I'm not gonna kill you, I don't wanna hurt you
Don't look so scared when I get close to you
I'm not gonna kill you, I don't wanna hurt you
Stop, can you not look at me in that way?

I'm not going to kill you-Nemahsis
(This artist is amazing and speaks about her experience with islamophobia through her music, check her out!!)
Tw: cutting? / mentions of suicide. But not really
🥀
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Taehyung did not smile, did not react to her embarrassment like the others in the room. Instead, her took note of her proud silence.

Her articulate disobedience.

Leila was not loud in her actions, her voice, her threats. They were as silent as a desert breeze, but just as scorching as the suffocating, golden sun.

She did not have to be loud, dramatic, or biting to burn others.

So instead, she leaned forward, bowing and paying her royal respects to her new husband without breaking eye contact. His eyes glittered black as they followed her in her descent and back to rise.

Taking in the "custom" she learned from Jimin, she boldly grabbed one of his large, golden hands. The man made no sound, no movement as she lifted his limb to her plum lips, and pressed softly into his cold knuckles. Leila did not falter in contact, though his smooth skin made her lips tremble.

So unlike the lips she had touched before. And this was just a hand.

He smelt like mahogany. And the woods when it caught aflame. That and another deeper, sweeter and spicy scent she couldn't place.

She let the weight of his hand fall. Feeling her chest move a little faster than usual as he let it all happen. If he had moved away in the silence of the room, it would've been obvious to his subjects that he had little control over what she chose to do in those moments. Though his handsome face did not show it, her little act had been one of defiance.

Taehyung did not intend for the opportunity to go to waste. The taller man placed his hand on the small of her back, right on the V of her gauzy material.

Leila couldn't hide her gasp, as another human's flesh had never touched her there. At least, someone who was not a woman whom was meant to bathe her. The expanse of his hand fit almost across the entire surface, strong and sure against her. Her silver eyes flickered up to him, to find he was already staring back at her, his jaw tensed.

For a moment, and one moment only, she saw a flash of something in Taehyung's eyes. A hesitation as he traced the length of her spine, drinking in every drop of her tanned face, and long hair that tickled the back of his hand.

Just like that. They were connected. Breathing. Alive.

Leila was in a lightening storm, her every pore and strand lifted. Charged.

Taehyung let his hand fall from her back, jaw losing its tension. His eyes once melted were back to the stone that paved the ground he walked upon.

It was gone before she could even question if she had the ability to truly intrigue him. If he even cared for her beauty, like Jimin had in the carriage. At the inn.

It seemed like he couldn't have been more unimpressed. Unmoved.

Unaffected.

It was silent, except the sound of blood pounding in her head.

Strangeness wrapped around the expanse of her throat, stealing words of authority that hid behind her. What was this cruelty? This unknown?

She had been told their territories were kind enough to each-other, trading silks and spices. What was this cloud of animosity that threatened the air between them? That thickened into a blanket of bitterness, and made her betrothed stare at her as if she were furniture to be reupholstered. It was a sickening feeling, like she had been out exactly where she needed to be. Like she had been lured into their black seas, not of her own volition.

This was not the way.

Had she been mislead?

Her family, elders, and leaders would've never sent her if it were naught. They wanted her to succeed. They would've warned her if this territory had showed malice. It would've hindered her ability to enact the prophecy, to kill him.

And yet the prophecy would be all the same. It would be fulfilled.

Only one of them had to die for the sun to shine again. Only one of them would have the glory and the title of doing so.

No, she decided. No one at home would've sent her if they didn't know.

They wouldn't.

No one would know she felt like a mouse caught in a trap, a snake circling it's way through the metal bars. Fangs already pooling with venom.

"Apprehend her." The dark Prince called out, his deep voice echoing.

Leila had been expecting something, but still the words sent a shock through her system. His voice more of a vice than the metal shackles that had been forced onto her wrists, the cold needles against the once warm skin she had. The left guard let her go once put in shackles, the advisor Jimin smiled cruelly before pushing her onto her knees. She did not offer him a grimace of pain, but instead bared the scraping stone onto her flesh.

