it was midnight, and the bright, gloriously large moon shone over the kingdom. the air was cool, and the chilling december breeze ran rampant throughout the grounds. it rattled mackenzie's bones, giving his legs hollow creaks and aches as he walked. the air was the same as it had always been, the same chill running through eldurian blood as the year before, however this time around, there was an eerie deadness to the land that filled mackenzie's ears and choked the blood flow in his feet.

he'd spent just over half of his lifespan in the darkest and emptiest sector of eldur, where the impoverished had little to no chance of surviving the deep froid. he had. he'd half starved and had stolen food from passerbys, and he'd bled onto the cool hay mattress he slept on, the wooden splinters tingling his feet and the cold in his heart absolutely and utterly numbing. year after year, when the cooler weather came so had the thievery, the sauntering between houses through the night to steal blankets from their equally as poor neighbours. it had been no way to live, but it had been a way to survive. survival was the only word than brought warmth to his small, filthy hands and the only word that brought food to his stomach. mackenzie never tried to remember his childhood, he never thought to ever even count that as being a child. he'd always hoped and prayed for a do-over, a second chance at childhood. a smooth, warm, and rounded life, as opposed to the jagged and pointy one he had been forced to live in the name of survival.
the first christmas spent in the guard's training quarters had been foreign. the young men - all much older than him - sharing stories of their own christmases, of turkey and prayer. mackenzie never understood prayer, but it didn't matter because the men in the cots around him did. they made him feel like much more than a heretic. he didn't even need to know the religious significance of christmas to feel holy that night. it was warm in there, and warm in his stomach after the three or four beers. that was the only night they'd been allowed to drink, during their training. so, naturally, they all got progressively drunker throughout the night. the next morning, half of them had to be woken up via a bucket of water to the head. this was also not a foreign concept to the young man.
it was no real unknown policy, to mackenzie. the training was tiring, not only physically but mentally. after his first few outbursts, he'd decided that his only means of survival in the camp was to cooperate. the hoodlum knife tricks got him nowhere, when the men around him wielded swords.

this year, the aura was different. this, now christmas night, was the feeling of fragile silence. mackenzie was angry, in fact. why was it so silent?! after all that degan had done for his kingdom, his death drew upon a silence from the people that even mackenzie could not stand. could they not at least have a riot?! could they not at least spit on the ground and set fire to the flags?! any noise, a scream, a shout, a whisper, anything would do, even a doe, trotting by, the leaves under her crackling like a fire - but yet there was none of it, complete silence filled the kingdom. no crying, no cheering. it was a colder silence than the air, a harsher slap than a hand. the only thing possibly giving him some body heat was the fur coat that he'd draped over degan's dead body, that was draped over mackenzie's living body. the man was far more enjoyable in life, than in death. at least he hadn't ever had to carry him around, like the current situation had him doing. this entire thing, the silent mocking air, the chill that blew silently through the naked trees. this was all just a merry fucking christmas, mackenzie. this had to be degan's christmas card. a dead man's one final little joke, beginning by addressing him as some stupid nickname that he'd never approved of to begin with. mack, mackie, pup, son, mackie. it would end with degan's signature. yours dearly, degan soleil westergaard.
he must have looked laughable; on one shoulder was a man, heavier in death than in life, a pile of bones and flesh. on the other, a shovel. it was a great balancing game, that mackenzie was playing. which one would fall first? if a dead body fell in the middle of a forest, would it make a sound? would the dropping of a king's corpse be enough to break the horrible silence in the land? would his fall break the curse? would a hundred women begin to weep, would a hundred men begin to cheer? neither happened, as degan's body was brought to the ground. sorry, your majesty, he muttered. for the rough landing.
the frost that hardened the ground made it difficult to get the shovel in. the thin later of snow laughed at the men, mocking mackenzie with the shovel and becoming one with the dead man's frigid body. in response, mackenzie only hit the ground even harder, begging it to give way to the shovel; he was begging for the ground to let up and to allow him to craft a hole, at least the size of the man's body. finally, with a grunt and a crunch and by the grace of god, the ground gave way to the metallic shovel. the clang of the shovel meeting with sedimentary ground rang throughout the silent land, yet once again, made no sound. what then began was the long process of digging a hole, a large and deep one, that would serve as a makeshift gravesite. it would be no gravesite fit for a king, but mackenzie could always try his best.

about halfway through his gravedigging, surrounded by a pile of frozen dirt, mackenzie smelt the faint smell of wine. it was definitively red, a smooth cabernet or a divine merlot. regardless, the putrid smell hit his nostrils and reminded him of degan's office; it wasn't that far away, yet mackenzie knew that he could never return. he would never sit in degan's office again.
they would never again have the privileged chance to congregate and share a glass of wine, going over the work that they had completed during the day. they would not get to look over a map of eldur and pinpoint what areas needed to be dealt with in order to lower the crime rate. they would not discuss suspects or criminals anymore, and mackenzie would never set foot in degan's office again.
why? well, for starters, degan was dead now. by the morning, the office would belong to somebody else. in fact, the moment he'd been killed, degan had no longer had ownership over the office. dead people owned nothing of the living.
in fact, the living owned the dead. the second degan had died, he had become property. he was no longer a person, in the eyes of the living. he was a body. he wasn't even his own body; now somebody had to be responsible for it. it. the pack of flesh and bones. it. not him, it. it was no longer a person.
the smell of the wine came and went with the cold wind, and gave mackenzie a feeling of warmth that partially overtook the feeling of sogginess. only partially, however, and the second the scent left, then came back the soggy. it wasn't even just his clothes, now. he never even thought to describe one's heart as soggy, but now, surrounded by piles upon piles of dirt, his feet below ground, it was all that he was able to come up with. his heart was soggy.

