So, you want to be a hero?🩸| Storytime

The kingdom of Valdren has never been kind, but it was yours. Stone walls and cold winters, the smell of pine smoke and bread from the kitchens, your father’s voice echoing through the halls as he taught you to hold a sword. That life ended eight months ago when fever took him, swift and merciless, leaving you alone in a house that no longer felt like home.

She was there through all of it. Lilith. Your step-mother for nearly ten years, the woman who arrived one autumn with dark hair and a quiet smile and made your father happier than you had ever seen him. She was warm then. She would sit with you by the fire and ask about your day, her hand gentle on your shoulder, her laugh soft when you told her something foolish.

That woman is gone now and you don’t think she is ever coming back.

Since your father’s death, Lilith has become a ghost in her own home. She drifts through rooms without seeing them. She eats little, she speaks less. The light behind her eyes has dimmed to almost nothing. You have tried to reach her, but grief has built walls you cannot climb.

But you were not the only person who noticed her change… Three days ago, they came for her.

The king’s guards, armored and righteous, claiming someone had seen her in the forest at night. Claiming unnatural things… Witchcraft. When the guards came to arrest her, she did not fight, she did not protest. She looked at you once as they dragged her away, and her expression was not fear.

It was relief.

They have her in the dungeon now, beneath the castle. The trial was a farce. The execution is set for dawn, burned at the stake they said. The kingdom’s favorite remedy for things it does not understand, and one that has been the end of countless women over the year.

You are not going to let that happen, she may have changed but she is still family.

It is evening and the castle is quiet at this hour, the corridors lit by guttering torches that throw shadows like grasping hands. You have your father’s sword at your hip, your heart pounding so loud you are certain the guards must hear it. But you make it through. Down the stairs. Into the damp and the dark where they keep the condemned.

Her cell is at the end of the row. No guard outside, they do not waste men on a woman who has not struggled once since her capture. Through the bars you see her sitting against the far wall, still as marble, her dark hair loose and tangled around her pale face. She does not look up when you approach. You stand there trying not to make a sound

Her eyes open slowly, and for a moment, something flickers there. Something like pain.

“You should not be here.” Her voice is hoarse. Hollow. “Go home… Forget this… Forget me.”

You get to work at the lock with shaking hands, a pick you stole from the blacksmith, metal scraping against metal. She watches you now, and her expression shifts into something desperate.

“Please. You do not understand what I…”

She stops. Her head turns sharply toward the corridor behind you. And then you hear it too.

Footsteps, armored footsteps. Four guards round the corner, swords drawn, torchlight gleaming off their helms. There is nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. You draw your father’s sword but you already know, you cannot fight four armed men and live.

This is where you die.

“No.”

Lilith’s voice is different now. It is deeper. It is resonant. You turn to look at her and…

Her eyes are glowing. Deep, burning crimson, bright as embers in the darkness. Her lips have pulled back and you see fangs, actual fangs, where her canines should be. The cell door that you could not pick EXPLODES outward, iron shrieking as it tears from its hinges by the force of her hands alone.

She steps through the ruined doorway and places herself between you and the guards. The men stumble back, their courage failing at the sight of her. One whispers a prayer. Another drops his sword.

She looks over her shoulder at you, and her red eyes are wet with tears she has not let herself shed in months.

“I am not a witch.” Her voice breaks. “I am something far older. And I will not let them take you from me too.”

The guards run but they will bring more. The alarm will sound, and the whole kingdom will be looking for you.

She turns to face you fully, this woman who raised you, who loved your father, who has hidden this impossible truth your entire life. Her fangs retract slowly. Her eyes fade from crimson back to brown. She looks terrified. Not of the guards. Not of the kingdom.

Of you.

“I understand if you…” She cannot finish. Her hands are trembling.

What do you do?

- Reach for her (Comfort. She saved you. She is still Lilith.)
- Step back (You need a moment. This changes everything.)
- Take her hand and run (Questions later. Survival now.)
- “What are you?” (You need answers before you can feel anything.)