Chapter 22: - Chains

  Exia hated pacing. And yet he paced, because pacing was about all he could do. Ksenija was in the ward, alone—no, not alone—with Volkov. He might as well have left her in there with a rabid dog.

  He could be doing anything to her, he could be doing everything to her—Exia did not let his mind wander any further. Instead, he took solace in the fact that Volkov had shown some measure of restraint to him, and imagined he might extend that kindness to Ksenija.

  Volkov had shown kindness to me…

  It was the least he could do really. Well that was wrong. The least the usurper could do was ram a sword up his own ass and beg forgiveness for his sins as he shat out his blood and guts.

  But that was neither here nor there. It was still…surprising. Exia supposed the man’s guilt was finally coming to bite him.

  He heard soft steps on the marbled floor and recognized Ksenija’s gait instantly. He chased it down the corridor, saw his friend, and without a thought, had his arms wrapped around her. “Ksenija!” He beamed.

  She gasped, seized up, and hurriedly pushed off of him. “Fuck, my wound, you bovki!” she yelled, taking a few steps back and clutching the side of her belly.

  “Sorry, I didn’t know—”

  —”Didn’t know I was stabbed?” She snapped, glaring at him, first with heat. And then with an uncertainty. A weariness—almost as if they’d only just met. “So…you’re the King.”

  “Yes…” Exia said, though he wanted to say more. That with her he was Exia, not the King, not even the servant boy he pretended to be. Just Exia, and how that felt truer to him than any crown or facade. But he didn’t.

  She didn’t meet his eyes now. “Does that change anything between us?”

  “Well, of course it does,” Exia scoffed. “We now have a manor to explore.”

  It seemed that was the right thing to say, because Ksenija grinned. Then she looked around at the opulent floor, walls and their intricate paintings, ceiling and the beautiful chandeliers hanging from it…all with a look of disapproval. “This is a bit much isn’t it.”

  Exia blinked. “Much? Much? I’ll have you know that these floors have been walked on by the greatest monarchs from all corners of the world, that those walls were painted year by year, each by a different artist continuing the style of the previous one, representing the ebb and flow of time and the Vanfoster line, that those chandeliers are made out of sirion glass—impossibly rare, impossibly hard to shape, and impossibly fragile at that.” Exia stopped to catch his breath for a moment, inhaling and exhaling before continuing. “And, I haven’t even begun—” he stopped at the realization that Ksenija was laughing.

  She clutched her belly as she did, head thrown back, wincing as her wound flared and still continuing to laugh herself into pure incoherence. “You…” she began but could not finish. Ksenija was leaning on the wall when she had began to gather her breath, still laughing, though in long enough intervals to allow her speak. “You were actually red in the face….like a…like a…the vegetable, what do they call it…”

  “A tomato.”

  “A tomato!” she exclaimed, laughing harder and louder.

  Ksenija finally gathered her wits and was left panting against a wall.

  Exia huffed.

  She grinned. “It’s a massive freaking palace, of course I think it’s awesome. But the real entertainment was the look on your face. Show me around.”

  Exia glared harder.

  Ksenija grinned wider.

  And they explored. And it was great.

  Exia showed her everything and told her more. Mother’s study, Father’s training room, the library. And even the garden. All places held a certain darkness to them, a wallowing grief, but with her, Exia barely felt it. All he could think about were the great memories tucked away in their walls.

  For the first time in years, he could see Bezdna Palace—not as a prison, not as a house of nightmares and best-locked-away memories, but as a home. As his home.

  Still, like all good things, the time spent did come to an end. Morning had come, and Ksenija had to leave. But Exia was not filled with melancholy as he watched her go. Only anticipation for the weekend, when they might meet again.

  He found the Captain in his room when he got there, sitting down on his bed, with a face as ugly as ever. Exia grinned at the intrusion, not finding it within him to care that much about it. “Hello Captain. Can I help you?” he asked.

  “You need to stop seeing the girl,” was his reply. Cold, sudden, and certain.

  Exia had thought he’d misheard the man. He raised an eyebrow. “No I don’t? Volkov cleared it. I’ll see her on—”

  —“Do you care for her?” Morozova asked, cutting through his words.

  Exia hesitated. “I—”

  —”Do you, boy?” he urged, standing up now and letting his large frame loom over Exia.

  “Yes. Yes I care for her. I care for her a lot.” Exia said, voice wavering as he spoke, but the truth was as certain as ever.

  “Then you need to stop seeing her,” Morozova told him yet again. The words still didn’t make sense; they only served to anger him.

  And Exia was angered. “No, I do not need to stop seeing her!” He snapped.

  “It’s not safe for her, Exia,” Morozova told him, jaw tensing.

  “Who are you to tell me what’s safe for her.” Exia growled. “I will keep seeing her. And if you try to stop me, I’ll have your balls—”

  —The strike came like a flash, quick, unseen, and yet it hit like thunder, ratting Exia’s jaw and throwing him back to stumble in agony. He didn’t fall though, because the Captain grabbed him by the face with one massive, scarred hand and shoved the back of Exia’s head against the wall.

