I just stare after the open door and press my back against the glass. I think about what it would feel like to crash my elbow through the window and fall from this height. Would it hurt? What would it feel like to fly through the air, and would I know when I hit the ground, or would I just die?

My toes tingle as I envision it, thinking about lying on the ground as I die and knowing there would be nobody to protect my people. No. I'm not done yet. I have to do this. The easy way out could no longer be an option for me.

Self-sacrifice had been something I'd grown accustomed to, in my young life it had been the only reason I'd been tolerated by my father. My red hair had set me apart from my siblings who were all darker complexion and darker in their various hair lengths. The black, voluminous tangles looked quite strange what compared to my own near blood-red locks. More than my birth order had descended me from the opportunity of wearing the crown, my complexion discounted it entirely.

I had known I was different from my siblings before anyone had pointed out to me the complete lack of resemblance. The bred in bravado of my brothers and the cat-like, mysterious nature of my sisters never touched my animated, stubborn personality. As my father liked to remind me, I was not fit to wear the crown though my mother often recanted with I was made for much more important matters.

I had no way of knowing they were grooming me, preparing me for the day when I would be sent to do the task that very few returned from when I would be stripped of my title as Royal Prince and turned into, for better words, a monk. If I was to return, it would be as a beacon of all that was light and good, reborn in a vision of prosperity and I would be assist my bustling home town with creating a new era of abundance. As a farming nation, I was to be much more important than a future king.

I had never dreamed of becoming King, I never wanted such a title. With my two older brothers so adamant in the war room, coveting my father's every word, and his complete disinterest in my person, I had nestled myself with my mother and the servants and yet, even there I didn't seem to quite fit in.

Never having seen the point in gossip and idle chat around wine glasses, I had thrown myself into the academics that our vast libraries had to offer. Befriending the staff suited for the perfect cover story to my continuous tardiness in mundane tasks such as Court and fine art schooling. I didn't wish to paint, I had wished to read, to escape the ever dismissive pass over of my father.

Now, I'd give anything to attend another boring history lecture. I would walk through hot coals to entertain at dinner or sit in on Court.

I tread to the kitchen before fetching the first pale of water, snagging some bread to soothe the ache in my stomach. There was little fear of the overlord Alpha finding me, I doubted the mongrel even knew how to find the kitchen, and if he did there were a plethora of hiding places. I'd spent plenty of time here in my youth, baking or more so, stealing baked goods.

The rounded male chief offers me a plated sandwich, a simple slab of meat between two slices of bread. While it wasn't my norm, I wouldn't turn it down. I thank him quietly, not wishing to draw any more attention incase a wandering ear were to pass.

My aversion to meat had suited me fine as we were a heavily farmed community, rich with various vegetables, nuts, bread, and even sweets when my parents imported the chiefs for our special events when dignitaries would visit. Seeing the halls now left an ache in the pit of my stomach, nothing had changed on the walls and yet everything was different. As if the very life had been sucked from the depths with the death of the matriarch, my mother.

"Would you like some help, M'lord?" A small voice echo as I carry the first bucket. Her frail hands circle the other side of the handle and I sigh in relief, though I want to refuse her help, I can't say that I'm not grateful. Physical labor wasn't exactly something I was good for. I hadn't done much for labor in my short twenty-some-odd years.

"If he catches you, he'll have you killed," I warn her, not quite turning her away. The fair skin and brown eyes watch me gently from under the heavy cover of crudely cut bangs. Her thick black hair pulled back into a tangled bun, stuffed under a bonnet.

"It's a risk I'm willing to take, M'lord. I hate to see you suffer so. It's not right, forcing one of your blood to do such a task.. is it true? Are the royal family..." her voice trails off. Was she saddened that only I remained? Would she had much preferred one of my brothers?

"Dead," I conclude. "I'm the last one." It does go by quicker with help, without her, I don't know how I would have managed. My body protests already, despite my schooling, I had been home for nearing on a month and I had, admittedly, been partaking in the comforts that the crown had to offer. Mutilated, I had no desire to lift a finger for the foreseeable future. It would seem that dream had been cut horribly short.

Her lips purse as she considers this, pulling her eyebrows down in a way that I might even admire if I could find it in my heart to look at a woman in such a way. The crease causing the most quizzical look to form in those chocolate eyes. Her lower lip curling to capture between her admirably straight teeth. Her freckled cheeks rounding with the grimace of deep thought, she was acceptable for a servant.

Gena, a personal servant, more so a maid than something so grand as a lady to one of my sisters. She had desired me for longer than I care to think, I remember in my boyhood her presence as often as I have fond memories and yet, I don't recall anything particularly remarkable about her person.

She'd been a ward of my family most of her life, a constant admirer from afar as I was the only of my siblings to never have been courted. Perhaps it was her wishful thinking that I had other things in mind, that I'd not yet met the right woman. Wouldn't she shudder to find out my lack of suitable mates had been my mother's doing, for she knew well as I did where my tastes lie? "Have you not learned much from school? I thought..."