She did not struggle against the cages on her wrist. She did not move.

Letting blood mingle with lavender stars.

When Leila looked up she did not see the crystalline ceiling. Instead she saw the navy blanket of stars from her home. Felt the thick air of heat. Smelled the flowers by her bedroom window. Swayed in time with her russet sister as the silver moon filled her with magic.

Persia.

A smile lifted to her lips, the thought sweet on her tongue. A word that if she uttered aloud it would be her last.

Her mother's loveless eyes. Her father's pride. Her sister's envy. Her elder's wisdom.

They couldn't have known.

They couldn't have known she would die today, at the hands of her fiancé.

Those images of home flittered away as her husband replaced them above her. So beautiful, the bones of his face, she thought once again maybe this was a dream. She stared up at him, the angle showing his torso and up to his neck and regal face. Her face nearly met the sword that hung off of his hips.

He knew he was safe above her. Her hands, bound before she had the chance to act. She could not use the knife hidden in a strap around her leg, or her magic bound like the metal at her wrist. It required specific movement. He knew of this weakness.

Taehyung smiled for once, his cat like eyes remaining untouched, "You look very submissive for a royal who thinks they're going to die."

She hated him in that moment, more than most. He had this expression on his face like he knew everything in the world, more so than she.

Do you like that?

The angry words shocked herself, but snuffed out in her own thoughts. She would meet him in the same stony indifference he offered her.

He clicked his teeth, bored gaze arising again on his pretty face. Like it would be the most dull thing in the world to end her life.

"Not much of a talker, are you? That's good. Neither am I. But let's talk, my bride, about all the things you've been lied to about your entire life."

Leila felt coldness shift to her heart. She suddenly knew why emotions were seen as shameful, why they were weeded out through generations of moderation and suppression.

They make you stupid.

"I was not lied to." Her voice was sweet, strong. It made Taehyung twitch and look down into her large, heavily lashed eyes.

The lights in the room seemed to swell in their golden warmness. Magic, that she guessed the prince to possess as he was blessed by the eclipse in the opposite way as she.

It made the embers in his eyes glow.

"You really believe that you and your territory were the only people who knew of the prophecy?" Kim Taehyung spit out, not out of anger but more of a harsh mockery.

Heat lit up the young woman's face. It wasn't even a thought that had crossed her mind, that her husband might have been aware of the same information as her. That he also might have been told and trained and prepared to kill her, the same as she had been.

Out of all the things in her life, this is the only time she'd felt true shame. Realization was as harsh as the seas slapping against the shores outside.

How could she have been so blind?

The prince watched her carefully, crossing his hands behind his back, and started to pace. She heard the murmurs of the crowd behind her, as they listened eagerly to the strong words of their leader.

"While Tenebris has no true leader, rumors and stories are always left alone by the Union guards. What harm could stories do to their monopoly on resources? Not much, they thought. So the territories have passed on information, their own pieces of culture and tradition that aren't supposed to exist. Tell me, Leila, what is the story you've been told of our heroic sacrifice to the sun?" Taehyung finished arrogantly, finally stopping in front of her again as his brows furrowed in fake interest.

Leila felt honey in her throat, as he spoke her name. The timbre shaking her limbs, her heart squeezed. She bit the inside of her lip, not daring to speak aloud.

He would get nothing from her.

Taehyung nodded once, before unsheathing a knife from his right breast pocket. He turned the blade, letting it glint in orange light before bringing it too her neck.

Leila felt the cold press of blade against her, wondering if she leaned forward this could all be over. Taehyung did not allow it to cut, pulling away as he saw the serious look in her eyes.

The man leaned down a bit, forcing her closer to him. His tongue ran across his lips, as his irises trickled from her neck, the her mouth, to her eyes.

She felt dizzy.

"You're so brave. So loyal. If only it weren't for nothing." His voice was a caress against her, for once not speaking for the crowd. The words were only for her.

He stood up full again, putting the knife away.

