1 Chapter 1

"Andreas?...." A timid voice worriedly called out his name but he couldn't hear it.

He couldn't hear anything. He couldn't feel anything. All he could do was see and what he saw broke him. His beautiful wife was laying on the ground, her body bent and twisted in unnatural angles. She had no visible wounds but he knew she was dead. He mechanically took a knife from his waist and glanced at her stomach. Tears were spilling from his eyes as he prepared himself. He had to do it. She told him to. He promised.

Andreas gently cut her clothes to expose her enlarged stomach where their child laid. He took a deep breath and made a cut right at the base of her stomach, making sure he was careful. He could feel the bile rising in his throat as he did it, but he kept going. His mind was on the brink of breaking but he had to hold on to his sanity. At the very least he had to know if the child was dead or alive. He gently reached in an pulled out the tiny child. It had only been in her womb for eight months, just enough time to be able to survive in the outside world. He checked the child's breathing and his lips curled up in a gentle, sad smile. She was alive. Their child was alive.. He cut the umbilical cord and held the baby to his chest. Its soft cries managed to make their way to his consciousness and he whispered sweet words to the child in his arms.

He glanced at his wife's body and then at her stomach as his ears picked up on another heartbeat. He put his hand on her stomach and his smile widened slightly. He dried the tears blurring his vision with his sleeve as he removed the second child from his wife's body. He took off his jacket a wrapped his little girl in it and then he took off his shirt to swaddle his little boy. He placed them both gently beside him and pulled his wife closer for one last embrace.

The crowd watched on in silence. They were waiting for what he would do next. None of them were concerned with the battle that should have been happening. They were all sure their lives would be over and second but they didn't dare run. There was no use, he would find them anyways.

Andreas sat there with his wife's cold body in his arms and he promised himself something. With the heavens as his witness he would keep their children safe. He would raise them and care for them and make sure death came slowly to all who had wronged them. He took a final look at his wife and gently set her on the ground, straightening her body and brushing her dark curls away from her face. He took a deep breath and took off the necklace that she had worn for years around her slender neck and removed the jade hairpin that he had gotten her has a wedding gift. He removed her wedding ban and put it in his pocket as he finished mentally preparing himself. Then a small blue flame appeared in his palm. Andreas slowly guided the flame towards her body and watched as it engulfed her.

"I'm sorry.... and I love you..." the words were heavy and soft but they echoed throughout the silent hall. Andreas turned to his children who had stopped crying by now and were sleeping peacefully wrapped in his clothes and took them up, pushing himself off the ground and holding them comfortably in each arm.

"Andreas....." a desperate voice rang out, breaking the silence and Andreas turned to shoot a cold gaze at the woman who started all this.

"Repeatedly I have warned you. I told you time and time again that I did not want you, that I chose Carina. But you persisted. Because Carina begged me to, I showed you mercy. I did not kill you. I did not kill your pathetic excuse for a clan. My Carina was the kind one, the most merciful of us both and she...is dead. Today, I will not kill you. Death is too easy, but one day it will come for you and I will deliver it with a smile," Andreas' voice was deep and cold. He was the very picture of calm as he spoke these words to the woman shaking beneath his gaze and that terrified everyone in the room.

It was the first time they had ever heard him speak so many words at once.

Andreas swept his gaze over everyone in the room as he continued, "I am no longer the king. Consider this my resignation. You are no longer my people and the things you do are no longer my problem."

He glanced at his first disciple, and managed a small smile as he rushed over to him and gently took the twins. He knodded at the man and took out a small blue stone from his storage ring. He didn't spare another glance at his surroundings and disappeared with his disciple and children in the blink of an eye...

The silence in the hall persisted long after they left.....