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Once upon a time, there was a goddess who tried to destroy her other half.
She had been a lonely goddess at first because she was all alone with only the vast sky and the endless ocean for companionship.
The goddess cried for years and years, and her tears became the land, the plants and the trees and the animals. But still she was alone, because there was no one like her.
Then, slowly, the creatures of her world began to grow and change. They became clever, walking upright, and learned to speak the same language as the goddess. They loved their goddess dearly and so she granted them a name, calling them the Zunanma. The Zunanma, in turn, granted the goddess a title. Since her hair was as striking as the dawn’s first rosy light, they called her the Goddess of Dawn.
For a long, long time, everything was wonderful. The goddess and her children delighted in each other. But eventually, differences began to arise. The Zunanma evolved into various races, split themselves into various tribes, each thinking themselves superior to the others. Soon, one war broke out, and then another, and then another, vicious and bloody. Many perished.
Distraught by the wars waged between her beloved children, the goddess wept for decades, until the seas could no longer contain her tears. The tides rose, and the sky cracked with terrible thunder. Waves crashed unrelentingly along the shore, and rushing water swept through every city and town. Thousands died.
When the goddess realized what it was that she had done, she was horrified. And so she split herself in two. The part of her that had lost control, the part that had been angry and grieving and bored, would be excised from her body. All of her chaos, divorced from her being, so that she might never again make the same mistake. So that she might be perfect, a being of pure order.
But what to do with this second goddess, who was once the same goddess and also different? New and independent and remorseful, the second goddess begged the first not to kill her. They had been one once, after all, and neither could truly survive without the other.
She bargained. She pleaded. She threw tantrums like a child.
The first goddess would not be moved. Only when her most trusted advisor, the gentlest soul, offered a solution did the goddess relent.
It was agreed that the goddesses would sleep for a thousand years. If the thousand years passed without incident, all would be well.
But if war came, if it had engulfed the whole continent, the goddesses would wake. And their fury would be terrible.
Once upon a time, hundreds and hundreds of years later, a king and a princess welcomed a son.
When Soren was four years old, his mother was sent away.
Up until that point, he had lived with his mother in her rooms. His mother was beautiful, regal, and doting, and she never allowed anyone else to touch Soren. She tended to him herself.
“My little scion,” she would say. “You are precious beyond words. None of them are worth a single hair on your head.” She would kiss him on the top of his head. “You must always remember that the blood in your veins is the most ancient, the most powerful in all the world.”
Soren couldn’t say he understood it, being only a child.
(If he heard his mother weeping sometimes, late at night, she would always stop if he got out of bed and crawled into her lap. She would kiss him on both cheeks and call him her little prince and say that he was the greatest gift of all.)
One day, his father visited. Soren could only remember meeting his father a handful of times, but whenever he came, his mother would grow agitated and strange. His father was frightening, a mountain of a man who always arrived in a cape and armor. He was, his mother told him, a king, but none of the kings in Soren’s picture books looked like his father.
Because his father was a king, his visits were usually announced ahead of time. But on that day, Ashnard arrived unannounced, accompanied by only a small number of men. One of them, with brown hair and a scar above his brow, looked visibly uncomfortable, but he stood with the others, flanking the king.
“Wife,” Ashnard said, smiling at Almedha with teeth. He extended a hand. “I’ve come for the boy.”
Soren’s mother shoved him behind her. She made a noise low in her throat, almost a growl.
Ashnard threw his head back laughing.
“Do you think you frighten me, Almedha?” he asked. “The way you are now?”
A soldier came up on his mother’s side, reaching out as if to take him, and Almedha lashed out. She clawed the man across the face, then grabbed his arm. There was a sickening pop and Soren flinched as the man screamed.
Almedha shoved him to the ground and immediately spun around, sinking to her knees and pulling Soren into her arms.
“Don’t look, my treasure,” she said, cupping his face in her hands. “Cover your ears and it will all be over soon.”
Ashnard made a disparaging noise.
“Look at you,” he said. “The boy is of Daein, and you treat him like some soft little thing.”
Frightened, Soren clutched handfuls of his mother’s dress. Her hand slid through his hair as she clutched him closer. Her fingers were trembling.
“When I was his age,” Ashnard said, striding forward, “I was already dreaming of battle. I dreamed of bloody conquest, of power. I was not sheltered and spoiled, made soft by my parents. I knew what was expected of me and I relished it.”
“I’ll kill you,” Almedha promised. She held Soren close to her. “I’ll rip you apart with teeth and claws! I’ll tear your head off in front of all your men!”
Ashnard threw his head back and laughed. The sound sent shivers up Soren’s spine, made him clutch his mother’s skirts tighter. He leaned over them, seemingly towering, his face split in a wicked grin.
“You’re welcome to try,” he said. “You know my ideal world, wife. If you can free my head from my shoulders, you’re welcome to it.” His gaze landed on Soren. “But you can’t – the boy made you weak. He stole your strength. You’re worth less than nothing to me now.”
“You already took what you wanted!” Almedha snarled. “Leave me my son!”
“He is my son,” Ashnard said. “It’s Daein blood that runs through his veins, and Daein’s throne he is heir to. His life belongs to me.”
“You took my brother!” Almedha said. “Let me have my son!”
“I’ve been generous, haven’t I, wife?” Ashnard said. “I let you have him these few years. You should be thankful to me.”
Almedha hissed at him from between her clenched teeth.
Ashnard leaned in close. Up close, his eyes were cold and hard, even though he wore a broad smile.
“You might kill one of my men, wife,” he said. “Perhaps two, or ten. But will you be able to kill me?”
Soren’s mother was silent.
“I’ll kill the boy before I let you keep him,” he said. “You know I’ll do it, wife. Then neither of us will have him.”
Soren shrank back against his mother, biting back a sob. Her grip was painfully tight now, but he didn’t want her to let go of him.
“Spiteful monster,” Almedha spit out. “He’s your child!”
“You have a minute, wife,” Ashnard said. “Either you give me the boy, or I wring his neck in front of you.” He looked at Soren, his eyes flashing as he grinned. “Choose wisely.”
He straightened up and walked back to his men.
Soren’s mother was trembling all over as she held him closely. When she pulled back, she cupped her hands to his face.
“Listen to me, my treasure,” she said. “You must be brave for your mother.”
Her voice was shaking. There were tears streaking down her cheeks. Her thumb ran gently over Soren’s cheek, catching his own tears.
“You must always remember that I love you,” she said. “I love you more than anything in the world. One day we will be together again.”
Soren grabbed a handful of her dress, shaking his head desperately. He was too frightened to speak, tears spilling over his cheeks. Almedha pulled him into her arms again, hushing as she smoothed his hair and rubbed his back.
“Precious boy,” she said. “Sweet, lovely boy. The royal blood of two nations runs through your veins. Always remember that.”
She pulled back and cupped his face between her hands again. She pressed a kiss to the mark on his forehead. Then she looked up at Ashnard.
“I’ll see you torn to shreds for this,” she said. “Maybe not today, husband, and maybe not tomorrow. But when the day comes, know that you did it to yourself the day you took my son from me.”
Ashnard threw his head back laughing. He strode back over and leaned down, grabbing Soren by the arm. He yelped in pain and Almedha hissed. Her hand shot out, slapping Ashnard across the face. That only seemed to make him laugh harder as he grabbed her by the wrist. His mother grit her teeth but she did not cry out.
Soren whimpered in fear, a fresh round of tears blurring his vision. It was better that way, though. He couldn’t see his father as clearly when he was weeping.
“Are you crying, boy?” Ashnard said. “Daein’s heir does not mewl like an infant. Dry your tears.”
His hand tightened around Soren’s arm and Soren swallowed shakily. He understood the threat for what it was and he hastily scrubbed at his face.
“There now,” Ashnard said. “This is a happy day, boy. You are coming to live with your father, after all.”
He lifted Soren up into his arms, away from his mother. She made an anguished noise and reared up, grabbing onto Ashnard, only for him to kick her away. She went sprawling to the ground, a whirl of long skirts and dark hair, and Soren cried out, reaching for her.
“I won’t let you make him soft,” Ashnard said.
His father’s armor was cold and hard. His grip was too tight.
Soren was handed over to a man he would later come to know was General Bryce. His face was grim and solemn, but he held Soren firmly, following after his father as he left. Soren could see his mother over Bryce’s shoulder, sitting on the floor and weeping, her hand outstretched to him.
When his father glanced back at her, he began to laugh.
This was Soren’s first impression of his father. Cruelty for cruelty’s sake.
When he was six, Soren attempted to run away from the castle.
He hadn’t expected it to be difficult. He had one nursemaid who did not care for him, and often bemoaned having to take care of such a cursed little thing, and only a few guards posted outside the door. His nursemaid would sneak out at night to be with one of them, as if Soren did not lie awake and listen to her footsteps. He was quick and clever, small enough to slip by unnoticed, and most importantly, his father the king did not care for him.
He thought he would find his mother. He would find her, and they would go somewhere far away and it would be like it had been before, when he lived with her in the tower rooms.
Soren barely even made it to the grand hall. When his father’s men captured him, they did it roughly. He was brought to the throne room and thrown at his father’s feet.
The stone floor was cold and hard, but Soren did not dare cry out. This close, he could feel the hot breath of his father’s mount, the wyvern Rajaion.
He had told himself before he ran that he would not be afraid, even if he was caught. But now he could see Rajaion’s long sharp teeth. Now he was close enough for his father to strike.
“Well, well,” his father said after a long moment. “Quite a daring escape.”
“Your Majesty, he’s only a child,” Sir Gawain said. “My own son –"
Ashnard held up a hand.
“Your son and my son are not of the same make, Gawain,” he said. “Mine is a little beast, just like his mother. He offers me nothing but trouble. Do you think I have time to humor you, boy?”
Soren looked up and found he couldn’t answer. He didn’t know what to say. His father had always frightened him. He seemed to Soren impossibly large, and he always wore a smile that showed all of his teeth. Soren saw nothing of himself in him, felt no spark of familiarity.
He loathed him, too, for taking him away from his mother.
“How should I punish this transgression?” Ashnard wondered. He tipped his head to the side, his eyes glimmering. “Gawain favors leniency for the child. Bryce, what of you?”
General Bryce was unwaveringly loyal to the Daein royal family. Even now, he stared ahead, his posture tall and proud.
“I agree with Your Majesty’s judgment,” he said. “After all, a father knows best his own son.”
Ashnard threw his head back laughing. The sound seemed to startle Rajaion, who snarled and thrashed, his huge wings unfurling. Ashnard yanked on the gold chain connected to the collar around his mount’s neck, bringing his huge head down.
“Do you have an opinion?” he sneered at the wyvern.
Rajaion tossed his head, hackles raised. Ashnard glanced back at Soren.
“You’re not even a mouthful for him,” he said, and a chill ran up Soren’s spine.
Surely, he thought, even his father couldn’t be so cruel. He had expected to be beaten, perhaps even tossed in a dungeon until his father grew bored with the idea. Some small part of him, though, had hoped his father would be annoyed enough to return him to his mother.
“What will your mother do when she finds out what’s become of you?” Ashnard asked, stroking his chin. “Maybe it will finally drive her mad.”
“Your Majesty!” Gawain barked. “Please, be reasonable!”
Ashnard ignored him.
“Rajaion,” he said. “Strike.”
Soren threw his arms over his head and didn’t make a sound. It would be quick, he knew, from the time he had been dragged into the throne room and forced to watch as his father executed a traitor. It would be quick, but it would be painful. Rajaion’s teeth were as long as knives.
But the expected pain never came. Instead, there was hot breath ruffling Soren’s hair, and a low rumbling sound, like the purring of a cat but a hundred times louder.
Slowly, Soren raised his head. Rajaion’s huge head was bowed, his crimson eyes staring directly at Soren. He dipped his head and pressed his muzzle to Soren’s face in a caress.
Soren’s hands shook as he raised them and placed them gently on Rajaion’s face.
All was silent in the throne room except for Rajaion’s purring. His father’s Riders looked from each other, to Soren, and back to the king. Soren did not know what the silence meant. He clung to Rajaion’s neck because he had nothing else to cling to.
Rajaion made a low, comforting noise, bringing one wing up to hide Soren from view.
On the throne, Ashnard raised his eyebrows. He leaned forward, something glimmering in his eyes.
“Well, well, boy,” he said. “You might be useful after all.”
Soren was seven years old the first time someone tried to assassinate him.
His previous nurse had been dismissed after his escape attempt. The guards outside the door whispered that she had been imprisoned in the dungeons, to be fed to Ashnard’s wyvern at his amusement. They said that if the prince escaped again, the same fate would befall them.
His new nurse was a strange woman, tall and drawn. The guards whispered that she’d used to be a maid for the wife of one of the king’s brothers, before they died during the plague.
It was strange for Soren to think about ever having an uncle. Once, his father had brought him into a long hall of the castle he’d never been in before, lined with rows and rows of portraits.
“My father,” he said, bringing him before one depicting an old man with grey hair and a deeply tired face. Ashnard’s hand squeezed Soren’s shoulder too tight. “Your grandsire.”
He led him to the next one.
“My eldest brother,” he said. There was a low, amused rumble deep in his chest as he spoke.
The man in this portrait looked something like Soren’s father, if Soren tilted his head and squinted. The same shape of his face, the same dark blue hair. But there was something kind in his eyes, and his lips were lifted slightly.
He looked kind, Soren realized. It was an abrupt, arresting realization – that someone with his father’s face could look kind.
They continued down the long hall. One brother after another, one sister after another, wives and husbands and children. Cousins, Soren thought. These would have been his cousins. It was strange to think of it that way – Soren had never had playmates, let alone ones his own age. The only relation he had now was his father, and even at seven Soren was beginning to suspect that hardly counted.
“What happened to them?” Soren asked.
“They’re all dead now,” Ashnard said. There was no sadness in his voice. Rather there was a heavy curl of satisfaction, as if his father was glad that his family was all gone.
(Years later, Soren would realize just how far down the line of succession his father had been, and that all of those brothers and sisters in the portraits had stood between him and the throne.)
Aside from that day, though, Soren barely saw his father. He had many duties to attend to, his royal tutor said, as if Soren could possibly miss his father. He was glad that King Daein had no time for children.
His old nurse was dismissed after she failed to safeguard him on the night he attempted to run away. His new nurse was a much older woman, stern-faced and grey-haired. She had impeccable posture and always wore black. She never smiled.
Soren heard the maids whisper about her. In her younger days she had served the former queen of Daein, his grandfather’s favorite wife. They said she had loved her mistress very much. When she had died in the plague that swept through the capital the year of Soren’s birth, his new nurse mourned. They said she’d never been the same after her mistress died.
They said she had a deep loyalty to the old royal family. They said she cared little for Ashnard.
It didn’t matter, Soren supposed. His old nurse had ignored him. His new nurse would most likely do the same. None of them were his mother. None of them treated him as anything other than a nuisance, a little mouse they had to tolerate.
There was no love. No affection. Only a sense of duty that they didn’t really possess.
What was wrong with him, Soren often wondered, that aside from his mother, the only creature who had ever shown him love was a vicious, half-mad wyvern?
That evening was the same as all the others. His nurse sat by the fire, attending to her needlework, and Soren read quietly. He’d learned early and quick as a child, delighting his mother who praised him to no end. Even now, separated from her, he could recall the warmth of her voice and her loving words whenever he held a book in his hands.
When his nurse spoke, it was so quiet he almost didn’t hear her.
“Little beast,” his nurse murmured.
Soren flinched, and she looked up, her eyes cold. Then she looked back down at her needlework.
“To bed with you,” she said, louder.
All of the furniture in Soren’s rooms was made of dark wood, intricately carved with dragon heads and wings. His father’s symbols, he’d been told. The great King Daein, fierce as a dragon. It comforted Soren, though, because it reminded him of Rajaion.
It took him a long time to fall asleep, his nurse’s words ringing in his ears. Little beast. When he woke again, the fire had dwindled to just embers, and at first he wasn’t sure what had woken him. Then he heard it.
There were voices whispering nearby. One of the voices belonged to his nurse. He didn’t recognize the other one.
He sat up slowly, trying to pick out individual words. There was a prickling feeling at the back of his neck and the pit of his stomach, a sensation like something bad was about to happen.
“You have good instincts, my darling,” his mother had said once. “You must always listen to them.”
Soren sprang from the bed. He made it only a few steps before a shadow appeared in the doorway. A tall man stood there, his face in shadow, but the robes and the staff he held identified him as a member of the clergy. Soren’s breath caught; there were only a few priests in the castle. His father cared little for religion.
His nurse appeared behind the priest’s shoulder.
“Do it!” she hissed. “Do it now!”
The priest raised his staff.
At first, Soren didn’t know what had happened. There was a strange, tightening feeling in his throat, a tingling at the back of it. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out.
He’d read about different types of staves in an old book, once. There were staves that could heal and ones that could put a person to sleep. Staves that could repair weapons and ones that cured poison.
Then there were staves that rendered a target silenced, voiceless. They were meant to prevent mages from using magic by severing the way they commanded spirits.
Soren gasped soundlessly, his hands coming up to his throat. He stared up into the face of his nurse, took in the mad gleam in her eye.
“Grab him!” she hissed.
The priest threw the staff aside and gripped Soren’s shoulders instead, holding him down even as he thrashed and kicked. The priest’s grip was so tight, and Soren was small, even for his age. He had no hope of throwing him off. He tried to scream again, but it was pointless.
His nurse’s face appeared before him. Her lips were drawn back, her eyes alight.
“Abomination!” his nurse cursed. “Monster! You’re nothing human at all! Why should they all lie dead for the sake of your cursed birth?”
Soren couldn’t speak. He couldn’t scream.
Even if he could, he thought, ice in his veins as he clutched at his throat, would anyone come for him?
“Do it quickly,” his nurse hissed.
The priest let go of one of his shoulders. Something flashed in the dim light.
It was a knife.
Fear seized at Soren as he twisted and kicked, trying to claw at the priest, to do anything to defend himself, but it was useless. The priest held him down with a hand at the center of his chest and with the other he raised the knife.
“Goddess forgive me,” he said.
“The goddess will thank you,” his nurse whispered. “He’s a monster. A thing that should have never been born. You know this even better than I do.”
Soren squeezed his eyes shut, his breathing coming in fast, hard pants.
Then there was a sound, the loud bang of a door being smashed down, and his nurse was screaming at the priest to do it, to finish the job, but the priest was shouting, too, and his hand suddenly left Soren’s chest.
Soren rolled to the side, coughing soundlessly. His loose hair fell over his face, half-obstructing his vision. All he saw was the large man rip his nurse away from him, tossing her to the floor. She made a noise and then fell silent. The priest made a move as if to run, but the man was faster. He blocked his path, knocking the priest to the ground.
The last dim glow of the fire fell across the big man’s face and Soren’s breath caught. It was General Gawain.
He straightened up, larger than life in Soren’s room, and looked down at him.
“Prince Soren,” he said. He extended his big hand. “Are you all right?”
Soren opened his mouth, but still no sound came out. He found himself shaking his head desperately, fingers grasping at his own throat. Tears filled his eyes. His shoulders ached where he’d been held down against the bed.
The knife the priest had held was still lying on the floor. Gawain’s gaze fell on it and his mouth tightened.
“Did they hurt you?” he asked, his voice sharp.
He reached out as if to check and Soren shrank back, away from his touch. He opened his mouth but still no sound came out.
“Prince Soren?” Gawain asked.
Slowly, Soren pointed at the priest’s fallen staff. Gawain raised his eyebrows but slowly something like understanding dawned over his face.
“Ah,” he said.
Soren raised his hand to his throat, shaking his head. Tears threatened to spill over his lashes, but he had learned when he’d come to his father’s castle that crying was not something boys did in Daein. Crying was a weakness Soren could not afford.
“It’s temporary,” Gawain promised. “You’ll be all right soon.”
Suddenly there was another noise, a creak across the floor. Gawain spun around, his sword out, as Soren shrank further back on the bed. But it was only a boy. He looked about Soren’s age, with blue hair and blue eyes.
“Dad,” he said, breathlessly. “Is that a body?”
“Ike!” Gawain barked. “Go back to our rooms and stay with your mother!”
But something had happened when Ike and Soren locked eyes. Soren couldn’t explain it – he wouldn’t have been able to voice it even if he could speak. It felt heavy, and electric, and different than anything Soren had ever known.
“Is that the prince?” Ike asked. His blue eyes were wide in his face.
“Ike –” Gawain started, but Ike darted forward before his father could finish speaking.
“Are you okay?” he asked Soren. His voice was soft and gentle, and Soren felt mesmerized by it. He wanted so badly to be able to speak, to be able to say something, anything to the boy in front of him.
“Ike, don’t crowd him,” Gawain barked, but Ike wasn’t listening. Even for Soren, Gawain’s words felt strangely far away.
When Ike reached out a hand, Soren grasped desperately at his fingers. When their hands touched, a smile bloomed on Ike’s face, big and bright.
Soren was sure he had never seen anything so beautiful.
He clung to Ike’s hand and Ike squeezed his back. Soren wanted to say something, anything to him, but when he opened his mouth, still no sound came out. His hands reached for his throat. Realization dawned on Ike’s face.
“You can’t speak,” Ike said.
Soren shook his head desperately.
“Ike,” Gawain started, only to suddenly turn. There was noise from the hall, the sound of footsteps. They were heavy and unhurried, and they stopped just outside the door.
His father was standing there.
Quickly, Soren tugged his and Ike’s joined hands out of sight, where his father couldn’t see. Ike raised his eyebrows but he didn’t say anything. He didn’t let go.
“Your Majesty,” Gawain said, quickly dropping to one knee.
“What happened, Gawain?” Ashnard asked, his sharp eyes scanning the room. He looked at the bodies, the knife, the staff on the floor. He did not look at Soren.
“I encountered the priest in the halls some time ago,” Gawain said. “I thought his behavior was odd, so I followed him. He and the woman planned to kill the prince.”
“Is that so?” Ashnard asked. He nudged the priest’s body with his boot.
“I killed the assailant,” Gawain said. “The woman is only unconscious. She should be questioned – at Your Majesty’s leisure.”
He added the last part after a moment, as if he had forgotten that everything was done at Ashnard’s leisure. But then, Soren knew, Gawain had served the old king before Ashnard. Perhaps he was still loyal to him, the way his nursemaid was loyal to the old queen.
His father certainly gave no one any reason to love him.
“The boy is shaken and silenced, but unharmed,” Gawain said. “Should I send for a healer?”
Ashnard made a dismissive noise low in his throat.
“A silence spell will wear off by dawn,” he said. He finally deigned to glance at Soren. “There’s no point in wasting a healer’s time. Let this be a lesson to the boy.”
He was smirking.
Part of Soren wanted to lower his head or look away from his father’s burning gaze. It was easier not to have to look at him. But that was what his father expected him to do and so Soren, trembling all over, squeezed Ike’s hand tightly where their hands were still hidden, and held his father’s gaze.
Ashnard’s grin widened, all teeth.
“Guards,” he called. “Remove the body. Take the woman to the dungeons.”
There was a flurry of activity as the guards did what was asked of them. They bowed to Ashnard as they left.
“Fools,” Ashnard snorted, watching them go. “Gawain, escort them. Don’t let them leave the dungeons after they lock up the woman.”
“Your Majesty?” Gawain said.
“To have guards so useless that one of my generals had to stop an assassination attempt against a child instead of them,” Ashnard said, snorting. He bent down and picked up the knife, testing its edge with a finger. “Pathetic weaklings. I’ll throw them in the ring tomorrow so they can tear each other apart. As least they’ll be good for a show then.”
A look of deep unhappiness crossed Gawain’s face, but it was there and gone in an instant. He bowed again.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” he said. “If that’s your decision.”
Ashnard looked at him, his eyebrows raised, and Gawain glanced away.
“The boy is my son,” Ashnard said. He looked at Soren, his eyes glimmering. “I’m the only one who gets to decide if he lives.”
He turned and left without another word. Soren, still unable to speak, felt like he was choking on the words that wouldn’t come. He hadn’t expected any kind of comfort from his father, but to barely even be looked at – it made Soren feel as if he were nothing.
He startled when someone touched him, an arm wrapping around his shoulders, and looked up into Ike’s concerned face.
Gawain was watching them, his brow knit in concern.
“Ike,” he finally said. “I need to speak with the king. You stay with the prince, so he won’t be alone. Can you do that for me?”
Ike nodded eagerly.
“I’ll have my men posted outside the door,” Gawain said. “If anything happens, go to one of them.”
With one more long look at their joined hands, Gawain swept from the room.
For a long moment, everything was silent. It was almost oppressive, weighing down on Soren, pressing heavily upon him. Ike’s hand was his only anchor. Without it, he feared he would have disappeared.
“Are you okay?” Ike asked. “Were you scared?”
Soren wanted very badly to answer Gawain’s son. After a moment, he nodded his head.
Gently, Ike wrapped his arms around him. Soren froze. Ike huffed a little, maneuvering Soren closer, settling Soren’s head underneath his chin.
No one had hugged him since he’d last seen his mother.
“When I’m scared, my mother does this,” Ike said, and he slowly began to hum. His voice was offkey and faltering, but he kept humming, his arms wrapped around Soren. Gently, he rubbed a hand up and down his back. “Then I’m not so scared anymore. Is it working?”
Soren couldn’t answer, but it didn’t matter. He felt, for the first time in a long time, warm. He set his chin on Ike’s shoulder and sighed, shaky. He was trembling all over and he could still feel his nurse’s hand around his neck, see the blade glinting in the moonlight.
Abomination, she’d said.
“It’s okay,” Ike whispered. “I’ll stay with you. You don’t have to be scared or lonely.”
For the first time in a long time, Soren believed it.
—
The castle felt less cold after that. The atmosphere was less oppressive.
Ike was true to his word. He stayed with Soren until his father came back. He would have stayed longer, Soren thought, but his father led him away as new guards took their place at Soren’s guard and a frightened, mousey looking woman was forced through the door and introduced as a temporary nurse, until someone more suitable could be found.
Part of Soren was convinced that he wouldn’t see Ike again. But Ike came back the next day, and then the next. He snuck into Soren’s rooms on his own, nimbly evading the guards.
His father would have to collect him then, always looking harried and apologizing to Soren for his son’s impudence.
“No,” Soren finally said one day. He pulled himself up, his shoulders back and head held high, the way his mother had taught him a little prince must sit. “It’s no imposition. Ike is always welcome in my rooms.”
Ike, held by his father by the scruff, gave Soren a conspiratorial grin. Like it was a secret that they were both in on, something private just for them.
“We’re friends,” Ike said, looking up at his father. Gawain heaved a very long sigh. “Soren’s my friend.”
“We’re going to have some serious discussions about how to address royalty,” Gawain said under his breath.
Then he turned to Soren.
“Your Highness,” he said to Soren, bowing his head in deference. “If he isn’t bothering you, then please excuse me. I rudely assumed.”
“There’s no harm done,” Soren said, primly folding his hands in his lap. “Ike is always welcome.”
After they left for the day, Soren ducked his head and pressed a trembling hand to his mouth. His friend. Ike had called him his friend.
Now there wasn’t only Rajaion. Now there was Ike. His first and only human friend.
After that, Ike visited often, this time often accompanied by his mother, a kind looking woman named Elena who had blue eyes and hair just like her son. Ike clearly adored her, and her kind demeanor made something in Soren ache. He missed his own mother badly.
But Elena was always kind to him, always courteous and as doting as she could be to the prince of her country. Soren was glad that Ike had a mother like her. In the summer, when Elena took Ike and his sister Mist back to their family summer home, Soren missed him fiercely. He was shocked when the first letter arrived. It was short and to the point, written in an ungainly scrawl, and signed with Ike’s name.
Soren kept it under his pillow, along with all the letters that followed.
The years passed like that. One after the other after the other. Eventually Ike entered Daein’s military, training hard every day. He rose quickly, his strength and talent quickly apparent to everyone around him.
King Ashnard had changed the rules in Daein that prevented any mobility between its strict social classes, allowing anyone from any class to join the army and rise through the ranks. But Daein was an old country, and the old ways were deeply ingrained in many still. Ike’s family background certainly didn’t hurt his position.
Soren had been worried at first. Ike’s training schedule kept him busy, his talent and parentage quickly netting him attention. He moved into the barracks along with the rest of the recruits and Soren fretted about him meeting other young soldiers, people who had much more in common with Ike than Daein’s prince.
Ike would find other friends and forget about Soren.
Then, one night, when Soren was readying himself for bed, there was a thump from outside his window, and then an insistent knock. Soren rushed to the window and threw back his curtains only to see Ike standing on his balcony, snow in his hair.
Soren quickly forced the window open.
“What are you doing out here?” he demanded as Ike slipped into his room. He shook his hair out, sending Soren a quick grin. Soren leaned around him, eyes wide as he took in the balcony. “How did you even get up here?”
“Climbed,” Ike said simply. His teeth were chattering. He crossed the room in a few long strides, losing his cape and holding his hands out by the fireplace.
“You climbed up half the castle?” Soren said, staring at him with wide eyes. When Ike just shrugged, Soren desperately asked, “Why?”
Ike paused, turning towards him. The light of the flames caught on the planes of his face and made his blue eyes look like they were blazing.
“Because I wanted to see you,” Ike said.
Ike seemed to take it as something of a challenge after that. He seemed to take it as a challenge to find out how many different ways he could slip into Soren’s rooms without anyone seeing. (Soren had insisted firmly he not climb up the castle walls.)
He found many different ways over the years, undeterred even when Soren warned him it was dangerous, that he might be caught and punished.
“I want to see you,” Ike always said. “You’re my friend.”
It was very hard for Soren to argue with him when he said things like that.
The years passed like that, Ike training and growing stronger during the day and secretly visiting Soren at night when he could get away from the barracks. Or mostly secretly, anyway. Gawain was starting to go grey at the temples and often blamed his son for it, though Soren didn’t doubt his father’s mounting ambitions played a part.
When Ike was seventeen, an older soldier insulted Soren in his father’s throne room. Soren couldn’t say what the reason was. Perhaps he had simply been standing too close. Perhaps it was a poor attempt to curry favor with his father, who made no effort to hide his disdain for his own son. Perhaps the soldier simply hated him.
The slight wasn’t anything special. Certainly nothing that would have merited even a flinch from Soren. Rumors, after all, had dogged him since the day of his birth, and, slight of stature as he was, he was hardly what Daein considered the pinnacle of strength. In a country that valued warriors above all else, Soren could only be seen as, at best, a disappointment.
At worst, he was viewed as something else entirely.
Twelve years since his nurse had tried to kill him and sometimes he could still hear the hatred in her voice. Abomination. Monster. You’re nothing human at all.
Let them all hate him. Let them abhor and disdain him. He had Ike now, and he needed no one else. So Soren ignored it.
Unfortunately, Ike had overheard.
Ike suffered insults to Soren with far less grace than Soren himself. At seventeen, he was strong-willed and hot tempered, something that gave his father no end of grief. Soren had watched throughout the years as grey threaded Gawain’s hair and the lines on his forehead deepened.
He went after the older soldier who had snidely spoken about Soren, both physically and verbally, until two other soldiers had to pull him off. Soren wanted to go to him, to put his hands on his chest and calm him, but that would only make things worse. Instead he could only watch as Ike’s chest heaved, his eyes blazing.
“Upstart whelp!” the soldier snarled, blood on his face from where Ike had hit him. “You want to fight me? Do it properly!”
“Deal,” Ike snapped.
It might have ended there. Ike was General Gawain’s son, after all, and General Gawain was a legend. Daein men were proud, but not all of them were foolish.
It might have ended there, except that Soren’s father had seen everything.
“A duel?” he said, his wide grin splitting his face. He barked a wild laugh. “For my beast of a son, boy?”
He leaned forward, locking gazes with Ike. Ike, to Soren’s terror, didn’t lower his gaze.
“For the prince,” he said, and his voice bordered on a correction. Soren watched as a muscle in Gawain’s jaw jumped. “Yes.”
Ashnard’s grin, impossibly, widened.
“This is ridiculous,” Soren said, getting in front of Ike as soon as they were in the hall. “You’ll call it off, immediately.”
Ike snorted, crossing his arms. He was still fuming.
“Ike!” Soren snapped. “Call it off at once.”
Ike shrugged.
“It’s not really up to me, is it?” he said, and Soren’s stomach sank.
“Ike,” he said, reaching out to grab him by the wrist. “Please. Ask my father for forgiveness. He might – maybe he’ll be lenient, considering you’re General Gawain’s son.”
It was pointless, though, and they both knew it. Practically, Ike couldn’t call it off. Soren’s father loved no entertainment so much as watching strong men face off against each other in the arena. Still, though, Soren thought that he couldn’t bear it, the thought of Ike in the arena. He’d seen before what those matches were like.
“I’m going to win,” Ike said, as if it was as simple as that.
He put his hand over Soren’s and gently squeezed before he peeled Soren’s fingers from his wrist. He gave him a smile, a barely there quirk of his lips, before he turned and left. Soren watched him go, his cape swirling at his ankles and his stride long and confident.
He had no choice. He had to go to his father himself.
“Gawain’s son made his decision,” Ashnard said when Soren went before his throne.
“He’s a boy!” Soren said. “He was being impulsive. Your Majesty, please have mercy.”
“This is how boys grow into men,” Ashnard replied. His eyes glimmered. “That’s something my own weakling son doesn’t seem to understand.”
Soren clenched his hands into fists. His nails bit into his palms as he stared up at his father.
“If Gawain’s boy is strong, he’ll win,” Ashnard said. “If he’s weak, he’ll lose. That is all there is to it.”
“Strength is not the only thing that matters in a fight,” Soren said.
Ashnard threw his head back laughing. Then he stopped abruptly and gestured to Bryce.
“Remove him from my sight, Bryce,” he said. “The boy needs to learn to hold his foolish tongue if he wants to keep it.”
Soren barely saw Ike in the days leading up to the fight. He trained constantly with a single-minded, dogged determination.
The gathered crowd was small. For all Daein prided itself on its warriors, those who shared his father’s particular fondness for this sort of bloodsport were few and far between. Soren had once heard it compared in furtive whispers to the dog fights that took place in the slums, mangy starving creatures forced to fight for scraps.
His father was seated in his customary place, lounging on a throne on a platform that overlooked the ring. Rajaion was huddled behind him, his massive body wedged into a space too small for it, and his breath curled up like smoke in the cold morning. Gawain was to Ashnard’s left and Soren stood to his right. He’d felt sick the moment he saw Gawain standing there, about to watch his own son fight.
All because of Soren.
He hoped General Gawain had forbidden Ike’s mother and sister from attending. He didn’t think he could bear the thought.
Ike and his opponent entered the ring. Ike stood tall, a scowl on his face, and his stance was confident. Both men simply stood there for a long moment, sizing each other up, before Ashnard lifted his hand.
“Begin,” he said.
He looked at Soren and smiled with teeth.
Ike charged first with a wild yell, his sword meeting his opponent’s with a clang. The older soldier parried and Ike jumped back, then charged again.
Soren leaned forward so far that the iron railing bit into his stomach, so far he would topple over if he wasn’t careful. It didn’t matter. All that mattered was Ike in the ring, the arc of his sword, the streak of blood on his cheek where he’d been quick but not quite quick enough.
“Can’t you control that boy of yours, Gawain?” Ashnard asked, stroking Rajaion’s snout.
“Your Majesty,” Gawain said. His jaw was clenched so tight Soren could watch a muscle in it jump.
Daein’s winter winds always seemed to cut right through to his bones. His thick fur-lined cloak made no difference.
His mother’s home country was warm and dry. She had told him that once when he was very small, tucked up against her side so she could protect him from the chill. There were mountains, she said, and a coast with beautiful, rocky beaches. Soren couldn’t imagine such a thing.
Soren hadn’t seen his mother in over ten years. His father forbade it. Soren had long ago learned to stop asking.
Down below, Ike swung and parried, shuffling quickly backwards on the snowy ground to avoid his opponent’s blow. He had the advantage, it was clear, but it was no amateur he was up against. Those who displeased his father, or those strong men convicted of particularly heinous crimes, were all thrown into the ring.
“The boy will be impressive someday,” Ashnard said. His wide grin split his face. “If he lives, that is.”
Soren swallowed his fear. Ike was strong. And strength was the only thing that mattered in Daein.
Ike was strong. He would live.
He repeated it to himself like a mantra, his nails digging crescent wounds into his palms.
Ike was strong. He would live.
He leaned forward further, right over the railing, standing up on the tips of his toes.
If Ike fell, he thought, then Soren would fall too, in more ways than one.
There was a tug at the back of his cloak, dragging him back from the rail. Rajaion snorted, nostrils flaring, as he reeled Soren back against his massive body. One of his huge wings flapped, bringing Soren underneath the shelter of it. He tossed his head in agitation.
When Soren raised a hand to pet his neck and calm him, he found his fingers trembling. Rajaion made a low, displeased noise, as if Soren’s distress distressed him in turn. On any other day, Soren would turn his face into Rajaion’s scaly neck, let Rajaion fuss and preen at him until he calmed, but that would mean looking away from Ike.
If he looked away, he felt certain that something terrible would happen, so his gaze never left Ike’s darting form, the swing of his sword and the way his face was set in stony determination. Soren didn’t so much as blink, so he missed nothing. That was why he saw the moment when Ike snapped.
This far away, Soren couldn’t hear what Ike’s opponent said in a quiet voice, could only see his lips move. But he saw Ike freeze, just for a split second, and then he watched the fury cloud his face. He snarled, teeth bared, and then he lunged.
Soren’s breath caught. It was like he could feel the cold steel between his own ribs. He raised a hand to his chest, clutching at his cloak, and prayed as he so rarely did to Ashera. Please, please, don’t let Ike fall.
Then Ike yanked his sword free. His opponent fell to his knees, and then to the ground. His blood stained the fresh snow, spreading out like a brilliant field of red flowers.
Soren found it beautiful for the sheer fact that it was not Ike’s blood.
Ike breathed deeply for a moment, huge gulps of air. His breath misted up in the cold winter air, great white plumes, and Soren found himself fixated on the rise and fall of his chest.
Then with a wild roar he hoisted his sword into the air.
“I claim this victory in the name of Prince Soren!” he shouted, his voice filling the stands.
Everyone fell silent. Soren’s own ears rang with it, his breath catching.
Only Rajaion huffed in disinterest. He lowered his huge head and closed his eyes, steam curling from his nostrils.
There was a strange noise from behind Soren. Slowly, he turned.
Ashnard threw his head back laughing. He clapped his hands together, shoulders shaking with the force of his mirth.
“A good show!” he said. “A very good show. Gawain, your boy has talent. You’ve raised him well.”
Gawain looked white as a sheet.
“Thank you, Your Majesty,” he said. His hands were curled into his fists.
Sometimes, Soren wondered if Gawain hated him. He wouldn’t blame him. Ike had put himself in danger only because of Soren, and it wasn’t the first time. Ike had a disturbing tendency to speak exactly his mind.
“Well, boy?” Ashnard said, looking at Soren. “Go greet your champion.”
He yanked Rajaion back by the chain attached to his collar, heedless of Rajaion’s loud snarl. It gave Soren the distance he needed to slip away without Rajaion trying to snag him by the cape again. He had to step back quickly; the anguished roar Rajaion always made when they were separated went straight through him like a knife.
