by R. G. Green
“Kherin, calm down.”
Fear and anger crackled in the space between them, and the tension in Kherin’s body, the taut, gathered muscles of every limb, threatened to snap with movement at any moment.
“Calm down and breathe, Kherin.”
For a long, slow moment, Derek wasn’t sure if Kherin heard him, if he was even listening, but then, little by little, moment by moment, the fight began to recede, not vanishing entirely, but forced back, subdued. Only when Kherin’s stance eased did Derek loosen his grip and cautiously release the fabric. He turned when the prince’s gaze slid behind him.
The healer remained frozen in the shadows by the door while two Defenders stood watching from either side of his brother’s bed. Vic and Jori, a merchant’s son and a scholar. Kherin knew them both, as did Derek, but neither received more than a glance from the trader, and less than that from the prince. All attention turned to Adrien, heir to the Crown of Llarien, lying on the sickbed in the hospice of Gravlorn, watching Kherin with dark, haunted eyes.
The edges of Derek’s cloak moved as Kherin brushed past him, though the prince ignored both the trader and the Defenders as he approached his brother’s bed, stepping past them as if they weren’t there, and pausing only a moment before sinking to sit on the edge. The room filled with heavy silence as two worn and weary gazes met, identical even now, ill and shadowed and full of questions.
Kherin said nothing, and he didn’t want to hear the ragged breaths forced from Adrien’s lungs. He couldn’t fit the struggle he had heard moments before with the brother he had fought and followed and loved. Adrien was injured, but he had never imagined it would be so grievously, and though he yet lived, death seemed only a step away. He swallowed as he took his brother’s hand in his, and the heat of tears stung his eyes.
Their relationship as children had been typical of two brothers growing up close in age, and Kherin had endured years of torment as the brunt of the many schemes and tricks his brother devised. But that stage had passed, and the closeness that had grown as they aged increased, something few had thought possible back then, though fewer still questioned it now. Especially those here, bearing witness to such a heartbreaking reunion within the walls of this sickroom.
Only three years separated them, and it had become common in recent years to mistake one for the other at first glance. The dark chestnut hair was a shared trait, with both heads even now matted and tangled by rain or by sweat. Their builds were the same, though Adrien stood taller, if only by a little, and carried more muscle, but not much more. Even their noses, with the slight bump on the bridge inherited from some undetermined ancestor, were perfectly matched. What differences there were lay in temperament, Adrien’s calm to Kherin’s agitation.
The calm Kherin displayed now was more than a little unsettling to everyone who was watching.
But Kherin couldn’t find the words to speak, keeping his silence though he could feel the others in the room watching him, waiting. Fear twisted horribly in his stomach. His eyes found the thin scar that marred the flesh over the brow of his brother, took in the skin so pale it appeared bloodless and the sweat-soaked bedclothes that clung to Adrien’s body, soiled and damp and no doubt ruined. The hand he held tightened over his fingers, and he finally found again the anguished eyes of the elder prince of Llarien.
Adrien drew a breath deep into his lungs. His eyes closed, then opened. But he didn’t look at Kherin, his gaze shifting instead to the darkened room behind him. To where Derek stood, silent and unmoving. Kherin didn’t turn to see what was on the trader’s face, but he read Adrien’s clearly.
“Adrien,” Kherin began, drawing his brother’s eyes back and seeing fully the anger and anguish they held before the emotions vanished, replaced by something more gentle.
“You don’t look well,” Adrien said at last, his voice a low and painful rasp that cut deeply into those who were listening. “The storm. You’re ill.”
“Adrien,” Kherin tried again, but he flinched suddenly as a tearing cough erupted from his lungs. Adrien grimaced as he struggled to rise, but the hand Willum placed on his chest stopped him short. The healer pushed him back to the bed even as his eyes went to Kherin.
Derek appeared quickly at Kherin’s side, crouching low to steady him, and Willum changed his hold from Adrien to the younger prince’s shoulder. Kherin’s hand slipped free from his brother’s as he was shuffled away from the bed, and quick, quiet words passed between the healer and the trader that reached no other ears in the room. At a nod from Derek, Vic replaced Willum, and the healer vanished from the room as Kherin fought against another deep and painful cough. But a few long, tortured breaths at last stilled the spasm in his lungs, and Kherin slowly managed to stand on his own. He raised his head to the tired, worried face of the trader. Neither tried to speak.
The sound of steps drew their attention, and they turned to the door as Willum hurried through, a flask and a cup gripped haphazardly in one hand, several small pouches dangling from the other. Derek eased Kherin toward the single chair in the room without having to be told, and lowered him onto it as Vic stepped away. The small table near the bed that held the array of powders and bandages for the elder prince became a worktable as a potion was mixed for the younger.
“He will need dry clothes and a warm blanket,” Willum said to no one in particular, though certainly not to Kherin. “There is a spare bed two rooms down. It can be moved as a whole if you’re careful.”
Vic and Jori understood the instructions and vanished through the door as Willum approached the prince, the cup extended before him.
“Drink,” he said to Kherin. A healer’s orders, with no room for argument.
