The Heir Boxed Set

by Kyra Gregory

  The man, having turned to leave, glanced over his shoulder, “Five thousand gold coins and ten frigates,” he replied.

  A high price. He was dreaming, she thought. That would be almost the entirety of King Niles’s private fleet.

  He left. The cell door closed firmly behind him, locked up tightly. Another man, meant to guard her cell, soon shuffled along the hay-covered ground and replaced his superior in front of the door.

  With no witnesses to her swell of emotion, she leaned into the discomfort that worked its way from the pit of her stomach and into her chest. Her vision blurred once more, a mist of anger separating her from the sights of the world around her. A scowl growing on her lips, her nostrils flaring and tears stinging the back of her eyes, she slapped her hand against the wall beside her.

  ***

  Riffin stormed the corridors of the palace as soon as he was aware of the prospect of news. The doors to the throne room opened for him as he was still a fair distance away, the guards having heard his quick and heavy footsteps. “You have news?” he asked.

  His mother looked up from a piece of parchment. Her nostrils were flaring. She struggled to contain something within herself. The darkness in her eyes was familiar. Whatever it was, it was transferable—he stiffened and strengthened, something in side of him becoming darker and more determined. “Malia is being held by a band of rebels,” she said. “They claim to have her—alive and well.”

  “For what? Ransom?”

  His father nodded curtly, “They’ve made demands of Ludorum,” he said. “Five thousand gold pieces and ten ships.”

  “How do we know this is the truth?” he asked. He’d had enough of false hope. Each time he saw a messenger enter the Capital, his heart would leap at the thought that it was word from his wife, from captors or allies. Each time there was so much as a knock at his door, he would stumble out of his bed or shoot out of his seat in the nursery, hoping that it would be word that she had been heard from or, better yet, that she would be standing there.

  The more time went by with not a word, the hope inside of him started to die. The hope that she would be unharmed was the first to leave him. The next, though he tried to keep it at bay, would be the hope that she would ever be found alive at all.

  “Malia’s absence hasn’t been formally announced,” his mother declared. “Those who are aware of her disappearance are limited and trusted.”

  Trusted—Riffin wanted to scoff at the idea. Try as his mother might to have established allies for their family, Riffin found himself increasingly unwilling to trust any of them.

  “We will make contact with King Niles in Ludorum,” his father said. “He will have received word of this trade by now.”

  “I will go,” Riffin said, without a moment’s thought. It didn’t need any deliberation—it was an easy decision to make. “I will leave within the hour.”

  “We have messengers for this sort of thing,” his mother countered, sighing.

  “Messengers aren’t good enough,” Riffin declared. He bit the inside of his cheek and shifted his weight, the nervous energy working its way into him as he grew impatient. Watching his mother stand there, parchment in hand, and his father lean casually, arms crossed, against the marble-topped table, looked to him as though they weren’t doing nearly enough to see his wife brought home safely. If they didn’t do it, then he would. “Why would these rebels tell us this if their quarrel is with Ludorum?” he asked. Before either could so much as open their mouths to answer, he went on, “Because they don’t trust Ludorum to do what’s right for their allies,” he said. “They’ve told us this so that we apply pressure. No messenger can do what I can, no messenger can convey what the husband of the woman being ransomed can.”

  “No, messengers are more diplomatic than that,” his mother said.

  Riffin scoffed, looking to his father, “Don’t you trust that you’ve taught me well-enough?” he asked. “Don’t you trust that I can still have a heart and do what needs to be done?”

  “You are the heir to this kingdom,” his mother declared, “you don’t have the privilege of following your heart!”

  Riffin’s nostrils flared. He shook his head, “That’s not the kind of King I want to be,” he said. He stared them down and, when he received no more challenges, turned on his heel and left.

  Chapter 17

  MALIA LOOKED UP AS the door to her cell creaked open, the sound ear-piercing as the sound of rusty metal grinding filled the air. “We have yet to hear from the King in Ludorum,” Cisco said.