Ike’s sword was taken from him, his armor being removed by a page. He swiped a hand across his cheek and looked confused when his fingers came away stained with blood. Soren supposed he hadn’t even felt it, caught up in the fight. It was dark red against his fingertips, pale in the winter cold.
Then he saw Soren, and despite everything, despite the blood on his face and the man being dragged from the ring, he broke into that soft, almost wry smile that was reserved for Soren alone.
“Didn’t I tell you?” Ike said, his cheeks pink from the cold, blood on his face. His eyes were bright and his breath rose up like fog. “I won.”
(“What did he say to you?” Soren would ask later, when they were alone. He remembered it in crystal clarity, the movement of the man’s lips, and the way Ike had lunged in response. “In the ring, he said something. It upset you.”
Ike was quiet for a moment, then he reached out and squeezed Soren’s hand very gently.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “He can’t say it anymore.”)
Soren wanted to tell him not to ever do it again.
“You’re hurt,” Soren said, his voice tight.
“Barely,” Ike said.
If they were in private, Soren would have leaned up on his toes to touch Ike’s cheek. He would have taken his handkerchief and cleaned the blood away. He would have scolded Ike, told him to go to a healer immediately in case it scarred.
But they weren’t alone, and Soren couldn’t do any of that. Ike looked at him like he knew.
“Give a cheer for the prince’s champion!” someone in the crowd cried. It took a moment, everyone looking to Ashnard, but then Ashnard threw his head back laughing again. He rose to his feet and clapped, heavy and booming.
“A victory for my son’s champion,” he declared. “Well done, well done!”
Then the cheer went up like a roar, like a wave through the crowd as everyone gathered began to cheer for Ike. Ike turned in a slow circle, looking around, his eyes glimmering in the morning light. He threw his sword up and shouted, the same words he’d shouted when he’d won the fight.
“For Prince Soren!” he cried.
The crowd, caught up in the excitement, quickly echoed his call. Soren turned in a slow circle, taking in all of their faces, knowing that the person they were cheering for wasn’t him.
“For the prince’s champion!”
Somehow, the name stuck: Ike, son of Gawain. Champion of the prince.
“I brought you a present.”
Soren looked up from his book, his eyes raised. Ike stood framed in the stable doorways, the cold Daein sunlight shining behind him.
“Here,” Ike said. “Catch.”
He tossed him an apple, red and shiny. Soren caught it easily and felt himself start to smile.
“How did you know where to find me?” he asked.
Ike cast a glance at the hulking wyvern curled up behind Soren.
“You always come here when you want to think,” he said.
Sometimes it felt like Ike was the one person in the entire world who really knew him. Soren brushed a lock of his hair behind his ear, looking back down at his book.
“No one comes here to disturb me,” he said. “The wyvern grooms are all scared of Rajaion.”
“Because he’s liable to bite someone’s head off with one wrong move,” Ike grumbled.
“Hm,” Soren said.
Rajaion was restless even in his sleep. Soren wondered if wyverns dreamed and, if so, if Rajaion’s dreams troubled him. When he grumbled and twitched, Soren put a hand on his neck to still him.
It seemed that even in his dreams, he knew when Soren was nearby.
After a moment, he opened one golden eye. He saw Soren and snorted softly, then settled.
“It’s strange,” Ike said. “With anyone else, that beast tries to bite, but with you he’s as tame as a kitten.”
“He’s hardly a cat, Ike,” Soren said.
“I’ve seen you scratch him under the chin,” Ike said, amused.
Soren rolled his eyes. Rajaion lifted his head, as if looking for those chin scratches, then froze when he saw Ike. He growled, his hackles drawn back.
“See what I mean?” Ike asked.
Rajaion snapped at Ike, teeth gleaming in the gloom. Ike evaded him, quickly stepping back, but Soren saw the way his hand twitched towards the hilt of his sword.
Rajaion snarled, and Soren could see him readying to snap again.
Soren pulled his gigantic head down towards him. Rajaion obeyed with an air of long suffering; they both knew Soren could not physically move him unless he allowed himself to be moved.
“Don’t be rude,” Soren said, petting a hand down his snout. “He’s my…” he glanced at Ike and felt his cheeks heat. “He’s my friend.”
Rajaion growled.
Soren wasn’t under the impression that Rajaion could really understand his words, but sometimes he liked to pretend. No one else in the castle ever seemed to listen to him.
No one except Ike, anyway.
“He’s my friend,” Soren repeated, firmer. “You are not allowed to bite him.”
Rajaion looked aggrieved.
“And your guard,” Ike said, leaning back against the wall. “You should let me know where you’re going.”
After Ike’s duel for Soren’s honor, his father had done something that surprised him. Ashnard had appointed Ike as Soren’s personal guard. Soren couldn’t guess at his motivation. It certainly wasn’t concern for Soren’s safety.
Perhaps it simply amused him that anyone would want to fight for Soren.
It worried Soren, his father’s shadowy motivations. He could do what he wanted with Soren, but involving Ike made something fierce and angry flare in his chest.
He hated thinking about Ike being injured because of him.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Ike said. “Quit it.”
Soren snorted, looking away.
“This doesn’t change anything,” Ike said, crossing his arms over his chest. “I would protect you anyway.”
Soren knew that.
Years before, when Soren was still a child, General Tauroneo’s eldest son entered the palace guard. Their family was old and powerful in Daein, famed for being fearless warriors. For a while, the general’s son did well. Well enough that Ashnard selected him as his personal aide in the field.
The boy nearly died.
Rumor had it he’d been mauled by something with long, sharp teeth. A wyvern’s bite.
Tauroneo’s son would never fight again. Ashnard dismissed him without a second thought and the boy was sent to his mother’s home in disgrace. Tauroneo, too, shouldered the blame – he hadn’t raised a strong enough son, hadn’t produced a warrior worthy of Daein. His retirement from the Four Riders had not been his decision.
He suspected Gawain must have worried that the same fate would befall Ike. Perhaps he’d been relieved, then, when Ike was selected to protect Soren instead.
Until one night, a few months after Ike was appointed Soren’s guard.
Huge, covered crates had arrived at the castle, along with that cackling madman, Izuka. Soren did his best to avoid him, but his father, for some reason, found the old fool useful. At least he was no longer brought before him, not like when he was a child, Izuka circling him and mumbling under his breath all the while and his father growing increasingly unsatisfied. Soren never knew what they were looking for, only that they didn’t find it.
It was late at night and Soren was reading by candlelight when the commotion started in the halls. Guards were shouting, and footsteps pounded heavy on the floors.
Something prickled at the back of Soren’s neck.
When he opened his door, there were no guards standing in front of his rooms. Soren raised his eyebrows.
“Find it!” he heard someone yell, their voice echoing off the stone walls. “Find it and kill it, quickly!”
Someone else gave a wild, terrified yell.
Soren slipped quietly into the hall. There was something that was wrong, deeply wrong, in the castle, and he had to find Ike in the chaos.
But when he rounded the corner, he stopped in his tracks.
Standing there in the hall was a tiger sub-human.
The tiger didn’t look like any of the illustrations in Soren’s books on sub-humans. It was too big, its fur bristling and patchy. Saliva dripped from its fangs. It took a few slow steps forward, muscles bulging, and then lowered itself slightly to the ground, as if it was getting ready to leap.
Its eyes never left Soren’s face.
It was too close. There was no time for Soren to get away and he would never be able to outrun it.
“General Bryce! Grab the prince!”
It happened so fast that Soren’s head spun. Ike jumped in front of him, shoving him back. The tiger’s great paw came down, slashing Ike across the chest. There was a horrible screech of claws on metal.
“Ike!” Soren shouted.
He tried to rush forward, to help him somehow, but solid arms seized him around the waist, pulling him back.
“Prince Soren!” Bryce snapped.
“Let me go!” Soren demanded, trying to tear himself away, but Bryce had lifted him clear off the ground and his grip was like steel.
Ike gave a great yell and threw the tiger off of him. He took a stumbling step back, then raised his sword. The tiger growled, baring its fangs. It prepared to leap again, and Soren kicked at Bryce, clawing at his arms.
Ike slashed out and the tiger roared, rearing back. One more slash was all it took. The hall seemed to ring in the silence as the tiger slumped to the ground.
Ike was breathing hard. His sword clattered to the ground as he clutched at his chest. When he took his hand away, it was red with blood.
“Ike!” Soren yelled. He finally managed to tear himself from Bryce’s grip. Soren ran to Ike’s side, gripping his arm. When Ike sank to his knees, he took Soren with him.
“It’s fine,” Ike said, panting. His blood dripped onto the floor. He looked over at Soren. “Are you hurt?”
Soren wrapped an arm tight around Ike’s shoulders, pulling him close to him.
“Call for a healer!” he shouted at Bryce. “Right now!”
He had Ike brought to his rooms after he was healed. He knew there would be talk and possibly repercussions, but in the moment he didn’t care. He needed Ike where he could see him and know that he was fine. He wanted Ike to lie down, but instead Ike went to his window and sat down there, staring out at the snow. There was a frown on his face.
Just seeing the bandages wrapped around Ike’s chest made Soren feel like it was his own chest that had been nearly slashed open.
Ike must have seen him staring. He glanced down, then shrugged.
“It’s fine,” he said, his voice only a little tight with pain. “I saw the healers. I’m not in any danger. My father sent for my mother, too.”
If Soren had his way, he would have healed Ike himself. His hands were the only ones he trusted when it came to Ike’s safety.
But healing magic was not an option for Daein’s only prince. Soren swallowed hard.
“Will it scar?” Soren asked.
Ike’s mouth pressed into a thin line. Soren’s heart sank.
“I don’t mind,” Ike said after a moment. “It’s proof.” He coughed a little, glancing away. “That I protected you, I mean.”
His cheeks were red in the candlelight. Something glittered on his chest, right over the bandages. It was the ring he’d worn for a few years now, an old family heirloom from his mother’s side that she’d gifted him upon his acceptance into the royal guard. A lucky charm, she’d told him, so Ike always wore it beneath his shirt.
Now it would hang over the scar Ike had gotten because Soren hadn’t been able to push him out of the way.
“I can’t help it,” Ike said, sounding almost fond. “I see you in danger and my body moves before I can even think. It makes me a good guard, doesn’t it? My prince’s life before my own.”
“I don’t want to see you hurt,” Soren said, his voice tight. “I see no point in living without you.”
“Don’t say that,” Ike said, painfully gentle.
He only ever sounded like that with three people: his mother, his sister, and Soren.
Soren lifted his chin and said nothing. Ike sighed after a moment, glancing away.
“Stubborn,” he murmured.
“You’re one to talk,” Soren returned.
Ike snorted, crossing his arms.
“True, I guess,” he said after a moment. “We’re the same that way.”
Soren felt something inside of him warm at the idea that Ike considered them the same in some way.
“Where did that thing come from, anyway?” Ike said. “I’ve never heard of any sub-humans attacking the castle before.”
“Izuka brought it,” Soren said, the words falling numb from his lips. If he didn’t hate the cackling old fool before, he certainly did now. “Bryce told me. He presented it to my father as some kind of curiosity. It was quite mad, apparently.”
“It was strong,” Ike said. “Stronger than the others I’ve encountered before.”
“Perhaps my father meant to plan a hunt,” Soren murmured.
He found the sub-human hunts distasteful. He found most of his father’s hobbies distasteful, though. If his father meant to eliminate the sub-humans from Daein, then he should simply do it. To catch a few and force them to run for their lives as his father and his companions chased them was a pointless exercise.
He knew that Ike agreed, but then there was nothing cruel in Ike’s nature. He was gruff sometimes and he could be hot-headed, but he was always unfailingly kind.
“The sub-humans,” Ike said, frowning as he watched the snow drift outside the window. “I wonder… are they really so different from us?”
“You saw that tiger,” Soren murmured. He looked down at the bandages wrapped across Ike’s chest and felt hatred spread through him. “It was nothing but a beast. It wanted to rip us both apart.”
Ike looked uncomfortable. He shifted in his seat by the window.
Soren stared at the bandages and felt hatred harden in him.
“The sub-humans are completely different from us,” he said.
“Sub-human,” Ike said. “It’s an ugly word, isn’t it. There must be another.”
“Laguz,” Soren murmured, the word leaving his lips before he could even think about it. When Ike gave him a curious glance, he added, “I read it in an old book in the library. The sub-humans call themselves laguz.”
“Laguz,” Ike repeated, as if he was testing the feel of it in his mouth. “Yes, that seems better.”
“You shouldn’t…” Soren began, swallowing hard. “You shouldn’t share such sentiments outside of this room, Ike.”
“My father agrees,” Ike said. He had that tone in his voice that meant he was going to be stubborn about something.
“You and he… are different from others in Daein,” Soren said.
“You’re different, too,” Ike said.
Soren curled his hands in his lap and looked down.
“It’s not bad,” Ike said after a moment. “To be different.”
“Isn’t it?” Soren murmured bitterly. “Being different in Daein does nothing but invite danger.”
“I like that you’re different,” Ike said. “I like everything about you. I don’t want you to be more like others.”
Soren could have laughed, not that anything was funny. Ike always meant what he said, though. He liked that Soren was different. Soren liked that he was different, too, even though it made him afraid for Ike sometimes.
“Promise me, Ike,” Soren said. “Promise me you won’t call them laguz where anyone else can hear you.”
Ike set his jaw but after a moment he nodded.
But in the privacy of Soren’s rooms, he stopped calling them sub-humans and started calling them laguz.
After that night, his father’s mad games changed. He began to put out calls for only the strongest of warriors, inviting them to the castle. There, he issued them a challenge. Great fame and fortune, a place of high honor, but only if they could pass his test.
If they agreed, they would be sent, unwarned, into the arena with one of those monstrous beasts. Only the strongest ever emerged.
Aside from that tiger, Soren had only ever seen illustrations of laguz, and heard stories from a few older knights. But he felt certain that there was something abnormal about these ones. Watching from his seat with Rajaion curled behind him, he would stare at their twisted features and feel ill.
Ike had had healed completely under the attentions of the king’s personal healer – an odd act of supposed gratitude from his father that Soren couldn’t quite put his finger on – but, like Ike suspected, it had scarred.
Ike had already killed one in the hall that night, but Soren couldn’t trust that his father wouldn’t put him in the ring with another. He kept quiet and didn’t ask questions.
Soren still felt like he’d been the one slashed open instead.
And despite the rumors that spread through the streets of Daein, more and more warriors arrived to be tested.
One day, to everyone’s surprise, a young girl arrived.
Daein was not typically favored by outsiders. The landscape was harsh and inhospitable, the people had a reputation for being unfriendly towards outsiders.
When rumors began to spread through the castle about a new warrior from a foreign land, Soren was skeptical.
He was surprised when his father summoned him to greet her. His father so rarely involved him in court matters, preferring to ignore Soren unless he presented some form of sick amusement. He also was surprised to see Rajaion in the hall, curled behind his father’s throne.
Rajaion could not often be trusted in the grand hall when it was crowded. Not unless his father was fine with the potential of losing a few guards. Perhaps that was why Soren had been called, he reasoned. He could keep Rajaion—mostly—calm.
The new warrior wasn’t what he expected. She was a woman, which wasn’t unusual – his father didn’t care whether or not his fighters were men or women, as long as they were strong. If they could survive in the arena and on the battlefield, then that was enough for his father.
She looked young, perhaps only a little older than him. Her hair was dusky pink and she wore clothes of dark navy silk that looked foreign. Strange golden designs were embroidered upon them, like abstract dragons in flight.
What caught Soren’s attention, though, were the markings on her face. There was a red mark in the center of her forehead, and a red stripe on each of her cheeks. The mark on her forehead wasn’t the same pattern as his, or even really the same color, but looking at it filled him with an odd sense of familiarity.
She looked up at him with her clear blue eyes and her mouth fell open. It was only for a moment – she quickly closed it – but clearly something about him had shocked her. Soren watched as she clenched her hands. Rajaion shifted behind him, growling under his breath, and Soren raised a hand to steady him.
The woman stared at them with an emotion Soren couldn’t place. Something deeply, terribly sad.
“Hm,” Ashnard said, leaning one elbow on his throne. “And you’ve come to fight, have you, girl?”
“If it pleases Your Majesty,” the woman said. Her voice was quiet, her tone even.
“Madness,” Soren whispered under his breath. Such a small woman, she’d be torn to shreds in seconds.
“What’s your name?” Ashnard asked.
“Ena, Your Majesty,” the woman said, lowering her head again.
“Hm,” Ashnard said. He drummed his fingers on his throne. “Tell me a little about yourself, Ena.”
“There’s not much to say, Your Majesty,” she said. “I’ve come from very far away to serve at your side, that’s all.”
“And do you have any talent for fighting?” Ashnard asked.
Soren shot him a disgusted look. They could both see the truth, plain as anything.
Ena hesitated for a long moment.
“My land is known for producing great warriors,” she finally said. “However, the truth is that my talents lie more in strategy. I beg Your Majesty to allow me the chance anyway, if it is the only way I can remain here in your service.”
Behind him, Rajaion shifted again, growing restless.
“Petrine has no head for strategy,” Ashnard said. “You’ll serve as her tactician.”
General Petrine was the newest member of his father’s Four Riders. She had been appointed after his father had forced General Lanvega’s retirement, claiming he was old and soft. Tall and imposing, she fought like one of the beasts that lived along the border. Her tongue was as dangerous as the lance she wielded, and all of her soldiers quaked in her presence. Soren disliked her immensely, but at least the feeling was mutual.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Ena said, her head bowed low.
Ashnard’s fingers drummed against the arm of his throne, impatient.
“And my son,” he said. Soren looked up in surprise. “The boy is a weakling, useless in battle. But I’m told he has a quick mind. You will teach him battle strategy. Then perhaps he will serve some purpose.”
Ena lowered her head further.
“Yes,” she said. There was the tiniest little pause. “Your Majesty.”
Ena was soft-spoken and perfectly polite. She spoke little about herself or her background, and she was a competent enough teacher, quick enough that Soren didn’t overtake her as easily as he had the majority of his tutors when he was younger. By all rights, she was pleasant enough to talk to, certainly more so than most in his father’s fortress of a castle. By all rights, and yet.
There was something about her that bothered Soren. Something that made him uneasy.
Perhaps it was the way she looked at him, sometimes, as if she were seeing someone else.
“You’re troubled, my prince.”
Ena’s quick fingers set the board, laying the pieces in perfect order. Her eyes were lowered, her voice soft.
Soren disliked being read so easily.
“Is it because of Sir Ike?” Ena asked. “I noticed he’s been absent from the castle lately. You two seem very close.”
Soren felt his lip curl.
“Let’s just play the game,” Soren said.
Ena picked up a piece and made a move that was surprisingly aggressive, given her small stature and quiet nature, seemingly as placid as an undisturbed lake. Soren raised his eyebrows and matched it.
He was feeling aggressive himself, after all. Ike left a few days before, accompanying his father on a mission to the south. It was clear that he was being considered as a future candidate for the Four Riders. General Petrine couldn’t stop gnashing her teeth about it, so he suspected Ena must know as well.
The Four Riders were his father’s most trusted confidantes, the best of the best in Daein. He didn’t like the idea of his father conscripting Ike as one of his attack dogs.
“And Rajaion?” Ena asked after a beat. “How is he?”
Soren hesitated, his fingers hovering above a knight. He debated, for a moment, what to say. Why should Ena care about the king’s mount?
Curiosity won out. This was a basic strategy, to give your opponent a piece of information and watch their reaction.
“He grows restless this time of year,” he said, picking his knight up and setting it down decisively. “He always has, for as long as I can remember.”
Ena flinched, an involuntary reaction. Soren was careful not to let it show on his face that he saw. He wondered what that meant.
“Do you have a particular interest in wyverns, Ena?” he asked.
“Not wyverns, no. I grow restless this time of year, too,” she murmured, glancing out the window. “Someone once proposed to me during this month.”
Soren toyed with the piece between his fingers, a knight again.
“You’re betrothed,” he said. “Then why are you here, in Nevassa, serving my father? Does your fiancé also serve in the palace?”
Ena glanced down.
“Yes,” she said simply. “In a manner of speaking.”
That wasn’t altogether surprising. His father cared little for where people came from, as long as they had adequate strength.
“I cannot be with him, but I cannot be away, either,” Ena said. “I must be as close as I can.”
He was most likely one of his father’s more shadowy associates, then, the men he sent off to far corners of the kingdom. If Soren were to be honest with her, he would tell her to find herself a different man. But something about the way she said I cannot be with him made his fingers still on his knight.
He thought of blue hair and blue eyes and felt himself ache. He had to be as close as he could be, too.
“He is my love,” Ena said. “I will wait for him for as long as it takes. Until the end of time, if I must.”
The sentiment struck Soren, a knife between his ribs. He knew that feeling because he felt it himself every time Ike left the castle. If Soren could, he would watch him ride out, and until he came back Soren felt like he was frozen. A storm raged inside of him and the sun didn’t break through the ice until he saw Ike’s face again.
“Until all the cities burn,” Soren murmured to himself. “And the seas swallow Tellius.”
“Prince Soren?” Ena said.
“It’s nothing,” he said. “Just… something I heard somewhere.”
Ena stared at him, her brows drawn together.
“A lovely sentiment,” she said at last. “I did not know Daein had such talented poets.”
“Daein values many things, but poetry is not one of them,” Soren said. He moved his queen. “Checkmate.”
Ena inclined her head respectfully.
“You play well, Prince Soren,” she said.
“You play better,” he said, his voice flat. “You let me win.”
Ena didn’t confirm or deny. That was no matter. Soren had been watching her, watching as she was watching him. She was looking for something, and he couldn’t decide what.
“Normally I would accuse you of flattery,” Soren said. “I’m the prince, and so you threw the game in deference to some imagined ego of mine. But I don’t think that’s the case.”
“No?” Ena said.
“You wanted to determine something about my character,” he said. “So? Did you discern what you wanted?”
“It is not my place to examine your character, Prince Soren,” Ena said. Soren recognized a non-answer when he was given one.
“You stared at me the first time you met me,” Soren said. “You saw something in my face that surprised you. What was it?”
Ena stilled.
“Forgive me, my prince,” she said after a moment. “I wasn’t aware you noticed. You… look like someone who is very dear to me.”
Soren opened his mouth to ask another question, only to pause. Heavy footsteps sounded in the halls. Soren turned, a sense of familiarity settling over him, and he bit the inside of his cheek so he wouldn’t smile.
Ike burst through the doors a moment later. There was still snow dusting his armor, but his eyes were shining as he looked at Soren. Ike’s gaze caught on Ena a moment later and he frowned before he got down one knee, something he would never do if they were alone.
“Prince Soren,” he said, lowering his head. “I’ve returned from my mission and I’m ready to resume my duties to you.”
“Thank you, Sir Ike,” Soren said. He disliked the farce, but it kept Ike safe, and that was what mattered.
Ike rose after a moment and Soren turned to Ena.
“Thank you for the game,” he said.
Ena bowed her head.
“By your leave, Prince Soren,” she said.
She was watching them, though, watching the way Ike was looking at Soren. Soren could see her mind working, so he kept careful distance between Ike and himself as he rose. Ike seemed to get the message if the way he followed behind Soren was any indication.
Soren had reached the door when he suddenly stopped.
“Your betrothed,” Soren said, resting his hand on the door. “I hope you’re reunited soon. You’re a talented strategist, Ena, and I’d hate to see your work suffer for his absence.”
She pressed her lips together in a thin line.
“Thank you, Prince Soren,” she said.
The Duke of Sella’s youngest son arrived at the castle in the evening late into the autumn.
Sella was to the west, closer to the Crimean border, and so it was valuable. His father disliked the Duke of Sella, Soren knew, because he felt him disloyal, and weak of mind. The eldest son was a celebrated knight, but the youngest was dogged by unsettling rumors. A maid in the castle had once wept to her friend, both of them huddled in a corner of the library, that the Duke of Sella’s youngest son had assaulted her brother and strangled the boy to death after. There was nothing to be done, she said, because his father and brother protected him, and no one cared about a serving boy’s life.
People talked around Soren because they disregarded him, ignored him. Neither maid seemed to take notice of him some distance away, reading quietly. It was like he was a shadow in the room and nothing more. Only Ike saw him.
Still, he filed away the story about the maid’s brother. The Duke of Sella’s family had governed the area since Daein’s founding. They were proud and old-fashioned, and it was said the duke was staunchly against Ashnard’s social policies, the laws that allowed commoners to become knights as long as they were strong enough.
People, the Duke thought, should remain in their proper places. That place should be determined by their birth, and not by their strength.
Soren couldn’t bring himself to disagree, although it pained him to agree with his father about anything.
“I don’t like him,” Ike said, his arms crossed, when Soren asked him for his assessment of the duke’s son’s character. “There’s something dishonest about him. I don’t trust his motives.”
“Well,” Soren said mildly. “If it’s motives that matter, you must not trust a great deal of people in this castle.”
Ike snorted. He looked away for a moment, his face set in a deep frown. Soren, it seemed, had struck a nerve.
“I want you to stay away from him,” he said.
“I’m sure that won’t be a problem,” Soren replied.
Ike’s frown deepened. Suddenly he reached forward, moving to brush a lock of Soren’s hair behind his ear.
“For me,” he said. His fingers traveled over the shell of Soren’s ear, and then he curled his hand and brushed his knuckles down the line of Soren’s throat.
It made Soren’s knees feel weak.
Ike touched him more these days. Soren tried not to think anything of it – Ike had always touched him, in one way or another, ever since they had first met when Ike had held him in his arms and told him that everything would be okay. Through the years, it had always been the same – a covert, friendly elbow jostling into Soren’s, or a hand held out to steady him. Now, Ike would sometimes reach out and hesitate before brushing the backs of his fingers against Soren’s cheek, or put a hand on his back. When he closed his hand around Soren’s to guide him down the steps, he squeezed his fingers and didn’t let go unless someone was watching.
Ike was nineteen now, grown as tall as his father and broad in the shoulders. Everywhere he went, he turned heads for reasons beyond just his prowess on the battlefield. There was no shortage of ladies at court who pursued him, and Soren had heard more than one rumor about an arranged match with a suitable lady. The favorite, it seemed, was Lord Fizzart of Talrega’s daughter.
Ike had given him a strange look when Soren had brought it up.
“Jill?” he said, tilting his head to the side and crossing his arms. He shook his head. “She’s Mist’s friend. That’s all.”
Soren had been so relieved he’d nearly sighed out loud.
“Well, then, who else is there?” Soren wondered, partly to himself. “She’d have to have some standing.”
“She’d – what?” Ike said.
“Duke Nebula has several daughters who are of marriageable age,” Soren said. He bit the inside of his cheek. “It’s said the youngest is a great beauty.”
“I’m not… I don’t…” Ike made a frustrated sound. “There’s no women, Soren.”
“Oh,” Soren said, unsure exactly what that meant.
“I told my mother already,” Ike said. “So that’s it. You don’t have to worry.”
There were a great many things Soren had to worry about, every single day. Many of them involved Ike. If he would be safe, if his closeness to Soren would thrust him into unnecessary danger. Ike had already fought one duel for him.
Still, Soren found his shoulders relaxing slightly when Ike said there were no women. There would be one, someday. Ike would have to marry. But now Soren could keep him a little bit longer.
Hands closed around his shoulders, the touch gentle, and Soren looked up into Ike’s face. His expression was determined as he leaned in and, to Soren’s shock, kissed him on the forehead.
Soren had to bite back a stifled gasp. Ike’s lips lingered, pressed to the center of the circlet Soren wore to hide the mark on his forehead.
He pulled back after a long moment, his hands still tight around Soren’s shoulders. His cheeks were flushed.
“There’s no women,” he said, his voice rough.
Soren opened his mouth, trying to think of something he could possibly say, when there was a heavy knock at the door. Ike’s head snapped up and Soren looked around for somewhere to hide him, starting to push him back to the heavy wardrobe, only for a voice to call out.
“Ike,” Gawain said. “Prince Soren. I know you’re in there.”
Ike grimaced. He and Soren exchanged glances.
“It’s only me,” Gawain said. “So you might as well come out.”
Soren nodded, once, and Ike squeezed his hand before he went to the door.
Gawain stood there, looking solemn.
“Ike,” he said. “The king has called for you. He has something for you to do.”
Soren felt the same sinking feeling he got whenever his father called for Ike. He always wanted to reach out, to grab Ike by the arm and tell him not to go. But that would only make things worse.
Ike nodded once and Gawain clapped his son on the shoulder. He bowed to Soren again before he left.
“I’ll see you when I get back,” Ike said. “Hopefully it’ll be quick. Then we can talk more about the… women thing.”
He made some vague hand gesture, his cheeks still red.
Slowly, Soren nodded.
“When you return,” he said.
He expected the night to be like all the other nights Ike was away. He would eat by himself in his rooms and then he would read, trying to distract himself until Ike returned. Oftentimes the dawn light would come and Soren would still be there, seated at his desk, waiting for Ike.
Soren was surprised, then, when his father summoned him to dinner. He could count on one hand the number of times over the years he had dined with his father, and never with guests.
Surprise quickly gave way to suspicion. As much as his father seemed like a madman, he rarely did something without reason. Soren very much doubted his reason in this case was a sudden burning desire to dine with his son.
He doubted he had any innocent motives for dining with Duke Sella’s son, either.
Why the youngest son, he wondered. He was no great talent on the battlefield. No great strategical mind. Nothing to offer Ashnard. He served no purpose to the great King Daein.
At least, none that Soren could see on the surface.
Normally, Soren dressed himself, his robes well-made but practical with little of the finery that one might expect from a prince. He combed his own hair and tied it back himself, fingers working quickly. The only jewelry he wore was the circlet on his forehead, a red stone in the center that disguised his mark. Tonight, his father sent maids and new clothes. Soren stared suspiciously at the fine fabric, the intricate embroidery. The fluttering sleeves fell like a silk waterfall as the maids arranged his hair, pinning half of it up in an elaborate style more reminiscent of Begnion than Daein. The rest of Soren’s hair flowed down his back.
He barely recognized himself in the mirror. He wondered, suddenly, what Ike would think of him.
It didn’t matter. Ike had been called away on other business. He might think Soren looked silly, anyway.
A few guards he didn’t recognize led him down the halls. Instead of the grand dining hall, though, he was led to a smaller room, one of his father’s private studies. It was decorated the same as the rest of the castle with carpets patterned with dragons, paintings of dragons hung on the walls. Even the chairs were carved with dragons.
It was difficult to keep his lip from curling when he thought of his father’s obsession.
His father was seated with the fire behind him, and it threw odd shadows across him, made his shoulders look even broader underneath his armor and cape. His teeth flashed as he grinned.
The only other man in the room stood quickly, bowing his head to Soren.
“Prince Soren,” he said obsequiously.
“Son,” Ashnard said, a laugh rumbling through him. “Meet the Duke of Sella’s youngest son.”
The duke’s son had the classic Daein look about him. His skin was pale, his hair was dark, and his eyes were sharp, cold, and hard. Ike had the classic Daein look about him, too, tall and strong, but his eyes never looked cruel in the candlelight.
(And Soren, it was said, took after his mother. His memories of her were muddled now, her portrait removed from his quarters. But he remembered her hair, long and dark, and the red flash of her eyes.)
“A pleasure,” Soren said, his voice flat.
The duke’s son looked up and then down, his gaze sweeping over Soren. Soren glanced over at his father, wondering what he was planning. His father was not ashamed of him, exactly. Shame was not something he possessed. He was more disinterested. Soren was something to be kept out of sight, strange and unsightly.
A guard pulled out a chair and, seeing no other option, Soren sat down. He kept his back straight and his head up, but he kept silent. He hadn’t figured out his father’s game yet, but there must be one. He’d said once that Soren’s presence spoiled the food.
The food itself was acceptable, for the most part. Spiky, briny sea urchins from Daein’s coast, as prickly as his father’s armor made up the first course, followed by his father’s preference: steak.
Soren looked down with disdain at the blood pooling on the plate. His father liked his meat rare.
He ate little, focused more on what was passing between his father and the duke’s son. He’d never had much of an appetite, anyway, something Ike despaired over. He brought Soren food sometimes, either sneaking it from the kitchens or saying that his mother had made extra. Soren ate it, but only because it was from Ike.
(“My mother says you’re too skinny,” he said every time, arms crossed.)
The Duke of Sella’s son was trying hard to engage his father in conversation, bragging about some sub-human hunt the other month where he’d netted a large raven. Soren could tell, though, that his father wasn’t interested. Curiouser and curiouser, Soren thought.
For the most part he was ignored until halfway through the meal, when the duke’s son suddenly turned to him.
“Your father says you are half-Goldoan dragon. Slight little thing that you are, I don’t think I believe him.”
Soren’s lip curled. He disliked the way the duke’s son was staring so openly, and to do it in front of his father, too. It felt distinctly foolish.
“Baseless rumors,” Soren murmured. “My father’s idea of a joke.” He stared straight at Ashnard. “Can you imagine any man, even the great King Daein, bedding a dragon?”
His father’s expression tightened, those fierce brows drawing together. There, Soren thought, viciously proud. One little barb, but it had gotten through his father’s armor. Who was he to cast aspersions on what the great King Ashnard could or could not do? Bed a dragon, kill a dragon – surely, if anyone could, it was Ashnard.
Soren wanted to laugh.
He’d heard it before, of course. His father claimed his mother was a sub-human beast, one of the mysterious black dragons of Goldoa, and that Soren himself was some sort of half-breed. He remembered little of his mother, but he knew very well that she was not a dragon. If she had been, she would have surely killed his father on the day he’d come to take him away.
“He has grown up nicely,” Ashnard said, baring his teeth in a smile. “He’s pretty, isn’t he? Like his mother.”
Soren glared at him. He had no right, he thought, to talk about Soren’s mother. He had viciously ripped her child away from her. Debased her and slandered her and now he called her a beast. The woman who had raised Soren the first few years of his life was the furthest thing from a monster.
The duke’s son was in the middle of another implausible story about fighting off subhumans at the Crimean border when Ashnard abruptly stood. The duke’s son looked surprised. Soren half wondered if his father’s patience had finally run out. Perhaps he would do something drastic, like skewer the duke’s son on the spot. It wouldn’t be unlike him.
“I have some business to attend to,” he said. His eyes glimmered as he put a heavy hand on Soren’s shoulder. “See that our guest isn’t bored.”
Soren felt himself frown. It wasn’t like his father to touch him so casually, or touch him at all.
His father squeezed his shoulder and then he left. Soren bit back a grimace, fighting the urge to brush off his robes where his father had touched him.
An uncomfortable silence fell over the room in his father’s absence. Soren was not one built for entertaining. He watched as the duke’s son leaned back in his seat, his eyes shining as he regarded Soren.
“You certainly don’t take after your father,” he said.
Soren bit back a snort.
“I was made certain promises,” the duke’s son said. “Offered certain things in exchange for influencing my father.”
“Oh?” Soren said, raising his eyebrows.
He doubted the Duke of Sella had anything in particular that interested his father. They were hardly what Soren would call friends, if his father had those at all. He leaned his chin on his palm, watching the duke’s son in the firelight.
“I wasn’t sure how good of a deal it was until I came here,” the duke’s son said.
“And now?” Soren asked.
The duke’s son reached out and wound a long lock of Soren’s hair around his finger. Soren froze.
“Now I think it’s a good deal,” he said. His other hand reached for Soren’s knee.
Soren slapped his hand away from him, rising from his seat.
“How dare you touch me,” he hissed.
The duke’s son’s eyes glimmered in the firelight. He slowly rose to his feet, and something about his movement reminded Soren of the tiger from months ago, the way it had looked before it had attacked. The duke’s son was also a hunter.
Soren was still the prince, even if his father despised him, even if he was some unsightly thing to be hidden and ignored. He was still the prince, and this man had no right to touch him.
“Keep your filthy hands to yourself,” he said. “I’ll have you thrown into the dungeons.”
The duke’s son laughed. He walked up to Soren, standing in front of him. Soren wanted to step back, but he wouldn’t show weakness. He didn’t let himself so much as wince when the duke’s son grabbed him by the arm, swallowing down his gasp.
“The king –” Soren began, only for the duke’s son to tighten his grip.
“Your father the King,” he drawled, “is a very interesting man.”
Soren hissed at him from between his teeth and struck him again. The force of the blow turned his head and the duke’s son made a quiet scoffing noise.
“Fierce as a dragon, that’s to be sure,” he said.
Soren tore himself out of his grip.
“That’s all right,” the duke’s son said. “I like a little bit of a fight before a good bedding.”
Soren spun around and sprinted for the door. The duke’s son was fast, though, and he grabbed him around the waist, nearly lifting him off the ground. Soren thrashed in his hold, trying to kick him, hit him, anything to make him let go of him.
The duke’s son grunted, but he let go of Soren, only to slap him hard across the face. Soren stumbled back from the force of the blow, clutching at his cheek. He was cornered now, the duke’s son between him and the door.
The grin on his face told Soren that he knew Soren was trapped, too.
The man was stronger than Soren, wrestling him down onto the table. Soren cried out, trying to twist out from underneath him to no avail. Hands ripped at his robes, tearing the delicate fabric. His hands were big and soft, and the touch of them made Soren sick.
It spun out in front of him even as the duke’s son pressed him back. Ike, called away from Soren’s side so suddenly. His father’s sudden departure. The lack of guards inside the room.
No one was going to help him.
His father had planned this. He’d offered Soren up on a silver platter. The analytical part of his mind demanded to know why, but then those big hands closed over his throat. Panic clouded his mind. He scrabbled for purchase against his wrists, trying to pull his hands away, to scratch him, anything to get him to let go.
The duke’s son only squeezed harder. Spots appeared in front of Soren’s vision.
On his eighteenth birthday, General Gawain had presented him in secret with a dagger and told Soren to carry it with him. He’d warned Soren not to let anyone, even his father, know about it.
Soren groped for it, his fingers shaking as they closed on the hilt. He slashed upwards, catching the duke’s son across the throat. Blood splashed hot across Soren’s body as the duke’s son moved to clutch at the wound. Soren shoved him off, gasping, the dagger still clutched in his hand. He stood there for a long moment, frozen and shocked, staring at Duke Sella’s son as he stumbled and fell to his knees.
Soren’s harsh breathing was loud in his own ears. Louder even than the duke’s son gurgling as his life drained out onto the floor.
Blood dripped from the dagger onto Soren’s ruined robes. He swallowed hard, hands shaking. He wanted to kick the body, to make sure that the duke’s son wouldn’t get back up, but he couldn’t seem to get himself to get up. When he ran a shaking hand over his face, it came away stained red with blood. He stared at it on his fingers, his eyes wide.
It was only his father’s dark chuckle that brought him back to himself. Ashnard stood framed in the doorway, hulking in his dark blue finery. He was wearing his usual vicious smirk, even at the sight of his only son covered in blood with a body slumped on the floor.
“Interesting,” he said. “I was hardly expecting you to deal the fatal blow.”
Soren pushed himself away from the war table with shaking hands and whirled on his father, his lips drawn back in a snarl.
“Never do that again,” he said, “or I’ll kill you instead.”
Ashnard’s eyes glimmered with amusement.
“You do look like your mother,” he said.
Soren hissed at him and then turned and left the room. The guards did not stop him. Only Bryce seemed to look anything close to regretful as he moved out of Soren’s way.
“My prince,” he murmured quietly. “Let me escort you back to your rooms.”
“Don’t touch me,” Soren snapped at him. “Don’t even come close or you’ll be next.”
