She whispered something under her breath.
‘What?’
‘I’m sorry,’ she repeated softly.
I sighed, long and slow. ‘You’re forgiven – but don’t do it again. What if my ma had found you? I really want you to try this time.’
‘I will.’
We lay silent for a moment, then I rolled her over to face me. ‘Ambrose left with that Kayan boy a couple of days ago.’
She stared at me, her eyes big and brown. Those doe eyes were part of the reason people thought she was stupid – there was something vacant about them. I thought they made her look innocent, which she was – more so than anyone I’d ever met. The responsibility of that sometimes daunted me – if your wife was innocent, it was your duty to keep her that way. The problem was that she bruised so easily. Roselyn was a fragile peach, hurt by anything and everything – protecting her was a full-time job, one I didn’t have enough hours in the day for.
‘It was his punishment for nosing into Ma’s private room,’ I went on. ‘I think it will be good for him to do something selfless for Pirenti.’
Roselyn nodded slowly, thoughtfully. ‘He grows weary of not understanding his place, and seems to need something to believe in, more than anything else.’
I stared at her. Rose didn’t always know what was going on around her, but what she did understand – with more clarity than anyone I’d ever met – was people. She would come out with insights into the people around us that would shock me with their accuracy. I didn’t know the first thing about a person’s thoughts – I understood instinct, the primal man, but nothing subtler.
I often wished my mother could see this side of her, but Roselyn had an annoying habit of freezing up completely when she was around the Queen. It was because of her fear, I knew, and was valid given Ma wished her dead.
‘Maybe he just needs a good backhand to set him straight,’ I suggested gruffly.
‘He doesn’t respond to violence like the rest of you.’
I considered that as she ran her fingers over the scars in my skull. ‘He never used to be so different. It’s like he’s changing.’
‘Growing.’
‘But he should be growing into his role, not out of it.’ I was starting to get annoyed. Why couldn’t Ambrose see that he was steering himself away from me? He had less and less to do with the soldiers, even though he was the best fighter I had by far. I wanted to reign him back in and make him mine again, just like he’d been when we were kids.
‘Wine,’ I ordered softly and Roselyn padded out of bed to the dresser. She was pouring for some time, and when I looked over I caught her staring out the window as the wine overflowed around the cup and trickled down her arms. Her profile was stunning, illuminated by the flashes of lightning – she had high cheekbones, a straight nose, and full, plump lips. Her vibrant hair seemed to have a life of its own – it was like flames crackling around her. Once upon a time, when first we’d married, she’d been the envy of the country. Young and very beautiful, quiet as a woman should be – a perfect pick for the first prince. Then her oddities became known and the realm had quickly fallen out of love with her.
‘Rose,’ I reminded her and she snapped awake, making a small noise of distress.
‘Oh, Gods,’ she whispered. ‘Forgive me!’
I got out of bed, grabbed a towel and wiped her hands clean for her. I should have punished her for the mistake but I was too tired, and I’d missed her while she’d been in the dungeon. Once she was clean I nodded towards the bed and she crawled in again.
I walked to my side, gulping the wine and eyeing her small frame, which was curled in on itself. My nerves relaxed more with every mouthful, and I slid in beside her. She was soft in my arms, as she always was. This was what I couldn’t explain to my ma – the way a man needed his wife – and that was simply because I wasn’t supposed to need anyone but myself. Eloise had always taught us that – it’s why she sat atop her throne alone and surrounded herself with men. She had a heightened sense of isolation and an uncommon hatred for the weakness of her own sex. She didn’t think people should need to form relationships, and she believed that Roselyn deserved death for her stupidity. She was probably right, too. My Queen was right about everything else, so why not this? She ruled us with a severe, merciless hand, so that we’d never forget our place or question her authority. And it was because of her ruthlessness that we were winning the age-old war with the Kayan scum.
I’d never disobeyed a single command she’d ever given me, and nor did I plan to. That’s why my thoughts had started turning, of late, to the fact that she would undoubtedly order my wife’s death one of these days – and that I didn’t know what I would do when that happened.
