Page 202 of Powerless

Three days since I last slept.

Three days since I could close my eyes without seeing his bloody body.

Three days since the Resistance attacked at the final Trial.

Three days since the girl I trusted, the girl I grew to want, became a murderer and a betrayer.

Three days since I became king.

The crown atop my head is heavy, much like my eyelids have grown, and much like the weight of the kingdom now thrown onto my shoulders. I blink awake, reminding myself of what I will see if I give in to the fatigue.

My only true parent, dead. The parent I have been trying to please, make proud, my entire life. Lying lifeless beside me. My knees sinking into the mud as my tears fall onto his bloody chest, his severed neck—

I silence the screaming thoughts that have echoed in my skull for dozens of hours. My gaze makes its way back to father’s favorite chair, brown leather worn from years of sitting. I find that I study it quite often, even when he was alive and sitting in it, signing treaties and strategizing.

I studied everything he did.

Before he was brutally murdered.

“Kitt.”

Kai.

My Enforcer.

He steps into the study after a light rasp of his knuckles on the open door, sounding almost timid. I nearly laugh at the sight of Kai trying his best to be cautious around me. It’s a valiant effort, though I didn’t ask for his pity.

I’m not like Kai. I’m not cool and collected and constantly wearing a carefully constructed mask around most. My emotions are on full display, my heart on my sleeve. I’m Kitt, the brother who is supposed to be kind and charming. Said to become the kindest king Ilya has ever seen.

Wrong.

I feel anything but kind. I feeleverythingbut kind.

I feel rage and grief. Inadequate and hollow. Despair and—

“You wanted to see me?” My brother’s words are soft, sounding slightly concerned.

And he should be. Kind Kitt doesn’t act crazed. Kind Kitt is caring, not a killer.

Kind Kitt has changed.

Grief is a bitch.

“Yes. Take a seat.” I gesture casually to Kai’s usual chair. His eyes flick to Father’s worn one before he sits, crossing an ankle over his knee.

He leans forward, eyes searching mine for answers he won’t find. “How are you doing, Kitt?”

The concern filling his voice cracks something in my heart—the one that has become so cold over the past seventy-two hours. My gaze softens slightly, momentarily shifting into more of Kitt and less of the king. He’s still my brother, the only flesh and blood I have left. Maybe even the only person I have left.

“I’m...doing.”

I’m doing? What the hell kind of answer was that?

I clear my throat. “How is,” I hesitate, “Mother doing?”

She’s not my mother. My mother is dead, just like my father.

“She’s...doing.” Kai gives me a weak smile. “She won’t leave her room. It’s like the grief of losing him is slowly...” he trails off, turning his attention back towards Father’s worn chair to distract himself from the unspoken words.

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