"She won't answer. But we all know this version of the story. 'The sun cannot rise, if the moon does not call. Blade against blood, only one will survive the fall.'" Taehyung finished, laughing arrogantly.

His subjects joined him. Leila felt their amusement more than her shackles. Watched the shake of Jimin's shoulders as he glared at her.

The prince raised his hand, "How does the legend really go?"

The girl felt her earth shatter beneath her, as every voice in unison spoke a ghostly, familiar tune.

'The sun cannot rise, if the moon does not fall. Blade against blood, only the sun will survive the call.'

No. No. No.

Leila let out a croaked laugh, her metal restraints clinking. No.

That wasn't right. It was not what she was told.

Shattering shattering, splintering splintering. Her whole world crumbled. The ground did not exist beneath her feet. She would soon float away.

Stop. She wanted to scream. Until her throat was raw. Until their ear drums burst, and their vocal chords stung.

Stop.

He did not.

The prince held onto her shoulders, the icy touch scalding. She could barely see him through the blur of liquid in her eyes.

"Don't you see Leila? Your whole existence has been a lie. Love is not banned. Anger is not banned. Happiness is not banned. Especially not in my court. Did you notice people laughing around you? Did you notice your sisters and mother and father having family dinners while you were sent to bed? Did you notice your peers making friends while you were sent to training lessons? It was all a lie to prep you to become the willing lamb for the slaughter. A way to prevent you or anyone else forming attachments to you. To happily travel to your death. You are a decorated sacrifice, sent willingly by your family. You are not even seen as human."

Leila shook, her whole body feeling cold. Colder than it ever could. She wanted to go home. Home. She wanted to lie in her soft bed. To wake up and maybe hug her mother and father, like she'd seen her sister Ava do.

How had she missed it? How?

Lies. She wanted them to be, but his words had woken her up.

She'd missed out on so much. Leila had always been alone. She never really saw her family. She was either with her elder, or in her room. Or allowed to go off exploring. People would stop laughing around her, her mother would go silent. She thought it was due to her status, her royalty.

But it all had been apart of the framework to make her desensitized to life. To living.

To leaving.

What she had read in her books, was not a fragment from the past. It existed. It existed for everyone but her.

It hurt. Leila felt the dam break as finally she was given a reason to feel. The numbness would be a welcome friend, she grasped at it desperately. Trying to pull back the wall of indifference that allowed her to survive.

Because pain was too much. Physical pain ended. It was quick, and intense, but it flickered out like a flame eventually.

This, this was an endless ocean that would swallow her whole if it didn't end.

I was not loved, even though I could've been.

I was abandoned.

Used.

But at least she would die soon. It was the only thing that gave her solace. She would die and the sun would rise.

If that was her only purpose, she would complete it.

Kill me. End my suffering. End this miserable life I was forced to live.

Taehyung looked at her again, a small flame of sympathy entering his gaze. It was worse than the nothingness that clinged to him. His pity for her made her want to rub her skin raw. The softness hardened on his tanned face, and she felt relief.

He would do it. His hand rested on his blade. The long fingers covered in sapphires blazed against her. She begged him with her eyes to do it.

The prince sighed, grasping onto the handle. Irises holding her steady. Unfamiliar tears trickling down her face.

They tasted like salt. Leila hated how they burned.

Taehyung lifted his hand, and Leila wished it was his blade that caressed her skin. Alas, it was his knuckles that she had kissed. Dragging across the olive of her cheek, whisking away the river of tears. He spoke softly as he did so, stuttering her heart.

One more act of charity for her before he killed her, completing his duty. Knowing the sun would rise again as rubies collected under her body.

It would be all worth it in the end.

"And I will not complete the prophecy. I will not kill you."

Hysterical. She felt hysterical. Leila thrashed wildly trying to remove her restraints, feeling them bite at her wrists. Her knees were moaning, her dress in tatters.

Her blood was pooling she felt it. When she looked down and saw a puddle of silver instead, that shone like mercury.

