The dead bats burned into a pile of ash in mere seconds, the heat and intensity of the fire unnatural, born of a power beyond what any normal human could hope to conjure with flint and stone.

A power so strong he could burn this entire forest—no, this entire kingdom—to the ground. Unlike flying, his Ability to conjure and manipulate fire had come easy to him. The temptation was there, to simply let the fire he’d just started do what every fire was meant to do: consume. Already, its tongues of black flame were tasting the arms of foliage adjacent to where he’d discarded the dead bats. Left unchecked, it would travel like wildfire, devouring everything in its path. Spreading to the point where even he wouldn’t be able to stop it.

Then they would all know what it was to hurt.

The words of the woman he’d killed outside the throne room door came back to him, unbidden. Razim noth recorum. They were spoken in a foreign tongue unknown to him, and yet he’d understood them as clearly as if they’d been delivered in the common tongue. They were harsh, fearless—an accusation.

He could still feel the rage simmering inside him that those words had ignited. He hadn’t even planned to kill her—just scare her and any bystanders enough that word of the event would travel. It was only meant to be a warning to the man he despised more than anyone else—the king himself. And the guards, they were far more collateral damage than he’d counted on.

A sob caught him by surprise at the memory.

“I did that. I killed them. Me. It was me. I…hurt them. I burned them alive. Because I am—I am—I am—”

He couldn’t finish the sentence, his tears coming faster now, his breaths stuttering in a series of halting gasps that never gave his lungs enough air. And yet his mind finished what his tongue could not.

I am evil. I am a monster.

No, came that competing voice, the one that was always present but typically silent, like a dark shadow that had a mind of its own. It was his voice but not, like a piece of his mind had broken free to challenge his every thought, to provide a counterargument to every idea. It was that voice that had taught him the nature of darkness and shadows, and what he had learned had surprised him: That not every shadow was dangerous, not every spike of darkness was the enemy, just as not every ray of sunlight was kind, the brightest beams capable of blinding even those with the kindest, noblest spirits. You are not evil, that voice continued now. You are not a monster. They are the monsters. They are evil. All of them. Every last one of them.