Bryce hesitated and then he bowed his head. He didn’t follow when Soren turned away. None of the other guards followed him. They wouldn’t even look at him, and Soren realized with a sick feeling that they’d known what was about to happen. Everyone knew he’d been offered to that monster.
He strode quickly down the halls. He felt numb all over, his skin prickling in a strange way. The air seemed too thin, suddenly.
“Soren?”
He blinked suddenly and realized that Ike was staring at him from the other end of the hall. He was crossing quickly to him, concern written all over his face, and Soren found himself swaying.
“Prince Soren!”
Ike caught him by the upper arms, holding him still as he took in the extent of the damage. Soren’s ripped and ruined robes, the blood splashed across his face and hands, the red mark on his cheek where the duke’s son had struck him.
Fury flashed in Ike’s eyes.
“What happened?” he demanded. “Who did this to you?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Soren said. He was suddenly tired, more tired than he could remember ever being before.
“Of course it matters!” Ike said. “Who was it? I’ll –”
“You’ll do nothing,” Soren said, lifting his chin as he met Ike’s eyes. “You can’t. I killed him.”
Ike’s jaw dropped open and Soren felt something like a stab of annoyance. It was the first thing he’d felt besides the numb rage. He lifted a hand to Ike’s jaw and pushed his mouth closed.
It was only then that he realized his fingers were shaking. He pulled his hand back, staring at it. He still had that man’s blood on his hand. In that moment it felt like it burned.
Ike grabbed his bloodied hand, squeezing it tightly, and Soren raised his head to look at him. He couldn’t seem to make sense of the expression on his face.
“Soren, look at me,” Ike said. “Just at me.”
Soren licked his lips.
“I’m getting blood on you,” he said.
“It’s hardly the first time anyone’s done that,” Ike replied. “Is any of it yours?”
“No,” Soren said.
“That’s all that matters.”
Ike unslung his own cloak, setting it over Soren’s shoulders and securing it with his pin. Then, seemingly uncaring as to who would see in the viper’s nest that was the royal palace, he took Soren’s hand in his own and marched him to his wing of the palace. Soren’s body felt numb, but his legs were trembling. He was certain that without Ike he would have tripped.
Ike ordered the guards at the door away, seemingly aware Soren didn’t want to be seen by anyone. It was bad enough Ike had seen him like this, bruised and shaking, covered in an enemy’s blood. The knife was still clutched tightly in his hand. He kept it hidden out of sight beneath Ike’s cape.
With any luck, his father, amused by his own schemes, would think he had done away with the duke’s son with one of the steak knives.
He stood numbly by as Ike barked a command to the maid, asking for – things. A tub and warm water. Something to eat. Soren couldn’t seem to make any sense of it.
When everything had been delivered, Ike gave the maid a message to deliver to his father and then he sent her away.
Soren sank down into a chair. His knees felt weak. Ike’s cape slipped away, revealing his hand, his fingers still clutched around the dagger. Ike’s gaze fell to it instantly.
He knelt by Soren’s side, gently taking his wrist in one hand. Soren allowed him to turn his hand over, to see his white knuckles and the blood still on the blade. The blood still on Soren’s knuckles. Ike glanced up after a moment.
“I’ve never seen that knife before,” he said. “Where did you get it?”
Soren swallowed hard. His voice didn’t want to seem to work.
“Your father,” he finally said.
Ike looked unsurprised. He pressed his lips into a thin line and didn’t say anything in reply. Instead, he uncurled Soren’s fingers from around the hilt one by one, as if he understood that Soren himself didn’t seem to be able to let go of the blade. He took the blade from him—he was the only one Soren would allow to ever take a blade from him without a fight—and pressed his thumb to the center of Soren’s palm, rubbing firm circles until Soren’s fingers tingled.
“Where do you hide this?” he asked.
Soren told him about the secret compartment he’d created in the armoire and Ike nodded. He wiped the dagger off on his cape, much to Soren’s dismay, and then got up to go put it away. Soren slumped back into his chair, suddenly exhausted. He thought he might have drifted for a bit, focused only on the sound of Ike rummaging through the armoire, the sensation of dried blood on his hands.
There was the touch of a warm, wet cloth against his cheek, and he flinched.
“Sorry,” Ike said. “Here, just give me your hands.”
Soren couldn’t seem to think. He held out his hands and Ike took them, carefully cleaning the blood from Soren’s hands. He swiped it gently against his jaw next, then down the line of his neck.
“What happened?” Ike said, kneeling in front of him. “Soren. I need you to tell me.”
Soren licked his lips, cringing as he tasted the sharp iron tang of blood. Ike wouldn’t give up until he learned what happened, he knew that. It was better he heard it from Soren than go around asking any of the guards who had stood outside the room. He could only imagine what they’d tell Ike and how Ike would react.
He didn’t tell Ike everything. He left out some of the less savory details, like the touch of the man’s hands around his throat. He’d attacked him. Soren had killed him. It was as simple as that.
But Ike could clearly see his disheveled clothes and hair. Ike was smart, smarter than most people thought when they first met him, and he would put the clues together himself. Soren could already see the dark rage brewing on his face.
“The duke’s son,” he said. “Did he do this to you?”
Soren stared at him for a long moment.
“It doesn’t matter,” he finally said. “I killed him.”
“It still matters,” Ike said. “If he touched you –”
Soren cut him off with a sharp, brittle laugh.
“You’ll do what, Ike?” he asked, tilting his head. “Even you can’t fight a dead man.”
Ike set his jaw.
“For you, I would try,” he said.
Soren looked away.
“He didn’t manage much,” he said.
Ike’s gaze was piercing. Soren almost couldn’t bear to meet his eyes. He could still feel the duke’s son’s hand around his throat.
“I have fresh clothes for you,” he said after a moment. “Can you undress by yourself?”
After a moment, Soren nodded. He rose to his feet and tried to ignore the way his fingers trembled as he pulled at the ties to his robes. They fell in a bloody, ruined heap at his feet, and he stepped out of them. When he swayed, Ike reached out a hand to steady him. He only turned away when Soren stripped out of his under layer.
He felt a little more grounded once he was wearing clean clothes, a plain nightshirt that was warm and soft. His hands still trembled faintly, but he curled them into fists in his lap so it wouldn’t show.
“Your father,” Ike said suddenly, as if it had just occurred to him. “We have to tell the king.”
“My father?” Soren said blankly.
“He’ll be furious,” Ike said. “He’ll have the Duke of Sella’s head. How dare that man send his son here to assault his son!”
“Ike,” Soren said. “My father knows.”
“What?” Ike said.
“He arranged it,” Soren said. “Or one of his strategists did. The latter, most likely, but he still agreed.”
“I don’t understand,” Ike said, his brows drawn together. “The king… wanted that man to attack you?”
Soren stood up. He paced the room, agitated, his mind suddenly racing.
“The Duke of Sella poses a specific risk to my father,” he said. “His family is old. Powerful. They date back to the founding of Daein, as far back as the king’s own line. They are influential and noble, and my father’s reign is… unpopular, with some. With those who prefer Daein the way it was, stiff and unyielding, each and every social class in its own place.”
“You think that it was a trap,” Ike said slowly. “But that’s… I know how he treats you, but you’re still his son.”
He said it like someone who couldn’t believe a father would do that to his son. His own father never would.
But Gawain was different from Ashnard.
That the duke’s son had attacked the prince gave Ashnard cause to make an example of him. The older son, Soren had no doubt, would meet his end on the battlefield before the year was out. The duke would have no heirs.
And if the younger had killed Soren, well, then sacrifices had to be made. Princes were pawns. If his father were another man, Soren would say that he was still young. He could have another heir. But for years now he’d doubted very much whether his father cared to continue his bloodline.
He very much doubted whether his father cared for anything at all, save for bloodshed.
“Soren?” Ike said, and Soren was startled by his voice. He sounded so gentle and so concerned. He took Soren by the shoulders, his rough hands tender. “Should I call for a healer?”
“Oh,” Soren said. “I’m all right, Ike. There’s no need.”
He thought he’d shatter if anyone touched him. Anyone except Ike.
Ike raised a careful hand to his bruised cheek.
“You’ll tell me if you need one,” he said after a moment, gently drawing his knuckles down Soren’s jaw.
Soren took a shuddering breath. He leaned his cheek into Ike’s hand.
“All right,” Ike said after a moment. “Don’t have me executed for this.”
“That’s not funny,” Soren said automatically. Then, pausing. “What?”
Ike got an arm behind the backs of Soren’s knees and lifted him up easily. Soren made a noise of surprise, arms winding around Ike’s neck. His head spun; the ground suddenly seemed very far away.
“Up we go,” Ike said. “I won’t drop you, don’t worry.”
“I wasn’t,” Soren said, swallowing hard. Ike’s face was so close. He was still frowning, concern written all over his expression. Soren ached all over again just looking at him. “I was just… surprised.”
It was only a few steps to the bed. Ike set him down so gently, then settled behind Soren.
“Your hair,” he said. “It’ll tangle if we leave it like this.”
Soren was tempted to tell him to leave it. Let it tangle. He could take a knife to it, cut it all off. Except when he thought of his mother, one of the things he remembered most was her long, dark hair.
He reached up and numbly started to remove the pins.
“Just let me take care of it,” Ike said, and Soren glanced up, shocked. His fingers slid slowly from his hair.
“All right,” he said, hoarse, swallowing hard.
Ike gently pulled the ties from his hair, one by one, with a patience Soren rarely saw from him. He unwound the long locks, draping them gently over Soren’s shoulders as he worked. He felt like he was coming undone beneath Ike’s hands, every motion making his breath hitch and loosening something inside of him that had been locked up tight since his father had left him alone with the duke’s son.
Since before that. For years and years, Soren had had to be frozen. His heart had to be ice, lead, something cold and unfeeling. It was very hard not to feel when he could feel the warmth of Ike at his back.
Ike picked up the brush and began to carefully work it through the length of Soren’s hair. He worked from the bottom up so he wouldn’t pull on the tangles, and Soren didn’t have to look behind him to know that he wore a look of the utmost concentration.
“I can do that,” Soren said after a moment. He’d meant to say it normally, but his voice came out a hoarse whisper. “You don’t have to trouble yourself.”
Ike was quiet for a moment, but he didn’t stop brushing Soren’s hair.
“Ike?” he said.
“Everyone calls me your champion,” Ike said, and Soren could hear the strain in his voice. “But I couldn’t protect you from this. Let me do what I can now.”
When he was done, Ike began to weave his hair into a simple braid.
No one had taken so much care with his hair since his mother had used to brush it. Soren’s throat burned.
“You’re good at that,” he said quietly.
Ike coughed a little.
“I used to braid Mist’s hair for her, when she was little,” he said. “My mother showed me how. Yours is a lot nicer.”
Soren felt his cheeks heat up. He already knew Ike liked his hair. He’d commented on it as children, and it had only made Soren more determined not to cut it.
“Don’t let Mist hear you say that,” he said, and Ike snorted.
“Don’t worry, I’m not looking for another pile of snow left in my bed at home,” he said. He tied off Soren’s hair and then, for just a moment, he rested his broad palm in between Soren’s shoulder blades.
Soren twisted around to look at him. The concern shining in his eyes hurt more than the fresh bruise on his face.
“I’m fine, Ike,” he said. “I’ll be fine.”
Ike didn’t say anything. He just raised a hand as if to cup it gently to Soren’s face, but he didn’t actually touch him. He dropped his hand after a moment and climbed to his feet.
“I’ll be outside at the door,” he said. “Just get me if you need anything.”
The firelight was casting odd shadows across the room, though, making it seem like someone could come out from behind the curtains or emerge from the shadows at any time. Normally, except for Ike and Rajaion, Soren preferred to be alone. Right now, it seemed like a terrible thing. Like Soren would disappear if he was left alone.
Soren didn’t want him to go. Quickly, he climbed to his feet. Ike turned at the rustle of bedding, raising his eyebrows.
“Will you…” Soren said, grasping the banister of his bed in one hand. His throat worked, but he couldn’t seem to get the words out. It felt like stepping over a line to ask Ike. It felt like commanding him, and that was the last thing Soren wanted.
Ike’s gaze softened.
“I’ll stay,” he said. “Just until you fall asleep.”
Relief flooded through Soren’s body. He sat down heavily, like his strings had been cut, one hand curled around the banister for support. The events of the night seemed to rush back over him, all his aches and pains felt fresh, from the bruising at his throat to the ache at the back of his knees where they’d hit the edge of the table too hard. His fingers stung from where he’d clawed the duke’s son, his palm aching from gripping the dagger’s hilt too tight.
It took Ike to coax him to lie back against the pillows. He clucked like a hen as he drew the blankets up over Soren, fussing as he complained about the chill in the room as if he was Soren’s nursemaid. If Soren could have, he would have laughed. Instead, there was a sweet, sharp ache in the center of his chest, different from any physical pain.
Ike laid down beside him, over the covers. He hesitated for a moment and then there was a hand on Soren’s waist. Featherlight, barely touching. But it let him know that Ike was there.
Soren rolled over until they were nose to nose. Ike stared back at him.
Slowly, he moved his hand from Soren’s waist up to his arm, his touch gentle as it traveled further up until he was cupping Soren’s cheek.
“I won’t let them touch you and live,” Ike said, tracing a finger gently beneath the red mark on Soren’s cheek.
“I killed him already,” Soren said. The shock of that hadn’t quite faded yet, didn’t quite feel real.
“I didn’t mean only him,” Ike said. “I meant the man who put him there.”
Soren was tired. He didn’t immediately grasp the meaning of Ike’s words. When he did, his eyes widened.
Ike rolled over, tucking his hands behind his head. He glared at the blood red canopy of Soren’s bed.
“One day, I am going to kill your father,” Ike said simply.
Something almost like a truce seemed to settle over him and his father in the days after the failed assault.
His father was not warm to him, but then he never had been. That would have been stranger, Soren thought. But he was very nearly civil, if his father could ever be considered such a thing. Most importantly, he left Soren alone.
Perhaps Ashnard was simply pleased his useless son had finally bloodied his hands.
Like Soren had predicted, the Duke of Sella’s older son fell shortly in a border skirmish. The duke himself, heirless and distraught, simply withered away over the course of a few months. Or that was what the rumor said, anyway.
Soren found that he didn’t care. The only reason not to be glad the entire line was gone was because it made his father happy.
He tried to put Ike’s words from his mind as something said merely in anger, but it was difficult. Ike always said what he meant.
Ike was determined, and Ike was impatient. Soren watched him like a hawk for days after he’d said it, waiting for him to do something dangerous. But apparently Ike had decided now was the time to learn to bide his time. That was somehow even more unnerving.
The next attempt on his life was nothing of note, but Soren was almost glad for it. It gave Ike something else to be angry about, even though the would-be assassin was quickly apprehended and made an example of. It was hardly as dramatic as the last time, he reminded Ike, which just made Ike all the more outraged.
It surprised Soren, then, when his father held council about it.
“These assassination attempts against my only son find me troubled as of late,” Ashnard said, his chin propped up on one hand. He tilted his head to the side, his grin belying his words. He thought himself amusing. “That Daein’s only prince is threatened in my own castle cannot stand.”
Soren’s lip curled. He didn’t keep the disdain from his face as he stared up at his father.
“Bring him in,” Ashnard barked.
The grand doors opened. Two soldiers marched in, dragging a boy between them. Even from across the hall, Soren could feel his fear. The soldiers shoved the boy to the ground, and he crumpled, his knees going out from under him.
The boy was kneeling on the stone ground, and he was visibly trembling. He had a mop of curly dark blue hair and pale skin. His clothes were dirty and ragged.
Soren looked back at his father.
“What’s the meaning of this?” he asked.
The boy raised his head, and his hair fell away from his forehead. Soren’s breath caught in his throat.
He had a mark on his forehead very much like Soren’s own.
The boy’s name was Pelleas, and he was an orphan, Soren quickly learned. Not only an orphan, but a poor orphan. He had no money, no family standing, no family name. He was, all things considered, at the very bottom of Daein’s food chain, a prey animal surrounded by predators.
No one would miss him. Soren slowly twirled a chess piece between his fingers, trying to work out the machinations of his father’s game.
At first, he’d entertained the idea that the boy was his father’s bastard. But his father had never had any interest in women. Even his interest in men was what Soren would call unconventional. So he dismissed the idea quickly.
If there was a resemblance, it was a coincidence. And it was exploitable.
After all, few outside the castle had ever seen Prince Soren. He did not resemble his father. Pelleas, with his dark blue hair and taller frame, was a more reasonable approximation of Ashnard’s son – although he had the manner of a nervous rabbit.
Well, no matter. Everyone knew the Prince of Daein was strange and reclusive.
He ate alone with Ike that night in his rooms. Nights like this, where they had the opportunity to be alone, all the servants dismissed, were rare, and Soren secretly treasured them. He kept a list of Ike’s favorite dishes and always had those ready, hot from the kitchens, by the time Ike arrived in his rooms.
It was always a pleasure to watch Ike’s eyes light up like they used to when he was a kid, before he entered the royal guard. Tonight, though, his father’s latest scheme weighed heavily on him. Ike seemed to sense it.
“It’s bothering you, huh?” he said. “That boy your father dragged in.”
He kept eating as he spoke, his eyes fixed on his plate. Soren knew his mother despaired of his table manners, but he didn’t mind. He liked that Ike was blunt and informal.
“My father threw me to the lions a month ago,” he said. “He has no concern for my safety. So there’s another agenda at work.”
His own dinner sat mostly untouched in front of him. Ike looked up and raised an eyebrow.
“So tell me your theories,” he said. “But you have to eat, too.”
Soren pursed his lips in disdain. Ike snorted and pointed at his plate before he started to eat again. He was waiting Soren out, Soren knew. Ike wasn’t the most patient man, but he could play the long game when he wanted.
He nodded in approval when Soren took a bite. He waved a hand and Soren sighed. The food tasted too heavy on his tongue, too rich and oily. He forced himself to swallow it anyway, just to appease Ike.
“So this Pelleas, he isn’t for my protection,” he said. “I think we can both agree on that.”
“I don’t think Pelleas is much good for anyone’s protection,” Ike snorted.
Soren bit his cheek so he wouldn’t smile. After all, nothing about this situation was very funny. Ike had finished his dinner, and Soren had no appetite anyway. He rose from his seat and wandered over to the fireplace.
“He wants me to know I’m replaceable,” Soren said. “It’s possible now to dispose of me at any moment and unveil to the public a false prince in my place. He isn’t protection. He’s a threat.”
He kept his gaze fixed on the fire as Ike came up behind him. He could feel him at his back, strong and solid.
“Do you think he’s going to –” Ike began, only for Soren to shake his head.
“No,” Soren said. “I don’t think he’s going to do anything. If he was, he wouldn’t have given me warning. He’d just have done it. But I think he wants me to know that he could do it, if he wanted. At any point now, if I make myself a liability to him, he can simply replace me with a spineless, easy to manipulate orphan who just happens to bear my mark.”
A hand landed on his shoulder, spinning him around.
“Does your father’s cruelty know no end?” Ike demanded.
“Don’t speak like that,” Soren said. He took Ike’s face between his hands. “You know there are ears everywhere. Have some care, Ike. For me, if not for yourself.”
“I care only for you,” Ike said, his eyes blazing. “That’s why I can’t stand to see you treated this way. Like some – some pawn he can do whatever he likes with.”
“That’s what princes are, Ike,” Soren said. He let go and stepped back, away from Ike’s warmth. He let the ice settle inside of him once again.
Ike made a frustrated noise, and then he seized Soren’s face between his hands and kissed him.
Everything seemed to stop for Soren.
It was a clumsy kiss. Even Soren could tell. But it didn’t matter, because it was Ike, and he was kissing Soren. He felt dizzy, frozen to the spot. He tried to kiss back but found he couldn’t, could only make a broken little noise against Ike’s lips. His hands flew useless to flutter by Ike’s chest.
He gasped when the kiss broke, Ike panting heavily. He stared down at Soren, his cheeks pink and his eyes searching. Then his mouth tightened into a thin line.
Ike stepped back. His eyes were downcast.
“Forgive me, my prince,” he said after a moment. “I shouldn’t have done that.”
My prince, he’d said, and not Soren.
Soren didn’t want to be his prince. He’d only ever wanted to be Ike’s.
Soren surged forward, up on the tips of his toes, so he could press his lips back against Ike’s. Ike’s surprised gasp felt like it shook him to his core. Then Ike was kissing him back, one hand on his hip and the other tangled in his hair.
Soren had never let himself imagine what kissing Ike would be like. It was far too dangerous. But it didn’t matter, because whatever he could have possibly imagined would have never lived up to the reality of it, the warmth of Ike’s mouth, his winter chapped lips, the noises he made. The possessive way he grasped Soren’s hip, the slide of his fingers through his hair.
His body blazed hotter than the fire at their backs.
They kissed over and over again, fumbling and clumsy, trying to learn each other’s rhythms, what felt right. Soren had never kissed anyone before. Neither, he knew, had Ike. Soren had gone so long without touch that it was overwhelming, having Ike all over him, the anchoring grasp of his hand and the hungry press of his lips. When he licked into Soren’s mouth, over the sharp points of his canine teeth, Soren moaned.
Ike had always been a fast learner. He was panting when he pulled back, red in the face, but his gaze was as direct and determined as always.
“How long?” Soren asked, his fingers twisted in the fabric of Ike’s shirt.
Ike licked his lips, shook his head.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Always. Since the first time I saw you, even before I knew what it meant to be in love with someone.” The corner of his lips lifted, that slight little smile. “I probably gave my dad a few grey hairs when I told him I was going to marry the prince.”
“You told your father—”
“I told my father, my mother,” Ike said, kissing over his face. “I would have told all the servants if they hadn’t forbidden me. I was seven, Soren. Mist teased me in private for years.”
Soren made a disbelieving noise and Ike shook his head.
“It’s true,” he said. “Ask Mist if you don’t believe me.”
It felt like too much to be true. Soren had never dreamed about anything like that, never allowed himself childish fantasies. He had Ike. It was enough.
“We can’t, you know,” Soren said, his voice quiet.
“I know,” Ike said, his voice soft. His thumb rubbed gentle over Soren’s knuckles. “But that doesn’t matter. I’m sworn to you anyway.”
It should have been the other way around, Soren thought.
“What do you want, Soren?” Ike asked, his breath hot against Soren’s lips.
Soren wanted too much. He touched careful fingers to Ike’s chest, trying to catalogue his desires. He would be more than happy to do whatever Ike wanted, but Ike had asked first, and Soren knew he would be stubborn about it.
He wanted Ike to kiss him. He wanted Ike to throw him down and take apart. He wanted to just be Ike’s Soren, and not Daein’s unwanted prince.
“I want you to rip my clothes off,” Soren said.
A low, guttural noise left Ike’s lips. He pulled back, his eyes wide and his cheeks red.
“Are you sure?” he demanded.
Soren licked his lips nervously.
“Yes,” he said, sliding his hands up Ike’s chest. “I’m very sure.”
Ike grabbed a handful of fabric and pulled it back, exposing Soren’s neck and shoulder. A thrill caught in the pit of Soren’s stomach as he tore open his robes and ripped open the lacings. The fabric gave away easily under Ike’s hands.
Soren’s ruined robes hit the ground, a silken puddle by his feet. He was bare, completely, for Ike.
He had always been completely bare for Ike.
He worried that like this, Ike might finally see the flaws in him that everyone else seemed to see so readily. Ike was on him instantly, big hands on Soren’s hips, his lips over Soren’s own. He kissed him hungrily, the grasp of his hands possessive.
“Can I…” he seemed to have trouble taking his lips away from Soren’s skin for long enough to form a full sentence. Soren felt hopelessly endeared all over again, even as anxiety and excitement swooped in his stomach. “Soren – can I?”
Soren reached out to him, drawing him back up so he could seal their lips together again. His champion, his guard, his friend.
“Yes,” he said.
The rest of their clothes followed suit, left on a pile on the floor by Soren’s ripped robes. Ike was unbelievable up close and bare, and Soren couldn’t believe he got to touch him. He paused when he came face to face with Ike’s chest, then pressed his lips to the spot where the tiger had slashed Ike years ago.
He gasped as Ike slung him up and over his shoulder, scrabbling at Ike’s back even though he knew Ike wouldn’t let him fall. Ike’s grip on his upper thigh seemed to burn. He marched them towards the bed and threw Soren down on it and Soren, shocked, actually laughed, reaching up to brush his hair out of his face.
Ike was on him in a second and then they were kissing again, Soren’s arms twined around his neck as Ike braced himself over him on his knees.
“Do it again,” Ike panted when they broke apart. Soren shivered as his voice seemed to go right through him, rough and almost desperate.
“Do what?” he asked. It was hard to form the words when Ike was so distracting up close. He traced a hand up the swell of Ike’s bicep, fascinated by his warm, smooth skin, by the fact that he was now allowed to touch.
“You laughed,” Ike said. “Do it again.”
It was such a ridiculous request that Soren did actually laugh, disbelieving. He tried to cover his mouth, to muffle the sound, only for Ike to drag his wrist away. He pressed kisses to his cheeks, to the corner of his mouth, laughing himself.
Then he started on Soren’s throat.
He nipped at Soren’s collarbone, at the spot where his neck met his shoulder, hands sweeping down his sides. He kissed a line down Soren’s chest, lingering over his flat belly. Soren was so hard he ached.
It was fumbling at first, but thrilling, and eventually they fell into a rhythm that was only somewhat awkward. They’d both stopped laughing then, breath mingling between the two of them as they kissed over and over. Soren tried to stifle the noises he made as Ike’s length slid against his.
Afterwards, they lay tangled together, Soren half on top of Ike’s chest and Ike’s arm slung heavy over his waist. Ike’s chest was heaving, his skin gloriously warm and sweat slick beneath Soren’s palm. He met Soren eagerly when Soren raised himself up and tilted his head for another kiss.
“Did you like it?” Ike asked, his voice rough.
“I think,” Soren said, swallowing hard, “we have to work on our coordination.”
Ike laughed.
“Okay,” he said, smoothing a hand over Soren’s flank. “I’m a fast learner, don’t you worry.”
Soren’s ruined finery was used to clean them up and then after Ike climbed on top of him again, pulling Soren firmly against his body. He yawned loudly, pulled the covers up over both of them. It took some time to get comfortable, the two of them never having shared a bed before, but Soren would have been just fine half-crushed beneath Ike if it meant he got to touch him.
They kissed a bit, slow and gentle, nothing like before. Soren pressed himself up as close to Ike as he could get, one leg thrown over Ike’s and his hands on Ike’s chest. All he wanted to do was touch him. It only felt real when he was touching him.
Gradually, the kisses tapered off. Ike’s lashes fluttered, his head on Soren’s pillow, and a content smile on his face.
“Ike?” Soren whispered. “Are you asleep?”
A snore was the only answer he got. Soren pressed a hand over his mouth to hide his smile. Even alone together in his room, with Ike asleep, it felt too private to show the moon or the stars.
He would need to sneak out before dawn’s first light. The maids would bustle in early and all evidence of Ike would have to be gone. Soren would have to strip the bed himself, hide the old sheets until he could burn them. No one could ever know.
But for now, Ike was asleep in Soren’s bed, and Soren had never been happier.
He leaned over Ike’s sleeping body, touching the broad plane of his back. He lowered his mouth to his ear.
“I love you,” he whispered.
It should have only happened once. That was what Soren told himself.
It would have been more than Soren could have ever asked for to even have Ike once.
But it didn’t happen only once. It happened again the very next morning, just as dawn light was filtering through the window. It was rushed, the two of them tangling together and kissing desperately, Soren half-distracted, listening for any hint of sound in the hall.
And then Ike came back the next night. And the next.
And the next.
It was dangerous. It was foolish. It was not like Soren to give into his baser instincts, not when there was so much at stake. Ike’s safety, possibly his very life – he didn’t know what his father would do if they were discovered.
There was a distinct possibility that he wouldn’t care, but then his father was too mercurial for Soren to be sure about that. Often his father was cruel just to be cruel. Soren couldn’t hand him another weakness, and certainly not one in the form of Ike.
Ike was currently making it very difficult to think about the finer points of that strategy.
“Ah,” Soren said, clutching handfuls of his bedding. “Ah, Ike.”
“Yeah?” Ike asked. He pulled back to nuzzle Soren’s thigh, nip at his hip. His eyes glimmered as he glanced up at him. His mouth was red and wet. “Something you need, my prince?”
Soren made a wordless noise and tried to push Ike’s head back down. Ike snickered, his shoulders shaking with it, and went with the motion, his big hands hauling Soren’s thighs further apart.
Soren had never seen him as happy as when their clothes were off. Ike had always carried so much. The expectations of everyone for him to live up to his father’s reputation as a famed general and Rider of Daein. Caring for his mother and his sister. His own strict training regimen, the fighting skills he’d worked so hard to earn.
Protecting Soren.
It was rare to see him relaxed. But here, finally, in Soren’s bed, he looked like the nineteen-year-old he actually was, frown line between his brows softened as he pressed his lips to Soren’s hip.
“How are you so perfect?” he asked, his voice rough.
Soren cast a glance at Ike’s rippling back muscles and snorted.
“Come back up here,” he said, his voice gone imperious. “I’ll make it an order if you don’t.”
Ike grinned, surging forward. He tangled his fingers with Soren’s, pressing him down against the bed and chasing his mouth instead.
“You’re giving me orders, now?” he asked, his free hand skimming down Soren’s stomach.
It was like now that they had started, they couldn’t stop. Soren had never craved anything the way he craved Ike’s touch.
“When appropriate,” he gasped out.
“My prince,” Ike said, his voice teasing as he kissed Soren’s throat.
“Ah, don’t,” Soren said, shaking his head. He didn’t want to be Ike’s prince in bed. He only wanted to be Soren. “Don’t call me that.”
For the first time since they’d fallen into bed, Ike hesitated. He stared down at Soren, his brows furrowed like he was trying to put together the pieces of the puzzle.
“But you are,” he said. When Soren opened his mouth to argue, Ike continued, “You’re my prince. Not because of who your father is. Because you’re you, Soren. I would follow you anywhere.”
Soren’s breath caught. It was a relief when Ike leaned forward and kissed him again, cutting off any need for him to reply. He could think instead about Ike’s callused hand sliding up the bare expanse of his thigh, fingers squeezing just beneath his ass, as he rolled them over, so Soren was braced over him.
His unbound hair fell loose around them, and Soren reached up to push it back, revealing Ike’s face, the glimmer in his eye.
“What are you doing?” he asked, breathless, pointless. He had some idea, of course. Ike was hardly subtle.
“I want to try it this way,” Ike said, fingers digging into the backs of Soren’s thighs as Soren arched his back, let his hair cascade over his shoulders. “With you on top of me.”
“Oh,” Soren said, rocking his hips back. He could feel Ike’s length, hot and thick, and caught his lip between his teeth. “If you l-like, Ike.”
“I like it, I think,” Ike said. He couldn’t seem to decide where he wanted to touch, his hands drifting from Soren’s thighs up to his ass, gripping his hips. Soren, oil-slick and open, aching from Ike’s fingers, would have done anything Ike wanted.
Afterwards, they lay together tangled in the sheets, panting as they tried to get their breath back.
“Did you?” Soren asked, pushing himself up on one elbow. He pushed his hair back from his face, staring down at Ike. “Like it, I mean.”
The smug expression on Ike’s face told him all he needed to know. He huffed, nudging him, and Ike snorted.
“Yeah, I liked it,” he said. “A lot more than I was anticipating, actually.”
Soren raised his eyebrows.
“And how long were you anticipating for, exactly?” he asked, dry.
“Soldiers talk a lot in the barracks, about the things they do in bed.”
Soren shot him a look and Ike shrugged one shoulder.
“I don’t talk,” he said. “But it’s hard not to overhear things.”
“Don’t listen to things like that,” Soren groused. He sat up, savoring the twinge in his hips, and reached for the hair clips that had fallen to the sheets when Ike pulled them from his locks.
Ike didn’t bother to get up. He just wound an arm around Soren’s waist and drew him close again, fingers drawing patterns on his stomach as Soren tried to tame his hair before it tangled.
“You liked it,” he said, stated like a fact, as he pressed lightly against Soren’s belly. Soren felt his cheeks flush, remembering how he’d panted and moaned, gasped about how deep it felt.
He swatted at Ike’s hand.
“You’re not some common steed, Ike,” he bit out. Ike snorted in amusement.
It seemed he wasn’t done with Soren yet. When Soren made to climb from the bed, Ike’s arm tightened around him, drawing him back down. His other hand came up to pluck the clip from Soren’s hair, sending it cascading over his shoulders again.
“You’ve ridden a wyvern, right?” Ike said, pulling Soren on top of him. “This isn’t that different.”
“It’s very different!” Soren snapped. “Besides, you know I haven’t.”
The only wyvern that let him near was Rajaion, and Soren was not allowed to fly him. The others snapped at him, growled in his presence. His father had put him on one when he was young anyway and it was only a hasty catch by Gawain that had saved Soren from being thrown.
He glared down at Ike, his loose hair falling around them like a curtain.
“All right,” Ike said. He traced his big hands up Soren’s thighs to his hips, stroked back down. “I’ll teach you.”
“Teach me?” Soren almost laughed, but the feeling of Ike’s length pressing against him made him feel breathless.
“Yeah,” Ike said, looking up at him with that smile he reserved just for him. His fingers dug into Soren’s hips. “I’ll teach you.”
“I didn’t think when you said you’d teach me to ride that you meant an actual wyvern.”
Ike shrugged, creeping down the hall with Soren following close behind him. Soren was wearing a plain beige cloak with the hood drawn up, hiding his face.
“It’s a good skill to have,” Ike said.
“It won’t work,” Soren told him. “Even you’re not more stubborn than a wyvern, Ike.”
Ike just shrugged a little.
“I’ll take that challenge,” he said.
Soren made sure to keep the hood of his cloak pulled up as they slipped past the guards, but they seemed familiar with Ike and happy enough to let him pass. If a few curious glances were sent Soren’s way, no one said anything.
There would probably be rumors in the palace tomorrow about Sir Ike’s secret paramour, Soren thought with a grimace. Like he knew what he was thinking, Ike tossed him an amused look over his shoulder and squeezed his hand.
There was a figure waiting up ahead, by the wyvern training grounds. As they drew closer, Soren recognized her as Jill Fizzart, daughter of the famed wyvern rider Lord Shiharam.
Over the past year, his father had invited—ordered—a select few lords and ladies to send their children to the castle for a royal education. Soren knew very well that it was little more than a hostage situation, but what could they do but comply? Lord Shiharam of Talrega had sent his daughter, as had retired Rider of Daein, Lanvega.
Tall and redheaded, Jill cut an imposing picture where she stood beside a large wyvern with leathery dark wings.
“Thanks, Jill,” Ike said when they reached her.
“I’m just doing this as a favor for Mist,” Jill said. She peered curiously at Soren, who kept his head down and his hood up. “Who’s your friend?”
“Just someone from the castle,” Ike said, which Soren supposed wasn’t technically a lie. “I promised I’d take him flying.”
He reached a hand out, palm open and up, towards the wyvern. It gave him a suspicious look, but slowly moved forward, and after a moment it butted its head against Ike’s hand much like a cat would do to a favorite family member. Soren had only had one wyvern treat him like that before, and it was a different experience with Rajaion.
Even as large and imposing as this wyvern was, it was no match for Rajaion’s sheer size.
“She’s a calm girl,” Ike said, patting the wyvern on the neck.
“Commander Haar trains wyverns well,” Jill said, but there was a note of disapproval in her voice. “He can’t exactly afford to have one throw him as soon as he falls asleep and his grip slacks.”
Ike snorted.
“Thanks, Jill,” he said. “I’ll have her back before dawn.”
“You’d better,” Jill said. “She’s due to meet her new rider tomorrow.”
Ike’s expression tightened. As if realizing her words, Jill looked away.
A month before, a troop of wyvern riders had embarked on what was officially a scouting mission. Only a few had returned, led by a battered Captain Haar. The loss of that many wyvern riders had hit the army hard. Ike had been shaken by it, too, Soren knew. He’d brooded in Soren’s room afterwards.
Ike reached out and took his hand, drawing him forward towards the wyvern.
“It’s okay,” he said. “You can touch her.”
The wyvern let out a low, quiet growl. Soren took a step back.
“The king’s mount makes them nervous,” Gawain had told him, once. “You smell like him to them, but you’re not the threat he is. That’s why they snap at you.”
It made sense, Soren thought. Rajaion was so much larger than the average wyvern, his teeth and claws sharper. He couldn’t be kept in the same stables as them or he’d rip them to pieces.
Only his father could control him when he was in one of his rages. His father, and Soren.
Ike yanked briskly on the wyvern’s reins.
“Stop that,” he commanded. When the wyvern twisted her head, Ike tugged once more, firm, and then let go.
He turned and held out his hand to Soren.
“Come on,” he said. “It’s safe. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
He hoisted Soren up, onto the back of the wyvern, and then slung himself up in front of him.
“Hold onto me!” he called over his shoulder, and Soren only had enough time to throw his arms around Ike’s middle before Ike snapped the reins and the wyvern stretched her wide wings out with a cry.
They swooped into the sky, the wind blowing Soren’s hood back and whipping his hair around his face. He had to cling to Ike tightly, his stomach swooping at the unfamiliar feeling, and clenched his teeth against the urge to shout.
He had no idea how Ike enjoyed this, but it was clear that he did. He stayed calm and collected as they climbed, higher and higher, occasionally urging the wyvern into a swoop that threatened to turn Soren’s stomach. He clutched Ike tightly, burying his face in the back of his cape.
“Look,” Ike said after several minutes had passed. He swept an arm out. “Down there, that’s the palace.”
Against his better judgment, Soren loosened his grip enough to peer down at the ground below.
The castle looked so small from up here, like a child’s toy. Soren’s chest clenched to think of it, how it seemed to lose its power from this vantage. It looked suddenly like something he could crush.
He stared at it for a long time, until it fell away from sight as Ike steered them towards a rocky outcrop on the mountainside. He landed the wyvern expertly, dismounting before reaching up to pull Soren from the wyvern’s back.
Ike had a proud look on his face as he gazed up at Soren. It made him shiver.
The wyvern shot them a nasty look, but she seemed content to stay put after Ike tossed her a dried hunk of meat. He and Soren settled a little ways away, looking down at the city beneath them.
“You did good,” Ike said, tossing him a waterskin. “A lot of people throw up their first time.”
Soren grimaced.
“That would hardly be romantic,” he said.
“I don’t mind if it’s you,” Ike said. It was a strangely sweet statement, one Ike immediately ruined by adding, “Mist’s thrown up on me enough over the years, after all.”
“Let’s change the subject,” Soren said, flat. It was cold this high up, and he shivered. “I still don’t understand why you wanted to take me flying so badly.”
Ike shrugged. He reached over and tugged Soren against his side, wrapping an arm around his shoulders.
“I like to keep my feet on the ground when I fight,” Ike said. “All I need is a sword in my hand and my own strength. But flying is different.”
He glanced over at Soren, reaching up to brush a lock of his hair behind his ear.
“If you could do anything, be anything you wanted,” Ike said. “What would you do?”
Soren had never thought about it. For him, there was no other life than this. But Ike had asked him the question, so he pondered for a long moment. His mind conjured up pictures of places he’d only read about in books, high mountain vistas and deep blue oceans.
But no matter how he tried, he could not picture himself among them.