She had thought about what all the others had. That I would return some great sorcerer, not a downtrodden prince who hid away in his room to hide his shame.

I had been sent away, by my father, to a particular school to hone my skills. While some might see it as a gift, the reality was it was an almost guaranteed death sentence due to the trials a 'Solomonari' must go through to unlock their full potential.

From the ability to control water, more importantly, the weather, I had been deemed one of the rare few worthy of the approval of the dragons. I would be capable of crafting ice, summoning small dragons, and even a bit of healing, a Solomonari was as powerful as his surroundings called him to be. The once peaceful beings who were in charge of delivering the weather to poor villagers were now dispatched to areas of famine as miracle workers.

There had been nothing left to do but accept my fate, my ill-prepared fate. I hadn't even known of my 'calling' until moments before I was sent away. I had played with magic, many of the other boys I'd grown up with had some sort of magical ability, but I had always felt stunted in away. It'd never come easily for me as it had for them and then to be accepted into such a school, well, I had not believed I would return either.

A shudder rolls through me at her question. "Not enough to fight them off on my own." I lie. I had learned plenty, I just hadn't learned in an honorable way. Where my companions had left as masters of our craft, I was dwindling at the back of the class. I had only passed due to unsavory measures, defaulting to my only survival method, the one thing I had had to give was myself.

At the school, our teachers were brutal, and our testing was strenuous. Many did not survive the trials, with most eaten by the dragons that they summoned. Every day we prayed to survive; in a twisted sense of humor, they encouraged us as hope allowed us to last longer. We prayed to our gods that they would see us through, and every day less and less of those pleas were answered.

I watched as my classmates were killed off one by one until only a few of us remained. We were congratulated, told that we had passed. Only, it did not feel like a victory. We felt guilty, why had we survived when so many of our friends had perished? Some horribly so.

Using now felt foreign to me, the disconnect of the higher element of my magic wrought with the agony of the trials and shame of the beds I shared to find worth in my meager existence. I wasn't meant to live, this was revenge for cheating death, this was my personal hell on earth.

It was my job to end this, perhaps that would allow me to atone for giving myself to willingly in exchange for my survival. "M'Lord, the tub is almost full. Is there anything else I could bring you? Perhaps something more to eat...? If I could be so bold... I'm... I'm so sorry that this has occurred."

Was she? Was she sorry? The lone prince, the only heir to this bloody throne, who had used her as a servant her whole life? Much as I like to feel the hero now, I was not much more to my people than a Prince frolicking through their town whenever my parents grew bored of me. My sense of duty was all that I had left, a default, not a call to action as my training might have prepared me for.

These people were unlucky to be stuck with me for a savior, I couldn't even save myself. "Were any of your lycan friends apart of the resistance?" I ask, curious. She blinks at me, clearing her throat. The royal family had kept a few of their own slaves, it wouldn't surprise me if this was crucial to the entrance into this domain.

"No, M'lord. Well, obviously they have joined now, but they surrendered with the rest of us."

Her words play on a loop in my head. Surrendered, that's exactly what my people had done. Given themselves over because my mother strode into Lord Darrius's life, there was little to be done for the people of Dezna. We were estranged, a commodity, they weren't any more our people than we were their hosts. We had abandoned them, handing them me in exchange for decades of neglect had been a failed exchange.

Perhaps it was this that spurred me to do something right, to do whatever I could to change this.

It was an opportunity to be more than the lesser Prince.

I'm most likely not strong enough to choke or drown this man, though I could probably knock him out. As I dump the last bucket, I catch a glimpse of my reflection in the water.

My dark eyes have shadowy circles beneath them from exhaustion and lack of sleep, I can't say this comes solely from my current situation. As I run my fingers over my cheekbones, haunted by the faint echo my mother's voice, she scolds me that I've allowed myself to get to thin. It makes me smile and I feel tears threaten to spill over.

My hands travel up to tangle in my thick, blood-red hair and I sink to my knees and rest my elbows on the basin as I find myself feeling overwhelmed by the loss, once more. I would do it for my mother so that she had not died in vain. "You may leave me now, Gena," I command her.

Shuddering, I take a few deep and ragged breaths as I compose myself upon hearing him approaching. I cannot allow him to see me like this, I can not show weakness. I am still a prince, I am still far above his status. Her eyes widen with panic, she curtsies as she rushes out of the room and I pray that she made it before he caught sight of her in here with me. It is not for my own life that I fear but for hers, the one who was still willing to help me.

His boots echo off the stone floor and I fight to compose myself. There was no time for me to wallow in my own self-pity. I adjust my robes firmly, trying to rid my breath of the tremble. "You're a prince, get a grip." I hiss at myself, glowering at the man staring back at me in the clear water.

He enters the room and I place my hand on the basin, mumbling a few quick words as the water begins to steam. "There. It's warmed up for you."