He was human once, wasn’t he?

Thoughts like that came too easily at night, in the quiet moments when sleep claimed the King of Curses in his chambers. Beside him, you saw the hard lines of his face soften, becoming placid.

Who knew curses could dream? Or if they dreamed at all.

Your hand hovered close, tracing the sharp contours of his jaw, moving down to the tattoos that curled and spread across his neck, chest, and shoulders. You had only ever known tattoos as marks for criminals—All too fitting. He wore them like laurels.

You’d caught glimpses of his cruelty, his rage, his complete indifference to the lives caught in his wake. And yet, in this moment, he seemed more man than curse. He even snored—a dull rumble, a sound almost like a cat's purr.

The man shifted, drawing you closer against his chest. The smell of his skin eclipsed the fresh straw of tatami and you could hear the faint thrum of his heart—his humanity, or what was left of it.

You wondered who he had been before the weight of all this settled upon him.