“I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “What about you?”
“Hm,” Ike said. “I like fighting. I’m good at it. But I’d prefer to work for myself. My dad used to joke that he should quit and go be a mercenary somewhere. I think I’d like to do that, if I could choose.”
Soren could imagine it. Ike’s fierce spirit and talent with the sword would keep him in high demand.
“But mostly,” Ike said, smiling, “I want to be by your side. That’s enough for me.”
“It shouldn’t be,” Soren said. “You should want more for yourself.”
Ike snorted. He tugged gently on a lock of Soren’s hair.
“You’re enough of a handful,” he teased. “No, I promised myself when I was young. I’m going to stay by your side and protect you.”
Guilt lanced through Soren, sharp as a knife. He’d known it all along, of course. If not for him, Ike could be free.
“If I could anything at all, I’d choose to travel the world with you by my side,” Ike said.
“That would be nice,” Soren whispered. The winter wind burned as it whipped past them.
“It’s freedom,” Ike said.
“Freedom is something I’ve never known,” Soren said.
Ike was quiet for a moment, just watching the horizon. The sky was starting to lighten, and they’d have to return to the castle before dawn broke. Dread sat heavy in the pit of Soren’s stomach. He didn’t want the night to end.
“I’m going to change that,” Ike said at last. He reached for Soren’s hand, squeezing tight. “I promise you.”
It was a silly fantasy. As much of his father’s captive as he was a prince, Soren would never be free.
Still, he found himself smiling.
He met with his father’s ill-gotten orphan boy when he could put it off no longer.
Weeks in the castle had done nothing to temper Pelleas’ meekness. Soren watched him fidget and squirm as he sat across from him in the fine suite of rooms he’d been given, and wondered how long he would survive.
Daein was not kind to men who behaved like little mice.
The conversation had been stiff, stilted. Pelleas stole glances at him from underneath his curly bangs, an open curiosity on his face, but he only answered when Soren spoke, and didn’t offer up any conversation himself.
It was deeply irritating.
“Do you plan to gawk at me all day?” Soren asked.
“Ah!” Pelleas said, jumping a little. Soren resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “M-my apologies, Your Highness.”
Leaning against the door, his arms crossed over his chest, Ike snorted. Pelleas gave him a nervous look over his shoulder and Ike raised his eyebrows. Pelleas quickly looked away.
Every time Ike so much as shifted, Pelleas’ shoulders hiked themselves a little higher. It was exhausting to watch.
“Apologies are unnecessary,” Soren said. “Let your actions speak for themselves.”
“Yes, Your Highness,” Pelleas said after a pause. “It’s only that this is all so new for me. This… grandeur. I never expected to be chosen as a prince’s body double.”
“That makes two of us, at least,” Soren said. Ike barely disguised his snort as a cough.
“I knew Daein had a prince, but I’d heard he’s never been seen outside the castle,” Pelleas said softly. “I wondered what he might be like. I didn’t expect…”
He trailed off, awkward. Ike glanced over, his expression tightening. He’d taken it as an insult.
“I’m well aware I bear little resemblance to my father,” Soren said. Beneath the table, out of Pelleas’ line of sight, he waved a hand at Ike. Stand down.
Ike heaved a great, silent sigh, but relaxed against the doorway again.
“May I ask a question, Your Highness?” Pelleas said.
Soren resisted the urge to sigh.
“Make it quick,” he said.
“Your mark,” Pelleas said tentatively. “When did you bond with the spirit?”
Soren gave him an odd look.
“That’s the mark of a Spirit Charmer, isn’t it?” Pelleas said. “Like mine. I bonded with the spirit several years ago. I was wondering when you bonded with yours.”
Soren lifted a delicate brow.
“Spirit Charmer,” he repeated. The words felt strange on the tip of his tongue, although of course he’d read about the concept before in books. Spirit Charmers were mages who made a pact with a spirit, allowing one into their body in exchange for greater magical power. Once bonded, the spirit would slowly devour the host’s soul, bit by bit, year after year.
He disliked the concept, but at least it explained the mark hidden beneath Pelleas’ curly bangs.
“Do you really think this mark is a Spirit’s Protection?” he drawled, bored with the topic. His opinion of Pelleas hadn’t been high from the start of this conversation, but learning that he’d traded his body and soul just for magical ability had made it plummet to new depths.
“Oh!” Pelleas said, seeming excited. “The spirit must have bonded with you in infancy! How rare! Spirits only choose the most talented of children to attach themselves to, but then I suppose that would be expected of the Prince of Daein.”
Soren snorted, turning his face away. There was an odd, hollow ringing in his ears, because he knew that he was not a Spirit Charmer. And yet he shared such a similar mark.
“Flattery will win you nothing when it comes to me,” he said. “I am not some foppish prince from a story book, nor am I a spoiled, spineless child. I prefer honesty and integrity. If you can’t give me that, you’re useless to me.”
“I… yes, of course,” Pelleas said. “Forgive me, Prince Soren.”
“There’s nothing to forgive,” Soren said. “You made an error in judgment. You won’t do it again.”
“No, Prince Soren,” Pelleas said, sounding hopelessly confused. Soren was beginning to grow concerned that was his usual state. “I was simply excited. I’ve never met another Spirit Charmer.”
Soren didn’t correct him.
“You’re wise to hide the mark,” Pelleas said, his gaze flickering over the delicate gold circlet Soren wore with its red ruby set in the center. He’d chosen it because it reminded him of something his mother might wear. “Though I’m sure no one would ever accuse the Prince of Daein of being one of the Branded.”
“The Branded?” Soren asked archly. Now this was a term he was not familiar with.
Pelleas looked uncomfortable.
“Ah,” he said. “My apologies. This is a terribly improper topic for a prince—”
“No,” Soren said. “You brought it up. Explain it to me.”
Pelleas glanced around the room. His gaze caught on Ike and he swallowed, quickly looking away.
“The Branded,” he said, dropping his voice to a whisper, “are humans who have subhuman blood in their veins. They’re called that because they bear a mark, a brand like a Spirit Charmer’s—a brand. To denote, you see, the crime of their birth.”
Soren went very still.
Little beast.
Your father says you are half-Goldoan dragon.
He swallowed hard.
“Baseless superstition,” he said, and his voice barely trembled. “Surely there is no such thing.”
Believe what you like, little fool.
Ike was watching him, one eyebrow just slightly raised, as if trying to put the situation together. But he didn’t say anything, either.
“Oh,” Pelleas said, his throat bobbing as he swallowed nervously. “Yes, Your Highness. You’re correct.”
That night, Soren stormed his father’s sitting room.
“Let me pass,” he snapped at the guards.
They traded a look, lips curled in distaste. Soren could not have possibly cared less. He would stand there all night if he had to, until someone finally relented.
“Let the boy in.”
That was his father’s voice, deep and rough. There was always a curl to his tone, the promise of violence on his tongue.
The guards quickly obeyed. Soren took a deep breath, rolled his shoulders back, and entered. In the half-gloom of his father’s personal study, illuminated by the firelight, his father was the one who seemed like a beast, all the more inhuman removed from the shell of his armor.
He so rarely saw his father without his armor. He seemed to prefer to encase himself in it, like he existed on the battlefield, and all other ventures were merely temporary.
Even sitting in a chair by the fireside, though, his father still had his cursed sword by his side.
“It’s rare for you to come see me,” Ashnard said. “Is it parental guidance you seek, boy? You’d be better seeking it out from Rajaion.”
He laughed, as if he were funny.
“It’s quite the accomplishment to lose a parenting contest to a mad wyvern,” Soren agreed, cold.
Ashnard shrugged.
“Kings are fathers to nations, not to sons,” Soren said. “I know that very well. Don’t imagine I’m here seeking water from a dry well.”
“Fathers to nations, eh,” Ashnard said, rubbing at his chin.
Soren steeled himself to say it. His father’s patience wouldn’t last very long.
What are the Branded? The words were on the tip of his tongue, threatening to spill, when his father rose from his chair. Soren watched him as he wandered over to the fireplace, an almost contemplative look on his face.
“I was your age, you know,” Ashnard said suddenly, “when I killed my father.”
Soren froze.
Ashnard’s eyes glimmered in the firelight.
“Well?” he said. “Don’t you have anything to say? You inherited your mother’s sharp tongue. Does a simple thing like securing the throne fail it?”
It wasn’t like he hadn’t suspected. The long line of succession between his father and the throne, the convenience that the plague that swept through Daein the year of his birth had removed all his siblings from between him and it – but there was still his father. Still the king.
He wondered how many others knew.
“How did you do it?” he asked.
Ashnard propped his elbow up on the mantelpiece. He set his chin on his fist.
“He was tired and weak,” he said. “He didn’t fight. He knew it was his end.”
The fingers of his other hand curled around the hilt of Gurgurant. He’d slain him with that very sword, then. Soren wasn’t terribly surprised. His father favored that sword almost as much as he favored Rajaion.
“So you killed a tired, weak old man,” Soren murmured. “The Great King Ashnard, indeed.”
His father gave a short bark of laughter.
“There are consequences for every action,” Ashnard said.
Soren paused, looking back over his shoulder.
“Will you kill me, too, then?” he drawled.
His father’s grin widened.
“Not you, boy,” he said. “Not just yet.”
Soren should have left it alone. It was enough to be allowed to live by his father’s dubious graces. But it nagged at him, sometimes, late at night. He couldn’t make of sense of it. He wanted a reason.
“Why?” he pressed. “You killed your father, killed you brothers – but you spare your son? It isn’t paternal love. You’ve never had that in you.”
The cold assessment seemed to please his father, or at least amuse him. It confirmed for him, too, that it hadn’t only been a plague that had killed the royal family.
“When you were born, I was made certain promises,” Ashnard said. “I was told that a half-dragon child would come into immense, arcane power. That your birth would shake the foundation of the continent.”
Soren snorted, turning his face away.
“Not this again,” he murmured. “I’m tired of this ridiculous story.”
Ashnard’s explanation had hardened something in him. How foolish, he thought, to come here expecting any real answers. Pelleas was a poor country boy, an orphan only notable because he’d let a spirit into body in exchange for power. Of course he would believe in foolish legends like subhuman half-breeds.
He remembered his mother. She’d had no beast features, no fur-covered ears or tail like the beast subhumans, no wings like the birds.
His father had locked his mother up and ripped her only child from her arms. To malign her when she could not defend herself was shameful, even for him.
“You can believe what you like, little fool,” his father said. “I watched for years, waiting for your powers to emerge. But you, weakling boy, showed me nothing of interest. And you’d already served your initial purpose.”
What purpose, Soren wondered, gritting his teeth. Another man might have simply wanted proof he could produce a son, but that hardly seemed to matter to his father, who had never taken another consort, named another queen. To torture his mother, perhaps.
Perhaps the whole thing was nothing more than his father’s obsession with dragons.
“Rajaion listens to you,” Ashnard said. “There may be something of interest lurking in your breakable bones yet.”
“And when there isn’t?” Soren asked, tilting his head. “When all of this turns out to be nothing more than your mad fantasy? Am I to be disposed of then?”
“You half-breeds are a curse,” Ashnard said. “You bring doom and destruction everywhere you go. I wondered, am I strong enough to defy such a curse? To forge ahead while it lingered in my home?”
His grin widened.
“Look at what I’ve built with a curse under my roof,” he said.
Soren swallowed hard.
“Superstitions are for the weak,” he said. “I know that just as well as you do.”
Ashnard barked out a laugh.
“Leave now,” Ashnard said. “Before your indignation starts to bore me.”
Soren grit his teeth and swept from the hall.
“Give me your hands.”
Ike tilted his head to the side, a faint smile playing over his lips, but he lifted his hands without question. Soren, straddling him, slid his own palms against Ike’s sword-callused ones, examining the difference in their hands. Soren’s fingers were long and thin, and he hadn’t thought of his hands as small, but next to Ike’s large hands the difference was stark.
There was an uncomfortable feeling in the pit of his stomach, a growing suspicion.
“What are you doing?” Ike asked, sounding amused.
“You’re bigger than me,” Soren said.
“Yeah,” Ike agreed, raising his eyebrows meaningfully. “All over.”
Soren shot him a dirty look. Ike settled back, looking smug, and didn’t seem bothered, but he twined his fingers in Soren’s and squeezed gently, a small comfort.
“Does it bother you?” Ike asked.
“Not… exactly,” Soren said. “But you’ve seen my father. Don’t you find my stature strange?”
“I don’t usually think about your father when I have you on top of me,” Ike snorted. He shrugged one shoulder, rubbing his thumb over the back of Soren’s hand. “I guess it never occurred to me. You’re just… you. You look like you.”
“And they say Daein doesn’t produce great poets,” Soren murmured.
Ike shrugged again, untangling one hand from Soren’s so he could slip it under his thigh instead. He massaged the muscle, fingers digging in as his hand slid higher, up under Soren’s shift, ghosting over where Soren was still wet and open from his earlier attention.
“Ike,” Soren gasped. “I’m thinking.”
“I’m not stopping you,” Ike said. His fingertips circled and dragged, making Soren gasp again and shift his hips. “You’re tense. Let me help.”
“Is that what you’re doing?” Soren asked.
Ike let go of his other hand to grab his ass, pulling him forward and forcing his hips up. Soren rocked up on his knees, his hands braced against Ike’s chest. Ike kept him like that, one big hand gripping just below his ass as he slid two fingers back into him.
“I like how you look,” Ike said, his voice rough. “I like how easily I can move you around.”
“Ah,” Soren said, biting his lip. “That’s not – not what I meant, exactly.”
“Explain it to me, then,” Ike said, pressing his fingers deeper before drawing them out and circling Soren’s hole.
“Like this?” Soren said, staring down at him in disbelief. “Ike, I – I can’t.”
Ike’s gaze fell to his groin, where his hard cock peaked out from underneath his rucked up shift. There was amusement dancing in his eyes.
“Distracted?” he asked. “Your loyal servant apologizes.”
He squeezed Soren’s ass in a distinctly unapologetic way.
“You know I hate it when you do that in bed,” Soren said, frustrated now. The unease of earlier had faded as heat pooled in his gut, but Ike had a good grip on him, keeping him hovering on his knees over Ike’s hardening cock. His hole throbbed, the emptiness an ache as he remembered how just a little while ago Ike had been buried deep inside him, so deep Soren thought it might split him in two.
“Let me make it up to you,” Ike said. He fumbled for the oil on the bedside table, slicking up his fingers before smearing it over Soren’s hole, always so careful with him. His thick fingers pushed back in, massaging, before he took Soren by the hips and lowered him onto his cock.
The first press inside always felt like too much. Soren moaned, bracing himself against Ike’s chest as he took him in inch by inch, Ike thick and hot inside him. His cock twitched, precum dampening his already ruined shift. He’d have to burn it before the maids saw.
Dangerous, he reminded himself. Every time they did this, it was dangerous. But with Ike halfway inside him, he could never seem to care.
“Good,” Ike said, voice hot, as Soren took more of him. “I’ve got you. Feel okay?”
He said he didn’t think about Soren’s smaller stature, but he worried about him sometimes, Soren knew. It sparked something like annoyance in him, the idea that he was fragile, and rocked his hips to make Ike gasp.
“What about you?” he asked, breathless. His thumb brushed Ike’s nipple, too light to be anything but a tease. “How do you feel?”
Ike groaned, but something like a challenge flashed in his eyes as he stared up at Soren. He’d never been one to back down.
He gripped Soren’s hips hard and all but yanked, seating Soren firmly on his cock.
“I feel,” he growled, “like I love you.”
Ike’s cock had already knocked the breath from his lungs. The statement threatened to bowl him over completely. He felt himself trembling all over, hair sweat stuck to his back and Ike’s length pressing so deep inside him that he knew he would feel it the next day. He felt dizzy, and for a moment he was sure he’d misheard.
“What?” he asked. His voice came out a hoarse croak.
“I love everything about you,” Ike said, his voice rough. Soren trembled where he was seated on his cock, trying to move his hips, but Ike’s hands were locked tight around waist. “Your hands, your hair – your mind. There’s not one piece of you I would change, and there’s nothing that can change my mind about that.” He reached up with one hand, cradling Soren’s face and his thumb brushing his lip. “Whatever has you thinking anything could sway my love for you, forget it.”
“Ike, please,” Soren said, gasping wetly. “I – I can’t –”
He didn’t know which he meant more – that he couldn’t take this, Ike’s cock so deep inside, or that he couldn’t take the words. He couldn’t take the sincerity with which Ike said them.
I love everything about you.
Then, like a chill down his spine: You half-breeds are a curse.
He collapsed against Ike’s chest afterwards, Ike’s arms wrapped tight around him.
Ike’s confession still hung between them. Soren hadn’t been able to say the words back. It was tempting to pretend that Ike had simply said it in the heat of the moment, that it was nothing more than a lover’s frantic babbling, but Soren knew him too well for that.
Ike had meant it. Ike loved him.
“Do you think people can be a curse?” he asked quietly.
Ike’s fingers stilled. He’d been running the tips of them up and down the length of Soren’s spine, almost laughably gentle compared to how he’d fucked him.
“I’m not sure what you mean,” he said.
“Do you think…” Soren sighed. “Do you think a person could be cursed from their birth? That just by existing, everyone around them would suffer?”
“No,” Ike said. He ran his fingers through Soren’s hair. “I don’t believe that. People are just people.”
“A pretty sentiment,” Soren murmured.
“Laguz, beorc,” Ike said, shaking his head. He’d discovered the old language word for “human” a few years before and taken to using it in private, as he did laguz. “It doesn’t matter. We’re all just people.”
It was a nice sentiment. Soren put his head down on Ike's chest and wished he could believe it.
He didn’t speak to Pelleas again until a skirmish called Ike to the Begnion border. In situations like this, Soren considered ambush to be the best strategy, so he waited silently behind a shelf in the library until Pelleas had settled into a book.
He swept around the shelf, dropped his own book on the table with a loud thud, and sank into the seat opposite Pelleas. He took no special joy in the way Pelleas nearly fell out of his chair.
“Prince Soren!” he said breathlessly.
“I thought that since you’re to act as my decoy, we should get to know each other better,” Soren said, the lie dropping flawlessly from his tongue. “Don’t you agree?”
“I – oh, yes, my prince,” Pelleas said. His gaze searched the room wildly and it was a fight to keep down a snort.
“Ike isn’t here,” he said. “You may speak freely. Does he frighten you?”
“Sir Ike is… intimidating,” Pelleas said.
Soren knew what people thought about Ike. Ike had filled out as he grew older, looking more and more like his father every day. The son of a legendary general, with a skill all his own – he was intimidating, even by Daein’s exacting standards.
Ike had never frightened him. The only thing that frightened him now was that one day, something might happen, and Ike might look at him differently. But that would be Soren’s fault, and not Ike’s. Never Ike’s.
Even if, someday, Ike’s feelings changed, Soren’s would remain the same.
“You have nothing to fear from Ike,” Soren said firmly. “He’s a good man. As long as you have no designs against my person, he won’t harm you.”
“Of course I would never mean you any harm, Prince Soren!” Pelleas exclaimed, his eyes alarmingly wide. Soren sighed a bit, turning back to his book.
Pelleas often put him on a pedestal, treated him like his own personal savior. Soren supposed he was, in a way. A crueler master would have mistreated Pelleas, wouldn’t have overlooked his bumbling, easily flustered nature. But Soren had no interest in being cruel for cruelty’s sake.
Pelleas was fidgeting next to him. He bit his lip, glancing at Soren and then away again.
Soren took a deep breath and then closed his book.
“What is it?” he asked, not looking at Pelleas. “I’ve told you before. If you want to ask me a question, then ask it.”
Pelleas looked unconvinced.
“Soldiers would visit the orphanage I lived in sometimes,” Pelleas said. His hands clenched where he kept them in his lap. “They would taunt us. Sometimes worse. We were poor orphans, with no one to defend us. They could do whatever they liked.”
“I see,” Soren said. Well, that explained his discomfort in Ike’s presence, at least, although Ike constantly scowling at him probably didn’t help. Soren wouldn’t tell him to stop.
“I suppose it just makes me nervous, now,” he said. “The company of soldiers.”
“Ike is hardly a regular soldier,” Soren sniffed. But he was hardly surprised to hear that some of his father’s soldiers would run roughshod over those who couldn’t defend themselves. “What do you mean by worse?”
It took him some time to get the answer. Pelleas protested, said such things weren’t for a prince to hear, as if Soren was some delicate creature made of glass. The more he protested, the harder Soren pushed, until finally Pelleas told him in hushed whispers. It was horrible, but then Soren had expected that. Daein’s soldiers could have what they liked under his father’s reign, as long as they were strong enough to take it.
Cowardly, worthless brutes, taking advantage of those who were weaker than themselves. Soren tried not to remember the duke’s son’s fingers wrapped around his own throat.
“I can help your orphanage,” Soren said, and Pelleas looked up with bright eyes. Soren held up a finger. “I can help you. I want something in exchange.”
“Yes, anything!” Pelleas said quickly. “Some of the people there were cruel to me, but the young children – they don’t deserve such things.”
Soren nodded sharply. There was a horrible, sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, but he forced himself to voice the words anyway.
“Tell me about the Branded,” he commanded.
Pelleas startled, his book slipping from his hands. It landed on the table with a dull thud.
“Your Highness,” he said, a pleading tone in his voice. “I can’t – Sir Ike and the king surely wouldn’t like it—”
“Ike isn’t here,” he said. “It’s only you and me, so you can speak freely. What you mentioned the other day – humans with subhuman blood in their veins. I want to know more.”
Pelleas looked a little like he might be sick.
“Prince Soren, please,” he said. “These sorts of things aren’t fit for royalty to hear. Anything else I can do for you, I will do readily--”
“I believe I’m the prince here,” Soren said, leaning his cheek on one hand. “And you are my servant. It’s up to me to decide what is fit for royal ears.”
It took a bit more convincing, Soren’s voice clipped and cool, but eventually Pelleas relented. He told Soren in frantic whispers about how he’d been bullied at the orphanage by people who thought he was one of the Branded. How the Branded were cursed, strange beings who brought misfortune everywhere they went. How human parents of Branded children would smother them in the cradle or drown them at birth to avoid the shame and stigma.
With every word, Soren grew colder. With every word, he grew more certain.
Bile rose in his throat and he forced it down. He wouldn’t be sick in front of Pelleas. If nothing else, he had his dignity.
If a cursed half-breed could even have that.
Pelleas had worried his lip red and raw by the time he’d finished speaking, his shoulders hiked up. Soren almost felt sorry for him.
“That’s enough,” he finally mustered the voice to say. Pelleas peered at him nervously from underneath his bangs. “You did well.”
“Please, Prince Soren,” Pelleas said. “Please don’t tell anyone I told you such horrible things. Especially not Sir Ike.”
Soren barely repressed a shiver at the thought of Ike ever hearing any of this.
“Of course,” he said. “It will be our secret. Ike won’t hear of it from me.”
He examined himself in the mirror that night, critically tracing his own features. The deceptively young face, the red eyes, the slight points of his ears. He opened his mouth wide to examine his too sharp incisors, longer than the rest of his teeth. Then, of course, the most damning evidence: the red mark on his brow.
He touched it with one careful finger and was surprised when his hands didn’t tremble. The beast in the mirror was too pale, too stark, red eyes and dark hair and blood on his lip where he’d dug one of his too sharp teeth into it. He licked it away.
He thought about his mother. She’d had no wings, no tail. No fur or claws. But there had been a mark on her brow, hadn’t there? He tried to remember the shape of it, whether it had looked like his own. Perhaps she wasn’t a beast herself, but something like him – perhaps the sin belonged to one of her ancestors.
It didn’t soothe him.
Anger slowly rose up in him the longer he looked at himself, and it warred with disgust. Anger at his father, at whoever had done this to his mother, anger at every subhuman and human alike. Anger at Pelleas, for ever revealing the truth to him, however accidentally.
Anger at himself.
The tears came unbidden, coursing hot and heavy down his cheeks. A wild sob tore itself from his throat, his whole body shaking with the force of his sobs.
He thought about Ike and put his head down in his arms, forehead pressed to the wood of his vanity. He wept for the rest of the night.
By the time Ike returned, Soren had become determined not to let him know. He told himself it was for Ike’s safety, but that wasn’t the truth. The truth was that Soren was scared. He was scared to lose Ike’s love, his warmth. He was scared to lose Ike.
It was unfair to him, he knew. He was allowing Ike to dirty his hands on him, to touch something that was cursed, impure. Still, when Ike bent in the privacy of Soren’s rooms to kiss him, Soren didn’t push him away. He didn’t even shudder when Ike licked over his too sharp teeth.
“I missed you,” Ike said when he pulled away, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.
If what Pelleas and his father said was true, Soren wouldn’t be able to hide his true nature for much longer. Another few years maybe and then Ike would be forced to realize that Soren was aging slower than he was.
He curled a hand at the back of Ike’s neck.
“How are things on the border?” he asked.
Ike snorted. He tipped Soren’s chin up and kissed him once again, chaste this time.
“The same as ever,” he said. “You know what I think about Begnion.”
“Sienne’s glittering spires don’t tempt you, no.”
Ike snorted.
“I don’t know about any glittering spires,” he said. “At the border, all there is is mud, same as on this side.”
He tugged, lightly, at the lacing of Soren’s robes, fingers gliding over his hip. Just a little harder and it would fall open. He often favored robes that laced at the hips these days, knowing how Ike liked to tug the laces open and push them up around Soren’s waist while he tugged his pants down.
Soren had wondered, sometimes, what it would be like to forego the pants entirely, and wait for Ike in nothing but an easily removed robe.
How terrible, he thought now, staring up into Ike’s face, that he’d allowed Ike to touch something like him.
He should stop him, he thought, as Ike pulled him close. He should end it. It would break him, but it would free Ike.
Instead, he let Ike kiss his neck, and tug the laces loose from his robes, and push them up around his waist.
“You’re being quiet,” Ike said afterwards, kissing Soren’s neck. Soren tipped his head back and let him have free access, one hand coming up to rest lightly at Ike’s shoulder.
“Yes, because the Prince of Daein is famous for his loquacious tongue,” Soren said, trailing his fingers up Ike’s neck.
Ike huffed and nipped at him gently, a quiet admonishment.
“You talk when you’re with me,” he said. “Is something wrong?”
Soren ran his tongue over his too sharp incisors, a mimicry of the way Ike had licked into his mouth only an hour before. He thought, for one terrible moment, about telling Ike everything. He imagined Ike’s warm expression turning ice cold, the fondness in his eyes disappearing. He would be disgusted, and rightly so.
He wouldn’t hurt Soren. Soren knew him too well for that. But even a man as unique as Ike couldn’t possibly stomach loving something as inhuman as Soren.
It was better to think of the abuses of Daein’s military against their own people than about the cursed blood in his own veins. And he knew that Ike would care, if it was true. Ike had always been strict with the men under his own command.
“Pelleas told me something,” Soren admitted. It wasn’t a lie. It wasn’t even a distraction tactic, not really. He did want to discuss the things Pelleas told him.
The rest of it, he would swallow down. He would hide it deep in his heart until the truth could no longer be disguised.
“Huh,” Ike said. “Not like you to actually listen to him.”
Soren snorted. He glanced away.
“If I asked you to look into something, do you think you could do it quietly?” he asked.
Ike raised his eyebrows.
“Did what he said get to you that badly?” he asked. He leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees, and tried to get a good look at Soren’s face. Soren sighed, relenting as he turned back towards him, and Ike reached for his hand.
He tangled their fingers together and squeezed lightly. Soren had to bite back a smile.
“I’m just curious,” Soren said. “I trust your judgment. I need you to be my eyes and ears outside of the castle.”
“I can do that,” Ike said. “But I don’t know about quiet.”
Soren tilted his face up, brushing his fingers along Ike’s jaw. He watched as Ike’s lashes fluttered.
“Try,” he said.
Ike’s lips curved into a slow smile.
“Do I get a reward?” he asked.
“Bring me the information first,” Soren said. He tapped Ike’s lips with his finger. “Then we can talk about a reward.”
Ike caught his hand and kissed his palm. He settled in bed, bringing Soren with him, one big arm wrapped around him and Soren resting half on his chest.
“Understood,” he said. “Tell me what you know and I’ll start looking into things tomorrow.”
Soren told him everything he knew, and Ike’s arm tightened little by little over him as he spoke, as if Soren were the one in danger and not a group of orphans in one of Nevassa’s poorest districts.
That was unfair of him, he knew. Ike cared deeply, after all. Deeper than what was safe for a knight of Daein.
It was safe to be cruel. Safer to be as cold and unfeeling as the deepest winter night.
“All right,” Ike said when Soren had finished speaking. “You can tell Pelleas not to worry. I’ll take care of everything.”
Ike, as always, was true to his word.
He made quick work of investigating Pelleas’ allegations of abuse at the orphanage, easily working out which soldiers were targeting a group of harmless orphans. Then he took care of the problem.
He did it quickly, efficiently, and brutally. Ike had never liked injustice, and had to put up with far too much of it already.
Pelleas was ecstatic, and also far too nervous to thank Ike himself. Soren should have expected that. He practically whirled into Soren’s afternoon lesson with Ena, who watched with barely disguised amusement as he made to grab for Soren’s hands, thought better of it, and simply fluttered his own in the vague vicinity of Soren’s being.
“Some say the Prince of Daein is as cold as ice,” Pelleas said. “But you’re truly kind, Prince Soren. Thank you.”
He spun away before Soren could find something to say to that ridiculous statement, leaving Soren gaping openmouthed at his retreating back.
A delicate clearing of Ena’s throat made him snap his mouth shut and look back over his shoulder.
“Do you have any comments?” he asked, acerbic.
“You remind me of someone I knew, that’s all,” Ena said, shaking her head. “He’s also very kind. Like you, he had great responsibility thrust on his shoulders since he was a child, but he’s always borne it with grace.”
“You flatter me,” Soren said, coolly.
Something about Ena had always unsettled him. He didn’t trust her, not completely, although he didn’t feel she meant him any harm. It was her motives that troubled him. She was not from Daein, and she clearly bore his father no love, and yet she presented seemingly undying loyalty. Everything his father told her to do, she did, and she did it excellently.
He’d sent her to serve as General Petrine’s strategist on a recent subhuman hunt, far in the north. She’d gone without a word and somehow managed to return. Petrine had lost two other strategists so far.
“No,” Ena said. “I simply speak the truth. I think that person… would be very happy, if he could see you.”
Soren scoffed, turning away.
“I heard about what Ike did at that orphanage.”
It wasn’t often that Soren took walks with General Gawain, not anymore. But Gawain had approached him that afternoon and invited him on a stroll, his face set in a serious frown. Soren knew he had something he wanted to discuss, so they’d stepped out into the fresh air, far away enough from the castle that they wouldn’t be overheard.
“Yes,” Soren said. “Pelleas shared something with me, and I asked Ike to look into it.”
“I thought that might be the case,” Gawain said.
There was a troubled tone to his voice.
“If I may speak frankly, Prince Soren?” General Gawain said.
“You may,” Soren replied.
“Hm,” Gawain said. He folded his arms. “All right. I know about you and my son.”
Soren’s step faltered.
“I’m not the only one,” Gawain continued. “Ike is about as subtle as a brick wall.”
Soren could have denied it. He could have forbid the topic of conversation entirely. General Gawain would have obeyed him.
“He used to talk about marrying you when he was young,” Gawain said. “Mist had a phase where she always wanted to play dress up games about princesses and weddings and of course Ike got roped into it. I thought perhaps he’d just gotten too caught up in one of them. Children have vivid imaginations. But then he grew older. He stopped saying it, at least out loud, but I still knew.”
“Who else knows?” Soren asked after a long moment.
“Bryce,” Gawain said. “My wife. That girl, Ena, I suspect.”
“And my father?” Soren asked, trying to keep his voice even.
Gawain heaved a long sigh. He glanced away.
“Who can tell when it comes to the king?” he said.
“A strangely honest answer from one of his Riders,” Soren said, unable to keep the bitterness from his voice.
“I may be getting old, Prince Soren, but I’m no fool,” Gawain said. “You realize, of course, how dangerous it is for him.”
“Yes,” Soren said, staring straight ahead. “I understand.”
Gawain nodded quietly.
“Does he?” he asked.
Soren couldn’t reply to that.
“Even if I told him to end it, he wouldn’t,” Gawain said. “He takes after his mother too much. She’s even worse than he is when it comes to being stubborn.”
“Are you suggesting that I end it instead?” Soren asked. The words felt numb on his lips. Evening was falling, and he could taste a storm on the horizon.
Logically, he knew it was the right decision to make, to protect Ike from himself. He’d thought about it many times, considering the danger to Ike. But every single time, like he somehow knew what Soren was thinking, Ike would pull him in for a kiss, his fingers buried in Soren’s hair.
It made it very difficult to do the right thing.
“I’m not suggesting anything of the sort,” Gawain said. “Like I said, the boy’s too stubborn. But I want you to seriously consider the danger to him in the future. The steps both of you must take to protect yourselves.”
“Yes,” Soren said after a moment as the snowflakes started to fall. “I understand.”
Gawain sighed, glancing up at the rapidly darkening sky.
“Come, Prince Soren,” he said. “Let’s go back to the castle.”
Numbly, Soren turned to follow him, only for Gawain to stop in his tracks. He suddenly flung out an arm, gesturing for Soren to stop.
There was a figure standing in front of them, his cape blowing in the wind. He was tall and imposing, dressed from head to foot in black armor, and Soren had never seen him before. He certainly hadn’t heard him approach.
“General Gawain,” the knight spoke in a strange, whispering voice. “Do you think it wise to take the prince so far away from the castle?”
“Prince Soren,” Gawain said. “Stay behind me. No matter what, I won’t allow you to come to harm.”
“So sure of my motivations,” the Black Knight said.
There was a gleaming gold flash as he tossed a sword at Gawain’s feet. Gawain looked up, his brow creased.
“Pick it up,” the Black Knight said.
“I have my own blade,” Gawain said.
“Not like this one,” the Black Knight said as he drew his own sword. “If you have any chance of striking me down, pick up that sword. Or shall I go see if the son is as stupid as the father?”
Soren’s breath caught in his throat. Gawain’s stance changed.
The fight was fast and furious, both swords flashing in the evening gloom. The snow was falling harder now, the sky darkening. The Black Knight was good, far swifter than the bulky armor should have allowed, and strong, too. But Gawain was a legend for a reason.
He kept himself between Soren and the Black Knight, focused on defending him. Soren watched as he tracked the knight’s moves, calculating his own. From where Soren stood, they looked evenly matched.
It happened in a flash. The Black Knight charged, and Gawain could not move out of the way in time. Soren stared in disbelief as the sword pierced him. Gawain’s sword fell from his hand.
He stared up at the armored man, watching as Gawain’s blood dripped from the blade of his sword.
The Black Knight whispered something in Gawain’s ear, and then he yanked his sword free. Soren went scrambling, but it was useless. There was no way for him to support Gawain’s weight, not wearing his ebony armor. They went down in a heap, Soren’s half-pinned beneath his bulk.
The Black Knight regarded him coldly.
“Did you not think to run, Prince?” he said.
Soren shifted, doing his best to shield Gawain, but he knew it was pointless. He watched the Black Knight, blood dripping from the end of his sword, as he took a step forward.
Somewhere in the distance, there was a great roar, shaking the very ground itself. Rajaion, Soren thought, his heart caught in his throat. His father had left for a hunt several days ago and now it appeared he’d returned.
The Black Knight made a dismissive sound under his breath.
“No,” he said, more to himself than to Soren. “Not tonight.”
For a moment, Soren thought it was a trick of the wind and the snow. One moment the Black Knight was there, and then the next he was gone. But the snow was faintly glowing where he’d stood, the sign of a magic sigil.
He catalogued it away quickly. There were more pressing matters.
He struggled out from underneath Gawain’s heavy body, snow and ice clinging to them both. Gawain groaned, a low, guttural noise, and Soren scrambled to press his hands against the wound and staunch the bleeding. He whipped his head around to stare back at the castle, but it was no good. Even without the snow and ice impeding his path, he doubted he could make it back in time with help to save Gawain.
“Don’t move, my prince,” Gawain said, his voice strained. His blood was soaking through Soren’s robes. “Don’t move. Everything will be all right.”
“Do you think me a fool?” Soren demanded furiously, panic in his veins.
“Prince Soren,” Gawain said. “I would ask you a favor.”
“Don’t speak,” Soren said. His hands were trembling where he pressed them to the wound. “Help will be here soon.”
Gawain closed a big hand over his own.
“It’s Ike,” he said.
Soren’s breath caught in his throat.
“Ike… we both know he can be foolish at times,” Gawain said. “The stubborn pup rushes in headlong without thinking. He… he leads with his heart.” His gaze fell on Soren. “And his heart belongs to you.”
Soren shook his head, a denial frozen on his lips. To admit it was dangerous. To admit it, even to Gawain, to Ike’s father, would doom Ike. Even if he already knew it, Soren could not say it.
It didn’t seem to matter to Gawain.
“Be careful with him,” Gawain said. “Ike is strong, but there are other ways to hurt someone than just in body. He’s always… he has always had a kind heart. And a kind heart is a dangerous thing in Daein now.”
His voice was fading. His blood was still flowing, all over Soren’s hands, his robes. He couldn’t seem to stop it no matter how hard he pressed.
“General Gawain!” Soren snapped, desperation edging into his voice. “Stay with me! That’s an order!”
Gawain laughed, but it turned into a wheeze.
There were voices in the distance, carried by the wind. They were far away, though, nowhere near close enough to help – it was only the spirits of the air, trying to carry comfort to Soren however they could. He wished he could curse them for it.
One voice rang out, clearer than the rest. A voice Soren would know anywhere.
“General Gawain,” Soren said, the words falling frozen from his lips. “Stay with your son. Please, Gawain. For Ike.”
Gawain’s callused fingers closed over his own.
It was Ike that found them. Soren had hoped to spare him that, but of course it was Ike. He’d watched, helpless, as Ike’s eyes widened and his face paled, taking in the state of his father. The state of Soren, covered in his blood.
They were brought back to the castle. The healers immediately flocked to Gawain, doing their best to staunch the bleeding. Ashnard was there, and even he looked grim seeing Gawain’s condition.
All the while Ike knelt beside his father, clutching at his hand.
Soren was whisked away quickly, brought before a healer who determined him fine after a few moments of useless fussing. Soren’s bloody, wet robes were stripped away, and he stared, numb, as the blood was washed from his hands and body.
He felt it even after it had been washed away. Every time he closed his eyes, even just for a second, he saw Gawain, bleeding out in the snow.
Ike’s father, bleeding, all because of him.
It was hours before Ike came to his rooms. Soren rose quickly, going over to him as Ike sat down heavily on the edge of Soren’s bed.
“Is he…” Soren couldn’t say it. Not to Ike.
Ike set his jaw.
“The healers can’t say yet,” he said. “Someone’s sent word to my mother.”
Soren could feel something inside of him cracking open, something horrible twisting within him. If he hadn’t been there, would Gawain have been able to defeat that knight? If he hadn’t been focused on guarding Soren, would the fight have been fairer?
If Ike lost his father, would it be Soren’s fault? It would, he knew it bone deep, as well as he’d ever known anything at all.
“Ike—” he tried to say, but his voice broke on his name.
