Door of Bruises

<p><strong style=color: rgba(26 26 26 1)>Twelve years ago our fates were sealed with a kiss.</strong></p><p><br></p><p><span style=color: rgba(26 26 26 1)>We are all for better or worse doomed to love each other until death do us part. My heart belongs to Proserpina and St. Sebastian-even if he no longer wants it.  Even if she has left it behind to follow him. </span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> </span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(26 26 26 1)>Delphine's fled back home and Becket's holy calling is in peril. </span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> </span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(26 26 26 1)>And now only Rebecca and I remain at Thornchapel to face the unknown.</span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> </span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(26 26 26 1)>The door is open. The door that shouldn't exist; the door that people have died to close. I don't feel like the lord of the manor.  I don't feel like a king or a wild god. I am a friend and a boyfriend and a brother-and a failure at being all of these things. But the door doesn't care about my guilt. It only cares about the sacrifice I'll make to close it.</span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> </span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(26 26 26 1)>As the bruising dark of Samhain approaches so does the fate of our circle of Thornchapel and the village and the valley beyond it. And I must don the crown because one thing is still true even if I must face it alone.</span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> </span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(26 26 26 1)>Here at Thornchapel the kings must go to the door.</span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> </span></p><p><strong style=color: rgba(26 26 26 1)>Here at Thornchapel all kings must die.</strong></p>