PROLOGUE

The city was in flames. All around them, buildings crumbled into dust as their supports charred and fractured, and the great banners which once adorned the walls and towers of the grand metropolis were quickly reduced to nothing but smoke and ash.

The pink-haired woman saw none of this, her attention focused entirely on the body of the young woman in her lap. She brushed the teal hair from the other's face and felt a hollow space in her heart that nothing would ever occupy again. It had taken her long - too long - to realize her own feelings, unfamiliar as she was with them.

And now… her beloved was gone. She longed to weep, to cry aloud, to scream her pain and anger to the heavens. She did none of this, for she could not. Not now, while those who had brought death to her beloved still lived; perhaps not ever, not with a heart as empty as hers. She leaned down and placed a gentle kiss on one pale, cold cheek. When once more she did not feel the girl in her lap stir, she hugged her close, desperate to feel her warmth one last time.

Pink and teal hair intertwined and tangled together as the sound of metal-shod heels began to echo in the streets. The enemy would be here soon.

Silently, she rose, lifting the light burden of her beloved in her arms. She faced the oncoming army with hatred in her pale blue eyes, and sorrow in her heart.

Her lips parted, and she breathed the song that brought the world to its end.