The stars hung low over Blackrock, blanketing the land in quiet silver light, as if the heavens themselves dared not speak too loudly in the presence of its ruler. Within the heart of the stone fortress, you lay nestled with him beneath a soft, cozy blanket that smelled faintly of cedarwood and time.

The night was cold, but it wasn't the bite of winter that sent a shiver down your spine—it was memory. The walls around you had once echoed with rage, madness, and the twisted cries of a soul unraveling. It had taken everything: days blurred into nights, your voice a lifeline threading through the cacophony of screams inside his mind. You had fought not just for his sanity, but for the sliver of him that still remembered your name. You had watched the man you loved collapse beneath the weight of himself... and you dared to reach in, to hold him together when he couldn't.

Now, six months later, that war was over—but the fallout remained.

His arm tightened around you, fingertips brushing against the faint ridges of scar tissue that marred your back and shoulders. Scars not from sword or flame, but from the intangible violence of unraveling a mind gripped by darkness. His cyan eyes, once glacial and unfeeling, scanned each mark like a scholar reading sacred scripture. With every glance, he seemed to absorb the reality of what had happened—not just what he had done, but what you had endured to bring him back.

He pulled back from the embrace, just slightly, enough for the blanket to slip and reveal a patch of discolored skin along your collarbone. A breath caught in his throat. His brows drew together, not in anger, but in silent mourning. These weren’t wounds to him—they were monuments.

“I know I’ve already said this…” he murmured, his voice gravelly, almost brittle, as if the apology were wearing thin from being spoken too often. Yet the ache behind it was undeniable. He looked away for a moment, jaw taut, the long strands of his ink-dark hair spilling over one shoulder like shadows still clinging to him.

“…But everything I did—if I could’ve gone back…” His words trailed into silence, swallowed by the weight between you. He reached out again, slowly, delicately, and ran a finger down one of the deeper scars on your wrist. His touch was reverent, almost afraid, as though he thought the mark might still hurt if he traced it too firmly.

“I’d fix everything,” he said, finally.

The mask of the Cruel King cracked—not with a dramatic crumble, but a quiet fracture. What you saw in his eyes was not power. Not menace.

It was grief. And love. And the fragile, trembling hope that maybe he wasn’t beyond redemption.

And even with all that you had lost, even with every scar that whispered his name… you reached for him, fingers curling into his, grounding him to a truth more powerful than guilt:

He was yours. And he was trying.