by Elise Kova
“Now.” Raylynn inspected her nails nonchalantly. “I’ll give you… until I feel like leaving, to get ready. I would hurry if I were you.”
6. Baldair
“Baldair, think about this for just a moment.” Erion was relentless. “What you are doing is insane.”
“How is it any different from when we go off on a little trip?” Baldair took the steps with haste, trying to think of anything he might need to bring. She still hadn’t told him exactly where they would be headed, or what they would be doing. Her insistent obfuscation of her intentions combined with the coy presentation of what little information she did give him was downright thrilling. Baldair knew she was toying with him, but it was a rare treat indeed when he could meet a woman who would spar with him at every level.
“Do you want me to count the ways?” Erion sighed.
“You’re just sore because she said you couldn’t come.” Baldair grinned at the idea of being alone with this sword-swinging beauty for however long they would be gone.
“Please,” Erion scoffed. “You think a woman like that excites me?”
“I’m not sure if any woman excites you. Never seen you with one.”
“That is far from the point here.” He was so easy to rile.
Jax gave a snicker. “As fun as it is to see Erion be rejected… I do find myself agreeing with him.”
“Not you, too,” Baldair groaned, opening the door to what had been made his room for his time at the estate. The concept of moderation was more foreign to the Le’Dan aesthetic than it was even at the palace. So much gold was gilded on the furniture that Baldair was surprised the room didn’t fall right through the wooden flooring onto the heads of those below.
“I don’t like that you’re going on your own,” Jax explained simply. “I’d rather I went with you.”
“You’re not my mother, either of you.” Baldair rummaged through the trunks that the palace staff had insisted be sent ahead of him “for his comfort” for some sort of satchel or pack that wouldn’t require a carriage to haul.
“No, but I am your dog.”
“I thought I ordered you to stop that,” Baldair mumbled. He finally found a leather pack that would suffice. He hated ordering Jax around. If he could offer the man his freedom outright, he would. But the Emperor, his father, had insisted he could not, since doing so would be considered a great offense to the Western Court, given the history of Jax’s crimes and the false perception the man had insisted on perpetuating after the fact. “The Empire depends on the West,” his father had said. So Baldair allowed only the bare minimum of Jax’s servitude to stand, and even that was mostly for show.
“Fine, then my life is forfeit without you.”
Baldair sighed at the long-haired Westerner. That much may be true. If he died, Jax would be solely at the Emperor’s whim. Or, even worse, perhaps fall under Aldrik’s command. The very idea of his older brother having any hand in Jax’s life—more than he already did as the leader of the Tower of Sorcerers, of which Jax was a part—made Baldair want to gag.
“I’ll be fine.”
“You don not know that,” Erion said pragmatically. “What if she tries to murder you in your sleep? We already know she can best you in a fight. You, of all people.”
“If she wanted to murder me, she would have done so when she had her sword at my throat.”
“In front of everyone?” Erion rolled his eyes.
“It’s far more likely that she would wait until there were no witnesses. Since she clearly knows how to rile you up.” Jax teamed up with their friend. “Trust the murderer on this one.”
Baldair didn’t even dignify the comment with a response.
“I told you earlier, there are cases of a murderer targeting Western nobles in the area.”
“Good thing I’m not Western.” Baldair shrugged off Erion’s concern. There were murderers everywhere.
“But you are noble enough to make up for it, perhaps.”
“She doesn’t seem like the type,” Baldair insisted.
“Neither do I.”
It was Erion’s turn to shoot Jax a glare at the self-deprecating comment. The Western lord spoke, opting to continue the conversation rather than linger on the topic of murderers. “Just insist we can come. Then we will be there to help keep you safe.”
Baldair stared at the pack and the meager provisions he had placed in it. A change of clothes, a traveling cloak that could double as a blanket, his official royal signet that would give him all the gold, quarters, and safekeeping he could ever want—his life condensed into a handful of necessities. The pack was a stark contrast to the excess that surrounded him—excess he had lived with since birth. Comforts left and right, all things taken care of.
“You won’t always be there to keep me safe.” Baldair knew his friends meant well.
“We are your guards.” Erion lifted his arm, showing a more polished version of the bracer that Jax had made from the pirate gold they found last summer.
“And I will need to be able to split you from myself and from each other as my most trusted leaders in the battles to come.” It was a truth Baldair hadn’t wanted to see in all the meetings and lessons he’d had since the war with Shaldan had begun. But, as the days dwindled, the path to the war front had been laid out for him. This was perhaps his last opportunity to deviate before responsibility was thrust upon him, a mantle he would never be able to remove once it was settled on his shoulders. “You cannot always be there to protect me at war.”
Both men had the sense not to argue the fact.
“I know you mean well.” Baldair ran a hand through his hair. He didn’t want to disappoint or worry his friends. “But I need to do this. Myself.”
