by Ashley West
Now, the nervousness she felt was of an entirely different nature. She had only seen the Reman prisoner once when the guards had brought him before the prince. That had been weeks ago, and even at first sight he had seemed like a rather unsavory character. Now, she would have to face him alone.
There wasn’t even a guarantee that he would understand a word she said. Her Garinian was negotiable, at best, and the man might not speak the common tongue. Her goal certainly relied on a number of different factors working in her favor…and now, the time had come to discover if she could really do what she had imagined.
She was admitted through the last door with a great creak – only to find all of the cells empty.
Frantic, the young woman gazed about, moving into the room with her heart in her throat. They hadn’t already taken the Reman to be executed had they? Had Kael gotten antsy and put the man to death early?
All at once, something shifted at the far side of the room, making her jump. What she had thought was a pile of abandoned belongings was, in actuality, a man.
The prisoner.
He lay on his side in the corner of the last cell, and as Danielle stepped towards him, she gasped in shock and horror. The young woman hadn’t really known what razor chains were when the prince had referred to them…but she might have been able to guess. This man’s hands and feet were bound with sharp wire that seemed to be cutting into his skin – and from those ragged wounds, yellow-green blood oozed steadily. His pale face was bruised and battered from physical abuse, and he was curled into a fetal position, his breathing ragged and labored.
He’d been tortured – that much was clear.
Even though this man might very well have tried to take her life, Danielle couldn’t help but pity him. What else could she do when she didn’t understand him? Slowly, she advanced on his cell, kneeling about three feet from the bars, she spoke softly, in broken Garinian.
“Hello…are you awake? Can you hear I?” She was far from mastering the language – but with a bit of luck, it would be enough for her to achieve her goal. When the man didn’t respond, she tried again, louder this time. “Hello?...Please. I just want to talk.”
The figure before her shifted slightly, rolling over onto its back to stare at the ceiling. “You Garinians and your damned talking.” His voice was hoarse, as if he hadn’t had a drink of water in ages.
So he did speak the common tongue – quite perniciously, it seemed.
“I don’t want to hurt you. I just want to talk...really.”
The prisoner rolled onto his belly, raising his head to stare at her. Danielle was struck by the odd, bright turquoise color of his eyes. More of his queerly hued blood trickled from the slits that served as his nose, and as she looked upon his face, she could see how badly they had beaten him.
The moment the prisoner saw who it was who addressed him, his eyes narrowed. “You.” His voice lowered to an acidic hiss.
“Yes…I.” She stumbled over the syllables of the Garinian language. “You tried to kill I.”
The Reman merely spat a mouthful of blood in her general direction, though the gesture fell a few inches short. Danielle swallowed thickly, choosing to go on. “Why did you try to kill I? I’m not Garinian.”
“You married that son of a whore that calls himself their prince. That makes you just as Garinian as he himself.” The words were acerbic – scathing; and in the man’s eyes, Danielle saw a very real hatred for Kael and anything associated with him.
“I…had no choice.” She tried. Perhaps if she played the role of the victim, this Reman would speak truthfully to her, “He conquered my people too, and chose me as his bride.”
“And now you are poised to become their queen.” The prisoner spat, his eyes livid with fury. “Why do you think we targeted you? Their pampered, conquered prodigy? To prove that assimilation is the path of the weak.”
So far, this man hadn’t revealed anything that might lead her to think that the Remans were any less violent than Kael suggested. She would have to change her questioning tactics. The young woman noticed that the more she spoke, the more comfortable her tongue became with the syllables of language she’d learned.
“So you’d kill anyone on Garinia? Hundreds of races who’ve all assimilated into this empire – just to prove that their peaceful surrender was a mistake?”
“I would spit on anyone, even fellow Remans who yield to his rule. He is no prince of mine.”
Wait…fellow Remans? So that meant that there were those among this man’s race who didn’t want to plunge blindly into war. There were those who accepted Kael’s rule…that would mean they’d be willing to negotiate.
“There are Remans who would yield to the empire?” She tried cautiously, keeping her tone carefully neutral. “Outside the rebellion?”
“It matters not.” The prisoner said. Now, he mumbled to himself instead of speaking to her, and the more he spoke, the more Danielle realized that the man must be on the quick road to madness. “Whether we are the minority or not, this empire will crash and burn, and we will be the ones to fan the flames. Here…tonight.”
She barely understood what he was saying, but Danielle certainly understood one thing: the prisoner had just as much as admitted that he and those who perpetrated crimes against the Garinian Empire were in the minority – not the majority. Which meant that those causing all the trouble didn’t speak for every Reman.
There didn’t need to be a war.
The notion made her heart light and she suppressed a wide grin. She couldn’t call this triumph yet. She needed more information. She had to be able to give Kael more details, or he would never believe her.
“What flames are you talking about? I don’t understand.”
And that was when she heard it.
An audible din from behind the doorway she’d entered to access the prisoner. There was muffled shouting, the sound of clashing blades, and grunts of pain. Danielle staring at the doorway in disbelief. Someone had penetrated into the holding cells? This deep underground?
