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    June Leir


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    Anna was gone, and there wasn’t a thing I could do about it.


    My signature, clarity, had activated against my will, its calming presence washing over me, forcing clarity where panic should have been. It sharpened my thoughts, mapping out my options—what little I had now that I was alone.


    Our parents weren’t with us, which was odd—they would never leave us to face something like this alone.


    There was only one place they could be if they weren’t at home—our hometown, Crossroads.


    It was the only option that made sense, especially as I took in the sight before me. Even from this distance, the town was impossible to miss—a towering inferno, its flames stretching high into the night, turning the sky as bright as day.


    I arrived slowly at our house, setting all my things down—my stuffed fox standing watch like a loyal guardian in the night.


    Hobbling, I made my way toward town, determined to find our parents.


    I barely reached the outskirts before I had to stop, my throbbing ankle demanding a break—giving me a moment to plan my next move.


    Crossroads was laid out exactly as its name suggested—a large, intersecting road splitting the town into four sections. The main shops and inns lined the North and South streets, while the residential areas sprawled across the rest, dotted with various other buildings scattered throughout.


    The town sat nestled between two towering mountain ranges to the east and west, resting on the edge of a dense forest that crept up the slopes toward the northernmost point of the continent. This was the only passable route through the mountains in the entire region, making Crossroads a vital passageway.


    To the north, the road stretched toward a distant oceanfront town, a few dozen miles away. To the south, it led deeper into the heart of the continent. The east and west trails climbed the mountains, though the western path was usually impassable—a natural death sentence thanks to the influence of the Sloth Monarch.


    My parents were most likely at either the north or south gate, so I pushed through the pain, gritting my teeth as I limped through the slowly burning town in search of them.


    As I neared the town''s center, the sound of distant clangs of metal rang out from my right—the answer I’d been hoping for. They were at the south gate.


    To my left, down the wide road, I could see people still evacuating, their hurried movements a blur against the backdrop of the chaos.


    But I headed toward the danger instead, just like Anna would have. I couldn’t shake the hope that somehow, she was still alive.


    The fighting raged on the entire time I walked through the town, which felt like it was turning into an oven. The heat was suffocating, the smoke thick in the air.


    As I moved closer, I began to make out my dad, locked in combat with a nightmarishly tall, misshapen figure. Was it human? It barely resembled one, more like something born of nightmares.


    I could see my mom darting across the rooftops—what remained of them—shooting arrows with deadly precision to give my dad some space between his engagements. Dad was swinging his usual over-the-top lumber axe, a weapon as large as it was deadly, while the monster fought with its fists. Each punch flickered with a strange blue light just before impact, crackling with an otherworldly energy.


    Mom tensed the moment she noticed me approaching behind Dad, just as she loosed another arrow. She missed. The creature, not needing to divert its attention, landed a brutal blow right to my dad’s chest. A sickening crack echoed through the air as he was sent flying backwards, crashing through the wall of a burning building. The structure collapsed on top of him.


    The monster’s gaze shifted to me, its eyes locking onto mine with an unsettling intensity. Its side flickered with the same eerie blue light that had surrounded its fists, deflecting the arrow that had been aimed at it.


    “Leave, child,” it croaked, turning towards Mom as it braced to charge.


    But then, it froze, its gaze shifting back to me with unnerving focus.


    “Clap your hands.”


    I stared at it in confusion. Clap my hands?


    “June, do not speak to him!” Mom shouted, her voice sharp as she fired off more arrows.


    But the monster ignored her completely, its body lighting up blue again and again, like some strange, rhythmic pattern, deflecting arrow after arrow.


    The creature finally spoke again, its voice low and raspy. “Child, how old are you?”


    I was completely thrown off at this point. Was I missing something? Or was this thing just... weird? It wasn’t behaving like anything I’d ever encountered, and I couldn’t figure out why it was suddenly so interested in me.


    Another arrow slammed against the blue shield with a deafening clang.


    “Stop shooting, wife of Humility,” it commanded, its voice uninterested, without even turning towards Mom.


    From over its shoulder, I could see my mom tense, her fingers tightening around the arrow she had been about to release, before slowly lowering it and removing it from the string.


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    “Answer me, child, or I will kill you,” it commanded, its voice colder, more threatening this time.


    I could see the fear flash in my mom’s eyes as I hesitated, then answered, “Thirteen.”


    “Not sixteen?”


    I paused, hearing the distant groan of the building shifting to my left. Dad was slowly working his way up from beneath the rubble. “Not sixteen.”


    “Is that your mother behind me?”


    “…Yes?”


    The creature suddenly burst into laughter—an ear-piercing, shrill sound that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.


    It finally turned toward my mom, its voice laced with humor. “Wife of Humility, stab yourself in the neck with an arrow.”


    Without a moment’s hesitation, she obeyed. One moment, she was standing there and the next, she was falling from the building, the arrow lodged deep in her neck. The sight was so sudden, so brutal, that I couldn’t even process it before she hit the ground even with my signature aiding me.


    “Go to her, child. Here, let me help.”


    The thing was on top of me in an instant, moving unnaturally fast. Before I could react, I was soaring through the air, flying toward my mom. He had thrown me, like a sack of potatoes, with terrifying ease.


    I landed close to her—so close, in fact, that I was partially covered in her blood as I slid to a stop, coming to a grim halt in a puddle of it. I got back to my knees and as I knelt beside her, my body now throbbing with pain from various injuries, I took in the sight of her. She was barely breathing. The arrow had snapped in half during the fall, and blood poured from the gaping wound in her neck, staining the ground beneath her in a dark, unforgiving pool.