“Soren, don’t,” Ike said. He cupped Soren’s face with his hand—his father’s blood was still staining the lines between his fingers—and leaned down, sealing their lips together. He pulled back, a fierce look in his eyes. “This is not your fault. I won’t hear you blaming yourself.”
But it was Soren’s fault.
“Did you get a look at the man who did it?” Ike asked when he pulled back. “My father… he’s not someone who would be wounded by just anyone.”
Soren shook his head.
“I couldn’t see his face,” he admitted. “He wore a suit of jet black armor with a helmet. He was no normal knight, though, that’s for certain.”
He described the battle for Ike as best he could, walking him through the knight’s motions. Ike’s frown grew by the minute, and Soren steeled himself before he outlined the final blow.
“When I find him, I’ll kill him,” Ike promised.
Soren took a shuddering breath. He didn’t react when Ike took his hand and pressed his lips to the back of it, or when Ike let it fall back into his lap.
“I should be with my father,” he said.
“Yes,” Soren agreed.
“I’ll be back,” Ike said. “Try to get some rest.”
Ike didn’t return that night. Soren sat up and watched as the sky changed, storm white gradually fading into the grey dawn of morning, thinking of snow and blood and what just being near him had cost Ike all these years.
He visited Gawain a few weeks into his recovery.
As soon as he could be moved, Elena had arranged for Gawain to be brought to his family’s estate in Nevassa. Soren could hardly blame her for wanting her husband away from the castle. For those few weeks, Ike traveled back and forth as often as his duties would allow. It seemed like he’d aged overnight, his shoulders tight and the line between his brows deepening.
He barely saw Soren, and when he did he was quiet and tense.
Soren was quiet, too. Ike had said he didn’t blame him, but he’d had time to think about it now. Surely he had come to the conclusion that it was Soren who had cost his father his sword arm.
Then one day Ike sat down next to him. He leaned forward, elbow on his knees, and looked up at Soren from underneath his hair.
“Come home with me,” he said. “Mother wants to see you.”
Soren could hardly refuse that invitation when he was responsible for her husband’s injuries. After a moment, he nodded.
Ike exhaled, long and slow. He reached out one hand, his palm up, and raised his eyebrows at Soren.
Soren hesitated a moment and then he threaded his fingers through Ike’s. Ike squeezed his hand. He leaned against Soren, pressed up against him from shoulder to knee, and closed his eyes.
He wasn’t surprised when his father granted him leave to visit Ike’s family home. His eyes had been glimmering when he’d done so, a laugh in his voice as he told Soren to give Gawain the king’s kindest regards. It was all a game to his father, after all.
Ike’s family home was a large, austere building, made of dark stone with high walls and forbidding gates topped with spikes. It gave off a harsh, unwelcoming atmosphere – the exact opposite of the woman who waited for them inside.
Elena looked tired. She was dressed like a noblewoman of Daein, not a hair out of place, but Soren could see it in the shadows beneath her eyes, the pallor of her skin. The servants had been dismissed for the afternoon to keep Soren from being seen by those outside the palace, so there were no prying eyes. Ike embraced her tightly, rubbing a hand up and down her back while Soren stood behind him, feeling like he had no place even witnessing such a thing.
She’d never been anything but kind to him. She didn’t deserve the misfortune he’d brought to her door. Looking at her, at the slight tremble in her frame as her son held her, he recalled his father’s words.
You half-breeds are a curse. You bring doom and destruction everywhere you go.
She turned to Soren when Ike stepped back, and in spite of everything her eyes were warm.
“Prince Soren,” she murmured. “You honor us with your presence.”
But he hadn’t. He’d done the exact opposite.
Greil looked as well as could be expected, which was to say he looked terrible.
He was resting in the sunroom. The large room, with its vibrant carpets and carefully tended to plants, was the only room in the manor that Soren thought felt like Elena. Gawain was resting on an ornate sofa large enough to support even a man of his gargantuan frame, face wan and gaze faraway. More grey had crept across his temples, and the lines on his face suddenly seemed much deeper than before. There was a blanket pulled up over him, both to keep him warm and to hide the swaths of bandages still wrapped around his upper body.
Soren had already heard it from Ike. General Gawain would never fight again.
Sunlight fell across the floor, and outside the world was all glimmering, glittering snow. It felt like the rest of the world was very far away.
Gawain looked up when they entered and a shadow passed over his face. He made like he was about to get up, to try to bow to Soren, and a pained grunt was forced out of him. Ike was by his father’s side in a moment, trying to push him back down.
“Please!” Soren said quickly. “Please. Don’t stand on ceremony with me, General Gawain.”
“Father,” Ike said, his hand on his shoulder.
It took a moment, but then Gawain exhaled. When Ike took his hand away, he remained where he was. Soren let out a breath.
“I expect I won’t be a general much longer,” Gawain said after a moment. “Prince Soren. Thank you for coming.”
“No,” Soren said, even as Ike ushered him into a chair. “You saved me, General Gawain. It’s only right that I come to pay my respects to you.”
Ike’s hand lingered a moment too long on his arm. Soren knew that Gawain saw it. It made his blood run cold, remembering what he and Gawain had been talking about just moments before the attack.
He hadn’t told Ike about what they’d spoken about that day. From the looks of things, neither had Gawain. Ike glanced between the two of them, his eyebrows raised.
“Ike,” Gawain said. “I would like to speak to the prince. Alone.”
Ike opened his mouth to protest but Gawain shook his head.
“I’m still your father, boy,” he said. “Go on. You know he’s in no danger from me, especially not as I am now.”
He said the last part with a wry twist of his lips. Ike’s frown deepened, but he just squeezed Soren’s shoulder.
“I’ll tell Mother you’re hurting again,” Ike said. “She’s making more of that salve. And Mist insisted on making you soup, so you better rest up, old man.”
Now it was Gawain’s term to grimace.
It was too quiet once Ike left the room. Soren sat there, his back ram rod straight, his hands folded neatly in his lap. The weight of winter seemed to press in on them, the snow outside muffling any sound. Gawain just watched him for a long moment.
“Ike assures me you weren’t injured,” he finally said. “That’s a relief.”
“You guarded me excellently,” Soren said. He was unable to keep the coldness from his voice.
Gawain’s lips quirked upwards, a tiny smile reminiscent of his son’s.
“I only did my duty,” he said. “You are Daein’s future, after all.”
Soren barely contained a snort. Daein’s future, indeed. His father certainly had never treated him that way. He couldn’t be sure, even now, that this latest attempt hadn’t been his father’s doing. But there were some things he couldn’t say even in the relative safety of Gawain’s company.
Gawain’s expression softened.
“It is every soldier’s duty to protect you,” he said. “No matter how it sometimes seems.”
Soren took a deep breath. The ice inside him was cold and hard and biting.
“And if it had been Ike?” he demanded, knowing even before he said it that it was terribly unfair.
Gawain was quiet for a long moment. Soren forced himself to hold still and silent, waiting him out.
“Even if Ike wasn’t a soldier, he would take it as his duty to protect you,” Gawain said.
Soren swallowed hard.
“You know, when Ike was younger, I used to think about leaving,” Gawain said. “I saw the way he looked at you even from the first day. I knew how dangerous it would be for him, to love a prince. To love you.”
“Why?” Soren said. His voice was harsher than he intended. “Why didn’t you ever take your family and leave Daein?”
“Why, indeed,” Gawain murmured. “The best time to leave would have been in the days following your father’s coronation, before he’d fully established himself as king. But I didn’t leave. I wanted to believe that Daein could change for the better. Your father’s ideas were unconventional, but interesting. And I had young children to think about.”
“You saw how cruel he was,” Soren said.
“Good men do not always make good kings,” Gawain said. “Your great grandfather also ruled by fear, and our history remembers him well for it.”
Soren pressed his lips into a tight line. He did not like thinking of the men from whom he descended in general, but he had read the accounts of his great grandfather’s rule. He, at least, did not remember him fondly for his acts.
“By the time I began to think about leaving, Ike was old enough to join the army,” Gawain said. “He was eager. Even if I hit him over the head and loaded him into a cart in the middle of the night, he never would have forgiven me, not really.” He glanced at Soren. “You know why, don’t you?”
Soren swallowed hard. He looked away.
“He wants to protect what he cares about,” Gawain said, his voice gruff. “He wants to protect you.”
Soren took a shuddering breath.
“I know,” he said. “I know he does. I don’t know how to stop him.”
“He’s always been stubborn,” Gawain said with a sigh. “He gets that from his mother as much as he gets it from me. Once he sets his heart on something, he’ll see it through. You won’t be able to stop him.”
Soren couldn’t accept that. He’d dreamed of it before, Ike sacrificing himself for him. It had become something of a reoccurring nightmare ever since Ike had jumped in front of the feral tiger when they were younger. He dreamed that the claws sank deeper, that the teeth sank into Ike’s neck. It wasn’t always the same situation. Sometimes it was an assassin that came in the night.
Sometimes it was even his father.
It was always worse in times of strife. Soren had dreamed of Ike’s blood on his hands every night since the attack.
“You need to protect him, too.”
Soren took a deep breath and looked up.
“I will,” he said. “I promise you I will protect him with my life.”
Gawain looked at him, his eyes piercing. Then he nodded, once, curt. He looked tired suddenly, like now that he’d said what he’d needed to say he needed to rest.
Soren rose.
“I’ll take my leave,” he said.
“Thank you for coming,” Gawain said. Soren turned to go, only for Gawain to continue. “I don’t regret protecting you, Prince Soren. I would do it all over again.”
Soren clenched his hands into fists at his sides.
“Take care of Ike,” Gawain said. “He needs you more than you know.”
Soren bit his lip until he tasted blood.
“That knight,” he said. “You recognized him, didn’t you?”
Gawain was silent.
“Ike wants to know who he is,” Soren said, looking over his shoulder. “He wants revenge.”
“I know,” Gawain said. “That’s why I won’t tell him.”
Soren nodded, once, and then slipped out of the room.
“Prince Soren,” Elena said. “Thank you for coming, and for always taking such good care of Ike.”
“Please,” Soren said. It was harder, speaking to Elena. “I’ve done nothing worthy of your thanks.”
“He talks about you all the time, you know,” Elena said. There was a small smile on her face. “Ike. Every time he’s home, he talks about you.”
Gawain had told Soren that Elena knew. He blinked hard, tried to stop his eyes from stinging. He supposed that wasn’t surprising, even without taking into account Ike’s lack of subtlety. There was something about Elena that made him feel like she could see right through him.
“Prince Soren, I…” Elena hesitated. “If I might do something improper.”
Soren almost laughed. He had nearly taken her husband from her, had put her son in danger countless times. What could she possibly do that would be improper? Or unearned?
She was too kind to slap him, but he would have stood there and taken it. His own mother had been tempestuous. Never violent to him, not ever, but she’d had her rages, though up until that last she’d tried to hide them from him. He never knew what to do with the innate gentleness Ike’s mother radiated.
It was a shock, then, when she opened her arms and pulled him, stiff and unyielding, into her embrace.
Elena wrapped her arms gently around him. One hand rubbed circles on his back as she hushed.
“You looked like you needed a hug,” she said. She held him close, swaying a bit, pressing his head against her shoulder. She started to hum something that sounded like an old lullaby.
No one had ever held Soren except for his mother and Ike. His eyes burned as he swallowed hard. He wanted to put his arms around her, but instead they hung uselessly at his sides.
“You’ve had to shoulder so much,” she said. “I’m glad you and Ike have each other.”
Soren opened his mouth to say something, anything, to thank her for her kindness, to apologize desperately to her, but he couldn’t seem to find any words.
“Sweet boy,” Elena said, cupping his cheek. It reminded Soren so strongly of his now hazy memories of his mother that he found himself blinking hard, gritting his teeth against the welling of tears. “Whatever we can do to help you, you only have to tell Ike.”
“Mother,” Ike said, leaning in the doorway. “Don’t smother him. Come on, Soren. I’ll show you the gardens.”
“It’s freezing out there,” Elena admonished, holding onto Soren’s hands now. Her easy touch burned.
Soren thought Ike probably knew.
“We won’t be out long,” he said.
It was freezing outside, Soren’s breath spiraling up like white smoke. Ike unslung the thick black cloak from around his own shoulders, draping it over Soren.
“Won’t you be cold?” Soren asked, clutching at it.
Ike shrugged.
“It’s never bothered me much,” he said. “You know what they say about Daein men. Ice in the blood.”
“Not you,” Soren said, shaking his head.
“Hm,” Ike said, considering. He drew Soren down a winding path, snow crunching beneath their boots. “You, neither.”
He thought, once again, of his mother’s fairy tales about her homeland. Hot and arid, with swooping cliffs and great planes. Soren wondered if it would be enough to steal Daein’s chill from his bones.
He wondered if Ike would like it.
There was a winding garden at the back of the house, though the tree branches currently hung thick with snow.
At the very center of the garden there was a statue of the goddess. She had her hands held up and open, and a peaceful expression on her stone face, but all Soren felt when he looked at her was the winter’s cold. Ike came to a stop in front of it, staring up at its stone visage, the snow dusting her hair.
“This is where my mother comes to pray,” Ike said. “I thought you might want to see it.”
“It’s lovely,” Soren thought, and it was true, in an objective sort of way, the way one could look at a rose and know that it was beautiful even if one did not care for flowers. “I’m afraid I’ve never found any comfort in prayer, though.”
Ike shrugged one shoulder.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “It’s peaceful here, that’s all.”
It was peaceful. The snow had muted all the sounds around them, peaceful and undisturbed except for their footprints. The air, while biting, was crisp and clean.
For the first time in weeks, Soren felt like he could breathe.
“Come here,” Ike said.
He pulled Soren against his chest, threading one hand through his hair. Soren knew better, but he stretched up on his toes anyway and let Ike kiss him. The slide of his lips was rough and warm, and it made him shiver in the bitter chill.
Soren wished they could stay like this, just the two of them in this frozen world. But of course that was impossible. Ike knew it, too, because after a few long moments he pulled away with a sigh.
“Come on,” Ike said, holding out a hand. “I’ll take you back.”
He was not surprised when his father summoned him that night.
Soren was still raw and aching in the aftermath of his conversation with Gawain, still felt like his chest had been ripped open by Elena’s embrace. Every step towards his father’s throne made it all weigh heavier on him.
Rajaion was not present in the throne room this time. Soren was relieved. He was feeling too unsettled to manage his own emotions, let alone his father’s mad mount.
“I suppose I should thank Gawain for saving my son,” Ashnard said, smiling with teeth.
“Yes,” Soren said. “Because you are known for both your generosity and your love for your son.”
“Hm,” Ashnard said, smirking. “I can be generous, if I choose.”
He waved one hand. Bryce stepped forward, holding something wrapped in deep, rich red velvet. The wrapping fell away to reveal the gleaming golden blade that the Black Knight had thrown to General Gawain that night.
“This is the sword that Black Knight threw to Gawain,” Ashnard said. “Its name is Ragnell, a sacred blade from long, long ago. It’s a worthy match against even my Gurgurant. I’ve decided to gift it to his son."
“How unexpectedly generous of you,” Soren said, not bothering to hide the venom dripping from his tongue. “The losing sword for the victim’s son.”
“There’s no fault in the blade,” Ashnard said. “Perhaps it was in the wielder. Gawain is no longer the young man he once was.”
Soren set his teeth so he didn’t do something unwise and mention his father was also no longer as young as he once was. Not that it mattered, he supposed. His father’s viciousness was something that never seemed to wane.
“That’s not the only thing I’m offering Sir Ike,” Ashnard said.
Slowly, Soren looked up at him.
“What are you saying?” he asked. “Speak plainly, father. I’m too tired for your games.”
“Gawain’s sword arm is ruined,” Ashnard said. “He can no longer serve as one of the Four Riders. You know what that means, don’t you, boy?”
There was a cold feeling growing in the pit of Soren’s stomach, worse than any Daein winter night.
Please, he wanted to say. Please, anything but that. But that would only make it worse.
“General Ike of the Four Riders,” Ashnard said, grinning. “Yes, it does have a nice sound to it.”
Ike accepted the position. There was nothing else he could have done. One did not refuse King Ashnard anything. One did not turn down the most powerful position one could rise to in the Daein military. And Ike had never backed down from a challenge.
Soren was still incandescently angry.
They fought. They almost never fought, but Soren couldn’t help it this time. He couldn’t stop thinking of Ike on the battlefield, facing the fiercest of enemies, of blood and snow and fire and disaster, of all the generals who had left to fight and never come back.
He was halfway through his mad rant when Ike spun him around, pulling him close.
“Soren, listen to me,” he said. “Just calm down and listen – you’re smart, you’re strong. What are you so afraid of?”
“You,” Soren bit out, his voice ringing out from seemingly every corner of the room. “Losing you.”
Ike fell silent. Soren scrubbed at his face angrily, willing himself not to cry. It would make it worse for both of them if he cried. Still, Ike just stood there and said nothing.
“Ike, I have no friends, no allies other than you,” Soren begged. “If I lost you, I don’t – I don’t think I could survive it.”
Ike studied his face for a long moment, then reached out and cupped Soren’s cheek in his palm, brushing his thumb just underneath his lower lashes, where angry, frightened tears threatened to spill. Soren turned his face into his palm desperately.
“I can use this position to protect what matters to me,” Ike said. “You, and my family. Stop fighting with me, Soren. I’m not your enemy.”
His teeth grazed Soren’s throat. Soren let out a shaky breath, his fingers sinking into Ike’s hair. His other hand covered his mouth, stifling the sound he made when Ike kissed him behind his ear, his fingers making quick work of the ties holding together Soren’s robes.
They fucked like that, hard and desperate, Soren braced over the polished dark wood of his desk while Ike thrust into him, his lips and teeth set against Soren’s shoulder.
He rarely took Soren from behind. Soren always wanted to see his face.
Tonight was strange and terrible in a myriad of ways. Soren’s throat was tight with tears as he begged Ike to fuck him harder.
He was gentle afterwards, of course. Soren knew he would be. He sat Soren on the desk and swept his hands over the finger-shaped bruises blossoming on Soren’s hips, set his mouth to Soren’s bitten shoulders in an apologetic kiss.
Soren nuzzled against his temple, one arm wrapped around his neck, but Ike’s warmth couldn’t chase away the fear he still felt.
“I don’t want to lose you,” he said when Ike pulled back.
“You haven’t lost me,” Ike said.
But in a way, Soren had. His father had stolen him from his mother, and now he had stolen Ike from Soren.
Cruelty for cruelty’s sake. It was all Soren thought about in the days leading up to the ceremony at which his father would publicly announce Ike’s ascension to Rider of Daein.
He was half-hidden out of sight, standing with a restless Rajaion while Pelleas, seated by his father, sweat through his robes. Soren didn’t envy him his position. Pelleas looked like a mouse next to his father, the great vicious lion.
Gawain was not well enough to make the trip to the castle. Soren found himself relieved.
It should have been the greatest honor of Ike’s career, the highest one could climb in Daein’s military. Instead his father had rendered it a sick joke.
You need to protect him, too.
Ike knelt in front of Ashnard, cold steel in his blue eyes, and Soren forced himself to watch as the tip of his father’s sword touched Ike’s shoulder.
Soren made a decision.
If Soren was weak, it was because his father had kept him so. He did not have a swordsman’s build or strength, nor the temperament required. He admired Ike’s strength and grace, but he could hardly expect to compete on that same level. He would be at every disadvantage when it came to a physical weapon.
But there were other weapons available to him, and Soren had always been a dedicated learner.
“Here is what is going to happen,” Soren said to Pelleas one afternoon when they were alone. “You are going to instruct me in magic.”
“Oh!” Pelleas said, sitting up straighter. “I didn’t realize the king had issued an order –”
“This is not the king’s order,” Soren said, his voice harsh. “You will instruct me secretly. You will tell no one what you are doing. Not even General Ike.”
The color drained from Pelleas’ face.
“Prince Soren,” he began, nervous, his fingers twisting together.
“That’s an order,” Soren said, his voice as cold as ice. “I expect you to obey it.”
Pelleas looked pained as he inclined his head.
“Yes, Prince Soren,” he said.
Pelleas was not what Soren would consider the greatest of study partners, but for all his hesitance, his lack of surety, he understood magic.
He still thought Soren was a Spirit Charmer. Soren didn’t intend to correct him. And Soren was good at grasping things quickly, making connections on his own. He just didn’t need the help of a spirit to do it. He had survived twenty years in his father’s fortress; magic was nothing by comparison.
Still, he grit his teeth and learned it. It was for Ike, after all.
Daein held no real respect for magic, not as it did physical strength. If it valued any it was fire magic, because the beasts feared it. Soren had no difficulty learning fire magic, but he felt no draw to it. Pelleas had said there would be some type of feeling, although he got so flustered he couldn’t tell Soren what that meant beyond some fluttering hand gestures. Typical.
They tried thunder magic after that. Soren had grasped it easily enough, calling down lightning from the sky, but it had burned in his blood, fizzling through him like liquid fire. Tolerable, but unpleasant. He’d asked Pelleas afterwards if it was always like that only for Pelleas to look at him with confusion.
No, he’d said. It had never been like that when he tried it. He admittedly had little talent for elemental magic, though. Pelleas’ own specialty was dark magic, but no matter how hard he tried, Soren could not command the castle’s shadows in the same way that Pelleas did.
(He wondered, sometimes, if Pelleas’ talent for that magic in particular had anything to do with the deal he’d made, the spirit coiled around his soul, slowly corroding it year after year.)
Light magic, similarly, escaped Soren, but then as his father’s prisoner the past twenty years, he felt no affinity for the sunlight.
It wasn’t until the first time he tried his hand at wind magic that he understood what Pelleas had tried and failed to elucidate. From the moment the ancient words left his tongue, the wind sprang up, wrapping itself around him. It whipped his hair away from his face, fluttered at his sleeves, and seemed to thread itself through his fingers. The spirits whipped around him, ancient voices excitedly whispering in words he could not understand.
It felt like a caress.
Even Pelleas seemed to be in awe, turning in slow circles as the wind whipped around them.
“Incredible,” he whispered. “To be so beloved by the wind – it must have been a spirit of the air who marked you.”
Soren only hummed in response. It was easier if Pelleas believed he was a Spirit Charmer.
The practical aspects of magic they practiced in secret in the middle of the night. During the day, Soren forced Pelleas into the library with him, pouring over tomes of magic until Soren’s tongue could shape ancient words with practiced ease.
He didn’t tell Ike about any of it. As far as Ike knew, the library trips were to study history and strategy, catching Pelleas up on a hundred years of Daein history.
As one of the Riders of Daein, Ike was away from the castle frequently. It wasn’t difficult to keep up the deception. That didn’t make it any easier for Soren to lie to him. Not about magic, and not about anything else, either.
The first few times were agony. Gradually, that lessened, the anxiety becoming – not bearable. Never bearable. But expected. This was something Soren was used to, like every other painful aspect of his life.
“I’ll always come back to you,” Ike had promised before he left the first time.
He’d kept that promise. But every time Ike left, there was still the feeling caught in Soren’s chest. The awful anxiety of knowing that this time could be the last time he ever saw the only person in the world who’d held out a warm hand to him.
There was always a feeling in the air right before Ike returned, like a thread suddenly pulled taught in the center of Soren’s chest. He had been fighting a smile all morning.
He couldn’t let it show, so he pretended he couldn’t hear the familiar footsteps echoing across the library’s stone floor. He pretended he couldn’t feel the prickle of awareness that always washed over him when Ike was in the same room, as if he knew exactly where he was without even having to look.
Ike knew he was faking it, of course. But that was what made it fun.
“What are you reading?”
Hands landed on either side of him as Ike leaned over his chair from behind. Pelleas jumped violently, his book clattering to the ground, but Soren only hummed and turned the next page.
“A book on an ancient language,” he said. “I doubt you’d be interested.”
Ike leaned in closer and Soren felt the corner of his lips twitch.
“Try me,” he said, all heat.
This would be dangerous if there was anyone around except Pelleas, who looked very much like he wanted to slither under the table and crawl away.
“General Ike,” he said, a tremor in voice. “It’s – they call it the Serenes language, actually, and –”
Ike grunted and Pelleas slid further down in his seat.
“It’s only history, Ike,” Soren lied smoothly. “It never hurts to be able to read an ancient language.”
He pretended to go back to his book, even as Ike put a hand on his shoulder. Soren feigned a casual glance upwards at him, his eyebrows raised.
Ike jerked his chin at Pelleas, raising his eyebrows. Soren felt a thrill in his stomach.
“Leave us,” he told Pelleas, still looking at Ike. He felt more than saw Pelleas startle.
“Prince Soren?” he said.
“I said leave,” Soren said. “I need to speak to General Ike. Alone.”
The corner of Ike’s mouth quirked up in a smirk. Soren shivered pleasantly and hoped it wasn’t noticeable.
Slowly, Pelleas closed his book and put it down.
“If you’re sure,” he said to Soren, giving Ike a faintly terrified look.
Ike crossed his arms and tilted his head, giving Pelleas the same look Soren had seen him give his sparring opponents right before he unceremoniously knocked them on their asses. Pelleas squeaked a little and fled the library.
“Isn’t it beneath you to antagonize him?” Soren asked, ducking his head to hide his smile. “General Ike, of the Four Riders.”
He looked down at his book, feigning disinterest. He hadn’t seen Ike for over a week, but now that he was here again, Soren couldn’t help but want to draw things out, to linger in the moment. He savored every second, Ike coming up behind him, leaning just slightly over him, and then his arms coming down on either side of Soren. He could feel the heat radiating off of him and it made everything in him sing.
“I’m still your guard,” Ike said. He leaned down, his breath tickling Soren’s ear. Soren shivered pleasantly even as he nonchalantly selected another book. “What are you reading now?”
“A book on military history,” Soren said. He kept his eyes on the page even though he couldn’t focus on a single word, not with Ike leaning over him, solid and real and right there for Soren to touch. “It’s very interesting.”
“Oh yeah?” Ike said. His lips brushed the shell of Soren’s ear. “More interesting than me?”
Soren had missed him too much. He twisted around in his seat, throwing his arms around Ike’s neck and leaning up to seal their lips together. Ike kissed him back hungrily, one big hand sliding down Soren’s back.
“No,” Soren said when they broke apart, panting a little for breath. “Nothing is more interesting than you.”
Ike’s smile widened, genuine and all for Soren.
Soren chased after him, trying to kiss him again, getting onto his knees on his chair. Ike laughed a little under his breath and the next thing Soren knew he was lifting him up. Soren wrapped his arms around his neck again, kissing him over and over.
“We should stop,” he said, struggling to get the words out as he wrapped his legs around Ike’s waist. “We’ll get caught.”
“We won’t,” Ike promised, squeezing Soren’s thighs. “Just trust me.”
“I do,” Soren said. He laughed breathlessly. “I trust you more than anyone.”
Maybe it wasn’t high praise in a viper’s nest, but he meant it all the same.
“I know,” Ike said. His voice was low and husky. “It’s the same for me.”
Soren looked at him, his eyes wide, his lips parted.
“It’s the same for me,” Ike repeated. “I trust you more than anyone. You know that.”
The words burned through Soren like the rush of fire magic at his fingertips. I trust you more than anyone.
He surged up to kiss Ike, sinking his fingers into Ike’s blue hair. The kiss was fierce and deep, Soren swallowing his own sorrow so that Ike wouldn’t feel it.
Ike trusted him more than anyone. Even though Soren was lying to him.
Ike grabbed him by the back of his thighs, hoisting him up and onto the table. The books clattered to the floor as Ike settled between Soren’s spread knees, his big hands holding his legs open. He kissed behind Soren’s ear as Soren pointlessly pushed at his chest.
“Ike, those books are decades old,” he said, but the scold was ruined by his breathless voice. “Have some care.”
“Who cares about some dusty old books?” Ike groused, nipping at Soren’s earlobe.
Soren curled his fingers around his bicep and dug the heel of his boot into the back of Ike’s thigh, raising his eyebrows meaningfully. Ike grumbled, but he let him up, although he didn’t go far, the heat of his body sending shivers down Soren’s spine as he collected the books and set them neatly to the side, where they wouldn’t be ruined.
He refused to have to explain to the archivists why the pages detailing his great great grandfather’s conquest of southern Daein were sticking together.
The books in order, he spun around to face Ike again, and was quickly swept back into his embrace. Ike kissed him like he’d been thinking about it for every minute they were apart, deep and all consuming. His hands swept over Soren, across his shoulders, down his arms, his hands shifting to grip his waist instead, pulling Soren closer before his hands slipped lower.
Soren’s whole body throbbed with desire. He had no idea how they were going to make it back to his rooms in this state. Ike apparently had similar thoughts.
He worked his hands up under his robes, squeezing Soren’s ass.
“Can I?” he asked, his lips moving against Soren’s throat.
“Here?” Soren gasped. He looked around, his chest heaving, but there was no one. The alcove was out of the way, deep into the library where the oldest royal records were stored. There was no one who would come back there at this time of the day. “I…”
“Tell me to stop and I will,” Ike said. He raised his head and looked up at Soren, his blue eyes blazing.
There was no one coming. They were all alone. Beyond all that – Soren wanted him so badly he ached. He caught Ike’s face between his hands and kissed him, once, twice, gentler this time, trying to convey it through touch – just how much he’d missed Ike. How much he’d longed for him.
He thought of Ena, waiting for her betrothed, and felt something clench deep in his chest.
“Don’t stop,” he said, curling his arm around Ike’s shoulders.
There must have been something in his voice. Ike’s brows furrowed and then he leaned forward again, kissing Soren’s lips, the corner of his mouth, the space just beside his nose.
“I missed you,” he said, his lips moving against Soren’s cheek. “I thought about you, every night.”
He kissed his jaw next, and Soren tilted his head back, his breath stuttering, to allow Ike access to his throat. Ike didn’t need to be told twice. Soren gasped as he bit at his throat, the heel of his boot digging into Ike’s back.
“You’ll leave marks,” he said. He’d meant to sound chastising, but instead it came out breathless, excited. The idea of Ike’s marks underneath his clothes again made him shiver, sent thrills up his spine.
“Would that be so bad?” Ike asked. He bit him again, but on his collarbone this time, and Soren stifled a groan.
“You – there would be talk, if anyone noticed,” he said breathlessly. “Don’t give your father any more grey hair.”
Ike huffed a quiet laugh. He grabbed Soren behind his thighs, hoisting him up so he was trapped between Ike and the wall. Startled, Soren grabbed a hold of his shoulders, clinging to him.
“Like this okay?” Ike asked, voice husky. His fingers dug into Soren’s thighs.
“Oh,” Soren gasped, looking down at the floor below.
The swoop of anxiety lasted only a moment.
Ike was more than strong enough to hold him up.
He kissed him in answer, the heel of his boot digging into the small of Ike’s back. Held up and open like this, he was pinned, completely at Ike’s mercy.
He worked quickly, ripping the laces from Soren’s leggings and dragging them down his thighs. Soren’s robes were already askew, and every brush of fabric felt maddening against his sensitized skin. He longed to be in his bed, where Ike could strip him of his finery, but letting go of Ike long enough to get there felt impossible.
Neither of them were in any state to be seen. It felt dangerous, much more dangerous than coupling in Soren’s locked rooms.
There must be something wrong with him, Soren thought, that he enjoyed it. He kissed Ike again, knotting his fingers in Ike’s hair, rather than thinking about it as they rutted together like it was the first time all over again.
Soren’s legs were shaking when Ike set him down. If it wasn’t for Ike’s steadying grip, he would have surely fallen – but Ike was holding him, the steadiest person Soren had ever known. He was flushed and panting too, his mouth red and bitten, and Soren tried to kiss him again even as Ike fixed his clothes for him, fumbling to lace Soren’s trousers and straighten his robes.
Soren had other ideas, though, complicating Ike’s attempts as he slid his fingers down Ike’s muscled stomach, into the patch of curly hair at his groin.
“Don’t make problems for me,” Ike said, laughing under his breath as Soren’s fingers skirted along his length. He caught Soren’s wrist but didn’t move his hand as Soren pushed up on his toes to kiss him.
I love him, he thought, dizzy with it, his tongue sweeping into Ike’s mouth. I love him more than anything else in the world.
“Come on,” Ike whispered between them, cheeks red as Soren wrapped his hand around him. “You can barely stand.”
“I could get on my knees,” Soren suggested, his lips brushing Ike’s between the words.
Ike groaned. Then he stilled, and his hand tightened around Soren’s wrist. Soren opened his mouth to protest when Ike jerked his chin towards the shelves.
There were voices. Soren recognized the head archivist.
“Come on,” Ike whispered, grabbing his hand.
He pulled Soren around the corner. It was a rush between the two of them to get their clothes straightened, and Ike nearly knocked Soren’s circlet from his head in the process. Ike’s elbow bumped into a shelf and the books on it rattled.
The footsteps paused. They drew back, waiting, until they resumed.
Ike laughed under his breath, shaking his head. His hand found Soren’s again as he pulled him in the opposite direction from the head archivist.
“Here,” Ike said, pulling him behind a tapestry embroidered with dragons.
They fell together, both smothering their laughter. Soren pressed his face against Ike’s chest to muffle the sound, and Ike brought a hand up to cup the back of his head.
With a horrible shock, Soren realized that he was happy.
He knew it couldn’t last. His father had become more aggressive as the years went by, more restless.
Over the past few years, a new name for his father had swept through Daein, spilled into neighboring Begnion and Crimea. The Mad King, they called him.
Soren couldn’t disagree. He’d long known his father was mad.
Still, he did not realize the depths of his madness until he announced his plan to invade Crimea. The fact that his father desired war wasn’t a surprise. And Daein had been at war with Crimea before in the past. It was the method that had Soren standing by the war table, touching his fingers to his lips.
Everyone at the war table looked shocked. Even General Petrine.
“There’s only one person who will plan our attack,” Ashnard said, his grin wide. “My son.”
Soren’s head snapped up, his eyes wide. Behind his father’s throne, Ike looked sharply at him.
Did you know? his gaze asked.
Soren shook his head minutely. Ike’s scowl deepened.
He stayed behind after everyone else was dismissed. His father seemed to anticipate it, his gaze fixed on Soren as Soren remained standing. Ike hesitated, but Soren only shook his head minutely and jerked his head towards the door. Ike set his jaw, gave Soren a look that said they’d talk about this later, and then left, his cape swirling at his ankles.
“What are you planning?” Soren asked his father when they were alone.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Ashnard said.
“Invading Crimea in this way gains us nothing!” Soren said. “This is not the way to wage a war! I won’t do it.”
“Soren,” Ashnard said, and Soren froze on the spot. He couldn’t remember the last time his father had called him by his name. The sound of it was hateful on his lips.
“I won’t do it,” Soren repeated.
“That I have allowed you to live at all is reason to be grateful,” Ashnard said. “Others would have drowned a half-breed at birth. Do you think no one suggested it? That no one advised me to be rid of you? To kill both you and your useless mother?”
Soren snorted.
“And yet here I stand,” he said. “I will not plan your invasion. Not like this.”
There was nothing else to say. He turned to go, to let his father cackle to himself until he decided to either share his insights or plan an invasion in a proper way. Soren had no love for war, but he had no love for Crimea, either.
If he felt anything for Daein, he felt it because it was the land that had given Ike. That was all.
“Your mother is alive, you know.”
Soren paused.
“They tell me she still begs for you,” Ashnard said. “That she’s a deluded mad woman, still weeping for her son.”
The Mad King and a mad woman. Soren had certainly won the lottery when it came to his parents.
“Is there a point to this?” he asked.
“Your mother lives,” Ashnard repeated. “That could change if you displease me.”
Soren dragged in a harsh breath. He could feel his shoulders stiffening, his fingers itching to curl into fists. He determined not to let any of it show, not to give his father one single bit of satisfaction.
“I won’t be threatened,” Soren said.
“Won’t you?” Ashnard said.
Soren scoffed, turning to leave.
“Soren.”
It was his name again, so rarely used, that made him turn around. He knew it was a mistake as soon as he did it.
“You used to protest when I called you a half-breed,” Ashnard said, his grin sharpening.
Soren stared at him, hatred rising like bile in his throat. Then he turned on his heel and marched from the room without another word.
He took shelter in Rajaion’s stable.
For once, Rajaion was the calmer between the two of them. He cooed happily when Soren settled against his side, curling one wing over him and resting his giant head gently against his shoulder, careful not to crush him. Soren had seen wyverns treat their newly hatched young in the same manner, and it made him almost laugh.
“What is he thinking?” he asked himself, raising a hand pet Rajaion’s snout.
Rajaion snorted and Soren made a noise of agreement.
“Begnion is too big, too powerful,” Soren murmured to Rajaion, running a hand down the scales of his neck. “Daein would lose if he were to attempt to invade it. Crimea, however, is a country known more for its scholarship than its military strength. A surprise invasion would let us win without taking minimal casualties ourselves. Crimea is easy prey.”
He swallowed hard. It could work. Soren could lead this charge, and he could win it, too.
“King Ramon is known to be friendly to subhumans,” he said, well aware that he was speaking to himself. Rajaion growled a bit, so Soren resumed petting his neck. “This, too, can influence the situation. Perhaps it’s not really Crimea he’s set his eyes on, but Gallia. First Crimea, then Gallia… Eventually, Begnion will involve itself.”
They wouldn’t stand a chance against Begnion, and Soren knew little about the bird tribes, but it made sense to him that they would ally with the beasts in Gallia.
“It’s like he wants to plunge the entire continent into war,” Soren murmured. He pressed careful fingertips to his lips, wondering. Was his father mad enough to desire that? To what end?
Suddenly, Rajaion lifted his head. Soren, startled from his thoughts, made to reach up and soothe him when he heard it, too.
Everything had gone still and silent except for a nearby clank of heavy armor.
Rajaion began to growl as Soren kept a steadying hand on his neck.
“Easy,” he whispered. “Stay still.”
Rajaion snarled, but he held still as Soren commanded. His great body seemed to thrum underneath Soren’s hand.
The door creaked. Torchlight spilled into the large cell. It caught, glinting, upon an impressively tall figure clad in jet black armor.
It was the knight Soren had seen that night. The one who had attacked Gawain. Soren’s fingers tightened against Rajaion’s thick hide.
“Come to finish the job?” Soren asked.
“It was never my intention to harm you that night,” the Black Knight said. “Come with me. I have something to show you.”
He held out his hand. Rajaion snarled and lunged forward, jaws snapping. The chains restraining him strained against his bulk. Soren grabbed at him, wrapping his chain around his arm and grabbing onto his neck.
“Mindless, snarling beast,” the Black Knight said, and there was something like pity in the whisper of his voice. “A better man would simply put you out of your misery.”
“Don’t touch him!” Soren snarled. He clung to Rajaion’s neck, his gaze fixed on the Black Knight’s sword.
The Black Knight seemed to consider him for a long moment.
“I mean you no harm, Prince Soren,” he said. “Whatever your beastly protector may think.”
Rajaion snarled, and it shook Soren’s very bones.
“If you want the beast to live, come with me,” the Black Knight said. “Or shall I go and see if Gawain’s son is as easily cut down as his father?”
Soren grit his teeth. Slowly, he peeled himself from Rajaion’s side, unwrapping the chain from around his arm. He put a hand against his snout and turned his face towards his, heedless of his open, snarling mouth. Rajaion’s gaze met his own, wild with rage.
“Rajaion,” he said, his voice quiet but firm. “You will stay. Do you hear me?”
He knew Rajaion understood a few basic commands. Hold, stay, fly. Bite, rend, tear.
