The tyrant is gentle when they guide them to a room, not a cell as one might have expected.
He stood in the doorway as they looked around the room, astonished with it's plush furnishings, nothing about this room would have told them it was to be their prison.
"So you are their chosen one." The villain said quietly.
They turned to glare at the tyrant as they were reminded of their situation.
"You cannot hope to win, they won't leave me here." They yelled at the other.
"Mm, I know full well the lengths they will go through to bring you back to them, to have you fight their fight." The tyrant told them with a chuckle, "Tell me, child, did they tell you what will happen once you have ended me?"
They frowned, no they hadn't, but what did that matter, the villain was evil.
"No, I suppose they didn't, after all, they did not tell me." The villain said softly.
"Do you know the name of their last savior, child?"
They shook their head, "No."
"I have not used my name in the last century, it was no longer mine with the way they used it, they killed their last hero, child, and they will do the same to you, I was not the first and you will not be the last." The tyrant told them gently, "They fear me because I know them, because I was once their savior."
That was impossible, it couldn't be true.
"Yes, they found me in a world so very unlike this one, there was no magic there, and when they brought me here I burn with it. They taught me, gave me a family I could finally call my own, I had none where I came from, no that I would miss anyway." The villain sighed, "I fought their battles, I lost my friends, my family, and when I won their War they sent me back."
"No." They shook their head.
"Yes, when they were through using me they sent me back, they tore the fire from my veins until only ice remained. It took me years to find a way to return, I had hoped that those that survived would remember me, but they were dead and buried, gone because they knew the truth, that I survived that final fight and was cast aside."
The tyrant looked at the teary eyed hero.
"Tell me, child, are there any who you would miss when they banish you back to you own world?" The tyrant asked.
"They warned me that you were a liar." They snarled defensively.
"Yes, I suppose they would." The villain smiled kindly, "When they come to free you, child, I want you to do something for me."
The hero started to protest.
"Nothing that would go against your sense of right." The villain assured them.
The hero hesitated but found themself nodding.
They walked silently through the village, the rain soaking them through their thick cloak. The gate creaked loudly as they opened it and they winced slightly before they continued through.
The ground squelched where they stepped and muddied water splashed over their shoes and up their pant legs.
They glanced at the names carved into each stone, some faded with age, their lantern cast a sickly glow over each one as they passed them, searching for just one.
When they found it they found themselves frozen, and not from the cold.
There, carved in cold stone, was proof that the villain had not lied to them as they tried to tell themself.
They fell to their knees and sniffled, if the villain was right in this case what did that mean for them, was it still right for them to fight, what were they going to do?
The rain washed their tears away and they took a shaky breath and pulled the flame colored rose from inside their shirt where they had hidden it when they had heard the rescue party coming for them.
They set the warm rose before the stone and traced the name that was carved there.
"What did you call him, I wonder, back when he was the hero of his story, back before he became the villain of mine?" They asked the silent stone.
The grave stone did not answer but they stood up and stared at the stone for a moment longer before turning to leave.
They supposed that they had to go back to the inn where they were awaiting the rest of the rebellion, they supposed their knowledge of the truth changed nothing.
But they could not help thinking on the inscription on the cold stone that they had been asked to gift a flower to.
'Yesha, my heart, my love, may the stars hold you in their arms, my you always know the warmth of their touch, my heart is ever yours, if this is to be our last day I would do so as your husband.'
The tyrant had said that those words had been their wedding vows, that they were meant to have a life together but he'd been sent back to his original world and when he returned his heart was dead, killed for protesting his banishment.
They entered the inn and quietly made their way to their room.
It wasn't fair, they thought, how could they be so cruel? How could they separate them across worlds, how could they break love like they had?
They stripped themself of their wet clothes and redressed, they shivered, it wasn't right.
They wondered what they would have done in the villain's place, would they do the same? Would the rebellion cast them back where they found them after they were finished with them?
They didn't want to go home, they too had nothing worth returning to.
And all the while the rain continued to fall as it had since long before they came to this world.
A/n: little thought i had after reading a blurb about a hero being sent back to their original world and making their way back.
I figured they might be cast as the villain by those that got rid of them and that those people would probably get rid of those that knew the truth.