    The world around me blurred as I stared at her, helpless, as she died. My signature, the unique ability I’d had since birth, usually kept my emotions in check, helping me regulate my thoughts and actions. But in that moment, something inside me snapped. Unknown to me until now, there was a limit to it. A hard, painful limit.


    I had spent my whole life partially detached, unwillingly distancing myself from everything, so when the wave of unfiltered emotions hit me, it felt like a tidal wave crashing down. It hurt. It hurt so damn much.


    The anxiety and fear of Anna potentially being dead. The raw, suffocating grief of watching my mom die. And the searing hatred I felt for this... thing. This stupid thing that had taken everything from me.


    I felt a heat in my eyes as tears fell in an uncontrollable stream, like a broken sink. Then a loud crash pulled my gaze away from my mom. My beautiful, amazing, and... dead mom. The creature had thrown my dad through yet another building.


    My rage surged, a fire building inside me as the heat in my eyes intensified, spreading like a wildfire, slowly consuming my entire body.


    The wildfire inside me shifted once again, a spark of control flickering through the chaos. For the first time in my life, I forced my signature to bend to my will.


    Calmness, unlike anything I had ever felt, washed over me, like a wave smoothing out the chaos in my mind. I blinked, and as my eyes shifted, I could see it all. The tiniest details—the movement of muscle twitches, the individual snowflakes falling in slow motion, and even the subtle shift of the building as my dad began digging his way out for the second time.


    I rose to my feet, shouting, “Who are you?” at the monster.


    I caught its attention again. For reasons I couldn’t understand, it seemed captivated by me. It slowly approached, its gaze never leaving me, and finally spoke.


    “I’m the Pride Monarch, child.”


    “My name is June,” I replied, my words coming unbidden as it reached me and lowered itself to my level.


    “Why are you not scared of me, June?” it asked, its voice dripping with curiosity.


    “I can’t feel fear right now.”


    Pride let out a cold laugh, right in my face. “Expected of a Monarch’s daughter.”


    “Monarch’s daughter?”


    “The daughter of the Humility Monarch.”


    “That shouldn’t be possible. The Monarchs give warnings in the form of music.”


    Pride grabbed my hand, inspecting it closely. “Not the Humility Monarch, June. He has freedom from things such as that.”


    I let the silence hang between us, watching as Pride studied my hand with an intensity that made it feel as though he could see something I couldn’t.


    Finally, after what felt like an eternity, he spoke, breaking the silence.


    “Be my bride, June.”


    “Huh…?”


    “Be my bride,” he said, his voice low and commanding as he released my hand and stared intently into my eyes.


    After a long pause I backed up slightly as I answered, “I’m not marrying you.”


    He smiled a wide smile. A vicious smile. “Did you know that Monarchs can’t die if they have something called a Coro?”


    A saw movement behind Pride. I just had to buy a few more seconds. “No. Why is that?”


    “The reason doesn’t really matter for the point I’m about to make,” he continued, his gaze never wavering. “But just know, once I take your father’s heart right out of his chest, he will still be alive. Kind of. And the only way to get his heart back is to come, bring your sister, and marry into my court as my concubines.”


    Pride turned, deflecting a hit from Dad with his glowing blue light. It didn’t matter, though—I already knew what I had to do. The plan was forming as I kept Pride distracted, waiting for the perfect moment.


    Pride slowly began pushing Dad back, away from me, and I knew it was time.


    “Dad, usurp my signature.”


    His eyes widened in surprise, but in that split second, he sneaked a quick glance at me. It was so brief, but I could tell he understood my resolve.


    My vision blurred as my power slipped away, leaving me vulnerable. The emotions I had been desperately suppressing surged back, crashing into me with a force I couldn’t control now that my anger had faded.


    I began to shake, my legs giving out beneath me as I fell to my knees. The tears I had tried to hold back returned in a flood. My hand trembled as it touched the lifeless body of Mom, and without thinking, I clung to her, begging over and over for her to not leave me.


    “I warned you, Pride. Anyone who hurts my family will bear the same fate as Lady Time and Lorde Space.”


    I heard a sickening thud nearby, followed by Pride’s agonized scream of pain.


    Suddenly, a strong arm wrapped around me from behind, locking me in a chokehold, as the haunting sound of music began to fill the air. A third monarch had arrived.


    “Surrender yourself, Humility.” The new monarch’s voice was laced with rage, and the sheer fury in his tone sent a shiver down my already trembling spine.


    “Don’t you dare hurt her, Diligence,” Dad’s voice was filled with worry, his tone sharp and protective.


    “Surrender then.”


    A heavy silence stretched between them, the tension thick in the air. Finally, Dad spoke. “Promise me you won’t hurt her, and I will, Diligence. Using your Royal Signature.”


    Another pause.


    “I swear upon my oath, as the Diligence Monarch and Judge of all Monarchs, that I, Diligence, will not hurt your child and will prevent the Pride Monarch from doing so under your immediate surrender.”


    A bell rang out, its sound reverberating through the air, and a strange warmth enveloped me. The very next moment, my vision returned, and with it, my emotions surged once more, receding only slightly—my control now shattered.


    I wish my vision had never returned.


    I watched helplessly, still trapped in the chokehold, as a one-armed Pride drove his fist through my dad’s chest. In his hand, just as promised, was my father’s still-beating heart.


    My signature was lost, confused, unable to do anything as I began to fully shut down. The weight of everything crashed down on me, and I fell to the cold earth, my body going limp as Diligence released me.


    I could feel my consciousness slipping away, my vision fading as I watched Diligence carve a purple line through the air. The line expanded slowly, growing to the size of a large person.


    They both left through the tear in space—taking my dad’s body and heart with them—leaving me behind as darkness consumed me.