He drives his sword through Leeteuk's neck.

For a moment, Kyuhyun can do nothing but stare as the life spills out of Leeteuk. His senses are dull, but slowly they filter back into his consciousness—the dryness of his mouth, the weight of his sword in his hands, the sound of his own laboured breathing, and, eventually, the clamour of battle outside.

He swallows. He steps off the corpse of his once-revered mentor. He slides his sword out of his fallen enemy and lets it clatter to the floor, rips off his helmet, and forces himself to understand what this means.

He won.

He is the new king.

Kyuhyun lets out a sharp breath of air, then another, then another, and then he is laughing—laughing out of relief, laughing out all the pent-up adrenaline from the fight.

There are no words to describe the composite of emotions spreading from the top of his head to every fibre of his being, but one thing is for sure: he will remember this feeling for the rest of his mortal life. Nothing will ever come close to it.

His laughter echoing through the hall means he doesn't hear the sound of an arrow flying through the air until it implants itself into the small gap in his armour at his shoulder.

He's knocked to his knees, more out of astonishment than anything, and he wildly looks around for whoever could have shot him.

Standing on one of the atrium's many balconies is Eunhyuk, his crossbow already poised for a second shot.

'I'm never alone,' Leeteuk had said. Kyuhyun sees now that he should have taken that literally.

"Surrender now, or the next arrow will be more than a warning."

The front door bursts open then. Shindong and Kangin and about seven more soldiers spill into the entrance, battered and bruised but bellicose nevertheless.

Shindong apprises the scene fully first and holds onto Kangin's arm, just in time for the other to understand what he's seeing and attempt to charge forward in reckless fury. "Leeteuk!"

The footsoldiers move quickly to surround Kyuhyun, who is in such deep shock at the complete reversal of fortunes that he is still on his knees, hand curled around where arrow meets skin.

He turns his eyes back up to Eunhyuk, but the balcony is empty.

"Looking for something?" a voice says from behind.

Kyuhyun hastily makes to stand on his feet, and the circle of soldiers close in on him to hold him in place, presuming he is about to become belligerent.

"I don't understand." As a man who takes great pride in his intellect, it is a testament to how empty Kyuhyun feels that he can even admit that.

"You know how much Leeteuk abides by the rules. With no biological heirs to the throne, in the event he can no longer serve as king, I'm next in line," Eunhyuk informs him, speaking as if it were just another day at court.

"But I won." A reminder to himself as much as it is to the other.

Eunhyuk's faux-nonchalance hardens into impassivity then. His eyes do not waver from Kyuhyun's when he says, "You launched this war seeking revenge. You know it, I know it, Leeteuk knew it. He hoped—believed, even—you would see the error of your ways, but he knew he had to plan for otherwise. If you killed him, as you did," and here is where Eunhyuk's voice cracks, "it meant you were still too self-absorbed to properly serve as king. It was a fate worse than death to him."

Kangin and Shindong flank Eunhyuk now. In the eyes of his old friends, Kyuhyun sees rage, betrayal, and coldness. Even in the heat of battle, Leeteuk hadn't looked like that.

"The only commensurate punishment he could think of for your transgressions is to let you bask in victory just to rip it away, to let your sore pride fester with the realisation that it was all for naught, that nothing has been won. Do you understand, Kyuhyun?"

Kangin says something to the soldiers after Eunhyuk finishes, and he can feel himself move, but Kyuhyun is no longer present as he gets escorted to what will surely be lifelong imprisonment. His mind has already retreated into itself—replaying the conversation with Heechul, and the time in the study, and the war planning meetings, and the victory, and the defeat, and back again—all to the tune of Eunhyuk's final words echoing louder and louder in his brain.

"You were never going to be king."