the moon began to fall below the castle now, as mackenzie finally finished gravedigging. as he stood below the ground, dirt in his hair, he paused and half-chuckled to himself. no wonder people didn't like dying. it must have been so humiliating for degan to watch this puny young man dig a little hole for him to sit and rot in forever. until his bones became fossils and his skin became the soil that deer trotted over a hundred times a day. he supposed that he would have to remember than, next time. would this ever stop him from killing people? surely not. it was, however, something humorous to remember, to justify the tears and the cries that people gave him right before it all ended. interesting.

the gravedigger's next challenge was getting the body into the hole, and that task proved almost harder than the first two. if only there was a handbook, for this. sadly, all mackenzie had was his better judgement, that told him to simply pick the man up, get into the hole yourself, and attempt to lower him down. so, he moved degan to lay by the side of his grave, and stepped down into it himself. with one foot in the grave, he glanced up into the sky and looked around, not even the birds began to chirp, even as the moon disappeared behind the castle and the sky began to morph into a magical shade of purple, mixed with a poisonous orange.
he grabbed degan by the shoulders and grunted as he began to try and pull the man down into the grave, simultaneously trying hard not to crush himself under the weight of the weightless king. after a ton of trial and error, finally the king was in his most inglorious resting place. mackenzie stood over him, a looming force, and pulled his hands like a puppet-master until his hands were clasped one over the other in his lap. the dirty man stepped back and pulled himself up out of the grave, wiping his cheek with the back of his hand. it only smudged the filth across his face.

the young man didn't know how funerals worked. mind you, he didn't go to the funerals of his victims. the most he did was say "we'll meet again" after killing them. even then, he'd mostly given up on that practice by now; mackenzie had long accepted that there was a special place for him to go, when he died.
no, he'd never attended a funeral, but regardless, he felt compelled to say something. anything. so he did, indeed, say a few words at degan westergaard's funeral.
"i've never had as many things to say as i do now, but i know that you'd be bored to suicide if i ever truly did say them all. i'll only say a few," he began, speaking into the cold, paling air and the brightening sky. "i don't think i ever admitted to myself how i felt about you until right now. you saved me, degan. i was the muddiest little kid on the streets. i picked the wrong man to rob, you could've killed me". he paused for a moment, blinking and trying to wipe some more dirt off of his face. this felt like a whole 180. a flip. a complete, utter flip. now he was the muddiest little man in the forest. talking to a dead body.
"i don't like to think too hard on it, but all throughout these last years, you were..." a word caught on his tongue and ripped a hole in it. "you were my mentor. you and elinor- i owe it all to you. there's nothing that i have that you didn't give me the opportunity for, and i don't think i appreciate it enough. well- i don't really like to," he added bluntly, itching his nose. "you gave me a second chance at life, and yet you somehow brought me closer to death. i owe it all to you, even all of the shit you've made me do. even all of the horrible stuff. you've blackened my soul, and to think all i still ever wanted was to please you". his words hung in the air as he fell silent, looking down at the deceased in his crib. he turned, like a zombie, and picked up the shovel.
"i still- i still stuck with you. you know that you're a very persuasive leader, degan? it made you a great king, man. i would've killed myself for you. even yesterday, i might've. a shitty man, a shitty father, but you were never a shitty king. i mean, eldur is glowing- look around," he spun on his heels and looked up to the sky, the shovel spinning with him. "it's never been more... beautiful. you did all of this," he bent down and scooped some dirt into the shovel. mackenzie had never spoken so much in his life.

"back to that thing, earlier. when i said you've been a great mentor. i should elaborate, yeah? you've been the best worst mentor in history. i fuckin' hate you, but i can just... i just could never admit to myself how much i loved you. i, seriously... i hope it makes you happy to finally hear that, degan". another pause, he bit his lip. "i love you, dad". dirt began to cover degan's body. there was nothing more therapeutic than admitting your secrets to a dead body, but the sun was beginning to peak through the trees. time to wrap it up. mackenzie began to fill in the grave, burying the king of eldur in dirt and worms. the first shovel-full of dirt that hit degan also hit mackenzie. his heart stung, and he almost doubled over as it shook his nerves and spun grief through his bowels. degan was dead. it was over, wasn't it?

the young man's fingers were purple when he finished, and he clasped his hands together, blowing hot, breathy air into them. "if only you'd taught me how to write better. or, well, at all," he chuckled. "then maybe i could've written you up a gravestone," he laughed and shook his head slightly. he stood there, silent for a few long pauses, his hands still positioned up to cup over his nose and mouth. he picked the shovel up again and prepared to leave, stopping about ten feet away from the grave and pausing for a moment. he shook his head at himself.

then, he resumed and began trudging back up to the castle. he needed a shower.

2428 words. unedited lmfao. hope you enjoyed.