If he let him loose, could he kill the knight? Maybe. Soren couldn’t risk it, though.
“Stay,” he repeated.
Rajaion made a low, confused noise as Soren stepped back.
He placed his hand in the Black Knight’s and was quickly yanked against his armored chest. Rajaion’s roar shook the foundation of the stables.
The ground fell away in a whirling rush of colors. Soren recognized the touch of spirits against his skin, but he had never felt magic like this before. They seemed to fall for only a moment before the world righted itself, stone beneath Soren’s boots.
His head spun. He thought for a moment that he would be sick over the Black Knight’s armor.
He deserved it, Soren thought vindictively. After a moment, though, the world stopped spinning and Soren’s stomach righted itself. He took a few gulping breaths of air before he wrenched himself away from the Black Knight.
“You’re a strong one,” the knight observed mildly. “Most don’t take to warp powder so easily.”
“How nice for me,” Soren bit out.
He cast a look around the room. The walls and floors were made of dark, grimy stone, tacky beneath Soren’s boots. The air was bitterly cold, and he could see no windows. Torches set in the wall flickered ominously, and small spirit lights floated up above. There was an awful smell in the air, rotten and heavy with the taste of iron.
“Where have you taken me?”
“This, my prince,” the Black Knight said, “is Kiralyne Tower. It was once residence to your great grandmother.”
Soren had seen it before, marked on a map. His stomach swooped as he recalled how far away it was from the capitol. They’d traveled hundreds of miles in an instant.
“A mad woman, she tried to kill her husband and her young son, your grandfather’s younger brother,” the Black Knight said. “Afterwards, she was imprisoned here.”
“Yes,” Soren said tersely. “I’m well aware of my family’s less savory history.”
“It’s said that the king still loved her, in spite of everything,” the Black Knight said. “He visited her often, even as she descended further into his madness.”
Soren looked around, at the dark, dank stone walls, at the lack of windows, and thought of a woman denied even the smallest freedom of fresh air or sunlight. He doubted very much that it had had anything to do with love.
“He never took another wife,” the Black Knight said. “Perhaps that was why your grandfather decided to marry many times, with many wives, so he would not repeat his father’s tragic story.”
Soren had never known his grandfather, but he suspected it had more to do with a fickle, lecherous nature than anything else.
“And my father?” Soren said bitterly. “With only one banished concubine to his name?”
The Black Knight was quiet for a long moment.
“Some men are born with something missing in their souls,” he said.
Soren had nothing to say to that. It was hardly something he could deny.
“Why did you bring me here?” he asked. “Surely not to give me a history lesson.”
He took a step forward, towards one of the flickering torches. The stone floor was tacky beneath his boots. He stared down at it, frowning, only to realize that the stone was covered in blood.
“No,” the Black Knight said. “And for that, I am sorry.”
Soren tracked the blood trail. It looked like someone had been dragged down the hall.
“If you wanted to kill me, there are easier ways,” Soren said. “You needn’t have left after you struck down Gawain.”
“You may find it difficult to believe, but I never had any intention of harming you,” the Black Knight said. “Come, follow me.”
Soren had little choice. He had memorized a detailed map of Daein when he’d been young, and Kiralyne Tower was far from Nevassa, situated in Daein’s rocky, unforgiving mountains. Even if he could have escaped from the Black Knight, he’d die of exposure long before he made it back.
The Black Knight led him down long, dark corridors, lit only by the occasional lantern and the flickering spirit lights overhead. The spirit lights were different than the elemental spirits Soren commanded. They felt cold and muted, like distant things that would not answer his call.
From the corridor, they descended a staircase, long and winding. The stone was cracked with age and there was blood spilled here, too, far too recently to have belonged to his great grandmother’s day.
What a terrible place, Soren thought, to keep a wife.
The stench that rose up from the floor below them was vile. Once, when Soren was about twelve years old, there had been an attempt on his father’s life. The assassin had gotten close, but it had been futile—Rajaion had ripped the man in half.
His father had left the body displayed outside the castle gates as a warning. When he learned who’d hired the assassin—a noble family with distant marriage ties to the Daein throne—they’d joined him there.
Soren remembered the stench as days turned to weeks, just as surely as he remembered the huge black birds that swept down to pick at the bodies.
The Black Knight hesitated on the last step. Soren’s fingers twitched, thinking of the dagger hidden in his sleeve. It wouldn’t do him any good against the Black Knight, but he still longed for the feel of its hilt in his hand.
“I apologize, Prince Soren,” he said.
He didn’t say for what. He only turned, his long crimson cape swirling at his ankles, and walked on into the darkness.
Soren covered his mouth and nose with his sleeve and followed him.
It was the roar that first let him know they weren’t alone. Loud as a tiger, but hardly ferocious, it still seemed to shake the very air around them. It sounded like it was in pain. Other voices joined it, a horrible cacophony of snarling and screeching. It grew louder and louder as they approached a turn in the dungeon.
The Black Knight paused, and then put a hand on Soren’s back before he pushed him forward. Soren opened his mouth to protest, but gagged instead when the force of the stench hit him full force. Here all the walls were lined with prison cells, and cages hung from the ceiling.
“In a such a state,” the Black Knight said quietly, as if he was speaking to himself. “Tormented and twisted and yet they can still sense the presence of those who do not belong in this world.”
A tiger threw itself up against the bars of its cage, snarling wildly, its eyes roving every which way. The Black Knight’s hand came down heavy on Soren’s shoulder.
This, Soren realized, was where his father kept the feral beasts he used to challenge his strongest warriors. In the very prison that had once housed his own grandmother.
The Black Knight drew him down the hall.
“Walk quickly,” he said. “Our presence unnerves them.”
The floor shook from the force of the roar. A prickling awareness came over Soren, a strange pull beneath his ribs that urged him deeper, deeper, into some unseen basement.
“The dragons are kept several floors beneath,” the Black Knight said. “They’d tear the others to shreds if they were kept any closer.”
Dragons, Soren thought to himself. He bit down on the inside of his cheek until he tasted blood.
“I should have known it was you, Black Knight,” Izuka said, rubbing his gnarled hands together. “They get so excitable whenever you’re near.”
The Black Knight grunted.
“I’ve brought someone to see you,” he said.
He stepped aside, revealing Soren. Izuka narrowed his eyes, and then he made a noise of recognition. It was surprising how fast he could move, considering how frail and hunched over he looked.
“Oh, it’s the prince, is it,” Izuka said, circling around him. He rubbed his withered hands together, his eyes gleaming with mad light. “My, but he looks like his mother.”
Soren felt his lip curl.
“The king wished for his son to see your… work,” he said, and Soren knew he wasn’t imagining the hint of distaste in the Black Knight’s odd, whispering tone. “The timeline for the invasion can’t be pushed back any longer, and he wishes for his son’s involvement.”
“Ah, does he, now?” Izuka said. “The lady was a vicious one. One wonders if the son inherited her spirit as well as her looks. The king was so disappointed when you showed no… unique talents.” He broke off a strange little laugh, high and grating. “He would have done away with you in the cradle if not for the – intervention. But wait, wait, I said! Perhaps the prince will come into abilities as he ages. Perhaps they could even be… nudged along.”
“Izuka,” the Black Knight said. “Now is not the time. You are to show the prince your work and that is all.”
Izuka gave the Black Knight a nasty look.
“Yes, yes, I’m aware of the king’s orders,” Izuka snapped. “Bring out one of the beasts!”
A soldier in Daein armor entered the room, dragging a man with brown and beige wings behind him. A hawk, Soren thought, and a young one. The hawk youth was struggling, but weakly. He was painfully thin and bloody, and it was clear he did not have the strength to put up any kind of a fight.
Soren watched in morbid fascination as the hawk was dragged in front of Izuka, and as Izuka produced a vial of some kind of liquid from the folds of his robes. His gnarled fingers held it up to the light as if it were the most precious of jewels.
The hawk boy’s mouth was forced open. Izuka cackled as he poured the liquid in, forcing the boy to swallow. It didn’t happen immediately. Instead, they stood there, waiting, until the hawk began to writhe. A strange glow emanated from his body as he threw his head back with a scream. Talons sprouted, feathers bursting from his body.
It happened slowly at first, and then all at once. The transformed hawk was large, his feathers scraggly and dull, but it was his eyes that struck Soren. He had seen the madness in them before, in the beasts his father brought in for his warriors to fight.
“I call them the Feral Ones,” Izuka said, an equally mad light shining in his eyes as he rubbed his hands together in delight. “Aren’t they wonderful, Prince Soren? Aren’t I brilliant?”
Soren’s stomach threatened to turn. Ike’s mother had once said, in a contemplative tone of voice, that Soren was sensitive to the emotions of others. Soren had discounted it at the time. Elena was fond of him, for all he’d cost her, and so she wanted to see the best in him. But right now, the emotions of this place did threaten to overwhelm him. It was all he could do to keep his composure.
He swallowed thickly as the hawk cried out and flapped his wings, attempting to take flight. It took another two soldiers to drag him back down and out of the room, back to one of those putrid cages.
“Well!” Izuka said, a cackle in his voice. “Come, come, Prince Soren. Let’s go and see the dragons.”
Soren swallowed hard, that prickling awareness coming over him again.
“Izuka,” the Black Knight said, a commanding note in his voice. “Watch yourself. You’ve seen how the king’s mount reacts to the prince. How many red dragons are locked up in that basement? An entire platoon? If you lose control of them, even one such as I would have trouble restraining that number.”
Izuka’s lip curled.
“Have a care who you speak to with that tone, knight,” he said.
“The king will not be pleased with either of us if we destroy his prized collection,” the Black Knight said, a rumble low in his throat. “Nor if they react differently and tear the boy to shreds.”
Izuka’s face twisted. He rubbed his hands together, shaking his head.
“No, no, that wouldn’t do,” he mumbled, half to himself. “The king would string me up by my thumbs if something happened to his prize dragons. No, not after the lady went and made herself useless, no. Fine, fine, take the prince back to His Majesty.”
He flapped a hand, muttering to himself.
“One last thing,” the Black Knight said to Izuka. “The king asks for the herons to be delivered to him.”
“Hm?” Izuka said. “Ah, yes, the songbirds. It’s for the best. Such delicate creatures… although the male has the most unusual temper.” He flapped a hand at the Black Knight. “I’ll have them sent. Go, go, now, you interrupt my work.”
Izuka’s gaze lingered on him as they left. The Black Knight put a hand on his back, steering him down the hall and away from him.
“Don’t look back,” he said. “It’s better that way.”
Soren snorted, turning his face away. There was nothing about this place that he could possibly constitute as better by any standard.
“You must have questions,” the Black Knight said.
“Only one,” Soren replied. He flicked his gaze upwards at the Black Knight’s helmet. “Did my father send you to try and kill General Gawain that day?”
The Black Knight said nothing. Not for a long, long time as they made their way back through the depths of the tower.
“You understand now why the king wanted me to bring you here,” the Black Knight said.
“To witness the depths of his depravity, yes,” Soren murmured. “And to present an ultimatum. I imagine this feral drug works on half-breeds as well as full blooded subhumans?”
“It’s yet to be tested, but the theory holds,” the Black Knight said. “Even the drug didn’t strip you of your will, how long do you think you would last in this place, surrounded by the filth and stench of beasts that still abhor your very existence, even stripped of their sanity?”
Like his great grandmother, Soren thought. Like his mother. Locked away when he became inconvenient.
“Displease your father, refuse to fulfill his demands, and this is where you’ll be sent,” the Black Knight said.
Soren’s skin crawled. He said nothing.
“Ah,” the Black Knight said. “I see now. Threats to you don’t matter, do they?”
“Survival is the prerogative of all creatures,” Soren said blankly, staring straight ahead.
The Black Knight’s laugh was strange and breathy.
“The drug doesn’t only affect sub-humans, my prince,” the Black Knight said. “Slipped into your dear general’s cup at dinner and he would be rendered a snarling, mindless beast, too.” He gripped Soren’s chin, forced his head up. “Would he still recognize you, I wonder? You seem to have an uncanny ability to make yourself known.”
He couldn’t be sure, not with the helmet masking the Black Knight’s face, but he felt like he was staring at his brand.
“Could you bear it?” the Black Knight asked. “Watching the life dim from his eyes? Watching him rendered nothing more than a tool for battle? No tender touch, no laugh on his lips?”
Soren grit his teeth and didn’t answer. After a moment, the Black Knight released him.
“This is only a warning, little prince,” the Black Knight said. “Come. I’ll return you to your protector.”
Rajaion was in a rage when Soren returned to the castle, worse than he had ever seen before. He thrashed and roared, his tail lashing, as half a dozen wyvern grooms tried to keep a hold of the chains tethering him to his cell. He snapped and roared, tossing his huge head as his teeth flashed. His eyes roved back and forth as if in a desperate panic, and hot saliva dripped from his lolling tongue.
Ena was hovering by the doors, looking desperately like she wanted to rush in, but she couldn’t. Rajaion always grew more restless when she was near, and at the rate he was lashing out he was already liable to kill half the grooms in the stall. Two already lay bloody on the ground, and Soren couldn’t tell whether or not they would live.
He broke into a run, forcing his shaking legs faster, faster.
“Prince Soren!” Ena shouted, but he ignored her.
“Stop it!” Soren said, pushing one of the grooms out of the way. “Get away from him! It’s me he wants, you fools!”
He tried to grab for Rajaion’s chains, to yank him forward, but Rajaion reared up and away. He roared louder, wings beating furiously, and Soren was nearly knocked to the ground.
He had never seen Rajaion like this before. It was like he couldn’t recognize him.
“Prince Soren!” Ena shouted. “It’s the scent! You stink of dead la—subhumans! He needs to smell you.”
Soren grit his teeth. If he left the stall, even for a moment, Rajaion would kill one of these men. That was abundantly clear. But if he stayed, it might very well be him that Rajaion killed. He swept his gaze over the stall, desperate, and swallowed hard when he saw a pail of water.
It was worth a try.
“Hold him!” he commanded the grooms.
He crossed the room quickly, breathing hard, trying to ignore Rajaion’s snarling, the cries of the grooms. If this didn’t work, Soren would have to flee long enough to get the scent off of himself – and the men would have to suffer for it.
A small sacrifice, in the grand scheme of things. His father certainly wouldn’t care about a dozen wyvern grooms. He grit his teeth.
Soren sucked in a breath, grabbed the pail, and upended the water over his head. The shock of the cold ran down his spine, the water soaking through his hair and his robes. He gasped, shaking his head to clear his eyes, and tossed the bucket to the ground.
“Rajaion!” he shouted. He spun around, soaked through and shaking, and held out his hands. “Stop!”
Rajaion roared and Soren’s heart sank.
Then, suddenly, he seemed to come back to himself. The roaring stopped. He leaned in, almost cautious, and sniffed at Soren as he stood there, his hands outstretched.
If Rajaion bit him, Soren couldn’t stop him. He couldn’t get away in time at this distance. His teeth snapped, inches from Soren’s face, and one of the grooms shouted something about protecting the prince, only for his companion to drag him back.
He forced himself to keep still. Rajaion had never hurt him before. Soren had to trust that he wouldn’t hurt him now.
Rajaion made a noise of recognition. He butted his head against Soren’s chest, very gently, so as not to knock him over. Out of the corner of his eye, Soren saw Ena sag against the wall in relief.
“You see, I’m fine,” Soren said, running a shaking hand over Rajaion’s muzzle. “There’s no need for all of this. I am fine, Rajaion.”
He took that huge head between his hands and looked deep into Rajaion’s eyes. Rajaion blinked at him slowly and then lowered his head, his eyes closing.
“Yes, I expect you’re tired after all that racket,” Soren murmured. “It’s all right. I’m here now.”
“What the hell is going on out here?”
Soren took a shuddering breath and closed his eyes. Ike’s voice seemed to shake him like thunder.
Ike marched into the stall, his cape billowing in the cold wind and his face set in a frown. He had the sword Ashnard had gifted him strapped to his back, his hand at the hilt like he was ready to draw it.
“General Ike,” Ena said, lowering her eyes.
“Is someone going to explain to me why the king’s mount was screaming bloody murder in the middle of the night?” Ike demanded. “Or why the prince is soaking wet in the middle of winter?”
Soren forced himself to look at him. Ike would know something was truly wrong if he didn’t.
“Rajaion didn’t fancy my scent today,” he said. It was the truth, or at least part of it.
Ike’s frown deepened. His gaze flicked to Rajaion, and his mouth twisted to the side.
He didn’t buy it, Soren knew. He also knew he wouldn’t question him in front of a stall full of terrified wyvern grooms and Ena.
“All right,” Ike said. “Thank you, Ena. You can go. The rest of you, too – it’s not like you can control the king’s mount anyway. Leave him to the prince.”
There was a low mumble of “yes, General Ike,” as the grooms slunk by him. Ena hesitated for a moment, staring at Rajaion with that unbearably sad look in her eyes, but she too left when Ike raised his eyebrows in her direction.
“Soren,” he said when they were alone. “What the hell is going on?”
“Just stay over there,” Soren told him. “Don’t come close until he’s calmed down a bit more.”
It took some time to get Rajaion to fully settle. Even this close to him, the heat of his giant body did little to chase away the chill wind, and Soren found himself starting to shake from the cold by the time Rajaion finally curled up in a corner of the stall, away from him.
Soren just watched him, remembering the way he’d snarled, as Ike approached him from behind. He remembered Ena’s words, that it was the stench of dead subhumans that had disturbed him.
Ike unslung his thick winter cloak and wrapped it around Soren’s shoulders.
“You’re out of your mind, you know that?” he grumbled, examining the state of him. “What will my mother say if she finds out I let you get frozen?”
“I’ll be fine,” Soren said through chattering teeth. He clutched at Ike’s heavy black cloak with one hand. “I had to get him to stop. You heard him, didn’t you?”
“I’d have to be deaf and in Crimea to miss that racket,” Ike said. “What’s wrong with him?”
He saw the Black Knight take me, Soren thought, running a hand down Rajaion’s neck. But he couldn’t say that. Ike was liable to be just as bad as a crazed wyvern if he knew Soren had been taken from the castle.
“I don’t know,” he said. He looked away from Ike, focusing on Rajaion. His hands were still shaking, half from the cold and half from Gritnea Tower. “But he’s fine now, it seems.”
Ike didn’t seem satisfied with that answer. Soren could hear it in the silence.
“I’ll sleep out here with him tonight,” Soren said, feeling blank. Rajaion snorted, huge head buried against Soren’s chest. “He’s liable to take someone’s head off if I’m out of his sight.”
Finally, he dared to look up at Ike. His face was stony and his arms crossed over his chest. He didn’t like it, Soren knew. For a moment he expected Ike to argue with him. Then Rajaion growled, shifting a little in his corner, and Soren quickly sank down next to him.
“Fine,” Ike finally said. “I’ll bring you a blanket and dry clothes, and something to eat.”
“Thank you, Ike,” Soren said, wrapping his arms around Rajaion as the cold bit into him.
Ike looked like he wanted to reach out to him, but he couldn’t. Rajaion was still growling faintly and he barely tolerated Ike’s presence at the best of times. Soren hushed him, scratching behind a line of scales the way Rajaion liked. Soren kept his head down as he felt more than saw Ike turn and leave the stables.
“It’s all right,” he soothed Rajaion.
Rajaion’s wild eyes met his own. Soren’s fingers tightened on his scales.
Sometimes he felt like he could understand what Rajaion was thinking with just a glance.
It’s not all right. You’re not safe.
Mad, childish fantasies. Perhaps some of his father’s madness ran in his veins, to make him believe at times that Rajaion was capable of anything more than base instinct.
Still, he spoke quietly to Rajaion until the great beast settled, all the fight gone out of him. He curled up as best as his hulking form could manage, tail over his snout like some overgrown housecat. Soren sat beside him, soaked and shivering, until Ike returned with a lantern and a bundle of cloth.
“Strip,” Ike commanded, throwing a change of clothes at him.
Shivering all over, Soren huffed a quiet laugh.
“I don’t really think this is the appropriate place for a tryst,” he said. “Really, Ike, Rajaion will take your head off.”
Ike didn’t look impressed.
“You’re soaked through to the bone and it’s freezing outside,” he said. “Strip or I’ll do it for you. I’ll fight that beast off if I have to, so don’t argue with me.”
“You’re a terrible subject,” Soren said, starting on his sashes and belts. “Speaking to your prince that way.”
Ike just shrugged. They both knew Soren had never been a prince to him. He’d always simply been Soren.
Soren’s hands were shaking, so Ike stepped forward. He stripped him quickly and efficiently, nothing like how he undressed Soren alone in Soren’s rooms. There, his touch always lingered, big hands caressing every inch of Soren’s body. Now he just tossed his ruined robes aside and helped Soren pull on the dry ones. It was the warmest set he owned. Tears pricked at Soren’s eyes.
“You’re always thinking about me,” he whispered.
“What else am I supposed to think about?” Ike asked. He belted the robes, then spun Soren around so his back was to Ike’s front. “Come on, I’ll warm you up.”
They settled on the ground like that, Soren between Ike’s spread legs and one of Ike’s arms around him, holding him against his chest.
“It’s all right,” Ike said in much the same soothing tone Soren had used on Rajaion. He pressed his lips to the crown of Soren’s head. “I’ve got you.”
He stripped off his cape, covering Soren with it. Underneath, he pressed an apple into Soren’s hands, and Soren’s eyes burned. The idea of food turned his stomach, the stench of those half-rotted creatures still fresh in his memory, but he forced himself to take a bite anyway so Ike wouldn’t worry any more than he already was.
“I won’t ask what happened tonight,” Ike said, big hand rubbing circles against Soren’s hip. “Because I have a feeling you won’t tell me anyway. But you can talk to me, you know, about anything. I’ll never judge you.”
Soren took a shuddering breath.
“I’m fine now,” he promised.
Ike huffed a little, clearly disbelieving, but he pressed his lips to the crown of Soren’s head again and held him closer.
“You don’t have to tell me yet, but don’t lie, either,” Ike said. “When you want to talk, I’m here.”
Ike would never stand for the things Soren had seen in the tower. The horrible, mutilated bodies, the drugged, mad beasts. Ike would try to stop it.
He wouldn’t care about the danger to himself. Only about what was just.
“Crimea,” Ike said, and Soren froze. “What are you going to do about it?”
“What can I do?” Soren asked, staring blankly ahead. “My father ordered me to plan the invasion. I must obey my king.”
“Don’t give me that,” Ike snorted. “We both know you don’t give a damn about your father’s desires.”
Soren took a great, shuddering breath. He couldn’t bring himself in the moment to remind Ike that words like that were dangerous, even when they were alone.
“There will be consequences if I refuse,” he said. “I have no allies, except for you. I don’t doubt your strength, Ike, but even you can’t stand against an army on your own.”
Ike made a noise like he might try. Soren thought of all his strength, and about his vulnerability. A poison slipped into his drink at dinner and he’d be stronger still, and utterly lost to Soren.
“And you?” Soren asked, glancing over his shoulder. He took in the troubled lines of Ike’s face, the stony expression, the deep line between his brows that hadn’t been there before he’d been made one of the Four Riders. “What will you do?”
“I’ll follow you,” Ike said, like it was that simple. “Wherever you go, whatever you do. I’m devoted to you.”
And there was the danger.
“If you oppose the invasion, then so do I,” Ike said. “Just give me the word, Soren.”
Slipped into your dear general’s cup at dinner and he would be rendered a snarling, mindless beast, too. Soren understood the Black Knight’s threat for what it was. He understood where it came from, too. His father knew perfectly well where Ike’s loyalty truly lay.
“No,” Soren said. “I’ve decided. I’ll begin plans for the invasion in the morning.”
Preparations for the invasion happened quickly. It seemed that the only thing Ashnard waited for was his unruly son to fall into place. With Soren suitably tamed, everything was quickly arranged.
There were legions of cavalry and foot soldiers, and then of course his father’s beloved wyvern riders. Jill Fizzart was among them, to Soren’s regret. Gawain had always called her father an honorable man.
There were the crates, with their growling, snapping cargo. Soren knew exactly what they contained.
Then there was the wrought iron cage, heavy and ugly, hung with blood red curtains. Soren had only gotten the barest glimpse inside, but he’d seen two figures, both of them blond, with stunning white wings.
Only the royal family of Serenes had white wings, and only three of them had survived the massacre.
“What did you do?” he asked his father.
Ashnard only laughed.
“Preparations,” he said. “That’s all.”
Pelleas came to see him the evening before they were to begin the march. He would remain in Daein, a shadow prince to hold the throne while Soren played the part of his father’s strategist. It was better that way, Soren supposed. There was something fragile about Pelleas that was not meant for war.
“Prince Soren.”
“Hm,” Soren said, his cheek resting on his palm. “It would seem that’s you now.”
He was studying a map of Crimea for what must have been the thousandth time, even though he’d long committed it to memory. Every weak point, every strategical move they could make – he’d memorized them all.
What else could he do with Ike’s sanity on the line?
Pelleas was quiet for a moment, and then he gently placed something down on Soren’s desk. Soren looked up in surprise.
It was a beautiful wind tome, the cover embossed with sigils. He could feel the power in it as he traced his fingers across the spine, far more powerful than anything he’d worked with before.
“I want you to take this with you,” Pelleas said. “I’m sorry. It wasn’t easy to get – I was only able to procure the one without raising suspicions.”
“Ah,” Soren said quietly. He rose to his feet. “Thank you, Pelleas.”
“Please use it if you have to,” Pelleas said.
To Soren’s surprise, Pelleas reached out and grabbed his hands. His fingers were shaking against Soren’s, but his grip was strong.
“You’ll come back safe, won’t you?” Pelleas said.
Soren looked down at their hands, Pelleas’ white knuckled where they gripped his own. Something almost like pity rose in him.
“No,” he said, untangling their fingers more gently than he usually might. “I expect I won’t come back at all.”
Pelleas took a shuddering breath. Then, to Soren’s shock, he threw his arms around his shoulders, burying his face against Soren’s hair.
“What am I to do then?” he asked, his voice trembling. “What would I do without you?”
Shocked, Soren could stand still as a statue in Pelleas’ embrace. It was only when he felt something wet against his cheek that he pulled away from the other. He took Pelleas by the shoulders, tilting his head up to stare at him, his red puffy eyes and his trembling lower lip.
“You will do what you can,” he said. “You’ll survive.”
The invasion was swift and terrible.
At first, Soren watched from atop Rajaion, perched at the very top of the palace. He’d snapped and growled whenever someone had tried to guide Soren to one of the other wyverns, so eventually he’d been forced to spend an intolerable journey seated behind his father on the great beast.
Soren couldn’t remember ever spending as much time close to the man. It made his skin crawl.
There were so many wyverns in the sky it felt like their wings blotted out the sun.
Then his father sent him out into the field, attached to one of his generals. In a cruel twist of his whims, it was not Ike Soren was assigned to, but General Petrine.
He and Petrine did not see eye-to-eye. They never had.
Soren couldn’t refuse a command. Not when, every time he closed his eyes, he saw Izuka’s drug, heard the Black Knight’s threat against Ike.
He led Petrine’s forces as well as he could, but she wasn’t inclined to listen to him.
(“Do you know why?” she’d asked once, painted lips curved in a wicked smile. “It’s because we’re the same, you see.”
Soren thought he understood what she meant, now, catching the hint of a mark where her armor exposed the curve of her breast. It hardly mattered. He and Petrine were nothing alike, not even if they shared tainted blood.)
He wasn’t surprised when he was separated in the fray. Perhaps Petrine thought him defenseless, but he had Pelleas’ tome hidden in the bag on his belt, and he put it to good use. Everywhere there was shouting, screaming, cries of pain. The smoke from the fires burned his eyes, hid enemies from view, but wind spells cleared the air just enough to give him the upper hand.
The first splatter of blood across his face was almost shocking. He’d never used magic to kill before.
So, he thought to himself with a bitter little twist. This is war.
It hit him all over again when he stumbled into a city square littered with bodies. The fighting had moved on, but the evidence of it remained.
The dead Crimeans far outnumbered the dead Daeins. But there were dead Daeins – Soren saw the ebony armor gleaming in the streets.
Soren’s breath caught.
Ike.
Even the greatest general could fall. Soren knew this better than anyone.
He turned over one soldier, and then another, struggling under the weight of the corpses. In his blind panic, he barely looked at the design of their armor. He still had to see the faces.
Then there was someone shouting his name.
He froze, afraid for a second that he was imagining it. But then there were heavy, familiar footfalls coming towards him, and Soren looked up to see Ike’s panicked face. He staggered to his feet, his own eyes wide.
“Soren!” Ike said. He swept him off his feet as he grabbed him up in a fierce hug. Soren flung his arms around Ike’s neck, heedless of his armor or the blood that dripped from his sword as he clung onto him.
“Ike,” Soren gasped out, sinking his fingers into Ike’s hair. His hands were shaking. He couldn’t cling to him for long, he knew. He took what he could until Ike pulled back, setting Soren down gently on his feet.
“You’re all right?” Ike asked, catching Soren’s face between his hands. His eyes darkened to see the blood on his face, but Soren just shook his head.
“I’m fine, Ike,” he said. “It’s not mine.”
“That’s not much comfort,” Ike said. “All right. Stay with me. There’s still more fighting to be done.”
For three days and three nights, Melior burned.
The scale of the destruction was enormous. It seemed there was nothing that Daein’s army would leave untouched. Soren’s lip curled when they attempted to sack the royal archives. He’d snapped at the men and nearly come to physical blows with General Petrine over it.
It thrilled his father. Soren had never seen him so excited, so almost giddy with bloodlust.
He was thankful for the wyverns’ screams. At least then he couldn’t hear the people.
Still, he didn’t look away.
That night, his father summoned him to the grand hall. Soren had no wish to go, exhausted from the chaos and the bloodshed and in no mood for his father’s company. But he’d summoned the Four Riders as well, including Ike, and so Soren had no choice.
There was something macabre, he thought, about dining in the grand hall where King and Queen Crimea had once sat. His father had made quick work of both of them. Soren had disliked the idea of killing the queen, who seemed a gentle woman, but his father refused to be deterred.
Just because Soren couldn’t stop him didn’t make him feel any better about it.
They’d had to rip down the stalls in the stables to create a space large enough for Rajaion. He’d been restless since they arrived In Crimea, more aggressive than usual. Soren wondered if the energy affected him, if he could feel the wrongness in the air. Or perhaps he was being foolish. Wyverns were bred for battle, after all. An environment like this would surely trigger Rajaion’s baser instincts.
Still, Soren had gone down to the stables earlier to see what he could do to ease his snappish mood. His eyebrows had risen when he saw Ena slipping away from the building, her head hung low, but he said nothing.
None of them were here by choice. If Ena wanted to put herself in danger by approaching Rajaion when he was in such a mood, then at least that was her own decision.
He knew something was wrong as soon as he entered the grand hall. There was a crackling sort of anticipation in the air, like something had happened. Ike, who had already arrived, looked decidedly unhappy. Soren could always tell by the line between his brows.
“You’ve finally arrived,” Ashnard said, grinning wickedly. “Petrine caught something interesting. Would you like to see?”
If it was a charred corpse, Soren was going to turn on his heel and leave. He didn’t care if it was that of a count, a duke, or a local tradesman.
Ashnard gestured, a careless thing, and the doors opened again. Two guards brought in a woman in an orange dress. It must have been grand, once, the fabric fine and the skirt voluminous, but it was dirty now, smudged with dirt, the hem torn. The woman’s green hair was askew, and her gaze was fixed on the ground.
His father took her from the guards, forced her chin up. He silently regarded her face for a moment, uncharacteristically serious as the girl trembled from head to foot. Finally, his father’s face cracked into its familiar wide grin.
“Wretched girl,” Ashnard said, throwing her in a heap at Soren’s feet.
He crawled backwards instinctively; never had he known something thrown by his father not to bite.
“Well, boy?” Ashnard demanded. “Don’t you recognize her? No?”
Soren had never seen the woman before him in his life. He looked up at his father and said nothing.
“Meet Princess Crimea,” Ashnard sneered. “At one time, she was your betrothed.”
Dinner was horrible.
They sat in Castle Crimea’s grand dining hall, at the long stretched out table. His father sat at the head. Soren sat on his right-hand side, a rare and disliked honor, with Ike standing at his back. Soren could tell his fists were clenched even without looking.
Princess Elincia sat at the other end of the table, flanked by guards in gleaming black armor. Her face was bloodless, her knuckles white, but she kept her back straight, even though her head was lowered. There was a mark on her cheek where Soren’s father must have struck her.
“What’s wrong, girl?” Ashnard demanded. “Why aren’t you eating?”
She flinched when he spoke.
“Apologies, my lord,” she said, her voice wavering as she raised it in order to be heard. “I’m afraid I don’t have much of an appetite.”
“Hm,” Ashnard said, his voice dark with judgment. “You Crimeans are so easily cowed.”
Petrine laughed. Soren wanted to scream.
“What a pair you and my son would have made,” Ashnard said. “You, quivering like a mouse, and him, cold as a block of ice. Does she not interest you, boy?”
Soren tsk’d under his breath. Next to him, Ike was clenching his jaw so tightly Soren worried he’d snap something.
“No,” Ashnard said, a smug tone curling in his voice. “I expect she’s not to your tastes.”
Soren willed himself not to react, not to look too obviously to see if Ike’s jaw had tightened.
“It was your mother’s idea,” Ashnard said. “Brokered just after your birth. The more territory she could seize for you, the better. She was grasping for straws at that point. Anything to secure your position. I had it broken after I took you from her.” His lip curled in a smirk. “King Crimea seemed relieved.”
“Yes, I imagine he would be,” Soren said. He felt nothing but cold and numb as he stared at Princess Crimea, a prisoner in her father’s own castle. “Dinner with the in-laws would have been terrible.”.
They retired after dinner, and Soren couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this tired, aching right down to his bones.
The rooms he’d been given were simultaneously grand and understated, furnished in lush, comforting shades of green and blue. It seemed that Crimea favored comfort in their designs. The bed was large, but not ostentatiously so, and hung with thick curtains. There were birds and beasts of a fanciful design carved into the light wood of the frame.
He didn’t dwell too long on whose rooms he had been given on the chance that they had been Princess Elincia’s.
He didn’t have the energy to argue when Ike said he’d stay with him. He didn’t think he could bear to be separated from Ike right now, anyway. He helped Ike with his armor, and Ike unlaced the back of his sage robes, letting the outer layer fall from his shoulders.
He wrapped an arm around Soren, bringing him close. They simply stood like that for a long moment, Ike’s hand hot and heavy on Soren’s hip, Soren resting his head against his chest.
“You’re tired,” Ike said when he pulled back.
“No more so than anyone else,” Soren said. His lip curled. “Save for my father, anyway. I’ve never seen the man so happy.”
Ike sat down on the edge of the bed, its plush mattress giving away beneath him. He leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees and lacing his fingers together sometimes.
“My father told me something once,” he said. “I didn’t understand it at the time. He told me some men love battle more than anything else, and that it’s a terrible thing. That those men must never become kings, or generals.” He smiled, a ghost of a thing. “I think he was worried about me, but he didn’t need to be.”
He flicked his gaze up at Soren.
“I already loved you more, after all,” he said.
There was something strange in his expression, a deeper furrow than usual between his brows. His foot tapped, restless, against the ground, in a way Ike hadn’t been restless in years, not since he’d come into himself. Slowly, Soren sat down next to him on the bed.
“Something’s bothering you,” Soren said.
Ike snorted.
“Everything’s bothering me,” he said. “But you’re right. Princess Elincia…”
He broke off, shaking his head.
“Forget I said anything,” he said. “It’s not important.”
The only thing that was important to Soren was Ike.
“Tell me,” he said. “You’re always perceptive. Did you notice something strange about the princess?”
“It’s not her,” Ike said. “I just… you’re going to laugh at me.”
“Nothing seems particularly funny at the moment,” Soren said, taking a seat by his side. He put his hand on Ike’s thigh. “What is it?”
“I don’t like it,” Ike said after a moment. “The idea of you marrying someone else.”
That was not what Soren had expected him to say.
“Oh,” he said. He cupped a hand to his mouth, glancing away and then back. Ike’s cheeks were faintly red, his brow furrowed. Soren was abruptly reminded how young he was – how young they both were, despite everything.
“I told you,” Ike said. “It’s stupid.”
“No, it isn’t,” Soren said. “Typically, royal matches are arranged quite young, so I suppose in other circumstances… I would have been married already.”
“To someone you don’t even know,” Ike bit out. “Who doesn’t know you like I know you.” He made a frustrated noise. “Someone who wouldn’t know how to care for you.”
Soren had never thought about it. For him, there had only ever been Ike. The thought of being chained to someone else seemed almost unbearable.
“You’re stubborn. You don’t take care of yourself,” Ike said. “Would she know how to get you to eat enough, or lure you to bed?”
He glanced away when he said the word “bed,” his scowl deepening.
Oh, Soren thought, his cheeks heating. Ike was jealous.
“I just don’t like thinking about it,” Ike said tersely. “You with someone else.”
“You’ve no reason to be jealous,” Soren said. He tucked his hair behind his ears, sliding gracefully to the floor until he was kneeling between Ike’s spread legs. “Let me show you.”
He ran his hands up Ike’s strong thighs, taking comfort in the solid muscle of him, the warmth. He kept his touch teasing, his cheek pressed to Ike’s thigh as he watched him. He’d grown into a stoic man, but there were always the telltale signs Soren was affecting him. The twitch at the corner of his mouth, the way his thighs flexed under Soren’s hands.
“What are you doing?” he asked. His voice was rough as he slid his fingers through Soren’s hair.
“What does it look like?” Soren asked him, pressing forward to settle more firmly between Ike’s legs.
He kissed the growing bulge there, laving his tongue over it through the fabric of Ike’s pants.
“Soren,” Ike said, his voice strained. “Come back up here. I’ll take care of you.”
Soren ignored him. Ike was always reluctant to let him do this, although he clearly enjoyed it. Perhaps he thought it was unprincely for Soren to get on his knees for a general of Daein, but Soren didn’t mind. He would kneel for Ike happily.
“Would you have stolen me, I wonder?” Soren asked, unlacing Ike’s trousers slowly. “Taken me in the night, away from my doomed marriage?”
“There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you,” Ike said, his voice rough.
“Let’s test that,” Soren said. “Hold still. Don’t touch me.”
Ike groaned.
“Soren –” he said, the clear beginning of a protest. His breath hitched as Soren freed him from his trousers, wrapping his hand around Ike’s hardening length. The girth of him always made Soren’s fingers look delicate by comparison.
He hadn’t done this very much. Ike always wanted to take care of him, to lay him out and take him apart. Always so careful, always attentive. He thought of his own pleasure too little by comparison.
Soren thought of it, though. His tongue flicked out briefly, teasing over the head, and Ike made a stifled noise. His fingers twitched, like he wanted to grab Soren’s hair. Would he pull him off, playing the part of the devoted knight, or pull him closer, Soren wondered.
“It’s an order from your prince, General,” Soren said, giving Ike a cool look through his lashes. Then he leaned forward and took Ike into his mouth.
Ike swore viciously. Satisfaction surged through Soren, fierce and primal. He’d been the one to make Ike sound like that.
He wanted to do it again. He pressed forward, the weight of Ike heavy on his tongue. This, at least, was bliss, he thought, taking Ike down to the root.
