Prologue
I wanted to put the prologue of my book (as it is right now) out, so anyone who's interested can give questions/thoughts/feedback :3 Read the tags for content warnings before reading.
Basked in the orange light of the setting sun, Arsioly stood, attentive, and witnessed his third execution.
Most people didn’t see that many in their lives, much less when they were barely pushing eighteen, but it was different for Arsioly. His father was the one who carried them out, and his attendance was expected. At least this one was a little more interesting than the others; it was a public execution, done in the dusky light of the snowy city square with a small crowd watching, as opposed to the secluded nature of the other ones. He supposed that serial insubordination and homosexuality were lesser crimes that didn’t require such a spectacle as this.
The rough voice of Colonel Rasily, his father, echoed out over the small crowd, drowning out the pained huffs and curses of the young rebel who kneeled, bound and beaten, at his feet.
“It is Emperor Vahesy’s divine right to rule over these lands, and all those who oppose him will be punished!” He shouted, sending the ball of his foot into the rebel’s face; drops of blood from her nose glittered briefly in the air before splattering to the ground. Arsioly silently marveled at her ability not to cry out, ignoring the frightened whimper from Visralion beside him, the tightening of the boy’s grip on his arm.
The hits kept coming, and Arsioly watched with fear and pride, paying close attention to his father’s actions, as he always did. The way each strike hit easily despite the girl’s struggles; the way he remained unfazed by the curses she spat at him; the way he didn’t flinch at the freckles of blood dusted onto the pale fabric of his pants. His movements were confident and bold as one hand grabbed a fistful of hair and wrenched the woman’s head backward, and the other drew the shining dagger from its place at his side. He brandished it for the crowd as he cried, “Let this be an example to all of you! For the glory of the Emperor!”
With that, he brought the blade down across the rebel girl’s throat, slicking the snow with a hungry pool of crimson. He wiped his dagger on the shoulder of her shirt before replacing it in its sheath. He released hair he’d grabbed; the rebel thumped lamely to the ground. Once the blood stopped bubbling and gurgling in the body’s mouth, he motioned to the two soldiers standing at attention behind him to clean it up. Arsioly looked on, thumbing the folded paper in his pocket and avoiding his father’s eyes.
“Arsi, can we leave now? Please?” Visralion asked in a hushed tone, his face hidden against his friend’s sleeve.
He looked down at him, back up at the Colonel, then at Visralion again. He gave him a thin smile and ruffled his curly brown hair. “Yeah, let’s go,” he agreed, turning and walking away with his friend.
The boys made their way through the city streets, taking some of the smaller ones to avoid the other kids who were undoubtedly outside and taking advantage of the weekend. They walked towards the edge of the city out of habit, towards the woods where they often went to enjoy the relative solitude.
Once they’d passed the last building and the flat, grassy strip that separated the city from the forest, Arsioly glanced around to check that he and Visralion were the only ones present before pulling the folded poster from his pocket.
“Take a look at this, dove,” he said, cautiously unfolding it. He’d lost track of how many months he’d been carrying this around, and he’d rubbed at it so much that the paper seemed likely to tear if handled too roughly.
He opened the paper, revealing a boldly drawn illustration of a soldier with a gun. The uniform depicted didn’t align with the ones that the boys saw patrolling the streets every day. Even more damning than that was the big text written across the top, declaring, ‘Save your homes, join the Freedom Army!’
Visralion gasped, stopping in his tracks and taking a hasty step away. “Arsioly, why do you have that? Are you crazy?”
He laughed and shook his head, grinning. “Oh, calm down, it’s fine. Look— look what it says down here,” he said, holding the poster out to Visralion and pointing to the smaller words along the bottom. “It says that there’s free meals and shelter for anyone who joins.”
“So what? Our Army has that too!” He protested, backing up to a nearby tree, as if the paper held some disease he might catch if he got too close.
He folded the poster and put it back in his pocket. “But our Army won’t let you or your mom join.”
“That’s fine! We don’t even need that, we’re doing just fine by ourselves…” Visralion trailed off, and Arsioly scoffed, knowing that wasn’t even near to the truth. “Whatever. We still can’t join the rebels. We’ll be killed, like that girl—”
“No, we won’t. Trust me, dove, I’ve been planning this since forever. And think of how great it’ll be! We’ll run away and join the rebels, and we won’t have to worry about money or rules or anything.”
Visralion hesitated, and Arsioly took that as a sign to keep pushing. “And they’re fighting for our freedom, it’s even in the name! Come on, we have to do this.”
“But—”
“But, but, but. I’ll go no matter what. I’m only saying that you should come with me,” he bluffed, even though he was quite sure that he couldn’t bear to leave if his only real friend wasn’t going to be with him.
Visralion looked down and didn’t respond right away, picking at the frayed ends of his scarf. “Do you promise you know what you’re doing? I’ll only go if you promise.”
Arsioly nodded. “I promise, I know what I’m doing.”
“Okay,” he sighed, walking away from the tree and back up to Arsioly.
“Good,” he smiled. “We can leave tonight, just pack a little bag with anything you really want to keep. I’ll come and get you when it’s really late so nobody sees us leave. Don’t tell your mom what we’re doing.”
Visralion opened his mouth to argue, but closed it without a word and just nodded instead.
“Alright…” he agreed after a few moments. “Are you really sure about this?”
“I’m completely certain.”