Kherin took it without speaking, swallowing the thick liquid with an expression of distaste. The pressure in his lungs eased as warmth seemed to surround them, and his senses began to numb almost immediately. Whatever the potion was, it was powerful, and what strength he still held began to fade quickly.
The rest of what the healer said was to Derek, who answered his questions quietly and succinctly, describing the fever that had come and the coughs that had grown worse. Willum only nodded at the tale, and then talk fell away as the Defenders returned carrying the bed between them. It was positioned quickly, and then the linen retrieved and spread over its surface. When Jori vanished again, it was to return with a nightshirt. Then, just as he had done the night following the Mouse, Derek began to help the prince undress.
Kherin was exhausted but quiet by the time the cotton nightshirt was slipped over his skin, and his awareness was fleeting as he let himself be led to the newly arrived bed. Sleep was already pulling him under as he crawled beneath the blankets, and Kherin didn’t fight it. He looked to Adrien as his head felt the pillow and saw his brother already fallen asleep. Or fallen unconscious, he couldn’t tell.
But the heaviness that settled over him wouldn’t let him dwell on it. He was aware of the Defenders slipping quietly through the door and the cool hand that brushed through his hair a moment before a soft kiss was placed on his temple.
Then the potion took its toll, the world slipped away, and he finally began to rest.
DEREK sighed with relief once Kherin was asleep, and only then did he meet the eyes of the healer over the sickbed.
“Adrien is more than injured or ill,” he said softly, stating, not asking, and not bothering with titles when it was Adrien—and Kherin—who was suffering.
Willum’s eyes fell away, and he turned instead to the elder prince, the traces of sweat still visible on the linens beneath his body.
“I can’t explain it,” the healer said as quietly as the trader. “His wounds have healed, except for the mark on his back. And the seizures… I can’t stop them.”
Derek gestured toward the door when he caught the healer’s eye. Willum preceded him out, and Derek turned back to the princes one last time before he closed the door behind him.
In the hall, he looked at the healer and saw the weari
ness in his face and the fear in his eyes. Derek kept his own expression controlled and void of any accusation or hostility. His voice remained calm and steady.
“Tell me what happened.”
THE first touch of awareness leeched into Kherin’s consciousness well before the dismal light of morning had made it to the streets of Gravlorn, and it drew him unrelentingly back to wakefulness while the city outside the window was still drowning in rain and shrouded in darkness. The ritual confusion of remembering where he was, and why, was strangely reminiscent of his waking in the Crossroads over a week ago, though the room he saw now was far more austere than the comforts of a city inn.
The rawness of his lungs and throat became apparent with the first lucid breath, and he stared blearily at the darkened walls, remembering only the dull and faded blue paint that must look washed out even in daylight as he tried to piece together the events that had led him here. The sparse furnishings were vague shapes of darker shadows, and included only the pieces needed to conduct healing, with no rugs on the wooden floor and no paintings on the wall. Even the blankets were thick, sturdy, and warm, completely lacking the plushness of the bedding offered in rented rooms. It was a sickroom built for healing, not for comfort.
The cloud of memories regarding exactly how he had come to be here were a little more difficult to wade through. Only the weaker form of nausea separated this morning from the morning following the Mouse, as the heat, the thirst, and the dull pounding in his skull were the same. Remembering the rancid almond brew Derek had brought him in Delfore drew both a smile and a grimace to his face, though a painful turn of his head showed the trader absent from the room this time. It was the sight of the bundled figure occupying the second bed that brought full, horrifying memories crashing down on him, and he started from the bed before his own weakness stopped him.
“Adrien….” Though he breathed easier now, his voice still held the rasp of one whose throat and lungs had been scraped by fits of coughing, and the weakness of his legs nearly sent him tumbling before he gained his feet. The sudden constricting of his lungs was a further warning that the threat was not yet over. But the terrifying memories of the seizure crowded his thoughts, and he slowly and excruciatingly staggered to the sickbed where his brother slept. He hadn’t even been aware of the clenched knot in his stomach until the sound of his brother’s sleep-ridden voice released it. Then the relief that coursed through him drained the strength from his legs, and he dropped heavily to the bed before his weakness could topple him. His own state was the result of illness, he knew that now, but the seizure that had tortured his brother only hours ago…. He swallowed painfully as his lungs constricted with the threat of another torturous cough.
Adrien’s eyes fluttered open as the cough broke free, and they slowly, inevitably, settled on Kherin’s face.
Details began filtering through the grogginess of Kherin’s mind as Adrien worked to focus on Kherin’s presence at his side, and even in the darkness, Kherin could see that someone had come not long ago. The sweat he remembered so clearly had been bathed from Adrien’s skin, and the linens on which he lay had been changed, at least judging by the smell and the cool dryness of the bedding. Though Kherin wore the thin cotton nightshirt provided the night before, Adrien had been left shirtless, dressed only in pants similar to what Derek had provided at the Crossroads. The realization left the flickering curiosity of whether it had been a healer somewhere in the past who had provided that part of Derek’s wardrobe, though the sound of Adrien’s voice shattered the thought in an instant.
