Hypat, Denea, Day of Devastation (DD).

Mai's boots crunched as he made for the glint of gold at the top of the rise. Bleached bones cracked like dried shells beneath his feet, and dust drifted through the air, leaving a smokey, gritty paste in his mouth. As he walked, his heart thundering, skeletal pieces skittered away, exposing a darker trail of steaming ash. Despite the hot wind, Mai shivered and brushed a spiral of black hair away from his eyes.

Behind Mai, in the azure water of Hypat Bay, his small flotilla waited. Even from this distance, he could feel the tension radiating from the soldiers. He'd broken his uncle's orders coming here with the remainder of the army. All for nothing. They were too late.

When he reached his destination, a mound of human and equine skeletons near the centre of the battlefield, Mai stopped, crouched down and swept aside debris of ivory splinters and a quarter mandible. The burn of metal against his skin made him grimace as he picked up the crown. My crown. It shook in his hands as he examined it, the delicate pattern of filigree leaves now twisted into tangles reminiscent of a briar bush.

Breathing deep, he willed calm and thumbed the gold as he took in the devastation about him.

Ozone crackled, and the sun shone hot and white, burning away the dark clouds to reveal a too-turquoise sky where not half an hour ago there had been thunder and lightning and rain. A long shadow stretched to his right, thrown by the carcass of the citadel where walls and terraces of limestone blocks still clung to the cliff face. The sentinel statues of past kings and mages had fallen, though, resting in beds of rubble that once housed gardens of date palms, oleander and rose.

Pivoting on the balls of his feet, Mai turned full circle. The city of Hypat lay devastated. Probably the whole of Denea too—that once fertile crescent. The painstaking centuries of desert greening undone in a matter of minutes. All to keep the bloodlines 'pure'.

Damned, stubborn mages. Mai gritted his teeth. He knew what they'd done. To them, Denea was better returned to dust and sand than left in the hands of someone like him. A tick twitched at his jaw, and his body trembled with the suppressed fury that he shoved deep, deep down. Control, he needed to stay in control. Because he might be a half-blood, but he was as strong in the magic of the Carnelian Way as any mage. Proof 'clean blood' was unnecessary. Just the right blood—and determination.

He shook his head at the ruined city. Such a waste. Yet the method intrigued him. One corner of his mouth tugged up. If such a force could be safely harnessed and redirected...

The thought didn't keep him long. Now his uncle was dead—along with almost all the Euran military. His remaining kingdom, a kingdom he had not been raised to lead, was as exposed as the underbelly of some once-great beast.

A rustle pulled Mai's eyes up the incline. It couldn't be, and yet it was. A memory of indigo blue, there in the burnt-out pyre of a civilisation. He approached the crumpled robe and reached out his hand to touch the faded material. It disintegrated beneath his fingertips, like the curled embers of burned paper.

Two bright-yellow eyes flashed open beneath what was left of the hood.

"You."

A flush of ice washed down Mai's back, but he kept his face impassive, his words flat. "Hello, Arkis."

Mai dusted the remains of the fabric to reveal Arkis' melted face. A ragged red line of charred skin had replaced the mage's silver circlet, and the yellow Carnelian crystal it held was now embedded in the flesh.

Cupping Arkis' cheek with his hand, Mai said, "It's been a while."

Arkis started to cough, his chest making a hollow sound like the clanking of a dead branch dangling in the wind, and blood spurted.

Slowly, Mai brought his hand to his face and stared at the deep-red droplets. They moved of their own volition across his alabaster skin, quicksilver quick, snaking around his wrist and fingers. Alive. Mai sniffed. Power, the blood smelled of power—of a land leached of its essence. Of its èlan vital. Yet not enough to keep Arkis alive for long. Not after what he'd done.

On impulse, Mai sucked the tips of his fingers. The hairs on his forearms lifted. A faint tugging at his forehead, where his own Carnelian crystal sat in its golden diadem, caused him to smile.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk, Arkis," he chided, waggling a long white forefinger. "None of that, now. I didn't permit you to leech me."

Arkis' eyes closed, and the tugging stopped, another breath rattling out of him.

