Gav Thorpe: The Crown of blood

Raising his eyes, he looked duskwards over Askh, where the sun was disappearing behind the city wall. The sky grew red and purple as the sounds of the looting legionnaires was carried up to him from the streets below. Steadying his thoughts, Ullsaard smiled.

He liked the moment. Tonight the sun set on the reign of Lutaar, tomorrow it would rise on the reign of Ullsaard. It was a fitting end to one life and start of another.

Ullsaard stood at the window until the moon was rising above the domes of the palace. Not a single soul had disturbed him as he had admired the city that was his.

He turned, seeing again the body of Lutaar. A small crimson pond surrounded the throne, and the king seemed more slumped than before. Ullsaard's eye was drawn to the gleam of gold upon the king's brow.

There was his prize. All he had to do was reach out and take it.

Ullsaard ignored the slickness underfoot as he bent over the dead king, his good fingers curling around the Crown of the Blood. There would be a proper coronation later, he told himself, but it wouldn't hurt to try it on, just to make sure of the fit.

Looking at his reflection in Lutaar's blood, Ullsaard placed the Crown on his head.

Pain lanced through Ullsaard's mind, needles of agony driving into his brain. He fell to the ground and writhed as he felt his mind being shredded and gouged, torn at and pulled apart. His clothes soaked up the blood of Lutaar as he floundered across the floor in a swirl of crimson, a silent scream twisting his face.

Rolling to all fours, Ullsaard dipped his head and vomited as the Crown fell to the floor with a clatter.

The pain stopped and Ullsaard slumped to the tiles, gasping for breath, eyes screwed shut. He lay there for some time, the memory of the pain he had felt almost as much as the pain itself. When his breath came steadily and his heart was no longer hammering against his breastbone, Ullsaard opened his eyes and pushed himself up to his knees.

He looked at his reflection in the blood-spattered gold of the Crown. He could see no wounds upon his head or face, and he looked the same as he had done for the last few years. But something felt like it had changed.

Leaning forward to peer closely at himself, Ullsaard had the strangest feeling that someone else was looking out of his eyes.

"Who are you?" he whispered, looking at his distorted features around the rim of the Crown.

Askhos, replied a voice inside his head.