  Malia smirked, “You have the wrong person if you were hoping to illicit some sort of sympathy from the King of Ludorum,” she said. “The man despises me.”

  Cisco smirked, “Does he now?” he asked. “And why is that?”

  “Because I’m not worthy of being married to a Prince,” she said. She had heard the words so many times before that they ceased to hurt. Unfortunately for her, it also meant that it was increasingly difficult to have faith. “Because I’m not worthy of one day being Queen.”

  He chuckled, a sound that was almost delightful to hear, more so were it not from one of her captors, “He isn’t unlike the rest of his family in that regard,” he said.

  “I suppose not,” she whispered. She ran her fingers through her hair. Her head had been pounding for days. She wasn’t sure what it was. The lack of light, perhaps, causing her eyes to strain against the darkness that she had been kept in. Perhaps the water was different, tainted with something, purposeful or not. All she had been provided for food was a bread roll and a few thin cuts of meat, none of which had satisfied her for anything longer than a few hours.

  “The Queen of Lionessa has been informed of your…situation,” he said. “If the King of Ludorum is not of a mind to grant you safety, perhaps she will be.”

  A small smile twitched at the corners of her lips. As kind as the Queen could be, as caring as she was, she had about as much faith in her as she did in the Ludorum King. “Perhaps,” she agreed. She rested against the wall, adjusting herself in the corner of her cell. A tickle itched in the depths of her chest, working its way up her throat until she was forced to cough. It robbed her of breath, causing her to gasp for the air that only worsened her in the damp, dirty cell.

  “You best keep your strength up,” he said.

  Malia hummed in agreement. She look at him out of the corner of her eye, a smirk on her lips, “Of course,” she whispered, hoarsely, “you get nothing if anything happens to me.”

  The realisation that came to his eyes was faint but it was there, hidden in the depths of darkness, mixed within anger and disgust. While he turned and left, she knew he understood it more than he was willing to let on.

  ***

  With his heart in his throat, Riffin jumped out of the carriage just as it reached the steps of the Ludorum castle. One glance up towards it and he started to see red, marching past the guards at the door. He was greeted by a young woman, though she barely had a chance to say a word before he made his way past her, allowing himself into the sitting room that he was often sent to. “Summon the King,” he ordered, “tell him I must speak with him now.”

  The servant stood in the door way, shifting her weight as she opened her mouth to speak. Riffin glared in her direction and fright entered her eyes before she turned on her heel and left.

  Meeting Thane’s gaze, he could read the man’s mind; there was a temptation to warn him, to remind him to be diplomatic—he could also read that he knew better than to speak those words.

  They left him waiting longer than he had the patience for. Brushing the tips of his fingers against the corners of his lips, he shook his head, “I swear if he sends Pietros in his stead I’ll kill someone,” he murmured.

  Thane shifted his weight, standing poised and as patient as he could manage.

  Soon enough, he heard heavy footsteps approaching, the sound of heels clicking against the marble floors. “Tell me, Your Royal Highness, to what do I owe the pleas
ure?” King Niles asked, entering the room.

  Riffin tried to bite back his anger but he had held onto it, fuelled it for so long, that it was growing difficult to temper to a more manageable level. “My wife is in the hands of rebels and they’ve made demands for her release,” he said.

  “So I’ve been told,” King Niles said. The look of indifference on his face had a chill running down Riffin’s spine, contrasting with the hot anger that burned with such fervour inside of him.

  “What do you intend to do about it?” Riffin asked through gritted teeth.

  “What do you mean?” King Niles barked back, growing distasteful of the manner in which he was being spoken to.

  Riffin blinked. What part of his concerns weren’t being made clear? “My wife is in their hands,” he reiterated. “I demand you do whatever you must in order to retrieve her.”

  King Niles scoffed, recoiling. “You’re not in a position to demand!” he countered.