"I think," said Mai, leaning over to whisper into a hole that had once been an ear, "mayhap you have not cost me all. My father taught me all the secrets you tried to keep from me, and if I were to lay a wager, I'd say you'd sent the most gifted younglings inland." Mai's forefinger moved to his chin in an exaggerated gesture of contemplation, and he noted the way Arkis' chest froze. "Perhaps to the Temple of Elia?"

The slight tightening of the lines around Arkis' mouth was his answer.

"You didn't mean to die, did you?" Mai edged closer to Arkis, white-hot rage streaking from his veins as he hissed, "Just to kill the armies. To kill my uncle. To kill me?"

The shell of a mage winced. But his eyes blinked open and his lipless mouth spat out one word, "Abomination."

"Hmm." Mai placed a palm on each side of Arkis' head, his mouth watering with the need for another taste of that lifeforce. "Such a shame you will not live to see what this abomination will do." And with those words, he began.

The èlan vital was honeysuckle sweet. It slithered from Arkis' crystal in a stream of faint yellow light, and as Mai consumed it, Arkis fingers clawed at the air. Still, Mai drank, sucking from marrow and muscle and vein and nail, all the while, the body shrinking before him, the chest collapsing in on itself— an empty chrysalis pressed between thumb and forefinger—skin turning to parchment and then to powder. He guzzled the energy, drinking the last drops until his body trilled and he was drunk and Arkis was nothing but a husk.

Finished, his body ablaze, he eyed the crown beside him and wordlessly called it. It rose, circling until it reached the line of his eyes. Mine. The coronet stilled a moment, then continued higher, spinning faster above his head until it lowered, stems and thorns and leaves wrapping about his head, enveloping his diadem. A series of golden roses unfurled, small yellow crystals at their centre, and one brilliant Carnelian crystal at his forehead.

Mine.

A scuttle of bones and an exclamation dragged Mai back to the present. With this came the realisation that there was nothing under his feet, that he hovered, weightless, his arms outstretched. Bones snapped as he returned to the earth and faced his visitor.

The man—dressed in the embossed maroon leather armour, flowing silk trousers and high brown boots of a general—waited, still but for his darting eyes and the saffron plume swaying atop his helmet.

Mai eventually acknowledged him with the flick of a hand and said, "General."

"My prince, the—"

"Your Majesty."

The man flushed, and his eyes moved to his boots. "Forgive me, Your Majesty, it appears there is no one—nothing left, that the king, our army—" 

The man's words died on a gulp at the sound of Mai's teeth grinding.

Mai glared at the man. Hairline cracks snaked across the inner wall he'd painstakingly erected around his emotions during all those years of rejection. After everything, it was this man—this imbecile—who fractured that barrier. Of course, there was no-one left. They stood on an enormous heap of dead soldiers and civilians. He wanted to scream at the man, to sear him to a pile of cinders. Yet his half-foreign blood had kept him from ruling this land, Denea, his father's kingdom, any further destruction would not help him rule his mother's homeland. No, he could not let that happen. This was the time to keep Eurora safe from the vultures soon to start circling its throne.

He unclenched his jaw and let out a slow breath, raising his hand and measuring his voice in an attempt to console the shaking man.

"Not all is lost, general. Gather what cavalry we have. We have survivors to rescue before we return to Nebia. Then there will be time to mourn."

The man nodded, bowed and turned to leave.

"And, general."

The man stopped at his king's words, blue eyes intent.

"Should you encounter resistance, please be sure not to harm the young ones."

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A/N: Hi there, thank you for checking out this prologue. I have had this complex world evolving in my head for a few years now, and this story swirling about, wanting to be told. But writing it can feel like I am trying to snatch at smoke. This prologue is designed to set up the foundation of the rest of the story without giving away too many clues. I would love to hear if it made sense, if it was vague and confusing, if there was too much exposition—or anything else. 

Thank you for taking the time to read. If you liked what you read and would like to help me increase my rankings, please vote and comment. 

Thank you! 

Jas oxox

Image 'Babylon' by Accoz on DeviantArt

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Dedicated to Sarah_MacLean because way back in 2018 you gave me some very, very helpful advice for my previous prologue that led me to step back and rethink this whole story.