Chapter 267: Hate Me?
Prince Marcus sat in the garden, relishing the rare moment of solitude. His mother was busy elsewhere for once, and her absence was a relief. It meant she wasn’t hovering over him, drilling instructions into his mind, criticising his posture, his words, his very existence.
"You have to be the Emperor," she always said. "You have to be perfect."
But no matter how hard Marcus tried, no matter how much effort he poured into his lessons, his swordsmanship, his studies of court politics, he was never enough. Not in her eyes. Not when his half-brother Cassian existed.
Marcus squeezed his hands into fists, his nails digging into his palms. His mother rarely mentioned Cassian by name, but the comparisons were always there.
Cassian was stronger. Cassian was smarter. Cassian was the perfect prince—except, he lacked one thing... The title, but with his achievements on the battlefield, it was only a matter of time.
Cassian was the threat.
At least, that was what his mother had drilled into him since childhood. "He’s your enemy, Marcus. He killed your brother. If he becomes Emperor, he’ll have us killed too."
Marcus had accepted those words for years. He had believed them, absorbed them as truth. But as he grew older, as he watched and listened more carefully, cracks had begun to form in the story.
His grandfather, his mother’s father, had whispered a different tale. That his mother had traded her firstborn son for a title. That she had sacrificed him so that he could be the Crown Prince. That she didn’t care for Marcus, she did not care for any of her kids, only the power he could bring her.
"You are nothing more than a tool to her," his grandfather had told him. "A tool for her to grab power. But me... I already have power, and unlike her I have enough power to put you on the throne, you only need to cooperate." He acted like he was genuine, and honest. He laid out the ’truth’ so was he not the most trustable ally? At least over his cruel mother?
Manipulation. That was all it was. He wasn’t foolish enough to think his grandfather truly cared for him either. The old man simply wanted a puppet he could control.