  “We are allies,” Riffin retorted, his jaw tense. “What are allies for if not to help one another?”

  “What you’re asking for will take time,” Pietros declared, cutting through the tirade of abuse that he was sure was about to pour from his brother’s mouth.

  “How much time?” Riffin asked.

  “A few weeks at best,” he said.

  “Weeks are far too long,” he retorted. “We’ve already known of this for days and you’ve likely known about it for longer! We’re wasting time! Give them what they want and get my wife back!”

  King Niles snorted, a look of disbelief on his face, “Have your mother and father taught you nothing, after all those years and all those lessons? Have you truly learnt nothing?” he asked. “If they raised you right, you would know full well that that is no way to conduct matters with these people!”

  “She is my wife,” Riffin said. “We will conduct matters in whatever manner returns her home safely.”

  Prince Pietros lowered his head, turning his attentions elsewhere as the King chuckled and shook his head. “The fact that she’s your wife matters little,” King Niles said. “Your uncle, your namesake, was held captive and even your mother, then just a girl, knew that giving in to demands would not solve anything.”

  Those words were like an ice cold dagger to the heart. His uncle’s captivity was not one he wished to compare that of his wife’s. There was no redemption, there had been no saving him.

  “This isn’t the same thing,” Riffin whispered.

  “Of course it is the same thing,” Prince Pietros sighed. “This is a ransom, just like it was then, both pushing for political advantage.”

  “And we cannot give it to them,” King Niles said.

  Riffin sighed and his hands balled into fists at his sides. “You cannot let—”

  “We cannot give in to rebels! There’ll be an uprising!”

  “Deal with them after then!” Riffin said. “Give them what they want, get my wife back and then come down hard on them. Destroy them before they have any chance to use that advantage against you.”

  “You do not make such decisions!” King Niles growled.

  Riffin recoiled. His eyes widened, burning. “Is that what this is about?” Riffin asked, brows furrowing together. “You would risk everything just to prove that you are the one who rules here?”

  “I have more to lose, more at risk, if I do as you ask,” King Niles retorted. “If I give them the ships they ask for, they can go anywhere! They can leave, regroup and pose more of a problem later.”

  Riffin shook his head, his breaths slow and shallow, “That isn’t what this is about,” he said. “This is about us. This about her. This is about my...” He cut himself off, blinking through the anger as his lips pulled into an incredulous smile. “This is why you despised her! You wanted a political marriage for me to increase our strengths to help you with this!”

  “I didn’t despise her,” King Niles sighed, rolling his eyes. “She’s just a girl—there was nothing for me to despise.”

  “That’s the very reason you despised her,” Riffin said. “That she was just a girl, not a Princess, not a Queen, not a General in command of an army, not a Captain in command of a fleet. You despised that she didn’t give you political advantage.”

  Prince Pietros shook his head, opening his mouth to speak.

  “Admit it!” Riffin growled. “Admit that you knew of these problems all along and you withheld it!”

  Thane took a step closer, extending his hand to his shoulder, only for Riffin to swat it away before it could make contact. “It would suit you then, wouldn’t it?” he asked, scoffing again. “It would suit you to aggravate them, to allow them to kill her, perhaps then I will marry a woman you find more befitting.”

  “That isn’t the case at all,” King Niles said, a crack in his voice. There was some semblance of emotion there. Something small and faint.

  Riffin hit out, kicking the side-table beside the couch, bringing a candlestick and a glass ornament crashing to the ground. “Then what is it?” he asked. He didn’t give him a chance to answer. He advanced on him. Prince Pietros drew his sword and Thane did the same, bolting forward. “Help me get my wife back,” he growled, “help me get my wife back and I will see to it that my mother offers everything you require to end these people before they can do anything with what they have been given.”

  King Niles stared into his eyes, cold and resolute. The two said nothing. Their breathing in time with one another. “I will not give them what they want,” he said.

