The fortress was monumental, made of volcanic rock and jagged iron and built into a vast mountain. Every measurement, every angle was calculated to promote the King's ideology. The steel slats and bars may have seemed to be jutting out in random half-sawn directions, but if you could see the whole then you'd see the symmetry. It was a perfect expression of cosmic order, expressed in endless sevens.

It's a tough trip to remember, but bits and pieces come back. We were slaves, I think. We had been taken from a far-off land. The nobility looked down upon us with cruel eyes, but the King didn't care. He rewarded us, and so we were the instruments of his rule. When a village required the justice of the King, we would descend upon them with blood and iron. The villagers feared us, and that felt right to me. But when the horde came, with fire and burning and their cries of freedom, the villagers were still just as scared as they had been of us. That was not the fear of their master, I think, but the fear of anarchy. They didn't know which way to turn. In the end, most betrayed us. Many had had their daughters taken by our master. Old rites. Blood rites. Arcane rites.

But we stood upon the battlements, loyal to the last, our hearts bursting with happiness at the rightness of it all. I'm still not sure exactly what was going on- it was all so chaotic, and full of red smoke- but I could feel my host's bloodlust. We stood, and watched, and waited. The sound of rubble and explosions came from across the hill, and the last battle begun.

Then something strange happened. My host suddenly felt afraid, and he and I were somewhere else. The sky was not red but black. I was not a slave but part of a conscripted rabble. The peasants looked up at us. They were all starving. They held out their hands, begging, pleading, praying. The wind was their master, and it screamed at them. The horde was coming, but they, too, were starving.

Then the scene flickered back, and I was in my host again, under a scarlet sky. The King's voice raged. The rabble of his armies was fleeing to the gates, but they would not open. Our arrows, coated in flame and pitch, flew back again. But the horde was undaunted. In my mind I could see nothing but the fire, the fire of the king. I drew my sword. We all drew our swords. We all charged into the fray.

And then, as it were, the scene changed again. There were no battlements, only the dark sky and the wind and a more ragged and lonely sky. The peasants pleaded, the nomads laughed, cheered, wept. "The wind will rage no more!" they said.

The two scenes shifted in and out. A red fort bled into a black field. I have ruminated on it a long time, but I think they were the same battle, seen through two different eyes. Or at least the memories of two different battles. The whole thing felt strange; it was not like most of my trips. It was like a half-remembered cacophony, two ideas ripping at each other. There was a timeline showing what really happened, in that blackened wasteland. And there was one that had been made to be true, imposed throughout time on the truth.

The last thing I remember was being sliced by a nomad sword, of a frail urn being held high, of seven brides being ripped from a castle- or were they ripped from a field, taken as the spoils of war by some obscure tribe in some lost steppe? I remember the King screaming, writhing, thrashing as he was sealed.

And then I died, and woke up back at the ritual. For a second, I wondered if the others had just made up the King, and sent some image of him back to the past. But I don't think that was true. They lacked the power; and besides, it was never a total lie. There was something in that wicked wind that reminded me of some of the older rituals.

It was then that I decided to leave the Children. I went that night, without a word. They didn't stop me; probably figured it wasn't worth the effort. They were so certain in the success of their mission. But I wanted no part in that any more. The things I saw were based upon the law of blood, and I can only pray that they never come to pass.

DID YOU THINK THIS WAS A """BIT ACCOUNT"""??? WEAK, HOLLOW POSTERS. I AM A CHILD OF THE SCARLET KING AND I WILL FOREVER SERVE THEM.