Erion had the look of a dejected child as Baldair threw the pack over his shoulder. Jax remained silent. But there was a tacit acceptance hovering around both of them. Their summer of gallivanting was expiring. So too, the time when being wild young men was an excuse to behave as they saw fit. In no time at all, they would be transformed into men of war and action, and of death.
“Just be careful.” Erion stood from where he had flopped on the edge of Baldair’s bed.
“Aren’t I always?”
“No,” both answered in unison.
A breathless servant appeared in the doorway. “My prince, the Lady Raylynn told us to inform you that you were taking too long. She left.” The man seemed horrified to even repeat it.
“Oh, Mother above.” Baldair gave a quick thanks to the man and sprinted down the hall, leaving his friends behind for the darkness of the night and one last wild adventure before the days of war.
7. Baldair
He sprinted across the desert sands, leaving the glitz and glow of the Le’Dan estate behind him. The wind blew away his tracks, as if to hide the only path that led back to the safe hideaway he’d intended to house him until being forced to confront the horrors of war. Luckily for Baldair, there wasn’t much in the desert to obscure his view, and he saw the woman in question even if he didn’t have her footsteps to guide him.
“Wait!” he called after her. “Wait just a moment.”
“I waited enough.” She acknowledged him with a small wave but didn’t so much as turn to look at him.
Baldair shifted his pack. Whatever frustration he felt mustered nothing more than a grin. It was as if the Mother herself had handed this woman to him, carefully crafted to be everything he’d ever wanted without him having to ask.
He ran as fast as he could across the slippery sands, crossing the gap between them. Raylynn acknowledged him with a sideways glance and slipped her satchel over her shoulder. She held it out to him expectantly.
“Yes?” Baldair blinked at it, utterly unable to infer a meaning.
“I don’t feel like carrying it,” she hummed.
It was like one of the logic p
uzzles Aldrik so favored that did nothing more than put splitting pain between Baldair’s temples. Why would she want me to carry it? He couldn’t come up with a serviceable solution to the riddle.
Raylynn pushed the bag strap to the center of his chest and let go, leaving him no choice but to scramble to catch it before it fell. It was deceptively heavy—not enough to be a bother, but heavier than what the woman’s casual strolling belied. It was the clanking as he hoisted it to his shoulder that alerted him to the real reason why it had such weight.
“You’re making me carry my own gold?” Baldair balked at the irony.
“I won it from you fair, so I think that makes it my gold.” Raylynn hadn’t stopped walking, leaving Baldair tripping over himself on the shifting sands to catch up yet again.
“And why am I carrying it?”
“Oh, don’t tell me a big strong man such as yourself can’t handle a bag from little ol’ me?” The demure falsetto didn’t fit anything about the woman, and the contrast was hilarious.
“Is that how it is? I’m your servant now?” Baldair arched his eyebrows in a challenge. No one had ever been so presumptuous.
“I am doing the grand favor of taking you along; you should make yourself useful.”
“You’re doing me the favor?”
“Just so.”
“How could you possibly figure?” Baldair roared with laughter. “I offered you a life that isn’t…” He looked around, realizing for the first time exactly how far they were from the Crossroads. “Wandering the desert.”
“You really are a prince, aren’t you?”
“I thought it obvious?” Baldair ran a hand through his hair, letting it fall dramatically back into place with a small smirk. Where usually he’d watch other women melt, Raylynn remained unfazed. “My reputation generally precedes me.”
“That it does.”
There was a long pause wherein he expected her to say something further, but the woman was silent. Raylynn caught his eye, and Baldair urged her to continue with a look.
“Oh, I’m sorry, did you mistake the fact for a good thing?”
For once, Baldair kept his mouth shut. He had lost too many battles for one day.
They slept under the stars that night, in the sand just off the East West Way—the main road that ran from the capital of the West to the capital of the East. Infinity stretched above him, pulled taut to the point that light from the realms beyond winked through. Stardust scattered between the fractals like a glittering brush stroke on a pitch-black canvas. It was more sky than he regularly saw in the Southern capital or the Crossroads, and Baldair fell asleep wondering just how many sights there were in the world he had yet to truly take notice of.
Sunlight seared through his eyelids early the next morning, reminding him just how early the sun rose. Baldair rolled onto his side, covering his eyes with his forearm.
“Up with you.” A foot nudged his shoulder.
“It’s so early,” he groaned.
“And we’ve a lot of ground to cover yet.”
“Where are we headed?”
“I haven’t decided.” She teased her fingers through her hair, coaxing out knots and snags whipped there by desert winds, before plaiting it back into intricate braiding he’d only ever really seen in fashion in the West before.
“Then how can you know we have a lot of ground to cover?” Baldair lay still, trying to convince himself that his body would function this early. It was even earlier than Major Zeriam had been forcing him out of bed for practice.
“That’s what the wind tells me,” she responded cryptically.
“What are you, some sort of wind spirit?” Baldair finally managed a sitting position.
“Windwalkers died off years ago.” Raylynn stared at the sun where it rose from the Eastern horizon.
