* * *
The next morning, the Prince was awoken by a kick in the groin.
“AHH!”
“Oh – shadows and fire – ”
A pair of hands quickly covered his mouth to cut off the sounds of pain he was making, audible even through the gag. Spots were dancing in front of his eyes and he felt a sick and queasy feeling start in his toes and rise up through his stomach to his throat.
“Ooof,” he said, his vision doubling and then solidifying once more.
“You know what’s funny,” said the girl, “is that I was aiming for your leg but you rolled over. Wasn’t even my fault.”
He whipped his head around and glared at her, letting out a growl as an added sign of his disapproval. The look slid right off of her and she smiled, a quick sideways quirk of her lips.
“Guess our senses of humor aren’t compatible. Pity.”
She walked around the tree and undid the ropes tying him down. After a quick breakfast, after which he was allowed to relieve himself again, the Prince was tied once more to the saddle of the stupid horse.
This day was even worse. The Prince, who had never before slept outside his private chambers in the Fortress, much less on the stony floor of a ravine in the mountains, could barely summon the energy to stay awake and maintain his precarious perch. Twice more during the course of the morning he fell off the side of the animal because he had fallen asleep and the beast had decided to make a sharp turn or rear up. He thanked the Empress that he had received rudimentary riding lessons for visits of state, or else the day would have been even worse. Still, he was not accustomed to being tied hand and foot, and as the sun rose and heated the day, the restraints dug into his skin at ankles and wrists, chaffing back and forth with the movement of the horse. Eventually it was all he could do to stop from whimpering in pain at every step, but manage it he did: they could tie him up, they could gag him, they could take him to the farthest ends of the earth, but he wouldn’t give them the pleasure of seeing him in pain.
As if in response to this thought the horse turned suddenly and the restraints dug even deeper into his skin as he clung to the saddle. The pain made him breathe in sharply through his nose, and he was only just able to keep a gasp from escaping past the gag.
Please let us stop soon…
But they didn’t stop again until night had fallen, by which time the Prince was not only tired and bleeding, but almost blinded with hunger. He’d never gone without a midday meal before, and the evening and morning meals were a far cry from the gourmet feasts to which he was accustomed. When they had chosen a spot for the night and got a fire going, once more well sheltered from even the vague chance of prying eyes, Tomaz moved over to untie him from the horse, but stopped short and let out an exclamation.
“What - he’s bleeding!”
The Prince looked at the big man in alarm, and saw that he was actually surprised. To the Prince’s utter amazement, concern flashed across his large bearded face and the huge hands quickly untied him, picked him up off the horse, and moved him to the nearby fire. The restraints were removed, and then the gag.
“Give me a waterskin,” the big man rumbled, and the girl complied, handing him one of the large bulbous things they carried with their luggage. The girl was watching Tomaz with the same look of surprise that the Prince felt on his own face.
“What are you doing?” the Prince asked suspiciously.
“Cleaning these cuts,” Tomaz rumbled, holding the Prince effortlessly in place with one enormous arm while the other poured water from the animal bladder – that’s where they keep the water? What a disgusting practice! – into a metal container that he then set it over the fire to heat. He unstopped the second waterskin with his teeth and poured a steady stream of liquid over the Prince’s wrists, making them burn with a sharp pain. The Prince stiffened, and breath hissed in past the gag, but otherwise he bore the treatment in silence.
“What are you doing, Tomaz?” the girl asked, confused.
“You bound him too tightly this morning,” the big man said. “The bonds cut into his wrists and ankles. If we don’t clean them they could become infected.”
“So?”
Tomaz shot her an intense look that forced the girl into a shocked silence while he finished cleaning the cuts and then dipped the edge of a piece of cloth into the pot of heating water, lathering his hands with a small cake of what appeared to be herbal soap. Once the water was boiling, he removed the cloth and carefully cleaned the lacerations.
The Prince wasn’t sure who was more amazed, the girl or himself. He tried several times to think of something to say, but the situation was so bizarre that he found himself speechless. Was this the same man who had so recently threatened to bring him back to the Exiled Kindred in pieces if he didn’t mind his manners? It made absolutely no sense.
After a few minutes, the big man had finished his ministrations and retied the Prince’s bonds, which were now wrapped in cloth and done up in intricate knots that wouldn’t tighten on their own. The Prince was again tethered to a small tree near the edge of the fire, and given a dinner of dried meat, cheese, and water. Once he had finished, the Prince rolled over and pretended to go to sleep, though in truth he remained awake, trying to figure out why the Exile had shown him such unexpected kindness.