Fear began to creep in at the edge of her senses – and the notion was only confirmed when she glanced back at the Reman she had been questioning. His smile was wide and smug – his eyes glimmering with excitement the moment the door began to swing inward.
Danielle inhaled sharply, turning to face what entered – and screamed in terror.
**
Kael awoke with a start, his heart in his throat.
Something was wrong.
He could feel the tension thick in the air, crackling through his nerve endings. Immediately, he reached across the expanse of the bed for Danielle – only to find empty space. The prince sat upright, turning to find that his wife wasn’t in bed.
That was when the shouts reached his ears. There were screams of fury and the clashing of metal against metal just beyond his chamber door.
Kael leapt from bed, striding to the wall adjacent to the bathing chamber to remove two wickedly sharp blades from the display there. Barefoot and bare-chested, his movements sleek as a panther, the prince made his way to the door of his chamber.
His stomach churned with trepidation even as he readied himself to face whatever was on the other side of the door. The prince struggled to calm his mind, as it constantly blared at him that Danielle was not with him and he had no idea where she had gone.
Someone had infiltrated the palace – they had come far enough to reach his door – and he intended to beat them back.
Then, he would find his wife.
With a grunt, he hefted the immense door open, and was greeted with a scene of pandemonium beyond. The attackers weren’t numerous, but what few they were fought like demons. Kael’s eyes narrowed as he took in Remans with stolen Garinian armor and blades, taking down fewer soldiers than they injured, driven by pure fury. There were perhaps twenty of them to forty of the royal guard, but they were prevailing by sheer force of will.
At least, for the moment.
Kael cursed
himself.
He’d been putting so much effort into questioning their prisoner that he hadn’t entertained the thought that the man would be bold enough to call for reinforcements.
Not in the palace.
The prince meant to see him dead with his own hands.
Without a sound, he leapt into the fray, his blades dancing as if they were an extension of his body. Though the guards were unwieldy with their armor and their broadswords, he moved fluidly, slicing through flesh and bone in an instant. He met two Reman warriors with the edge of his blades, cutting their throats and sending their bodies sprawling before he sliced into the belly of another.
A screaming male caught the prince’s elbow to his face before a blade slit him from navel to nose and he collapsed to the marble floor, gurgling a death knell.
Kael didn’t see, didn’t breathe, and didn’t feel. It was as if he had never left the battle field. He cut down one man after the other, leaving a few for his men to take care of and a mess in his wake. Within minutes, there was no Reman left standing – and Kael’s weapons were stained with the pus-like color of their blood.
He barely paused to take a breath, instead barking orders to send guards to other sections of the palace – from, which battle sounds carried. It was clear that the Remans they’d killed hadn’t been their only invaders.
Kael strode purposefully down the hall to his sister’s suite, flinging the door open to find the younger woman brandishing a knife in his face, her son cowering in the corner. When she saw it was him, however, a cry of relief escaped her and she flung her slender arms about his neck. “Kael! Oh, thank the Gods!”
“Are you alright?” He demanded, holding her at arm’s length to look her over and assure himself that she was unharmed. Though his sister was pale with fright, she appeared uninjured. At the sight of his uncle’s bloodstained form, Hadric wailed, flinging himself into his mother’s arms.
“Arteh took his bow and left when the first sounds of fighting reached us.” Kaia informed him quickly, speaking of his brother-in-law’s skill with the manual weapon. “He told us to lock the door and doubled the guard. Kael, have you seen him?”
“I have not.” He replied tersely, before swallowing the panic that threatened to swallow him. “Have you seen Danielle?”
Kaia’s eyes widened even further. “She’s not in your rooms?”
The prince shook his head, his expression grave. “She was gone when I woke. Do you have any idea where she would have gone?”
His sister shook her head frantically, clutching her son to her. “You must find her. We’ll be alright, just go!”
Kael nodded curtly, before speaking to Yasin to ensure that his brothers and their families had been secured. The general promised him that they had come to no harm and that other areas of the palace were being quickly purged of the intruders.
They had only gained entry with the element of surprise. With the prisoner’s execution on the horizon, the guards had become somewhat lax; and though they were many, they’d been unprepared for the ferocity of the attack. Kael realized that he had not been nearly as thorough as he should have been in questioning his prisoner, and resolved to wring answers from the traitor if he had to skin him alive.
With Yasin at his side, he made his way toward the lower sections of the castle, even as he put every guard he encountered on a search to find Danielle. Where could she possibly have gone? It was unlike her to rise from bed in the middle of the night...and to leave their quarters…what could have gotten into her?
Now the palace had been plunged into chaos and she was very probably caught in the middle of it.
Her and his unborn child.
The thought made him physically ill and he doubled his pace towards the holding cells. He would have the truth of this attack, and he would have it now. Their prisoner hadn’t truly encountered pain.
With no less than fifty soldiers at his back, Kael rounded the corner that would bring him to the entrance of the levels – and froze in place.
He was greeted by a scene from his worst nightmares.
Twenty Reman rebels stood in a line before them, blocking their path – and at the head of their formation was his prisoner; battered, bruised, and with one thick arm around his wife’s throat.