“Derek. He brought you here.” Adrien’s voice was quiet and matter-of-fact, sleepy. Stronger, though still reminiscent of the frayed whispers of the night before.
“We got to Gravlorn last night,” Kherin told him, his voice weak, scratchy, and frank. “We heard you were hurt….”
Adrien nodded wearily, though whether with resignation or understanding, Kherin couldn’t be sure. The questions that followed were asked hesitantly and haltingly by the elder prince, and they were answered with the brief words that were all the younger prince was capable of. His father’s permission, the storm, the way-stop… all succinctly told, without the tempering of emotions that so often colored his words, and all straying from what had taken place that one stormy night in the shadows of that debris-strewn ruin. Adrien may be well aware of where Kherin sought his pleasure, but Kherin was far from certain as to how Adrien would feel about it being someone so close to them both that he took to his bed, no matter the circumstances.
The hour was still too early for the arrival of a morning meal, and rain still batted the window between the beds as Kherin answered Adrien’s questions without asking any of his own, until at last they seemed at an end. Only then did Kherin did take over the conversation, voicing his confusion and fear in one single question of his own.
“Adrien, what happened?”
Adrien blew out a sharp huff of breath, the sound ragged and strained, and his eyes closed for so long Kherin began to fear he had slipped away.
“I don’t know,” Adrien said at last. His confusion was clear. “It was the northerners… they were on our side of the river, here in Llarien… and they came out of the trees….” Adrien paused for breath as his eyes drifted closed and then slowly opened. “They caught us by surprise, and we were outnumbered… there was so much happening at once… so much fighting and scrambling, I don’t think I felt the blade that did this. I don’t remember it….”
Kherin couldn’t define what it was he felt as Adrien struggled to lift his shoulder from the mattress, revealing the edges of the unsoiled bandage that covered the skin high on Adrien’s back. He released his brother’s hand as he leaned in to support him, and after a single hesitant glance into Adrien’s eyes, he pulled the edges of the bandage loose. The deep, ragged line that tore his flesh was angry and red, the skin around it dark and splotchy, reflecting wetly from the salve the healer had used.
Kherin’s face was drained of color as he looked back to Adrien’s eyes, and Adrien drew a slow and heavy breath as Kherin sealed the wound again.
“It hasn’t healed,” Adrien said quietly. “The healer continues to treat it, but….”
“But what?” Kherin pressed as Adrien trailed off, and his hand covered his brother’s again as he looked at the scar on Adrien’s brow.
Adrien shook his head slowly. “The seizures began then, and they continue even now, and the skin burns and bleeds….”
Kherin shook his head now, not wanting to believe what he was hearing—but he had seen it last night, had heard the struggle through the door and seen the aftermath in this very room. He studied the shadows haunting Adrien’s eyes, but saw nothing to help him understand what was happening. He didn’t move as Adrien touched his knee.
“Willum doesn’t know what causes them or how to stop them.”
“But….” Why hasn’t he already stopped them? Kherin demanded silently. Willum was Gravlorn’s healer; it was his duty to find out what caused the seizures and stop them.
“Kherin,” Adrien said again, low and steady, his tone pleading, but for what, Kherin couldn’t be sure. Kherin breathed and swallowed and then blinked, and forced himself to accept his brother’s words. Slowly, he nodded.
Adrien gave him a relieved smile, weak and weary, and though he opened his mouth to say more, the words never formed. The change in his expression was followed by the stiffening of his muscles, and a breathy, “Gods,” barely made it through his lips before the sound of his breathing became too ragged to form words. His eyes had already lost their focus when Kherin leaned over grasp his chin.
“Adrien…?” Kherin managed to scratch out, but he stopped short as Adrien arched suddenly against the bed, twisting as his fingers clenched fiercely around his hand and in the folds of the linens spread over and around him.
Realization slammed into Kherin like a club, and he swore fiercely as he launched himself at Adrien’s writhing form, grasping him with the intention
of holding him still, holding him down. Panic overcame his own illness as he found his voice, and his shout for the healer echoed off the peeling walls…
And was followed all too closely by the sound of Adrien’s scream.
OVERLOADED shelves lined the walls and created paths across the floor, broken up by tables here and there. Looking at them now, he had no idea where to start. So many books—the answers might be here, and he still might never find them. He took a deep breath to drive back the hopelessness of his task and made a decision. He had to start somewhere, so he started with the nearest shelves.
He hadn’t been in a library since he had left the city of Delfore. More specifically, since he had left the castle grounds. He smiled bitterly, remembering how Kherin, the wild and fiery second prince, had been reduced to reading tomes thanks to a broken leg, and how he had been reading a book of poisons while he waited for the bone to heal. And he remembered the other books that had remained on his bedside table even after the splints had been removed, and how they had fallen to the floor as the bed and table shook with their recklessness during sex.
Or his recklessness, he should say. Kherin’s ass was made for the kind of fucking he liked, and he had delivered it mercilessly with every invitation he answered. He had looked forward to it, and the Gods knew Kherin had loved it.