  Riffin took a step back, raking his fingers through his hair.

  “I have a family of my own,” King Niles retorted. “If I give in to this, what is to stop them from taking them and doing the same thing all over again?”

  “That is why I’m asking that you end them after!”

  “Do you think it will be that easy?” King Niles shouted. “Don’t you think if it were so simple that I wouldn’t have done it already?”

  Riffin licked his lips, “You have never asked for our assistance in this,” he said. “Perhaps if you had—” Riffin recoiled, biting his tongue to allow himself to consider his words. Where rage failed, gentle coercion had to succeed. “What good are allies if we don’t help each other?” he asked. King Niles rolled his eyes and all that served to do is strengthen Riffin’s anger—to hell with gentle coercion. “Help us! Help us and then allow us to help you!”

  “No,” King Niles retorted.

  Sucking in a deep breath and growing taller, his nostrils flared, “You need to get my wife back,” Riffin said, “alive and well!”

  King Niles gritted his teeth together, “Mountains do not bow to the wind no matter how loudly it bellows!”

  “You are not a mountain!” Riffin growled, turning back to him. “You are not a mountain! You are a tree—capable of being uprooted at any moment!”

  King Niles pulled back, staring at him with raised brows. Riffin looked to Thane and Riffin left the room with Thane behind him, casting a final glare in the King’s direction. He made his way back down to his carriage, “Get me home,” he said.

  Thane got into the carriage and took a seat across from him. The carriage lurched forward almost immediately, the horses hooves clicking against the stone paths. “What will the Queen say?” he asked, quietly.

  Riffin found it difficult to breathe, looking to Thane with glassy eyes, “I have to hope this alliance is of no importance to her,” he said. “Or Malia will die.”

  As for King Niles—the crown had been given, and the crown could be taken away.

  Chapter 18

  RIFFIN SLAMMED HIS HANDS onto the marble-topped table in his mother’s throne room, “They are doing nothing!” he said. “They refuse to do anything to remedy this!”

  “The King is right, however,” his mother said, cocking her head to one side. “Should he give in to them, they will be at an advantage. All of those who may’ve kept themselves from being swayed by the rebellion due to it being at a disadvantag
e will quickly join their ranks once they are aware of the power they have.”

  “We will deal with them,” Riffin said with a wave of his hand. “Together, it can be done.”

  “He doesn’t want this to be done together,” she whispered, sitting back. “He wants to do this by himself.”

  Riffin scoffed, “Why?” he asked. “What is the use of having allies if they’re not relied upon?”

  “Because it makes them look weak,” his father said. He stood at a distance from them, arms crossed against his chest as he did nothing but listen. “The King’s throne is being threatened by those who think him too weak, too unambitious. By using his allies to deal with the rebellion, he’ll only be proving them right.”

  “What does it matter if there’s no longer a rebellion to join after we’re finished with them?”

  His mother scoffed, reaching for her brow, “One rebellion can always be born from the ashes of another,” she said. “We’ve seen it done countless times, in Evrad and in Azura.”

  Riffin pulled back, inhaling sharply. “Then what do we do?” he asked.

  His mother and father shared a short glance before both looked at him. The look in his mother’s eyes was like nothing he had seen before. They were flooded with sympathy, a softness, a regret and a despair.

  “What are you saying?” he asked. He shook his head and looked to his father, hoping that he shared another feeling. “She’s alive! We cannot just leave her there!”

  His mother rose to her feet and started to pace, approaching the steps to her throne. “I will liaise with the King and see to it that—”

  “The King has no intentions of doing anything about this!” he growled.

  She spun on her heel and turned to face him, “I will do the best that I can,” she said.

  Riffin scoffed, “You are a Queen, a ruler in your own right, with wealth and power at your disposal and you think writing to a King is the best you can do?” he asked. “Pay the ransom, give them what they want, send a fleet and let’s get her back!”