he reached the safety of his grandfather’s side. But in that moment, Soo-won’s words washed Hak into hell, and he surrendered himself to the bloodlust.
Wherever his princess went, he had promised to always follow.