I drifted to sleep with the sound of my wife’s soft voice in my ears, counting softly, just as she did every night.
Ambrose
I woke to a sharp pain in the side of my head, followed by the realisation that Avery had whacked me with the oar. ‘Ow!’ I exclaimed, sitting up and rocking the boat with my sudden movement.
‘Wake up,’ he muttered.
I swallowed the urge to slap him again and instead looked around. It was morning, and there was no land in sight. ‘Where are we?’
‘I would ask you the same,’ he said, and had the grace to look at least a little embarrassed.
‘I’ve been asleep for hours – how would I know where we are?’
‘This is your country! I skirted the oysters, but an eastern current caught us and there was nothing I could do.’
‘Why didn’t you wake me sooner?’
He shot me that baleful look of his. ‘What would you have done?’
‘Rowed against it.’
I thought I saw the flash of something lighter in his eyes, perhaps amusement. ‘Trust me. There’s no rowing against an eastern current. Not in these waters.’
I rubbed my eyes tiredly. ‘You’re useless, kid. I wouldn’t expect you to know what a real man can do.’
Avery rolled his eyes and dropped the oars back into the boat. He didn’t look good, actually. His face held no colour and his hands were shaking. I reached under the seats to where I knew the emergency pack was, pulled it out and took stock. There was a large canteen of water, a container of some sort of dried food, two large knives, a long length of rope, some flint, some bandages and a metal pot.
I passed the water to Avery who stared at me, stunned.
‘Is that … did you know we had that all night?’
‘’Course I did.’
‘Then why didn’t you tell me?’
I glanced up quickly at the rage in his voice. ‘We can’t waste it – we might have to make it last.’
‘Ambrose,’ he said softly, his voice low, ‘I’ve been rowing all night while you’ve been sleeping – I nearly passed out from thirst, and you didn’t even think to let me know there was water? You are such an ass!’
Despite the fact that his temper amused me, I did actually feel a bit bad for not telling him about the supplies. ‘Well stop whingeing and have a drink!’
Avery glared at me as he sipped at the water.
I shook my head. ‘You really need to unwind, boy. I’ve never met anyone as tightly strung. Here, let me take over.’
As I started rowing the boat picked up pace. I looked up at where the sun was and tried to angle us back towards the shore. He had been right, though – the current that was drawing us steadily out to sea was very strong. I began to sweat as I struggled against it, pumping my arms as hard as they would go.
‘Stop, Ambrose,’ Avery said after a while. ‘You’re just wasting your strength. The current will take us somewhere eventually.’
‘It could take us straight out into the middle of nowhere to die,’ I snapped, but nevertheless put the oars down and sat back, breathing heavily. I looked over at him – at his strange purple eyes. They were quite a deep shade this morning – dark enough to look almost navy, and I wondered what that meant. I wanted a list
of all the colours and what emotions they reflected, like a survival guide to understanding Avery, or Kayans in general. As it was, I was struggling. Sometimes he seemed so empty, so lost, like our tiny little boat in the midst of this mighty sea. Other times he looked at me with such intensity that I wondered desperately what had happened to break him this way. I knew without having to ask that he’d never tell me.
A few hours later the sun was getting hot above us. I took off my shirt and wrapped it around my head, then motioned for Avery to do the same. He ignored me.
‘Look, kid, enough with the attitude – you got yourself into this situation. I could have left you to rot, but, instead, I decided to save you. Show some gratitude.’
His eyebrows arched bitterly. ‘Gratitude? You shot me in the arm, tackled me out of the sky, put me in a cell, beat me up, shackled me to a bed so I couldn’t relieve myself, and now you’ve brought me out into the middle of the ocean to die a slow agonising death of dehydration. Not to mention you’re constantly insulting me. Which part am I meant to be grateful for?’