He could tell Ike was struggling with his command. His thighs trembled beneath Soren’s touch, powerful muscles hard as a rock, and his fingers twisted in the expensive linens. Once, he raised his hand, as if to slide it into Soren’s hair. Soren hummed a reproach, and Ike grumbled something deeply inappropriate about someone’s mother as he dropped his hand back to the sheets.
Finally it seemed he could take it no more.
“Soren,” Ike said, panting. “Soren, let me touch you.”
Soren hummed as he pulled off, looking at Ike with a cool gaze. He wrapped his hand around his length, slick now with Soren’s spit, and pumped his hand.
“General,” he said. “Can’t you follow orders?”
He flicked his tongue out over the head, catching the fluid gathering there.
Ike threw his head back, chest heaving. He clenched his jaw tight, a bead of sweat making its way down his throat.
“You do know what I’m going to do to you,” he said, his voice strained, “when you’ve finished, right?”
“I’m counting on it,” Soren said, and took him into his mouth again.
They hadn’t been together like this since they’d left Daein. Soren had missed it. Ike had, too, if the way he panted and swore meant anything. His release threatened itself sooner than it normally would, Ike pent up from the stress of battle. Soren sucked harder.
“Soren, I’m going to—” Ike broke off, panting. His hands were clenched tight around the bedding. “Come back up here before I—”
Soren intended to do no such thing. He dug his fingers into Ike’s thighs, a silent command -- hold still -- and did his best to relax his throat, taking as much of Ike’s length as he could manage.
Ike stilled with a strangled cry, his hands fisted in the sheets. Soren swallowed him down, not wanting to waste even a single drop, but it was pointless.
He choked, unpracticed, grimacing at the taste. He’d have to work harder next time, he thought to himself, right before the crushing realization hit once more than there would be no next time. Not if his plans were to succeed.
He licked Ike’s seed from his lips and blinked back his tears before Ike could see them.
“Can I touch now?” Ike’s voice was rough, breathy.
His heart in his throat, Soren nodded.
He wasn’t expecting for Ike to grab him by the chin, forcing his head up from where he was still kneeling between Ike’s legs. Ike’s eyes were blazing, and the intensity in them made Soren’s knees weak.
“Who told you to do that?” Ike groused, wiping his spend from Soren’s chin with his thumb. “You don’t have to – Goddess above, Soren.”
Soren swallowed shakily, touching his fingers to his lips. Ike made a punched out noise, sinking his fingers into Soren’s loose hair with one hand and grabbing his wrist with the other, pulling him up onto his knees and into a deep kiss.
Soren made a noise of protest, pushing at Ike’s chest, thinking – Ike had told him he didn’t have to swallow, so he probably didn’t care much for the taste. Ike didn’t let up, squeezing his wrist as his tongue swept into Soren’s mouth. Soren was breathless when he finally pulled back, but Ike just moved to kiss the corner of his mouth, his jaw, nuzzling behind his ear.
The hand in his hair fell to his waist instead, Ike deftly tearing open the ties of his inner robe. The thin material slipped from Soren’s shoulders, pooling at his elbows as Soren slid his hands up over Ike’s shoulders.
“Ike, wait,” Soren said, gasping as Ike got his robes fully open. “Let me – at least let me rinse out my mouth.”
“Why?” Ike asked, his voice rough. He bit at Soren’s throat, almost high enough that the mark would be visible, and Soren hissed. Ike looked up at him, his blue eyes blazing. “You think I don’t like the taste of myself in your mouth?”
He captured Soren’s mouth in another fierce kiss, as if to prove his point. His arms were unyielding as he held Soren against him, like he never intended to let him go.
One of his hands slid, possessive, to the small of Soren’s back, holding him captive as Ike continued his assault on Soren’s throat, lips finding his shoulder and tongue laving over his collarbones. Sword callused fingers spread over Soren’s chest, and he gasped, seizing a handful of Ike’s hair, as Ike tugged on a nipple, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger until Soren cried out.
It seemed like Ike didn’t intend to let any inch of him go untouched. Not that it mattered; Ike had conquered him long ago. His claim on Soren went deep.
It didn’t take much. A few tugs of Ike’s hand around his cock and he was spilling into his fist, biting back a sob as he buried his face in Ike’s shoulder.
“S’okay,” Ike panted. He nuzzled at Soren’s hair as he wiped his hand off on the sheets. “I’ve got you. Let it out.”
Soren shook his head, biting his lip to stifle the noises that threatened to escape. He didn’t want to cry, not tonight.
He wrapped his arms around Ike’s shoulders and clung on harder.
After a second round, and then a third, they lay together in the ruined bed sheets. Ike had his forehead pressed to Soren’s, his big hand resting on his hip. His thumb rubbed little circles as he hummed some old melody, his voice rough but familiar and always, always comforting.
It was one of his mother’s songs, Soren knew, and it made the fierce ache in his chest all the more painful.
The sun would rise in a few hours, but it didn’t matter. Soren doubted he’d be able to sleep anyway. There was too much to do, and too little time to do it.
“Soren,” Ike murmured.
Soren blinked, shifting a little so he could look at him.
“Yes?” he asked.
Ike’s mouth twisted to the side, his expression complicated. Soren slid a soothing hand up his arm, squeezing his bicep.
“What is it?” he said.
Ike sat up. He frowned at the fireplace, and slowly Soren raised himself up as well. He looked at Ike, at the deep line between his brows. It looked deeper now than it did when they left Daein.
“Ike?” he said.
“I want to give you something,” Ike said, his voice rough. He swallowed hard as he reached up, removing the chain from around his neck. “I know we can’t ever… that we can’t be married, not officially. But I still want you have my ring.”
Soren’s breath caught. His eyes burned.
“I can’t accept that,” he said, his throat tight. “Ike, it’s a gift from your mother! It’s too much, I’m not…”
Worthy.
“Soren, look at me,” Ike said. “There’s no one else but you. There will never be anyone else but you. Let me show you.”
He draped the chain over Soren’s neck. The ring fell just beneath his sternum, simultaneously light and the heaviest thing Soren had ever worn. He reached up to grasp it, gaze desperately searching Ike’s face. He wouldn’t accept it back. Soren already knew that. But it was far too precious a thing for him to keep.
“It suits you,” Ike said quietly.
It didn’t, not really. The ring, heavy and silver with a band of gold running through it, was studded with a large sapphire. It was a deep, fiery blue – the same as Ike’s eyes.
“Wear it for me,” Ike said.
Soren took a shuddering breath.
“Yes, Ike,” he promised.
Some of the tension left Ike’s body. He sighed, leaning forward, and cupped a hand to Soren’s cheek. He pulled him into a kiss, and Soren ached with how gentle it was. Ike kissed his cheek next, the space beside his nose, and finally the cursed mark on his brow.
Soren had never found a good way to tell him not to touch that filthy place. He touched Ike’s chest, shaking his head, but Ike only kissed him again, his lips grazing over the mark.
“It’s going to be okay,” he said. “Trust me.”
There was something Ike wasn’t telling him. Soren could feel it in the air between them. He had since the beginning of the invasion. He had thought, at first, it was simply a distaste for the destruction all around them, his father’s mad rampage. But as the days had gone on, the nagging feeling had only dogged him.
He wanted to ask what it was, to pry away the secrets Ike wouldn’t tell him.
But then there were things he wasn’t telling Ike, either.
Ike brushed his hair back from his throat, touched the chain hanging there. Soren, spent and aching in more ways than one, still turned his face up to kiss him.
It was soft and slow, but deep, Soren’s arms winding around Ike’s neck as Ike pressed him back against the mattress again.
“Like I said,” Ike murmured. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you.”
The words felt like a knife. Soren reached up to touch the old scar on his chest, long healed now, from where Ike had protected him from the tiger’s claws.
There was nothing Soren wouldn’t do for Ike, either.
Soren entered the dungeon after a few days.
It was easy enough to arrange. His actions as strategist and architect of the invasion had granted him some of the good will he’d been denied his whole life.
If Soren didn’t relish the violence, then at least he was brutally efficient.
He made his way through the dungeons in search of only one prisoner, not that his father took very many. He had always preferred more permanent solutions. It was only when he heard the prayer that he stopped, curling his fingers around the bars of an empty cell.
A voice rose up from the darkness, sweet and melodious.
“Oh blessed Goddess Ashera, I beg of thee, send me the strength to persevere…”
It was Princess Elincia, and she was praying.
The moonlight illuminated her figure, kneeling on the floor with her hands clasped in front of her. Her eyes were closed, her face tilted up towards the one barred window. Her orange skirt spread around her like a vibrant field of flowers.
Soren stood there, silently, and watched her as she prayed for her departed parents, and then her captured comrades.
The only thing she asked for herself was strength.
Soren wondered about that kind of faith. But then the goddess had never spared him any kindness. She couldn’t, not with his cursed blood. He’d been damned before he’d ever been born.
He waited as she lapsed into a hymn. Gradually, her singing faded, and she slowly opened her eyes.
“Do you find comfort in prayer?” he asked.
She turned, the moonlight spilling across her face. She was beautiful, Soren thought, in an objective sort of way. She had none of Ike’s fierce, raw beauty.
“Princess Elincia,” he greeted.
She looked tired, shadows beneath her eyes, her green hair unkempt. Still, she met his eyes.
“Prince Soren,” she returned. There was surprise in her voice, her attempt to mask it not quite successful. Soren appreciated that she tried at all.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, Princess,” he said, tilting his head and crossing his arms. “But I wonder why he’s kept you alive.”
Elincia was quiet for a moment.
“I wonder that too, Prince Soren,” she said. “My parents, and my lord uncle…”
She broke off, taking a shuddering breath. There were other names she mouthed, but apparently they weren’t for Soren’s ears. That was fine enough.
“I expect these are not the accommodations you’re used to,” he said.
“No, I…” she hesitated. “I was not raised like other royalty. To avoid the nobility taking sides between myself and my lord uncle, I was hidden away in seclusion, with only a limited retinue. I know how to cook, and sew, and do laundry. Horseback riding and swordplay. But I have never…”
“Been a prisoner,” Soren filled in. “Well, we’re quite different in that regard.”
“I’ve never been down here before, you know,” Elincia said suddenly. “My parents never would have allowed it. I had expected it to be dark, but perhaps not quite so cold. It’s a terrible place, isn’t it?”
Compared to Daein’s dungeons, Soren found it practically comfortable. But he didn’t bother to say that.
“My father was a just king,” Elincia said. She settled against the wall, her knees pulled up to her chest and her arms wrapped around them. From anyone else, the subtext would have been obvious: unlike yours. But there was no malice in her tone. “I know he never would have imprisoned anyone unfairly. Still, I feel like I can hear the cries of all who dwelt here, like they’re embedded in the stone itself. It comforts me to pray.”
“I envy you,” Soren said. “Prayer has never held any comfort for me.”
She must have wondered why he’d come, he thought, watching her. To gloat, to celebrate his father’s victory. To taunt her when she was at her weakest, helpless before him. That would most likely fit her image of the enemy prince.
“I want to speak with you,” he said. “I want to make a deal.”
Elincia looked up. Her eyes were wide and doe-like, guileless. He wondered what her childhood had been like that she could stare at the enemy with such a look.
“I have nothing to trade,” she said after a moment.
“Not yet,” he said. “But the winds of fortune are a fickle thing, princess. They can change in an instant.”
A breeze suddenly whipped through the dungeons, ruffling her hair and his sleeves, the spirits illustrating his point for him. Her eyes widened in the gloom.
“Do you understand what I’m saying, Princess?” he asked.
“I understand the words,” she said after a moment. “But I’m afraid I don’t understand the reasoning. King Ashnard is your father.”
“In your brief meeting with him, did you sense that my father was the kind of man to inspire filial piety?” Soren asked archly. He glanced away. “I have no love for my father, and no special affection for my homeland. I have other interests.”
Soren fought the urge to press a hand to his chest, to feel the ring resting beneath his clothes. Except it wasn’t there anymore. He’d folded it inside the letter he’d written Ike, and hidden it away where he’d only find it after everything was finished.
“General Ike,” he said. “He’s not like others in Daein. He’s a good man. You can place your trust in him and know it will not be betrayed.”
Elincia pursed her lips.
“You want me to promise his safety in return for your assistance,” she said.
“I want you to do better than that,” Soren said. “You saw him in battle. He’s strong, far stronger than most men. He was trained by Daein’s own General Gawain, the best knight in generations. Any monarch would pay a fortune to have a man like that under their command. I’m offering him to you for a pittance.”
The words burned in his mouth, like Ike was something trinket to be traded. But he had to voice them. He had to make her understand Ike’s worth.
“He’s not loyal to Daein,” Soren said. “He’s loyal to me. He’ll go where I tell him.”
Elincia seemed to consider that for a moment.
“My lord Soren,” she said. “Why are you doing this? Even if you do not love your father, even if you don’t care for your homeland – why?”
Soren considered his answer for a long moment.
“Because there are still good men, even in Daein,” he finally said. “And good men won’t be able to stand for this for much longer. I am thinking of one good man in particular.”
“Oh,” she said after a moment. “Do you, perhaps… that is, I mean…”
It was a dangerous thing to voice. Soren shook his head before she managed to say it.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “Not anymore.”
“No,” she said softly. “My apologies.”
“There’s nothing to apologize for,” Soren said. “Nothing was said.”
“But I’m still sorry,” Elincia said, and Soren’s shoulders stiffened. Her expression was softer now, and frighteningly genuine. “I can’t imagine what it must have been like, to have been raised by a father like that.”
“I don’t need your pity,” Soren said. “Only your cooperation.”
“You have it,” she said. “I have dear people I care about, too.”
That, at least, Soren thought, was common ground. He had worked with less.
“Prince Soren,” she said, closing her hands around the bars of her cell. “Tell me what I can do.”
Elincia gave him enough information, but not too much. He was surprised by that – with her sweet face and wide eyes, she seemed the kind of person who would believe in the kindness of any stranger.
She gave him only one name. Bastian, the Count of Fayre.
“Why him?” Soren asked.
“Because I must put my trust in you, Prince Soren,” she said. “And I believe that you’re sincere. But if you intend to deceive Crimea to aid your father, Bastian will know.”
Soren supposed he couldn’t argue with that.
The messages were coded, using a cipher Elincia told him the count had once taught her, and sent them discretely to a location she claimed Bastian had once told her to contact if he ever went missing. It seemed this Count of Fayre had managed to weasel his way into the company of certain Daein soldiers, who enjoyed his acts in his cover as a traveling performer down at a tavern they’d all but taken over.
They fell into a dialogue quickly enough. Soren couldn’t blame the count for suspecting his motives, but neither had he ever seen a coded message so loquacious. Whether or not the Count of Fayre began to trust his motivations, or whether he’d simply accepted he had no better options, he acquiesced to Soren’s requests.
The package arrived carefully wrapped, delivered by a shaken looking messenger. It contained a single glass bottle filled with a strange, viscous liquid. Soren tilted it back and forth in the sunlight for a moment, and then wrapped it back up and stored it carefully away.
He sat up at night and watched as Ike slept for a precious few hours, night after night. A few times he reached out to brush his hair back from his face or to touch his cheek, but he didn’t want to wake him. Ike needed his rest.
He let himself touch him on the last night, his fingers combing softly through Ike’s hair. Ike made a sleepy noise low in his throat and started to turn towards Soren, only for Soren to hush him. He leaned over him and kissed him gently, his hand braced on Ike’s shoulder.
“Go back to bed,” he said.
Ike snorted, reaching over to pat Soren on the hip.
“You, too,” he muttered, but he turned his face into the pillow easily enough.
Soren sat there until dawn’s light just threatened to spill out over the horizon, and then he rose. He dressed quickly and silently, careful not to wake Ike. Pelleas’ tome he slipped into the bag at his hip, and Gawain’s dagger was hidden up his sleeve.
He hesitated only a moment when it came time to lift Ike’s necklace from around his neck. The ring was still warm from his skin, and Soren held it for a long moment – too long, longer than he could afford. Then he tucked it away in the letter he’d written the evening before, when Ike had been in the bath. That, too, he slipped into a hiding place – somewhere Ike wouldn’t find until it was too late.
But he would find it. Soren wondered if he would hate him for it.
Finally, he picked up the little vial, tilting it back and forth as he watched the liquid slide inside. He closed it in his fist, one finger curling after another.
With one last glance over his shoulder at Ike, still sleeping on the bed, Soren slipped from the room.
Ashnard had killed his father when he was Soren’s age. Now Soren would kill his father, too.
He made it halfway to the throne room before he was intercepted.
Someone seized him by the wrist, yanking him back, before he was grabbed around the waist. A hand came up to cover his mouth as he was yanked back against an armored chest.
Soren tried to claw at the arm holding him, kicking backwards. He was just about to bite down hard on the heel of the hand over his mouth when he felt a hot gust of breath at his ear and a familiar voice whispered to him.
“Quit it,” Ike said. “It’s just me.”
Soren froze.
“Can you be quiet?” Ike asked. His tone was tight and furious, nothing Soren had ever heard directed at him.
Slowly, Soren nodded.
Ike let out a long breath and peeled his hand away from Soren’s mouth. He took him firmly by the hand and pulled him down the hallway, striding long enough that Soren had to rush to prevent being dragged, and into another room.
It was only then when Ike let go of him. Soren couldn’t look at him, so he looked at the room instead. It must have been beautiful once, he thought, before his father’s monstrous shadow fell over the castle.
“You accosted me,” Soren said, the words cool and flat. “Can I not take a walk in the castle now?”
“Do you think I don’t know what you’re doing?” Ike said, still in that furious tone.
“I—” Soren started, only for Ike to grab him by the shoulders and spin him around, forcing him to look at him. Ike’s blue eyes were blazing, his scowl set firm. Normally Soren might reach up and smooth his fingers over the line between his brows. But not now.
Ike gripped his shoulders tightly, but not nearly hard enough to bruise. Even now, when he looked furious beyond belief with Soren, he was still so gentle with him.
It was going to get him killed.
Soren’s throat burned.
“Let me go, Ike,” he said. “Don’t make me order you.”
“We’re well past that, Soren,” Ike said. “You were going to try to kill the king.”
Soren opened his mouth to deny it, only for Ike to snort. He kept a tight hold on his arm with one hand and with the other he reached around Soren’s waist to rummage in the hidden pocket he kept sewn into the seams of all his robes.
The pockets were something Soren had taught himself how to do, carefully practicing on stolen bits of scrap fabric by candlelight until the seams were invisible. Nobody knew about them. Nobody except Ike.
Who else regularly got him out of his robes, after all?
“Stop,” Soren said, trying to catch at Ike’s wrist, twisting in his grip. “Ike, stop –”
Ike made a triumphant noise when his fingers seized on the vial. He held it up in front of Soren, shaking it.
“What’s this, then?” he said.
Soren swallowed hard. He could deny it, or try to, anyway. He was sure his face had already given him away. Somehow, he could never keep Ike from seeing through him. He made a move to snatch it away, and at least Ike let him, even though his chest was heaving and his shoulders were tense.
“How did you know?” Soren asked quietly, slipping the little vial away again.
“You think I don’t know you better than you know yourself?” Ike demanded. “Of course I figured it out, Soren!”
He took a deep and seemed to almost wilt, his grip on Soren loosening as he closed his eyes.
“What were you thinking?” he asked, and the fury had gone out of his voice.
“He has to be stopped, Ike,” Soren said. “We all know it.”
“And that stuff?” Ike asked. “Is it poison?”
“Of a sort,” Soren replied. There was no need for Ike to know any details other than that, of how monstrous Soren’s plan really was. Finally he had proved himself to be his father’s son.
“Where did you get it?” Ike asked.
There was no point lying about this part. Ike would find out sooner or later anyway.
“From a member of Princess Elincia’s retinue,” Soren said bluntly. “I’ve been in contact with the escaped Crimean forces.”
Ike’s eyes snapped open.
Soren shrugged one shoulder, looking away. He couldn’t look at Ike’s expression.
“It’s not a difficult plan to understand,” he said. “I poison him and I… I sacrifice myself.”
He didn’t feel the need to go into any more detail than that. It was too cruel to make Ike picture it. His father, feral, slaying his traitor son in his blind rage, and then Rajaion, always his protector, reacting the way he had the night the Black Knight had taken him away. If Rajaion failed, eventually someone else would succeed. A mad king would have to be put down.
“My father holds this army together through fear and control,” Soren said. “Without him, they’ll collapse. That’s when the Crimean army will take advantage of the situation. And you… you can…”
Carefully, he looked back at Ike. He shook his head, pressing his lips together, and Ike nearly growled.
The next thing Soren knew, he’d been swept off his feet, one of Ike’s arms behind his back and the other under his knees. He grabbed at Ike’s shoulders, even though he knew Ike wouldn’t let him fall. Not even now, when he was furious with Soren.
“I can what, Soren?” Ike said, his eyes flashing.
Soren shook his head. You can be safe, he wanted to say.
“What do you think I would have done if something had happened to you?” Ike demanded. “Simply gone home?”
Soren set his jaw and looked away.
“There’s a threat to you as long as I’m alive,” he said. “It holds no value once I’m gone.”
“Then talk to me!” Ike said, hoisting Soren higher. “We can figure this out together, Soren, I promise.”
But Soren could only stay silent.
“Fine,” Ike bit out after a moment. “You’re not the only one who’s been keeping a secret, you know.”
Soren’s head snapped up.
Ike set his jaw. Whatever he said next, Soren wasn’t going to like.
“I’ve been in contact with the Crimean underground, too,” he said.
Soren’s jaw dropped. He tightened his grip on Ike’s shoulder, searching his face.
“Since when?” he demanded.
“I met a lady knight with flaming red hair on the battlefield,” Ike said. “And a – jester, I think.”
“Oh,” Soren said faintly, thinking back on the information Elincia had given him. “Yes, the Count of Fayre.”
“The – what?” Ike said. He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. I managed to make my position clear to them.”
“And what is your position?” Soren asked, his mouth dry. He fidgeted with Ike’s collar, lowering his gaze when Ike looked incredulous.
“Do you think I’m going to let him do this to you?” Ike demanded. “To use you however he wants? You think I’m going to let you run off to your doom to stop him alone?”
After a moment, Soren shook his head.
“No,” he whispered. “That’s why I left the letter.”
Ike snorted. He held Soren closer, tighter, shaking his head.
“Did you think at all about how I’d feel if I found that thing too late?” he asked. “Knowing I couldn’t do anything to save you? Soren, I was so –”
He cut himself off without an angry noise, tilting his head to kiss Soren. Soren gasped into it, his hand coming up to cup Ike’s neck. He’d expected the kiss to be angry, but it wasn’t. Ike just kissed him.
“I can’t lose you,” Soren confessed when Ike pulled back. He played with the hair at the nape of Ike’s neck, Ike’s headband brushing his knuckles. “Please, Ike. Please.”
“Then don’t,” Ike said, squeezing Soren beneath his knees. “Stay with me. Fight together with me.”
“I can’t,” Soren said, his voice breaking on it. He gripped the back of Ike’s neck tighter, willing him to understand. “I can’t, Ike –”
“Then I’m not putting you down,” Ike said, his eyes blazing. “Do you hear me, Soren? I won’t let go of you, not ever. Forget about this plan.”
“I can’t,” Soren insisted, shaking his head. “Ike, you don’t know what you’re asking of me!”
Gently, Ike set Soren back on his feet, but he didn’t let go of him. Instead, he put his hands on Soren’s waist, keeping him close as he looked down at him. Ike’s face, even set in a scowl, was always open and honest, and it took Soren’s breath away just looking at him.
“This is not your war, Soren,” Ike said. “And I fight for you.”
“You’ve always been a devoted one, Ike.”
They both turned. Bryce was standing in the doorway, looking impassive. One look at him told Soren that he’d heard everything.
Ike shoved Soren behind him. Bryce regarded them with a solemn expression.
“Plotting against the king is a serious matter,” he said. “You’re going to have to come with me.”
Ike snorted.
“Don’t be an idiot, Bryce,” he said. “You see what the king is doing. He has to be stopped.”
“You’re still young, Ike,” Bryce said. “There are things Gawain shielded you from. That was his mistake.”
“What do you see Ashnard bringing to this place, aside from a mountain of corpses?” Ike demanded.
Bryce was quiet for a moment, and then he shook his head.
“I see nothing, save for a land of absolute darkness and terror,” he admitted.
Ike nodded tersely. He and Bryce continued to circle one another, both keeping a careful distance between them. Ike had one hand on Soren, pulling him along, always careful to shield his body behind his own, but Soren was well aware this presented a weakness.
“My father told me once that you’ve always been loyal to the royal family,” Ike said. “The royal family doesn’t end with Ashnard. Support Soren. Help us overthrow the Mad King. There’s no better path for Daein.”
“It’s true that the prince is of the royal blood,” Bryce said, and he sounded terribly sad. “But there is the matter of the other side of his heritage. His mother.”
Ike’s brows drew together, even as Soren’s breath caught.
“How could his mother be a problem?” Ike demanded.
“Ike,” Soren whispered in a hiss. He grabbed Ike’s sleeve. “Don’t –”
“The woman was a subhuman,” Bryce said. His gaze cut to Soren, flat and hard as his voice. “Her blood taints his veins.”
Silence crashed down around them. Like this, caught behind Ike, Soren could not see his face. It was only because he knew Ike at all that he caught the slightest intake of breath, the tensing of his muscles underneath Soren’s fingers.
“Your mother,” Bryce said, looking past Ike at Soren. “The Lady Almedha. She was a black dragon of Goldoa.”
“General Bryce!” Soren hissed, panic flooding through him. “Hold your tongue.”
But it was Ike who spoke next.
“What are you talking about?” he asked.
“King Ashnard was fascinated with her,” Bryce said. It was clear that it pained him. “She was powerful and shrewd. She knew how to use her charms. The king was a young man, then. Young men… certainly fall victim to beauty, no matter the source. An old man understands this, Ike.”
His gaze flicked to Soren.
Ike’s grip on Soren tightened, then relaxed. He was older now, and no longer as brash as he’d been, but the taunt had cut.
“Daein will never accept a half-breed on the throne,” Bryce said. “It was cruel of the king not to kill the boy as soon as he was born and try again with a normal woman.”
He looked terribly sad as he gazed at Soren. He believed it, Soren realized. Truly and completely, he believed it.
Bryce had never been cruel to him. He’d been kinder than some.
“Shut your traitorous mouth!” Ike growled.
Soren startled at the fury in his tone, the sheer rage.
“This farce must end,” Bryce said. “The king is still young. There’s still time for him to wed a suitable woman, who can produce a legitimate heir.”
He raised his sword, the tip pointed at Soren’s throat.
“I’m sorry, my prince,” he said. “I’ll make it quick. Your suffering will end today.”
Ike took a step forward, his own sword drawn.
“You’ll have to go through me, first,” he said.
Soren’s breath caught in his throat as Ike shoved him back a step.
“Just stay out of my range, Soren,” he said. “Don’t worry. I won’t let him lay a finger on you.”
“You want to try me, boy?” Bryce asked. “I was a soldier before you were born.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Ike said. “All that matters is if you have the skill to beat me, and you don’t.”
Bryce nodded to himself.
“You truly are Gawain’s son,” he said, and then he charged.
Their swords met with a clang, Ike’s Ragnell glinting golden in the light as he drove Bryce back. It was clear immediately why Ike, as young as he was, had been able to so effectively climb the ranks of the Daein military, but Bryce did have the superior experience. Worse yet, he knew very well how both Gawain and Ike fought, the uniqueness of their family’s sword work.
Ike fought the same way he did everything else: direct, not wasting any time. Bryce was stalwart, too. Their swords clashed, Ike advancing and Bryce defending. Ike’s youth and strength gave him an advantage, even over Bryce’s experience.
“The only thing that matters is Daein’s legacy!” Bryce shouted at Ike. “Even though the king gives it little consideration, Daein’s royal bloodline must continue, untainted!”
“There’s no taint to be found here!” Ike shot back.
Ike had taught him how to use a dagger after Soren had been attacked.
“If you’re going to carry it, you’re going to know how to use it,” he snorted, curling Soren’s fingers around the hilt. “Now come at me.”
Soren had been reluctant at first, but Ike had insisted.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “You won’t hurt me. Now strike and don’t hold back.”
Ike had grabbed his wrist before he’d even gotten close, crossing the room in a few quick strides. He pulled Soren into his body, the dagger held aloft, and his grip was firm but not painful. Ike steadied him with a hand on his lower back, leaning down as Soren leaned up. Their faces were so close that Soren felt dizzy.
“Again,” Ike said.
He’d shown Soren how to grip and how to slash, his hand firm around his wrist and his voice close in his ear. He was a good teacher, patient but firm. They kept at it until Ike seemed satisfied with the fluidity of Soren’s movements.
“You’re fast,” he said one day after their practice. He crunched on an apple. “That’s your advantage. But I’d still rather you didn’t use that unless you have to.”
Now Soren had to use that speed. A dagger would do no good against a warrior like Bryce, but Soren had other weapons now.
He fumbled for his tome, fingers slipping against the smooth leather of the cover, only for it to fall open in his palms. He mouthed the words, disobeying Ike’s request as he slipped closer. The spell would hurt more, the closer he was. Already he could feel the wind pick up, whipping his sleeves and his hair.
Ike felt it too. He risked a dangerous glance backwards, his eyes widening as he saw Soren holding a tome, but Ike was a disciplined fighter, and he only allowed him that one split second glance before he locked eyes with Bryce again.
Soren’s aim was true. The wind rushed at Bryce, sharp as a hundred daggers as it cut into him. He hadn’t been expecting it, hadn’t braced himself against it, and so he stumbled.
Bryce was a good fighter. Ike was better. As soon as Bryce stumbled under Soren’s spell, Ike charged forward. It was over in minutes.
When Ike wrenched his sword free, Bryce fell to his knees with barely a sound. He stared up at Ike for a moment, clutching his wound.
“You truly are Gawain’s son,” Bryce rasped out. “The resemblance is strong.”
Ike’s face was impassive.
“Farewell, knight,” he said. “You should have made different choices.”
“My strength was not enough…” Bryce murmured, a bare, bloody whisper. “I could not… protect my homeland…” His gaze fell on Soren. “Forgive me, Daein…”
Ike made a derisive noise. It was over in a moment.
Soren sank to his knees in front of Bryce’s body, heedless of the blood pooling on the ground. For as long as he could remember, Bryce had been by his father’s side. He’d been loyal to a fault, in a way lacking in the others.
His father would no more grieve Bryce than he would a wyvern, or a dog.
Such a waste, Soren thought, staring down at Bryce’s body. All that for a man who had never cared about him.
There was the sound of Ike sheathing his sword, and then footsteps.
“What General Bryce said,” Ike said. “You weren’t surprised.”
“No,” Soren said. The word felt cold as ice on his lips.
“It’s true, then,” Ike said. “Your mother was laguz.”
Soren’s breath stuttered. Still, Ike used that word.
“How long have you known?” Ike asked.
Soren couldn’t look at him.
“For some time now,” he said. His voice didn’t shake at all, to his surprise. “A little over a year, I suppose. My father has called me a beast my whole life, and when Pelleas explained about the Branded… it made sense.” He swallowed. “I found a few ancient books in the library that confirmed things for me.”
“And you didn’t tell me,” Ike said, not a question. An accusation, then.
He had every right to it. Soren bowed his head.
“Why?” Ike demanded. “Why would you keep something like that from me?”
“Because I couldn’t bear it!” Soren shouted, whipping around to look at him. Hot, angry tears brimmed, and Ike’s face swam before him. “I couldn’t bear the idea of you turning away from me!”
Ike grabbed him by the upper arms, pulling him to his feet. Soren readied himself—he didn’t even know for what, too caught up in the storm of his emotions—only to freeze as Ike pulled him against his chest, strong arms circling around him.
“Soren,” Ike said, his breath ruffling Soren’s hair. “You’re so smart, but you’re so stupid.”
“What?” Soren breathed out. His voice came out small, muffled. Ike’s grip was iron, pressing his face into his chest. Fingers sunk into his hair, cradling the back of his head. Then Ike pulled back, taking Soren by the shoulders so Soren had to look up at his face.
“Ike?” he asked, his voice shaking.
“Do you think I care about any of that?” Ike demanded. “If you have laguz blood in your veins, if you inherit the throne or not – Soren, I love you!”
He made a frustrated noise, then cupped Soren’s face between his hands and kissed him until Soren was breathless with it. He was panting when Ike broke away. Tears spilled over his lashes and down his cheeks, uncontrollable.
“I was so afraid,” he admitted, forcing the words out. “So afraid that you would hate me.”
He broke off with a sob, shaking his head. It all seemed too good to be true, that Ike could know and still accept him. Still want to touch him.
“You could be a – a fish for all I care!” Ike said. “Do they have fish laguz?”
It was all so ridiculous. Soren couldn’t stop the tears.
Ike made a frustrated noise, taking his face between his hands and kissing him deeply again.
“It’s you, Soren,” he murmured when they broke apart. “I can’t continue without you by my side.”
Soren scrubbed furiously at his face, only for Ike to gently take him by the wrists. He leaned in, putting their foreheads down against each other.
“We’re going to talk about the magic, too,” Ike said, although he failed at sounding truly stern. “Just not now. When it’s all over.”
“Yes,” Soren said, wiping at his eyes. “All right. I’ll tell you everything.”
“Stubborn,” Ike grumbled, embracing him again. “Stupid, beautiful – don’t ever run away from me again.”
“I wasn’t running away,” Soren said, his voice wet. Ike’s fingers slid into his hair, his arms tight around him. “I was trying to protect you.”
Ike pulled back, taking a deep breath, and held Soren by the shoulders.
“I have something for you,” Ike said. “Again.”
He reached into his shirt and drew something out, letting it fall glimmering from his fingers. Soren quickly held out his hands to catch it in his palms.
It was Ike’s ring, the one Soren had removed from around his neck and left carefully hidden in Ike’s things, for him to find after everything was over.
Ike carefully placed it around his neck again, and the heavy ring fell, grounding, over Soren’s sternum, still warm from the heat of Ike’s body.
“No more secrets,” Ike said. “From now on, we face everything together. Do you understand?”
“No more secrets,” Soren repeated, clutching the ring.
“All right,” Ike said, touching Soren’s cheek. “Tell me what you want, Soren, and we’ll do it. Together.”
“All I want is to be by your side,” Soren said, and Ike huffed a quiet laugh.
“That’s convenient,” he said. His hand found Soren’s, tangling their fingers together. “That’s all I want, too.”
Their dash to out of the castle was mad, Soren’s hand caught in Ike’s as he pulled him along, only letting go when they met opposition. They fought well together, it turned out, Ike quickly adapting his swordplay to cover Soren as he attacked from behind him. Then they were running again, Ike rapidly explaining his plan to Soren. They would join his contacts in the Crimean underground and use what limited time they had to regroup and replan. He would vouch for Soren, he promised, and Soren wondered what he had done to earn their trust so quickly. But then that was Ike, he supposed. Ike always stood apart, his ability to convey the goodness of his heart unparalleled.
Soren loved him completely, even though he was clearly insane. So was Soren, though, so at least they were a matched set.
They were almost free when a black shadow fell across their path. Soren’s stomach sank.
The Black Knight was standing there, blocking their path. His jet-black helmet gave him a sense of almost impassiveness as he stared at them.
“Prince Soren,” the Black Knight said in his strange, breathy voice. “I’m afraid this is where your rebellion ends.”
“You!” Ike snarled. Soren tightened his grip on Ike’s hand, feeling as Ike’s muscles tensed, watching as he bared his teeth.
Ike had promised to kill the Black Knight, after all.
“Ah, so it’s the son,” the Black Knight said. “General Ike, son of Gawain. Does your father yet live?”
Ike snarled. He wrenched his hand from Soren’s and charged at full force.
“Ike!” Soren shouted. “Be careful! He’s faster than he should be in that armor!”
It was like Ike couldn’t even hear him. Soren had never seen him like this before, so single-mindedly consumed by an opponent. Their swords met with a terrific clash, and Soren watched with horror as he witnessed the strain in Ike’s posture, saw his boots slide as the Black Knight pushed him back.
It was the same as that night, Soren thought, remembering the way the Black Knight had attacked Gawain. He could picture it in excruciating detail: the Black Knight forcing Ike back, overpowering him. The Black Knight wounding Ike as he’d wounded his father. The Black Knight doing worse.
He flipped open his tome with shaking fingers but, without even looking back, Ike barked an order at him.
“This one’s mine!” he snarled.
Soren hesitated only a split second. Ike’s pride was not worth more than his life.
He threw spell after spell, but none of them seemed to make a difference. The Black Knight just kept attacking Ike, their swords meeting again and again and again as Ike struggled to keep up. Soren had never seen him have such difficulty in a fight before. Everyone in Daein knew that General Ike fought like a demon.
Was there even a man underneath that armor, Soren wondered, or had his father somehow managed to secure the cooperation of a spirit of war? Soren didn’t know. Right now, it didn’t seem so farfetched.
A blow from the Black Knight nearly landed, Ike’s quick reflexes the only thing that saved him as he leapt out of the way. He looked up, his eyes blazing, and charged again. He wasn’t going to stop, Soren realized. Ike wouldn’t stop until one of them was dead.
“Your father taught you well,” the Black Knight said. “I’m glad his swordplay lives on through you – for the moment, anyway.” Then, in a surprisingly melancholy tone, he added, “Of course, once I kill you, Gawain’s swordwork will be lost forever. Such a shame.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Ike grit out. “I’ll make sure I’m not the one who falls here today.”
The Black Knight seemed to consider that for a moment.
“Very well, son of Gawain,” he said, blocking Ike’s next swing. “If that is what you desire, I will allow you to live another day.”
He shoved Ike back hard, hard enough that even Ike stumbled. Before either of them could realize what was happening, the Black Knight switched directions. He charged at Soren instead, as swift as one of Kilvas’ ravens. The wind whipped itself up at Soren’s command, a miniature tornado, but the Black Knight charged through it like it was nothing. He was in front of Soren before Soren could turn the page of his tome. He grabbed Soren, twisting his arm until he dropped his tome with a cry.
“Don’t touch him!” Ike shouted, even as the Black Knight’s armored hand seized Soren’s wrist.
“We’ll meet again, General Ike,” he said. “When we do, remember this moment.”
Then the world fell out from under Soren’s feet again. The last thing he saw was Ike’s horrified face, his outstretched hand.
They reappeared in a dizzying rush, the floor pitching beneath Soren’s feet, and again he only barely managed to keep from falling to his knees. When the world righted itself, he realized he recognized the room he was in.
It was Castle Crimea’s grand throne room, which must have once felt airy and light before his father sat on its ornate throne. He searched the room, only for his gaze to fall upon his father.
Rajaion’s hulking form was curled behind his father, and heavy chains had been driven through the wall and floor to restrain him. Petrine stood by his where he sat on the throne, eyeing Rajaion with an air of nervousness. Good, Soren thought viciously.
In the corner of the throne room, there was the wrought iron cage Soren had seen before they left. The cover was thrown back now, revealing two golden haired, white winged figures, a male and a female.
The male was watching Soren’s father with the most hateful expression he’d ever seen. Soren could hardly blame him.
His father seemed to loom where he sat, dressed in his heavy cape and armor despite Crimea’s relatively warm weather. He held a goblet loosely in one hand, and his grin was as wide as Soren had ever seen. Just as he’d suspected, there was not even a hint of grief over Bryce.
On the floor in front of the throne there was some sort of sigil drawn, splashed across the floor in garish red. Soren had never seen its like before.
