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Martyn knew he had to do it, there was no other choice. His liege’s comforting words didn’t help calm the shaking of his two hands, tightly gripping the axe’s handle. Ren’s hand coming up to briefly squeeze Martyn’s and his gaze filled with pained determination, did. Here was a good man, forced by the world to give up his kindness for protection. Protection not for himself, but for his people, for Martyn. He didn’t deserve Ren, in truth, nobody did.
He took a deep breath in and raised the axe, while Ren knelt in front of him, head bowed. It felt intimately wrong, a king should not kneel in front of a lowly servant. Here was an angel freely giving himself over to a demon, because they both knew that’s how it had to be. Martyn always knew he’d be going to hell, he just never thought he would drag Ren down with him.
The full moon watched sorrowfully over them from on high as the axe descended, cleanly severing head from neck. The world went still. No bells tolled in mourning, no candles burned in remembrance, no wolves howled in grief. The only sound Martyn could hear was the steady drip of blood as it coated the bricks of the altar, before seeping into the soil around it. Soil cared for by Ren’s own two hands, built by him from the ground up just like everything else in his kingdom, just like the axe that now fell uselessly to the floor. The King’s Hand collapsed down to his knees and wept for his fallen liege and everything he represented.
It took frightfully long for anything to move again. Slowly, the body pushed itself up, picked up the severed head and reattached it. It said nothing as it placed a hand on Martyn’s shoulder and stared at him. The feeling should have been warm and comforting, but he could only feel a deep chill. He killed Ren and now something else took his place. The Red King had risen. If Ren was an angel and Martyn a demon, that could only mean the new monarch was a fallen angel. Ren’s golden crown, now eternally stained by his blood, made for a fitting halo.
Ren and the Red King were alike in many ways, Martyn quickly realised. His new liege inherited all of the memories of his previous one, and along with them, his complete trust in Martyn. It tried giving him a choice between killing it forever and taking the kingdom for himself, or staying loyal. It wasn’t a hard choice to make, this was them now, it was the two of them until the end. He told the Red King as much.
Maybe one day he would be able to admit to himself that he did consider the other option.
The moon hid in shame, the sun slowly rising to take her place. No more words were exchanged. Instead they sat down together, with the Red King holding its loyal Hand close as they watched the dawn of a new day. Snowflakes started peacefully drifting down, dying themselves crimson where they landed on the altar. Winter had come.
Martyn let his head fall on the King’s shoulder and closed his eyes. Maybe that way he could pretend nothing had changed, that it was still just him and Ren. It had always been the two of them. The chill he felt wherever he touched or was touched by the Red King reminded him otherwise.
He loved Ren. Maybe he could love his new liege as well.