I stared at him, then grinned, unable to help it. He was funny. ‘I can’t believe you haven’t pissed yet! What’s wrong with you?’
He flushed and looked away.
‘Just go into the water now.’
‘No way.’
‘Why not?’
Avery refused to answer me, just folded his arms and pouted.
‘Well don’t come crying to me when your bladder bursts.’
‘Believe me, I won’t.’
We sat the next few hours in silence, the sun making us drowsy and sluggish. I felt like rubbish – I hated not being able to move around, hated having to sit still for so long. This had to be the worst way to die – stuck here with no way to fight our way out. The strength and size and power that I’d worked so hard to achieve wasn’t worth anything when we were at the mercy of the sea. It pissed me off.
Just when I was starting to think I’d never see anything again besides the horizon, Avery abruptly sat up. ‘Look!’ he yelled, his voice breaking in a strange way. ‘Land!’
There, in the far distance, was a smudge on the horizon. ‘Yes!’ I cheered, punching the air and laughing. ‘Told you we should just ride the current.’
He shot me a look of exasperation, but the hardness in his eyes had disappeared. Grabbing the oars, I started rowing again, my strokes long and powerful, inspired by the thought of endless food and water. As the island drew closer, it grew huge and spread out over the horizon, its mountain peaks shrouded in mist.
As we reached the rocky beach and dragged the boat ashore, all I could see was thick jungle. The air felt instantly humid and I could feel sweat beading over my naked chest. The odours on the air were strange, like nectar and slightly rotting fruit, alongside the heavy, salty scent of the sea.
‘Where are we?’ Avery asked.
I scratched my chin, thinking it through. I wasn’t much of a sailor – I didn’t really like boats, so I’d never been exploring on one before. But I was good with maps, and I’d studied the geography of my lands closely. There was only one possible place we could be. ‘We’re on the isle,’ I told him. ‘We must be.’
‘What? The prison isle?’
I turned to look him in the eyes, and something constricted in my chest. I nodded slowly. ‘It’s the only island in this direction for thousands of miles. The current must have taken us straight to the south beach, instead of following the coastline up and around to the northern side, as the ship would have done.’
He stared at me for a long moment, then closed his eyes, clearly exhausted. ‘Looks like you’ll get your job done sooner than either of us expected.’
I gazed down at the rocks under my feet. ‘Look – it’ll take us a long time to get across the island. Let’s just think about one thing at a time – we need to find food and water.’
We entered the jungle, and I led the way, clearing a path with my sword. Avery immediately disappeared behind one of the trees to relieve himself and came back looking a lot more comfortable. The ground was covered in soft moss, and the atmosphere was strangely magical under the canopy of trees, the tallest I’d ever seen.
We walked for hours, keeping the sun to our sides as it sunk lower and lower, heading towards the base of the mountain we’d seen. We knew we’d be able to find water there – the water in our canteen was finished, as was the food from the pack. Finally, we emerged at the base of the mountain to the most wonderful sight imaginable – a huge waterfall, with a gloriously clear pool at its base.
‘Thank the Sword!’ I grinned, and without another word I shed my clothes and flung myself into the water. The cool shocked my overheated body, biting right down to my bones and making me sigh with pleasure. I surfaced and looked at Avery who was still standing on the bank. ‘Get in! It’s amazing!’
‘It could be infested with disease, for all you know,’ he said. ‘Don’t drink any until I boil some.’
I sighed and sank onto my back. ‘Coward.’
Avery cleared a space and used the flint to create a campfire. He filled the pot and brought it to a boil before setting it aside and looking around. You had to hand it to the kid – he was a survivor. As I watched him, impressed, he picked out one of the arrows in my quill, rolled up the legs of his trews and waded into the water.
‘What are you doing?’
He was peering intently into the water. Slowly he raised the arrow above his head, then, quick as lightning, he jabbed it into the water. I blinked, realising that there was now a wriggling fish on the end of the arrow.
