Kings of the Wyld

As individuals they were each of them fallible, discordant as notes without harmony. But as a band they were something more, something perfect in its own intangible way.

Gregor had been born a monster in a monstrous world, and had managed to find beauty in it nonetheless. He’d squeezed sweet juice from a rotten orange. He’d painted an old house pink. And what was more: He had given all this to his brother, as a gift.

“Who wants to read the self-pitying lamentations of an old revenant?”

“Those were heavier than they looked,”

But what does a mirror know? What can it show us of ourselves? Oh, it might reveal a few scars, and perhaps a glimpse—there, in the eyes—of our true nature. The spirit beneath the skin. Yet the deepest scars are often hidden, and though a mirror might reveal our weakness, it reflects only a fraction of our strength.

Look here at a warrior born, a scion of power and poverty whose purpose is manifold: to shatter shackles, to murder monarchs, and to demonstrate that even the forces of good must sometimes enlist the service of big, bad motherfuckers. His is an ancient soul destined to die young.

WHEN WE SEEK TO RULE ONLY OURSELVES, WE ARE EACH OF US KINGS.

Which are you, the monster or the man?

“I prefer rain for a robbery. Not a downpour, mind you—more of a light drizzle. Suits the mood, I think. You ask me, it’s a shame to spoil a sunny day like this with something so crass as petty thievery.”

There was nothing to mark the grave, no headstone upon which Talia Cooper’s single mourner might lay a wreath, or set a candle. There were only the words be kind carved into the birch’s brittle skin, as if whoever did so had been crying, or a child, or both.