It was a realization added the the others. She had never bled before. Not like other women once a month, and not ever. She'd been protected from it.

Was she even human?

Taehyung leaned down, his lips leaving fire along the shell of her ear. They were the only warm thing about him. She shivered aggressively, trying to move away from him.

Monster. He had to be.

That was the only reason why he would continue to allow the world to succumb to darkness.

And she would be kept alive. Burning in the shame that she was bred to die. And would not be able to fulfill her life's purpose.

"Your family, and their offspring, and the next generation after, and the generation after that will die knowing that you failed them." His words were spoken like a lullaby, but they were stab wounds in her abdomen.

Leila screamed.

It was raw. It burned in her throat.

It felt good.

Windows burst around her in the throne room, glass raining from the heavens. It cut into her skin, her face. Splinters creating more lines of silver across her body.

People screamed around her, covering their faces. She saw the Prince's advisor stare at her in horror from underneath a bench.

She reveled in their screams. It was better than their stares. Their laughter.

Taehyung had covered his head, and Leila breathed out.

One...two...

Leila grabbed a bigger blade of glass from behind her back, pressing harshly into a softer part of the metal. She felt it enter her skin, crying out, but the piece of metal abridged in chain fell away.

Weak.

With silver dripping down her hands and down her forearms, she felt the glass like it were her own heart. Her eyes blazed as chaos burst around her.

This piece of sand, pressed with heat would be the only thing to save her.

She lifted it with her right hand, it's flight aimed for the left side of her chest.

The sun will shine again.

She hoped, she would feel a glimmer of it's heat and glory before she left her body. Hope she would see the waves lick the shore, with golden life. She would never see her bed again, but at least she would see that.

Leila probably looked crazy. As she smiled at the ceiling, her metallic blood running down her face. Praising the deity of the moon.

She did not care.

She was ready to break the curse.

خداحافظ شب بی پایان

Yet, before she could make the plunge, the angel of death stopped her.

Taehyung blazed over her again, this time he was angry. He did not care about his own flesh as he dug the glass out of her hand. Gold dripped down from him as he took away her chance to not be a prisoner. Her freedom.

His chest moved harshly up and down, his eyes furrowed in disbelief.

"Leila, you will never attempt this again." Taehyung's voice lost its arrogance. It was quiet. Authoritative.

She did not understand at the moment, his incredulous countenance was because she had not tried to hurt him when she was free.

No, her hatred had been directed towards herself.

Leila felt rage as she snarled back, "Do not underestimate me prince. I will.
Over and over until you have to do it with your own bare hands."

Until you have no choice.

The royal got up slowly, avoiding her eyes and he threw the glass to the side. Leila felt her body shake with sobs, her voice wailing out into the space. A song of despair under the moonlight that swelled through the broken windows. The sea sang with her, waving with their mournful sound.

No one laughed anymore. Servants, guards, members of the court, advisors, and officials moved in silence as they cleared out of the room.

Deranged. She heard.

Monster. She laughed.

Witch. She felt.

She would again be alone in this land, but awake. And being awake was scarier than being in a dream. It made everything more real.

Soon only she, Jimin, and Taehyung were left.

"Why? Why would you want this?!" She yelled out once more, using the last of her broken voice.

His tall frame did not shutter against her anguish, her pain.

Taehyung beheld her coldly, fixing the edge of his royal garment. He cleared his throat before lending her a wave of his hand, and walking out of the throne room.

Jimin grabbed onto the back of her shackles, willing her to stand up in the puddle of her own silver blood.

Leila had been tricked once.

Tricked twice.

The moon had met the sun, and they would not take turns in the sky.

The sun had won. Burning everything in its greedy, selfish wake.

The moon would not lose again.

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(A/N): YALL I CANT!!!

I am so in love with this story, I hope you can tell I really enjoy writing it! And of course I am known for my plot twist, which as you can see are very much going to be a large part of this story.

Thank you again for all the support! Tell me what type of tension / scenes you would love to see in this book! If you're lucky I'll remember to write it and tag you for credit!!!