“So you’ve come to kill your father,” Ashnard said, laughing. “Finally, I see something of me in you.”
Rajaion strained at his chains, trying to get to Soren. Ashnard grabbed the chain connected to the collar around his throat, yanking sharply, and Rajaion let out a wild snarl, turning to snap at him, but he couldn’t reach.
Soren raised his chin. He wouldn’t beg.
“And there’s your mother again,” Ashnard said. “Defiant to the end, eh?”
He rose, looming in his great armor, and descended the dais, each step heavy. Rajaion tracked him, his hackles drawn back, and Soren wondered what had him especially agitated today. Perhaps he sensed, somehow, that Soren would most likely never leave this room.
Poor, mad beast, he thought, aching with it. Perhaps it was foolish sentiment, but if he could have spared him that, he would. But it was pointless to ask his father even for a favor.
“To seduce one of my Riders of Daein into doing your bidding,” Ashnard said, circling him. “To lie in wait, scheming and plotting. Yes, how very like your mother.”
“Better I resemble her than you,” Soren said. He followed his father as he circled him, turning on the spot. “I have a vague memory that she threatened to kill you, too.”
“She failed,” Ashnard said. Soren watched his hands, but he didn’t reach for the hilt of his sword. For some reason, he was still hesitating to kill him.
There was something that wasn’t adding up. His father still needed him for something.
“What is it that you actually want?” Soren asked him. “It isn’t conquest, is it? You don’t care about your own throne, let alone the thrones of other nations. If you did, you would not have gone about it this way.”
“What I desire is war,” Ashnard said.
“Well, you have it,” Soren said, venom dripping from his tongue. “And yet you’re still not satisfied.”
“You think this is a war great enough for the likes of me?” Ashnard laughed. “I won’t stop until the fires of war consume the entire continent.”
“For what purpose?” Soren demanded.
Ashnard stopped his circling abruptly. His impressive height made him seem almost looming, a monster of a man. Ike was so tall, Soren was used to looking up at people, but it was different with his father.
“If war was to descend upon the continent, embroiling every country, it’s said that a great catastrophe will befall Tellius,” Ashnard said, his eyes glimmering. “That the goddesses will descend and wreak their wrath. I would like to see it.”
Soren snorted derisively.
“You’re madder than they all think,” he said. “All of this chaos and destruction over a legend? A mere myth?”
“It’s no myth, boy,” Ashnard said. “The skies will darken and the seas will swell. The land will run red with blood. It sounds glorious, doesn’t it?”
“And me?” Soren asked, raising his chin. “Where do I come into your schemes?”
“You, traitorous little beast,” Ashnard said. “You are not enough to break the Black Dragon King’s famed neutrality. Not even if I toss your broken body at his feet.”
Soren felt nothing. He could not picture a grandfather, could not conjure up the image of a human or a dragon. Why should this man, who ruled an entire isolationist nation, care about a young man he’d never met?
“Your mother was always the Black Dragon King’s favorite child,” Ashnard said. “She used to gloat about it endlessly. But did he come and save her from my clutches?”
Soren clenched his jaw, remembering the distant echo of his mother’s secret weeping. If he didn’t care for himself, then he could sympathize with what he remember of his mother. It was a terrible thing, to be tossed aside.
“So what will you do with me instead?” he asked. “Surely, now that my plot was discovered, you’ve kept me alive for a reason.”
“The ritual needs blood,” Ashnard said. “The blood of every nation. The older, the better.”
Old blood. Soren had read enough arcane books to know what that meant: royal blood.
He’d always scorned the concept that royal blood was somehow more precious. He bled the same as any peasant in the lowest slums of Nevassa. But belief was a powerful thing, and now it had seized his mad father in its talons.
He’d bleed entire nations if it got him what he wanted.
“Black Knight,” his father said, turning suddenly. “Bring me the male heron.”
The Black Knight was still for a moment. Soren had the oddest feeling that he didn’t wish to comply. But then he moved, walking swiftly towards the cage and wrenching the door open. He took the male heron by the arm, even as he struggled against him.
The heron girl flapped her wings in agitation and grabbed at her brother’s other arm, trying in vain to pull him away from the Black Knight. Her voice was panicked as foreign words spilled out of her lips. It was the Serenes language, Soren realized, but he didn’t recognize the vocabulary. He understood her all the same.
“Princess Serenes, do not make this more difficult,” the Black Knight said. “I have no wish to harm you.”
She snapped something at him, high and furious, but there was nothing that she could do. The Black Knight dragged her brother from the cage, even as he fought him, too, his pure white wings flapping angrily.
Everything Soren had read about Serenes herons indicated that they were passive to the point of helplessness. The two his father had found seemed nothing like that. Perhaps, he thought, that was why they’d survived.
The heron’s golden hair and pale skin almost seemed to glow, the fine features of his face ethereally beautiful even twisted in rage, as the Black Knight presented him to his father. The Black Knight had been oddly gentle, for all his force, but Ashnard had no such compulsions. He grabbed the heron by the arm, yanking him into the strange sigil in the center of the room.
“Let go of me, vile human!” he hissed, and even his voice was eerily beautiful.
Ashnard paid him no attention. Herons had no physical strength, Soren remembered reading. They were such delicate creatures that even an excess of negative energy could kill them. A being like that held no interest for his father, no matter how the heron cursed and struggled.
Soren watched in morbid fascination as his father brought out the knife. The heron bit his lip as his palm was slashed, swallowing down any noise of pain. It seemed he refused to give Ashnard the satisfaction.
“Watch,” Ashnard said as the heron’s blood dripped onto the sigil.
Soren sensed it before he saw it, a sudden rush of magic like nothing he’d ever felt before. The closest he could compare it to was Pelleas’ dark magic. It felt like a chaotic jumble of power. Light surged up from the sigil, a shining prism of colors, but it lasted only a moment.
Ashnard threw the heron boy aside without a care for the way he landed hard on the stone floor. His lips curved upwards in a wide grin.
“Do you see now?” he asked Soren.
Soren set his jaw.
“Where did you find this?” he asked, not entirely expecting an answer. But when the answer did come, it came from the Black Knight.
“A few hundred years ago in Begnion, a relative of the apostle at the time decided that he was tired of the order of things,” he said. The heron was watching him from the floor with hateful eyes; Soren understood the feeling. “He wanted to hear the voice of the goddesses himself. This is no easy thing to accomplish. It requires fire and blood. The man in question invented a ritual – old blood spilled from each and every country. He had planned to finish with the apostle herself. He only managed to slay Daein’s first princess before he was killed, but the ritual remained, hidden in Begnion’s archives.”
“If you defeat a god, does it not make you a god?” Ashnard asked.
“It makes you delusional,” Soren bit out.
Ashnard laughed.
“When the Hawk King comes for his ward, I’ll strike him down,” Ashnard said. The heron snarled, baring his teeth, but his father paid him no heed. “Those carrion birds in Kilvas don’t have the strength to resist. Gallia’s king should offer a challenge, as will his nephew, the heir. And then there’s Goldoa.”
His grin sharpened. He yanked Soren forward, his grip painfully tight.
“Goldoa and Daein’s blood both, in one package,” Ashnard said, forcing Soren’s chin up. “I can bleed you for both and not have to lose my mount. You’ve always been a tool. Nothing more.”
“I’m very aware of what I’ve always been to you,” Soren said coldly.
It didn’t matter what his father thought of him. It hadn’t before, and it didn’t know, not even as he prepared to sacrifice him for some mad ritual. It had only ever mattered what he was to Ike. Not a prince. Not a half-breed. Only Soren.
That was the thought he held onto as the dagger cut deep into his palm. He grit his teeth and made no sound, loathe to give his father the satisfaction.
The heron hadn’t screamed. Soren could do no less.
Not that it mattered. Even if he had screamed, he wouldn’t have been heard over Rajaion’s enraged roar.
His blood dripped, dark red, down his palm to fall on the sigil beneath their feet. It flared again, nearly blinding, and that horrible energy rose up. Soren felt like he could feel it in his bones.
“This is not enough, not by far,” Ashnard said. “But you should know what waits in store for you.”
“Why?” Soren demanded, curling his bloody hand into a fist. “You’ve never given me the liberty before.”
Ashnard laughed.
“I’ll bleed you last,” he promised. Soren knew it wasn’t out of any sort of sentiment. He simply wanted to punish Soren by making him watch his mad rampage.
“King Ashnard,” the Black Knight said. “There is a commotion in the halls.”
“General Ike, is it?” Ashnard said, and Soren’s breath caught in his throat. “I’m not surprised. He’s grown strong. It’s only his fondness for my son that makes him weak.” He glanced at the Black Knight. “You failed to kill the father. Do you wish to try the son?”
“Your Majesty,” the Black Knight said, his only answer.
“Keep him distracted, at least,” Ashnard said, the smile falling from his face. “Kill him if you can. He’s outlived his usefulness.”
Soren could hear the sound of battle now, growing closer. He knew that Ike would come after him, of course, as much as he’d been dreading it. This was exactly what he hadn’t wanted; Ike putting himself in danger because of him.
“Prepare yourself, boy,” Ashnard said, grinning down at him.
It wasn’t long before the sound of battle was right outside the throne room, the great doors shaking as the attacking force attempted to break them down. The Black Knight situated himself at the door, the sword that had nearly slain Ike’s father held in his hand.
Soren saw the moment that the doors splintered and Ike, standing at the front of the force, saw him. His lips drew back in a snarl. His gaze found Soren next, standing there behind his father in the middle of the blood red sigil.
“Let him go right now,” Ike said, to Soren’s father or the Black Knight, it didn’t matter.
“You’ll have to get through me first,” the Black Knight said.
“That’s fine by me,” Ike snarled.
For the second time that day, their swords clashed. Soren could see Ike’s gritted teeth, the strain in his arms. As strong as Ike was, the Black Knight was a match for him. Soren started forward on instinct, his mind racing as he thought about what he could possibly do to help Ike, to protect him, when a strong hand seized around his arm. Ashnard yanked him back, looming over him. Soren couldn’t look at him, though. He couldn’t look at anything but Ike, fighting.
“I’ll let you watch your knight die,” Ashnard told Soren. “And then, when it’s time, I’ll send you to join him.”
That was the thing that made Soren look up at him. He traced the familiar, hateful features of his father’s face, the mad gleam in his eyes and his terrible grin. He saw nothing of himself in that face.
“I’ll kill you myself,” Soren said, every word clear and cold, perfectly enunciated. “And my knight will watch.”
Ashnard threw his head back laughing. Soren looked away from him, back towards the fight, breathless with it. For the first time, Soren noticed the other fighters in the room, challenging the Daein soldiers that had spilled in from the halls. There was a red-haired woman, her hair caught in a long braid, wielding an axe, and a pair of fighters, both with light blue hair. The man fought with a lance and the woman with a sword. Princess Elincia was there, too, her orange dress traded in for a white outfit beter suited for fighting. She had a sword at her hip and a healing staff grasped in her hands, and the blue-haired woman was guarding her closely. To Soren’s surprise, Ena was among them, along with a tall man with blue hair and a red mark on his forehead. They seemed to know better than to try to assist Ike in fighting the Black Knight.
Ike’s strength was ferocious, his swordplay second to none, but what made him a truly great warrior was his ability to learn. He’d fought the Black Knight once already, and now he knew how he moved. If Ike had made any mistakes in the first fight, he wouldn’t make them again. He’d given the Black Knight no chance to force him back this time. Instead, they seemed locked in a stalemate.
From Soren’s perspective, it seemed neither had the advantage over the other. He felt his stomach twist, sweat beading at the back of his neck.
If Ike fell, he wouldn’t survive it. He knew that deep in his soul.
Just like the sigil’s strange magic, Soren felt it before he heard it. There was a prickle in the air, a strange sort of energy. Unlike the sigil, it didn’t set his teeth on edge, didn’t make him feel like something was deeply wrong with the world. Instead, the prickle seemed to energize him, to lift his spirits. Some of the nausea he felt faded away.
His father’s grip tightened on his arm.
A voice rose up, clear and sweet as newly melted snow. It was the heron girl, and she was singing. Her brother, holding his still bleeding hand to his chest and staining his white finery red, looked from her, to Ashnard, and finally to Ike. Then he began to sing, too. His voice was just as clear, but utterly haunting, a hard look in his eyes.
Soren knew that the Serenes herons practiced seid magic, but he had never known that it would feel like this, like flowers sprouting, leaves turning green. Soren suddenly felt like a weight had been lifted off his chest.
He could tell that Ike felt it too, from the deep breath he took, to the new fire in his eyes. He swung at the Black Knight, again and again, his movements fierce but steady, self-assured. The Black Knight was the one being forced back now. The herons sung louder.
Then the Black Knight stumbled. Soren saw the light in Ike’s eyes. He pushed his attack, forcing the Black Knight even further back. One of his strikes scored the Black Knight’s armor, from his helmet down to the chest.
Soren felt more than heard the sharp intake of the Black Knight’s breath.
“It seems the tides of the battle have turned,” the Black Knight said. He heaved a heavy sigh. “Very well.”
“I’ll kill you for what you’ve done,” Ike told the Black Knight.
“Yes, you will,” the Black Knight said. “But not today.”
The sigil began to glow underneath his feet and, even as fast as Ike moved, it wasn’t fast enough to keep the Black Knight from being whisked away by magic. Ike was met with nothing but air, catching himself just before he hit the wall. He made a noise of rage under his breath.
Ike was never one to dwell on what couldn’t be helped, though. The Black Knight was now beyond his reach, and so he turned on Ashnard.
“You have your father’s stance,” Ashnard said, laughing. He let go of Soren, shoving him aside so that Soren landed painfully on the stone floor, only just managing to catch himself. “I don’t know that I ever mentioned how very happy it makes me that your father taught you swordplay.”
“Mad King Ashnard,” Ike said, and there was nothing but confidence in his voice. “I will cut you down with this blade and end your reign of terror.”
Ashnard threw his head back, laughing harder. He sounded delighted, Soren thought, picking himself up off the ground and backing away. Ike fought best when he had room to maneuver, and Soren wouldn’t be a liability to him. Not now.
“You? Cut me down?” Ashnard barked. “Good. If you possess the strength to do so, then so be it. That process is the principle on which my ideal world operates.”
“Don’t doubt my strength, Ashnard,” Ike said. “I won’t lose.”
He lunged, so fast Soren would have missed it if he’d blinked, or if he’d known Ike’s movements slightly less well. How many days had he spent quietly watching at the training grounds, at first watching Ike growing stronger and more sure of himself, training with the other young soldiers, and then, when he was older, leading the drills himself.
That had been careful and controlled. This fight was wild. Ike wasn’t holding back at all.
Neither was Ashnard.
Soren had only seen his father fight a handful of times, but he seemed stronger now. Soren wondered if it had anything to do with the sigil.
It occurred to Soren then that the rest of the fighting had ended. There was only the small, anxious crowd gathered around the corners of the room, Elincia grasping her staff with white knuckles and the male heron deliberately planting himself in front of his sister.
Ena, staring at something behind Ashnard, nothing but panic in her eyes.
Soren realized why a moment later.
Rajaion was straining at his chains, tongue lolling from his mouth. The links wouldn’t hold, Soren realized, a half second before one chain snapped, and then the next. With a wild roar, Rajaion lunged forward.
“Rajaion, no!” Soren shouted, flinging out a hand, but it didn’t seem to matter. The fighting was too much for him, and it was like he couldn’t hear Soren any longer. Soren couldn’t stop him as he fixed his gaze on Ike.
He lunged first, trying to get between Rajaion and Ike, only distantly registering Ena’s gasp. It was a mistake; the movement drew Ike’s gaze, and he shouted Soren’s name in warning. He dodged Ashnard’s next strike but only just barely.
“Soren!” Ike snapped. “Get out of here!”
There was no time, though. Rajaion was rearing back, clearly prepared to strike, and Ashnard’s gaze had fallen on him, too. It took on a considering look as Ike dodged Rajaion’s lashing tail.
“I’ve changed my mind,” Ashnard said, a cruel curl of a smile on his lips. “I think I’ll bleed you first.”
Soren threw his hands up, even though it was pointless.
The expected blow didn’t come. Instead, there was another great screech of rage from Rajaion. His father made a noise Soren had never heard from him before: one of pain.
When Soren lowered his hands, he found Rajaion with his huge fangs sunk deep into his father’s shoulder, puncturing his armor.
That was all the opening Ike needed.
After it was over, it seemed almost impossible. For so much of Soren’s life, his father had loomed over it, dominated it, kept him prisoner in his palace. As much as Soren had hated it, he had always seemed invincible.
And now he was on the floor, bleeding out. Slowly, Soren thought, regarding him with a certain shocked distance, but not slowly enough. Not for everything he’d done, all the people who had suffered because of him.
“How disappointing,” he said, the words falling from his lips before he could even think about them. “It turns out you’re just another man.”
His father gave him one last hateful look.
Soren tilted his head to the side and held his gaze.
“Goodbye, Father,” he said.
It should have been over, but it wasn’t. It was mere moments after Ashnard died that Rajaion began thrashing wildly, worse even than the night the Black Knight had returned Soren stinking of the Feral Ones. He roared, his huge wings flapping and his tail thrashing.
Soren tried everything he knew. He called Rajaion’s name. He ordered him. He cajoled and comforted to the best of his limited ability.
Rajaion wouldn’t listen.
Perhaps, Soren thought, his mind racing against the panic, it was the chaos in the room, still thick in the air. Perhaps Rajaion couldn’t stand it.
“Soren,” Ike said, his voice tight.
Soren whipped around to look at him, only to see him holding his sword, his knuckles white.
“I’m sorry,” Ike said. “He’s mad, Soren. I won’t let him hurt you.” He dragged in a deep breath. “Hate me for it if you like.”
Soren could never hate him, not for anything, but horror still caught in his throat as he turned to look at Rajaion, calmer now, but his eyes still roved and his teeth still snapped. Rajaion had been his companion since he was a child of six years old, lonely and terrified. He’d done his best, in his own animal way, to comfort Soren, to protect him. He’d been his only companion, save for Ike.
Now he was going to have to watch as Ike cut Rajaion down. Soren was a pragmatist; he knew that there was no other option. What could they possibly do with a mad wyvern, now that Rajaion would no longer listen to him?
“Will you make it quick?” he asked Ike.
Ike nodded, tight and decisive.
Soren closed his eyes, but only for a moment. He owed it to Rajaion not to look away.
“Prince Soren!” Ena cried out, an edge of desperation in her voice. “You can’t!”
She made a move as if to run towards Rajaion, only for the man she’d arrived with to grab her by the arm, yanking her back.
“Ena!” he barked, sharp and commanding.
“Grandfather, please,” she replied.
The man looked nowhere near old enough to be Ena’s grandfather, but that was no concern of Soren’s. His heart ached as he watched Ike circle Rajaion, looking for an opening. In just a moment, that sword would come down on Rajaion’s neck, and it would all be over.
He was too large to bury. It would take an army. A funeral pyre it would have to be. Soren would light it himself, and he swore to himself that he wouldn’t cry.
Ike raised his sword.
Rajaion’s eyes met his and a jolt went through Soren.
“I can bleed you for both and not have to lose my mount.”
Soren’s breath caught in his throat.
“Stop!” he yelled at Ike.
It spoke to Ike’s extraordinary control that he did stop, redirecting his swing so it missed Rajaion. The motion startled Rajaion, and it was only Ike’s quick instincts that kept him out of range of his snapping teeth.
“Soren?” he demanded, backing away.
“There’s something I’m missing,” Soren said, near breathless. “There’s something wrong here. I need to think – I need –”
Then a voice rose up, clear as a bell. The female heron was singing, her hands clasped in front of her. Her song seemed to reverberate through the very stone. Everyone stopped to stare at her.
Even Rajaion.
At first, Soren fully expected him to lunge at the herons. Delicate and fine-boned, both of them would amount to little more than a bloody mouthful for him. Ena looked like she had her breath caught in her throat.
Slowly, Rajaion’s roars faded into snarls, then to a faint, dissatisfied rumble in his chest. His tail stopped lashing, his wings folded back. Slowly, he lowered his head, blinking almost sleepily.
The song was so mesmerizing that Ike realized half a second too late that Soren had pulled out of his grip. He made a move to grab him, but Soren was quick, spinning away from his hand.
“Soren!” Ike hissed, barely audible above the herons’ song.
Rajaion’s scales were fever hot beneath Soren’s hands, nearly burning. He barely reacted to Soren’s touch, as fixated as he was on the song, but after a moment he swayed towards him, turning his huge head so he could look at Soren. He blinked, slowly, his yellow eyes staring into Soren’s.
The reality of it threatened to send Soren to his knees.
He wasn’t the only one who had run to Rajaion’s side. Ena had torn herself away from the man she’d arrived with and fallen to her knees in front of him. She reached up with trembling fingers, as if afraid, and there was a sob caught in her sigh when she touched his neck.
She’d known, Soren realized. She’d known all along. He watched her lips move and thought she might have whispered my love.
The song faded, but the stones of the castle still seemed to hum with its music. The female heron turned to her brother and said something in dizzyingly fast-paced Serenes language, tugging at her brother’s sleeve. The male heron took a deep breath, then turned to Soren.
“He’s laguz, isn’t he,” the heron said, his voice clear and melodious. His fair brows were knit together, a look of confusion on his face. “He’s no mere wyvern.”
Soren turned towards him, lips parted. He couldn’t seem to find the words. I didn’t know sounded too paltry for the situation at hand. But he hadn’t known. He had never even suspected.
“You’re correct, Prince Serenes,” the man who had entered with Ena said. “He is Prince Rajaion of Goldoa.”
Prince Rajaion. Soren’s breath caught in his throat.
“I see,” Prince Serenes said, his eyes hard and flinty. “And what has been done to him?”
Finally, Soren managed to find his voice.
“It’s a drug,” he said. “A man named Izuka developed it.” He took a shaky breath. “I don’t know if the effects can be reversed. Knowing the late king’s depravity, I doubt it.”
“Leanne?” the heron prince said as his sister insistently chattered at him. “Are you certain?”
She nodded decisively. The heron prince took a deep breath.
“My sister and I would like to try something,” he said. He gave Soren a wary, flinty look. “If you’ll allow it.”
Soren took a deep breath.
“Please,” he said. “Even… even if it’s only to bring him peace.”
The heron prince regarded him silently for a moment. Then he nodded.
The heron siblings’ voices rose up again, mingling together. It was a different song this time. It reverberated through the air, heavy with melancholy, and Soren found, inexplicably, tears pricking at his eyes. Ike, standing next to him, rested a grounding hand on his back.
Rajaion’s massive body shifted and shrank. He made low, pained noises, and then before Soren could even register what it was he was seeing, there was a man lying on the floor. His dark skin was ashen, his long dark hair a tangled mess. His breathing was ragged and pained.
There were tears running down Ena’s face.
“Rajaion?” she sobbed, her voice breaking. “Do you know who I am?”
He turned his face weakly towards her. Then slowly his mouth curved into an exhausted smile.
“Ena,” he said. His voice was a bare whisper, hoarse and cracked.
“Yes,” Ena replied, laughing through her tears. “Yes, you recognize me!”
The man – Rajaion, Soren thought, reeling with it, Rajaion – lifted a trembling hand with great difficulty, brushing the backs of his fingers against Ena’s wet cheek.
“You were made...to suffer...,” he whispered, “because of me... I'm sorry.”
Soren remembered, with knife-sharp clarity, that day he’d spent playing chess with Ena, when she’d spoken about her betrothed. The way she’d asked about Rajaion, the words so careful in her mouth, her eyes guarded. It had been Rajaion, he realized. It had been Rajaion all along.
Ena’s betrothed. Prince Rajaion. Your mother was always the Black Dragon King’s favorite child.
“Rajaion! Rajaion! Oh, Rajaion...” Ena sniffed. She shook her head, the bare curve of her smile almost unbearable as she wiped the tears from her cheeks. “There’s someone you should see.”
She looked up at Soren, standing there frozen before them. Slowly, Rajaion followed her gaze.
At first there was nothing as Rajaion looked at him. His eyes were dull, his lips barely parted. But then after a moment, there was a spark of recognition in his gaze. His smile widened, a brittle, delicate thing.
“Nephew,” the man rasped.
Soren fell to his knees.
At first, it seemed doubtful that Rajaion would survive.
Over twenty years spent twisted into his father’s weapon, locked in his transformed state. It seemed too terrible to believe.
But Soren knew his father, and so he could believe it.
Ena sat by Rajaion’s bed and held one of his hands in both of hers. She spoke slowly, gathering her thoughts, relaying the story to Soren with infinite sadness. His birth. The loss of his mother’s powers. Her desperate plea to her brother to come and save her infant son.
Rajaion had tried. He’d been drugged, turned into a snarling beast, and used as a mount by his father. A member of his platoon was supposed to smuggle the infant prince out of the palace and to safety, but they’d all been captured before it could be done. Soren had been locked back in a tower with his mother until his father deemed fit to take him from her.
Each piece that fell into place felt like a knife.
“You must hate me,” Soren said. “He sacrificed everything for me, and I treated him like nothing but a mindless beast.”
“No, Prince Soren,” Ena said, shaking her head. “He loved from you from the start, so how I could ever hate you? And no matter what you think… your presence brought him comfort, even when he couldn’t recognize anyone. Not even me.”
“I’m sorry,” Soren said, looking down at Rajaion.
“So am I,” Ena said after a moment.
Rajaion woke on the third day.
Ena seemed to feel it even before Rajaion’s lashes fluttered, his hand twitched. She clasped his tightly in her own, watching anxiously until his eyes opened. He turned his head slowly, his lips parted, and then ever so slowly, they curved up in a smile.
“My Ena,” he said, his voice dry and cracked.
“Rajaion,” she said. There were tears glimmering wet on her lashes. “My love.”
“Why are you crying?” he rasped out. He made a move as if to wipe her tears away, but was too weak to fully lift his hand.
Ena shook her head. She pressed her lips to the knuckles of the hand she held in her own.
“It’s only because I’m so happy to see you, my love,” she said.
Rajaion’s wan smile twitched wider. Then he shifted, glancing at Soren on his other side.
“Ah,” Rajaion said, the barest noise. Soren sat there, frozen, and wondered what he saw. His uncle had sacrificed everything for him, had been warped and twisted, had spent twenty years his father’s captive in both body and mind.
For Soren, it was impossible that his uncle could look at him as he was now and think him worth it.
“My nephew,” Rajaion said. “You’ve grown so fast.”
Soren made a bare, disbelieving noise. He couldn’t seem to find his voice.
“Are you uninjured?” Rajaion asked.
Soren shook his head and forced his throat to work as it should.
“How can you ask that?” he said. “You should focus on your own wounds…”
He wanted to say the word. Uncle. It was only two syllables, but he couldn’t seem to force his tongue to form them.
Rajaion’s eyes fluttered shut for a moment. When he spoke, it was with a deep gravity, despite the obvious effort it was taking him to speak at all.
“This, I can bear,” he murmured. “Harming you, I could not.”
What was Soren supposed to do with that statement, he wondered. Rajaion didn’t know him, not really. For the past nearly twenty years, Soren had treated him as nothing more than a beast.
“You’ve grown well,” Rajaion continued. “Strong and steadfast. Your mother would be both proud and pleased.”
“Everyone says I look like her,” Soren said.
“Ah,” Rajaion said. “There’s a resemblance, to be sure. But I think you take after me.”
He reached up, his long fingers trembling with the effort. In spite of everything, he still smiled at Soren.
“How much do you remember?” Soren asked, his eyes closed.
“Such a question,” Rajaion mused. He coughed and shook his head, and Soren’s chest clenched.
“You’re tired, my love,” Ena said. “You need to rest.”
“My nephew has questions,” Rajaion said. “He’s been waiting a long time for answers.”
“No,” Soren said. He made to rise and excuse himself. “Please, rest. My questions can wait.”
He wasn’t even sure if he wanted the answers to any of them.
“Nephew,” Rajaion said, and even as exhausted as he sounded there was infinite patient in his voice. Soren wasn’t used to it, not anymore than he was used to being called anyone’s nephew. His father had killed all his own brothers, after all. Then, very gently, “Soren.”
He wasn’t used to that, either. Rajaion said his name like it was something precious. Only Ike had ever done that before.
“Please,” Rajaion continued. “I’d like you to stay. It comforts me to see you whole and well.”
Soren could hardly refuse him. Not after everything.
They didn’t speak for very long. Rajaion, despite his words, was clearly too exhausted to do much talking. Still, he spoke to Soren about the desperate summons he’d received from his mother, Rajaion’s sister. Almedha, he thought to himself. Princess Almedha of Goldoa. It had been so long since he’d seen her that he’d forgotten her name until Bryce had spoken it.
When Rajaion lapsed into silence, Soren spoke.
“I must apologize to you,” he said, speaking slowly so that the words wouldn’t choke him. “I had planned to use you to kill him – Ashnard. It was more cruelty against you, after everything you’d done for me. You must hate me.”
“Nephew,” Rajaion said softly. “As if I would not have torn his head off myself for what he did to you.”
Soren remembered Rajaion’s teeth in his father’s shoulder and repressed the urge to shudder.
“There is no hatred for you in my heart, nephew,” Rajaion said, his voice fading as he spoke. “Quite the opposite.”
He was asleep between one moment and the next, his breathing not yet quite peaceful, but improved from before.
“When he is well enough, I will escort him back to Goldoa,” Ena said quietly. “He will be able to rest there, and hopefully recuperate.” There was a shadow in her face, at odds with the hope in her voice.
Soren thought that they both realized Rajaion would never again be the man she once knew.
What would he do if it was Ike, twisted and tortured, held captive for years? Ike who emerged battled and bruised, wounded in both body and spirit? The answer was simple. Soren would love him.
There was much to do following Daein’s surrender. Soren’s head spun with it all, but Ike handled it in stride. He spoke to the heron siblings – Reyson and Leanne – after everything.
“I despise humans,” Reyson had said bluntly, all icy beauty as he tossed his hair and fluttered his wings. “But I saw your actions. Our clan has the ability to read the hearts of others, and you… you have a good one, General Ike.”
Soren could do nothing but agree with that sentiment.
“King Tibarn of Phoenicis is my guardian,” Reyson continued. “When he comes to retrieve me, I will tell him what you did. He’ll listen to me. No harm will come to you.”
There was the reconstruction, too, Daein’s army having savaged Melior and the surrounding countryside. Princess Elincia, soon to be queen, rose to the task with impressive fortitude, bolstered by her companions, Sir Geoffrey and Lady Lucia. If there was one person Soren had been curious to meet, it was Count Fayre, but according to Elincia she’d received no word from him after Ashnard’s death. It clearly troubled her.
(It troubled Soren more that no one could find Izuka, either. He wondered if he’d wormed his way to safety somehow, fled like General Petrine as soon as the tides of battle had turned.)
Soren, in the meantime, disposed of the vial of the feral drug he’d asked Count Fayre to smuggle him. Even looking at it turned his stomach now. Ike watched him quietly as he did so, and placed a hand on his shoulder afterwards.
“You all right?” he asked.
Soren glanced up at him, his lips parted to answer, but it turned out he had none. He couldn’t say one way or the other. He was still standing and so was Ike. It had to be enough.
Ike seemed to understand. He curled his arm around Soren’s shoulders and pulled him in against him as Soren leaned up on his toes to kiss him.
The next few weeks passed in a blur. Soren sat with his uncle, and he assisted the recovery effort how he could, and at night he and Ike retired to bed, often too exhausted to do more than kiss softly and discuss their respective days. (If Ike didn't fall asleep first.)
“Will you return home, then?” Elincia asked them one afternoon as they were walking in Castle Crimea’s gardens. “To Daein?”
Ike and Soren exchanged a glance. The corner of Ike’s mouth curved up. Soren shook his head, fighting the urge to smile, himself.
“No,” he said.
The breeze by the seaside in Crimea was warm and salty. It tossed Soren’s hair back from his face as he leaned out the window, staring up at the blue sky. The laundry was fluttering on the line outside, dancing in the wind, and the sky seemed to stretch on forever.
Summer in Nevassa had always been oppressive at best. Trapped inside the castle, Soren had dreaded it year after year. He’d never seen a sky so blue before Ike had suggested they travel to the seaside.
The war hadn’t had time to spread this far up the Crimean coast, and if Soren didn’t know better, he’d never think to dream of what had nearly befallen this place. He watched the people sometimes and wondered if they knew how close disaster had been to their door.
If they cared about those in the capital who had to rebuild. He knew that Ike thought about them, Princess Elincia and her compatriots, the red-haired lady knight he’d befriended.
Soren thought of people, too. His uncle and Ena especially. His uncle had been stronger when they’d left Crimea, he and Ena preparing to make the journey back to Goldoa, but stronger was a relative term. He was still weak, still brittle in his appearance and movements. The hollows underneath his eyes were deep, and he moved with the gingerness of an old man. Still, though, when he’d looked at Soren, he’d always smiled, and it had been so full of warmth.
Soren almost couldn’t stand it, but he hadn’t looked away. He owed Rajaion that much.
He thought of his mother, wherever she was. He wasn’t ready to look for her, not yet. “When you’re ready,” Ike had told him one night, his arm slung over Soren’s waist and Soren’s head tucked beneath his chin. “We’ll go.”
Perhaps when his uncle recovered, Soren thought. Perhaps if they went to look for her together. Soren wouldn’t turn up empty-handed, the son that she’d lost, the one that had cost her the home of her birth and her brother.
Ike’s parents and sister were still in Daein, but perhaps not for long. Ike had passed Jill Fizzart a letter for Mist before she’d flown home, and a month later, in a small countryside inn, a man calling himself the Fireman had approached Ike at the bar and handed him a letter back. It was written in Elena’s careful hand, and promised that as soon as it was safe, the family would follow Ike to Crimea.
Soren was glad to hear it, and gladder to see the slow, contented smile that spread across Ike’s face. He knew he’d missed his family.
Then there was Pelleas in Daein, lingering in the palace like Soren’s own shadow. With so many dead, his father and Bryce and Petrine, there were few left of high rank who knew that he was not, in fact, the true prince. The throne was his to do with as he pleased, although Soren knew that Pelleas was even less suited to ruling than himself. He hoped Pelleas would survive, but his life had not made him much of an optimist by nature.
(And if there were rumors making their way over the mountains, now, about a maiden with silver hair gaining a following among the common folk as a prophetess, well, then, that was no longer something for Soren to worry about.)
He sighed, shaking his head to banish the thoughts. He had more practical matters at hand to think about, like deciding what he should do with the vegetables for dinner, already wondering how he’d prepare the fish. Cooking had been something of a learning process, Ike at first showing him how to skin and gut the hares he caught as they traveled through the Crimean wilderness, showing him how soldiers prepared their meals. Now, in this small house with its kitchen, he was slowly experimenting, figuring out how to flavor their meals so Ike liked it best.
He was consulting the little book of recipes he’d started keeping, his fingers touched to his lips, when he heard heavy footsteps and the creak of the door.
“Soren? Are you in here?”
“In the kitchen, Ike!” he called, turning. He smiled as Ike filled the doorway, loose-limbed and smiling with the day’s catch swung over his shoulder.
Soren had been right. The warm weather suited Ike more than Daein’s ice and gloom ever had. His sleeveless shirt revealed golden shoulders and strong arms, and there was the faintest hint of sunburn across the bridge of his nose. Soren would have to inquire with the local healer about what herbs would soothe the sting, not that Ike seemed to mind it.
They had only meant to stay in this village for a short while, but the weather was pleasant by the sea, and the old fishermen had taken a liking to Ike. Honest and hardworking, he quickly won their respect, and they began teaching him how to fish. Ike easily explained away their accents, citing that they’d fled the mountains near the Daein border, fearing the invasion.
He had to think of his spouse, Ike explained, and the old fishermen all chuckled and shook their heads, joking good naturedly about newlyweds.
Ike had only laughed and nodded, shooting Soren a pleased look from across the pier. Soren had resisted the urge to reach up and grip Ike’s ring where it lay against his chest, the sunlight glinting off of it.
This life suited Ike. And what suited Ike suited Soren. So they’d agreed to stay, at least for the summer.
“Did you catch anything good?” Soren asked as Ike proudly produced his catch, his eyebrows raised.
Soren nodded to himself as he inspected the fish. It was a good catch, and it would be nice to grill it out under the stars, he and Ike sitting together at the small table Ike had constructed for their small yard.
The fish carefully put away until dinner, Ike bent to brush a kiss to Soren’s cheek. He smelled like the breeze and the sea, salt and the nets the old fishermen used to drag in their catches.
Soren turned his face at the last moment so their lips met instead. Ike kissed him thoroughly, the warm sunlight streaming through the window and onto the both of them.
Ike looked smug when he pulled back. Because of the fish or the kiss, Soren didn’t particularly care.
“Go wash up before dinner,” he said.
Later, they did grill the fish in the yard, out under the moonlight. The breeze was cool and refreshing, the small yard illuminated by torches. They shared the fish along with the fresh garden vegetables Soren had been given in exchange for healing a young couple’s child who had sprained his ankle.
Those who could use healing magic, Soren found, were in high demand in remote villages. People were so happy to have someone with his skills that they asked few questions.
“Is it good?” he asked Ike, as if he hadn’t devoured half the fish already.
Ike nodded firmly, downing his water and wiping his mouth off on the back of his hand.
“Everything you make is good,” he said, and Soren snorted a little and shook his head. Ike didn’t seem to mind if the flavor was off or the meat overcooked, so long as it was Soren that made it. From anyone else, it would have seemed insincere, but Ike was never anything but honest.
Soren bit down on a smile and shook his head.
“The greens are overcooked,” he said. “I’ll make adjustments next time.”
Ike made a noise of acknowledgment and inclined his head, but otherwise gave no answer. No matter, Soren thought, picking at his own portion of fish. He knew Ike trusted him, both with his life and with his dinner.
Beneath the rickety little table, Ike’s foot knocked gently into Soren’s ankle. He kept it there.
For a few long moments, they ate in silence. They didn’t need to speak, sometimes – they both understood each other well enough without words. The weather was exceptionally pleasant, the moon overhead full and bright, and if Ike was content in silence, than so was Soren. He’d worked a long day, after all, hauling in nets with the fishermen.
He seemed almost contemplative, looking out over the yard. Soren put some more fish on his plate before he returned to his own portion.
“Soren,” Ike said suddenly, and Soren looked up to find him looking at him. “Are you happy?”
“Am I – what?” Soren asked.
“Are you happy?” Ike asked. “Here, with me.”
Soren looked around at the little yard, behind the little house – theirs, for now, for as long as they wanted.
He had worried, at first, that he had taken Ike away from a better life. A promising military career at the top of Daein’s chain of command, the warmth of his loving family. A normal life, a normal marriage with a normal person – a beorc, like him. All the things Soren could never embody.
But looking at Ike now, lounging in their little yard and looking at Soren with nothing but warmth in his eyes, the corner of his mouth just slightly lifted in contentment, Soren let the feeling wash over him.
It wouldn’t be like this forever. Ike still trained diligently, day in and day out, determined to one day find and kill the Black Knight for what he’d done to Ike’s father, for the fact that he’d twice kidnapped Soren. Eventually they would move on from this little seaside town, with its salty breeze and friendly villagers. But for now, in this moment, the air was warm and Ike was smiling. Soren smiled back.
“Yes, Ike,” he said.
It felt like freedom.