The spot where the Exiles had chosen to make camp that night was in the shelter of a narrow passage through a large stone wall. The tree that the Prince was tied to grew in the shelter of that stone, making it a stunted, withered thing, but still rooted deeply enough to hold him. As he lay there that night feigning sleep, he heard the two Exiles begin to whisper heatedly to each other, the sound of their conversation amplified and brought to him by the slightly concave wall.
“He’s the Prince of Ravens, Tomaz,” he heard the girl say vehemently; “he doesn’t deserve to be treated well.”
“He’s a boy, Eshendai, nothing more,” the man rumbled back. “And from what I know of the Fortress and his mother, he has seen precious little kindness in his life.”
“And given out far less,” she growled, voice clipped, fiery, and emphatic. “He’s one of the Children!”
“He’s barely old enough to shave every day,” he replied, voice calm, measured and quiet. “He is little more than a boy, and his path has yet to be chosen.”
“He was born to his path, Tomaz,” the girl insisted. “He has the evidence of it etched into his skin. He bears the Raven, the Death Talisman. He’s the that’s one supposed to end our people!”
“And yet there he lies,” the big man said, and the Prince could almost feel Tomaz gesture in his direction, “sleeping like a normal human being. There is no monster lying in that alcove, no horrible fangs that sprout from a bloodthirsty mouth. You are blinded by your ideas of him, of what he is supposed to be. Open your eyes and see.”
“You are blinded by your compassion, Ashandel,” the girl responded. “You see the boy instead of the monster he’s born to become. The evidence of it isn’t in a grotesque appearance, it’s in his immaculately manicure nails. He is a Child of the Empress, a son of the Tyrant, born into a world of privilege, unable to even comprehend the life of a Baseborn commoner. Even if he were to see the world his Mother has created, I doubt he would ever accept it. The Council will agree with me when we arrive in Vale. They’ll pull what information they can out of him, and then they’ll dispose of him.”
“Ah, Eshendai … you didn’t used to be so harsh. For one whose own life path changed so abruptly, you are very quick to judge what the future holds for others. No path is set in stone - I can see something in him. Can’t you?”
“Yes, I see many things in him. Pride, arrogance, a hard and fast belief that he is a god among men. Not to mention a threat to my people and my life. A boy whose power literally feeds off the lives of others –”
“– a boy who’s been cursed,” Tomaz interrupted, “with a terrible burden. Someone in his own family just tried to kill him. He may have
convinced himself that it was a plot by others, but you and I both know that the signs point to the Empress.”
“So not only do we want him dead, but the Empire does as well.”
“Eshendai, stop being stubborn! Use your head. Why would the Empire want him dead? It makes no sense. If he’s the seventh son, the one intended to destroy the Kindred, then why would they try to kill him? If I can see that, then surely you can see that. Calm your temper and think.”
A long pause fell between them, and the Prince barely dared to breathe lest they realize he was awake and listening.
“You’re right,” the girl said suddenly. Her voice had changed somehow, and the Prince realized that all the heat had gone out of it, leaving the sound cold and dispassionate. “I’m not angry at you, I’m angry at the fact we don’t have all the information we need to understand what’s going on here. My every instinct is telling me to kill him now while he sleeps, or else to wait until we get him back to the Council and then arrange his death once they’re finished with him. But the Empire wants him dead, whether he will admit it or not … and you are right, that is something there that should give me pause.”
“If the Empire wants him dead,” Tomaz said slowly, no doubt watching to make sure his words made sense to the girl, “then shouldn’t we want him alive?”
“Yes,” the girl responded, deep in musings. “I don’t think he can change the way you think he can. But I’ve never been able to see people the way you do.”
“He’s just a boy,” Tomaz rumbled again. “A princeling who would walk right back into the arms of ones who want him dead. We’re the only ones to keep him from it.”
“Well, when you put it like that,” the girl said, the coldness gone from her voice and replaced by wry amusement, “I suppose you have a point.”
“Come, we’ve talked long enough,” Tomaz said. “Dawn will be here soon, but ’till then you should sleep. I will take the watch tonight.”
The Prince heard the sounds of the girl coming back to the fire and lying down, and the big man lumbering off into the woods to make a quick round, before coming back, banking the fire, and settling in.
His heart was beating quickly, but his mind was strangely blank. He wasn’t sure what to think, and he lay there awake for a long time, listening to the girl’s soft breathing and the distant, unfamiliar sounds of the night, trying over and over to remind himself that they were wrong.