“You answer questions with riddles.”
“Just because you don’t seem to comprehend the answer doesn’t mean it’s a riddle.” It was a small victory when she gave a yawn. “Now, this all needs to be tidied.”
Baldair looked at the cloak she had used as a blanket the night before, somewhat proud they’d had the same idea on how to manage a bedroll in the desert. “What’s all this?”
“My bedroll.” Raylynn had already begun walking.
“Why can’t you put it away?”
“Because you’re making yourself useful to me, remember?”
“I thought you had a task for me.” He wanted to complete it as quickly as possible. The sooner he did, the sooner she would be an official member of his guard.
“I don’t know if you’re worthy of completing it yet.”
The idea of someone not deeming him “worthy” grated Baldair in all the wrong ways in all the wrong places. He tried to live an honorable life. He tried to fight for what was noble and right. He was a prince!
As much as Baldair hated pulling rank, this woman made an appealing case for it as she tested him and every last thread of patience he had woven together for her.
“Do you have something to say?” She turned, as if sensing his discontent. “Because if you do, you can walk back to the teat of luxury that is the Le’Dan estate and suckle from it all you want.”
“Did I do something to offend you?” Baldair was up, balling up his cloak and shoving it into his own pack. He wasn’t keen on the implication of him being an infant. “All I can remember doing is showing you kindness and generosity.”
“Kindness isn’t kindness when it’s not freely given.”
Baldair pursed his lips, containing any kind of retort. He was tired, and while the sand hadn’t been expressly uncomfortable, it was far less so than the feather-topped mattresses at the Le’Dan estate.
There would be no lux accommodations at the war front.
So, he kept the notion of pulling rank to himself. He took her cloak and, with all the delicacy he could muster, folded it neatly, tucked it into the woman’s bag and hoisted that on his own shoulder. Raylynn cast a discerning eye in his direction, but her silence was her approval that morning.
And the morning after that.
And the morning after that.
8. Raylynn
Her princeling could be taught—a damn near miracle.
At first, she thought he was going to pitch a fit and make their time together shorter than it had to be. Really, Raylynn was betting on it being merely a matter of time until he did something she couldn’t forgive, and the prophecy that had been foretold about her service to the golden crown would be proven wrong. She had faith in the Mother above, but mortals often misinterpreted words and signs.
So, she waited for him to commit an offense against her in clumsy error. But he didn’t. The man held his tongue and did as she demanded. He bent his nobility before her.
At first, it was clearly begrudgingly, and she fought—not very hard and usually unsuccessfully—to prevent herself from laughing at him and his efforts. She had no doubt the man had always had everything handed to him. Their duel had been a fluke, or the product of having the best tutors and teachers in the land always at his disposal. Nothing about him made her think he knew the song of the sword. He did not sleep with his blade as she did, did not oil and sharpen it to perfection. It was almost as if the man forgot it was on his hip most hours of the day.
Raylynn had traveled around to the Crossroads from the southern half of Mhashan, so now she rounded north and west once more. It was a great loop she had done in its entirety about four times in her life. Twice with her mother, now twice on her own.
They were nearing the town of Yon, the most substantial outpost before Xia, and her best shot at making another batch of gold before heading home to the Nameless City. She didn’t really need the coin, but she certainly liked having it. And if it was a little bit more that she could give back to the Nameless City, all the better for it.
/> It had been some time since she was last in Yon, and, like the sands of the Waste, things moved and shifted in one’s absence. In her travels, she had come across a few rumors surrounding the Knights of Jadar she wanted to pursue there. The Knight she’d slain at the Crossroads had confirmed those whispers, and now she felt herself closing in on what could be the location of her mother’s sword.
Raylynn smiled to herself as the town materialized on the horizon. It felt good to win. She liked asserting her dominance over her world and exercising as much control over fate as the Mother allowed. If she could have a hot meal, a soft bed, a triumph in the arena, and potentially learn her next steps to locate her mother’s sword, it would be a victory all around.
“Oh, by the Mother, is that a town?” Her princeling sounded so relieved that Raylynn almost reconsidered stopping just to push him a little longer.
“It’s the town of Yon.”
“Will we be stopping there?”
“We will. And I will be dueling.”
“So this is what you do? You wander the desert and fight for gold?”
She couldn’t fathom why the idea clearly sounded insane to him, so all Raylynn could do was give a small motion of affirmation.
“And you didn’t jump on my offer to be part of my guard because…?”
Raylynn let out pearls of laughter to the sky. “You still have no idea.”
“No idea about what?” The prince adjusted her satchel mindlessly, no longer complaining or even noticing the fact that he was carrying the extra weight.
“You see the world as you want to see it, from where you sit high in your Southern sky city.” She couldn’t explain the freedom of the desert wind in words. She couldn’t give voice to commanding one’s own destiny, answering only to the Mother above. It was something he would either understand, or far more likely, wouldn’t.
“I’m merely trying to convey that I’m offering you something far better.”