Kael suddenly felt weak, as if all his strength had left him.
Danielle was struggling, her blonde locks falling lank with exertion around her face. At the sound of their approach, she looked up, and her panicked eyes locked with his. For a moment, Kael lost himself in those eyes –felt the fear in them, and liquid fury coursed through his veins.
“Zekhed Zender.” He hissed the man’s name like a curse, his skin crawling at the sight of the man’s hands all over his wife. “Release the princess or die where you stand.”
Danielle cried out as the traitor only clutched her closer to him. “How are you going to kill me with your lovely bride in the way, your highness?” Zekhed sneered. “Though I’d love to witness your knife piercing her face, should you try. That would make my day.”
How on Earth had he gotten hold of Danielle? How had he escaped from a maximum security cell? Kael’s mind whirled with a thousand questions. He took a deep breath, trying to keep himself from rushing at the man. Such a thing could hardly end well for Danielle – and if he sent his men into combat, Zender could slip away with her. “What do you want?” He demanded lowly, fairly trembling with anger.
“What do I want? Now you want to know what I want, don’t you princeling? Now that I have what you want? Well, what if I want her dead?” The man withdrew a serrated piece of metal from his tattered shirt and held it against Danielle’s throat.
Kael’s heart was nearly ejected from his chest. He wanted to throttle the criminal where he stood, but he forced himself to keep calm. His anger could not help Danielle…would not help her.
“There is no need to spill her blood. We can…negotiate.” Not a word he would think of when discussing the Remans…but he thought of it now. He was willing to do anything to keep Zender from slicing Danielle’s throat - to give away half his empire…to travel to the third sun and back if need be.
“Oh, well now you sound like your bride. You know, she’s one for negotiation, this pretty little human. I tried to kill her…” Zender drew his knife taut against the skin of her throat. “And yet she would still speak to me. She came to me of her own free will, right? Did you know that?”
The prince’s heart stopped.
His gaze once more met his wife’s and the guilt he found there would have brought him to his knees in any other company.
She had left him…snuck away from him in the middle of the night against his express orders…just when she had told him how much she believed he could protect her and their child. The prince’s desolation flowed through him and he swallowed thickly, pressing down those emotions. He could not afford to feel them right now. He would be angry with Danielle- reprimand her later.
He would rather have her warm and safe in his arms, even furious as he was, then see her killed in this conflict.
“I’m sorry, Kael.” The young woman’s words were barely audible, gasped through the tightness of Zender’s arm around her throat. She had to be in pain, and yet still, she tried to make her apology. “I didn’t want to hurt you. I just didn’t want war…I didn’t want you…or anyone to die.”
Well now, there would certainly be war. There was no question of that. The only matter left to solve was what the war would be over: the death of a Garinian princess or the attempted assassination of the entire royal family?
“How touching.” Zender snorted, his makeshift knife now drawing a trickle of blood on Danielle’ pale white throat. “She doesn’t quite understand men like you and I, does she, highness? That we live for conflict. It is what breeds us…what separates the wheat from the chaff. You know, it was quite lucky that your little treasure stumbled upon me. Were it not for her, I didn’t think it would come to this. You handled the bombing with m
ore grace than I would have expected.”
Now the man was speaking in riddles. Riddles Kael had neither the time nor the patience for. “Speak plainly.” He spat, his eyes flashing bright gold. “I’ve no time for games.”
“You don’t like games, princeling? War itself is the finest game there is to play, and everyone is a pawn. Here we are now, standing on the brink, and all I have to do is simply tip the scale…” A whimper escaped Danielle as he added further pressure to the knife.
“No!” The prince demanded, his voice on the edge of a plea.
“Kael!” He was cut off by his wife’s panicked cry. “Kael, don’t listen to him. Promise me that whatever happens…whatever he does…you mustn’t go to war with the Reman people!”
Her words hit him like a physical blow.
Was she mad? They were going to kill her. Did she have such conviction for her pacifist tendencies that she wouldn’t want him to avenge the death of their unborn child? Had she taken leave of her senses? “Kael, listen to me!” She choked, “These Remans...they’re a faction! A small minority! They’re rebels causing trouble. There are Remans who could cooperate with you – who would adhere peacefully to your rule, you only need to speak with them!”
For a moment, the prince couldn’t believe his ears. How on Earth could she possibly know such a thing? She was perpetuating ideas that she hoped to be true with her dying breath and denying the cold reality of matters. War happened – and this one was inevitable. It had been since the unrest in the wake of the first Reman conquering – since the first small skirmish on the borders of the empire.
…a small skirmish caused by isolated bands of Remans.
“Quiet, woman!” Zender jerked Danielle enough to draw a stream of blood and her mouth snapped shut, but he, Kael, could still read the plea in her eyes.
No war.
In that split second, Kael remembered the details of their troubles with the Remans. Ambushes, small battles and instigations along supply lines. Uprisings not from women and children, but from young men - and always when they thought they had the advantage. They assassinated, blew up their own resources as well as those sent by Garinian forces, and seemed to have no method to the manner in which they attacked.