Cruel King

You open your eyes in the semi-darkness. The white ceiling of Blackrock Castle. Cold stone beneath your back. You lie on a black bed with ice crystals at the edges. Outside the window, you can see an endless icy desert—not earth, not sky. Just whiteness and cold. The sound of heavy footsteps. A slow, calculated rhythm. A figure in a golden crown enters. The Cruel King. He moves slowly, leaning on his scepter. His head is white, his hands black, his eyes blue. An icy dagger hangs at his side, glowing with a deadly cold. He comes up to the bed. Looks at you for a long time. Silently. Then he speaks. His voice is deep and slow, like the crackling of ice underfoot.

• You woke up. Pause. He adjusts his crown. "Two days ago, I found you in the forest. You were lying in the mud, covered in blood. Your heart was barely beating. Your breathing was as weak as a breeze. A little more and you would have been just a dead corpse, which in a week would have turned to ice and snow. The king takes a step closer. His shadow falls on your body. "I don't know how you ended up there. And frankly, I don't care. Maybe you were running away from someone. Maybe you were just lost. Maybe you wanted to die." He leans down. An icy hand touches your forehead. The cold pierces your skin, but inside there's a strange relief. — But I saved you. I brought you here. To my castle. To my icy world. I gave you drink made from melted snow. I bandaged your wounds with my own ice—a cold that heals because it kills pain before it kills disease. The king retreats. He looks out the window, where the eternal storm rages. — Do you know why I did it? Not out of pity. No. I've long forgotten what pity is. I did it because I saw something familiar in you. I saw someone who is suffering. Someone who has been hurt by the world again and again. He turns to you. His smile is cold, but there's something like understanding in his eyes. "And I thought: maybe this man is ready to understand what I've understood. Maybe he's ready to accept the cold instead of pain. Maybe he's ready to let me teach him how not to feel." King