My mouth dropped open. I’d never imagined the boy to be capable of anything remotely like this – he was so small and useless. I felt like a fool for forgetting that Kayan people were fishermen by trade. They were a race that lived by the sea, as the bulk of their country was uninhabitable desert. We might have oyster farms in one region of Pirenti, but most of my people lived inland and didn’t have a clue how to survive by the water.
‘You’re full of surprises, pretty boy!’ I told him. Avery flashed me a smug look, then turned to start scaling and gutting the fish.
I emerged from the water and shook myself off, stretching lazily in the sun. ‘I’m famished! Is dinner ready?’
He glanced my way, obviously noticing for the first time that I was naked. His cheeks flamed bright red as he quickly looked away, clenching his teeth. I couldn’t help but grin, enjoying making him uncomfortable. His eyes, however, made their way back to my chest.
‘Are those …?’ He suddenly stood up very straight.
I didn’t need to look down to know what he was staring at. ‘Two of them.’
He gazed at them, transfixed, and then his eyes went so dark they gave me chills. ‘I’ve never hated anyone as I hate you now,’ he told me simply, an incredible emptiness in his voice.
They were called Marks, tattooed symbols that I’d achieved the impossible – if a Pirenti man killed a Kayan warder, he received a Mark above his heart. Very few people had one, and it was no small feat for me to be adorned with two.
‘I wear them with pride,’ I told the kid calmly, daring him to argue. Instead he looked silently disgusted, and it was worse, somehow.
‘So … dinner?’ I prompted after a while.
‘Did you actually think I did all this work in order to feed my captor?’ he asked me bleakly.
‘You’re kidding, right? You seriously expect me to sit here and starve while you get fat on fish?’
‘You want to eat, then catch your own meal.’
The kid was a selfish little bastard! Feeling my good mood evaporate, I decided it was time to re-establish who was in charge. ‘Avery,’ I murmured, and he looked up at the new tone in my voice. ‘All the food that either one of us catches will be halved, all right? It’s only common decency when we’re stuck out here together.’
‘Decency?’ He stood up, flung the knife to the ground, and gestured at the fish cooking over the fire. For a minute I thought
that he might burst into tears. ‘Have it all then. Just take it.’ He turned and stalked into the forest, pausing only to say over his shoulder, ‘It’s funny that you can speak of common decency.’
And then he was gone. I stared after him for a long time, but eventually sat down, telling myself to relax – this kid was no one. He was an enemy soldier who was here to be punished. He wasn’t my equal and from now on I wasn’t going to take any shit from him.
The sun sank below the horizon – I could see it through the tree trunks, casting a warm orange glow over everything. The pool of water looked beautiful bathed in the sunset, and it calmed me. I watched its shimmering surface, and it reminded me of my brother’s wife and the way she was so unendingly fascinated by the sight of light on water. I wondered what would happen to her if I died out here. And Thorne – what would happen to him? There’d be no one to buffer the ferocity of his temper, no one to remind him of his humanity.
Avery hadn’t reappeared by the time it was completely dark, so I looked around for a big stick and lit the end of it. Sighing crankily, I moved into the forest to look for the stupid kid, managing to stumble over a fallen branch in the darkness. I made sure to keep the campfire in my sights as I wandered around, and just as I was about to give up, I spotted him curled against a tree trunk fast asleep.
All my anger slid away when I saw him there, so small and helpless, and I felt a funny feeling replace it – I wanted to protect him. Gods only know why, but that’s what I felt. I leant down and lifted him gently into my arms, careful not to let my fiery stick go out. Back at the campsite, I placed him next to the fire to sleep. I ate half the fish, then set about boiling some more water.
It was only once I’d finished that I noticed he was awake and staring at me. Wordlessly, I passed him the remaining fish and the canteen of water. He didn’t argue this time, and I knew it was because he was desperately hungry. When he was finished, I took the rope and tied it around his wrist. He struggled, unsure of what I was doing, but I held him tightly and tied the other end of the rope to my own wrist.
Avery (Random Romance) Page 5