  Exia could only see him through the one eye, and what he saw was a face twisted in feral rage. Every inch of the man was vibrating with violence, and Exia could feel the Captain’s will just barely being able to resist killing him right then and there.

  He didn’t struggle, he didn’t move, he just stayed there—feeling the hard grip squeeze down on his head, tasting hot sweat on the killer’s palms, and being overwhelmed by the scent of malice that seemed to ooze from every inch of him. He felt suddenly certain that to move would be to inspire violence, like finding himself in the gaze of a pounce-taut predator.

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  “Listen to me, Exia,” The Captain began, and Exia could do nothing but listen. His voice was like chewed gravel, rough and hard. “Everyone in your life is in danger. Everyone. You think the enemies of the Republic won’t use her to get to you? You think Volkov won’t? She will only have as much of a life as is allowed to keep you in check. Used as you are used, if not worse. You’re dealing with matters of life and death, and you’re acting like a child. And I know you’re just a lad, Exia, I know you are. But you don’t get to be. You just fucking don’t.”

  Exia was moving now, but only because he was trembling. Tears leaked from his eyes, ones of terror and more. Something flashed in the Captain’s orbs, and he seemed to have only just realised where he was.

  Morozova pulled his arm back, and shrank back from Exia with a suddenness. He looked at his fist, at the burning at the side of Exia’s face, and then into his eyes. Exia saw anguish in the Captain’s eyes. “Lad, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

  Exia started for the door. He raced out, and ran away from Morozova. Exia ran, and ran, and ran, and ran. He ran until his legs burned, until they ached, and until he couldn’t feel them anymore. Finally, when it was all said and done, he found a corner, crawled into it. And cried. Because he knew that Ksenija Lyubushkina would never again step foot in Bezdna Palace.

  ###

  Exia awoke.

  He awoke beneath the clouds, against the ice, blasted by cold, and tended to by a fire. He saw it burning next to him, orange and brave against the winter’s winds.

  Memories of Navtej, of magic, of a gun, and of blood flooded his head. How was he alive? Exia tried to stand, and found a pain flare up in his neck. He groaned, gasped, spasmed, and heard a word of advice.

  “I was able to burn the wound shut, but that doesn’t mean it won’t hurt like a fucker,” the voice said. And Exia turned—carefully this time—to see the Captain sitting by the fire. Cross legged, green eyes on the inferno, and resting dogs behind her.

  Exia guessed at a lot of things that must have happened between him losing consciousness, and she finding him. In the end, there was only one thing he could say. “Thank you.”

  That lit something within the woman’s eyes. Her jaw tensed, her fingers spasmed. “Don’t thank me.” she nearly hissed.

  Exia nodded. He carefully got into a sitting position, and felt all the pain from his battle with Navtej flare up again—those done to the body as well as the mind.

  “You betrayed me. Again.” The woman nearly growled. “You made me feel like a fool. Again.”

  “Captain—”

  —”No!” she snapped, meeting his eyes now. Hers were an inferno, banishing away the freezing cold in the place of something far less welcoming. “I don’t care that you do not care about my job, I don’t care that you don’t respect the republic, that you think all of this is a joke—maybe it fucking is, maybe it fucking isn’t—I care that you put my life in danger, that you twisted my trust, that you hurt me!” Exia saw that in her eyes was not just anger—he had hoped it was, it was something he could handle—it was betrayal. Something much more painful.

  The very blade he had been dealt with, he’d long since turned against her. How in character of you, King Exia.

  “I am sorry, Captain. I have wronged you. Deeply. I assure you, I will do better.” Exia said it, and he meant it. He wondered for a moment if the Captain might dismiss his apology outright—he would not fault her. Instead, he saw hesitation in her eyes.

  “I’ll believe it…when I see it, your grace,” was all the Captain said.

  ###

  Fishing in the ice was a trait many a Military Mage either learnt or died trying to. That she was part of the learned half provided Sasha with ample food to sustain them for the night. The clothing they had both brought however, was only barely a worthy opponent for the gluttonous winds, drinking away at the heat in her face, fingers, and toes.

  Sasha and the King sat cross legged around the fire, each with a stick holding a fish over the open flame. They hadn’t spoken since their brief exchange, so she didn’t know exactly how he got the wounds that covered his form, the arm that hung limply by his side, and the gash that ran across his neck—but she could guess how.

  He looked barely here really, eyes on the flame, but truly somewhere distant. Oh she hated him, and hated him greatly for his past deeds, but Sasha would be lying through her teeth if she said she wasn’t moved by the deep sorrow in his gaze, by his almost genuine sounding words of regret.

  “Would you like to talk about what happened?” The words just sort of came out. But Sasha did not regret them. Not when she asked it. And not when the Mage King had no response.

  And then he did. “Everyone is always watching me…” he began—voice a whisper, eyes still lost on the flame. “Even you, Captain, even you,” he added. “What are the Mage King’s goals, what is he planning, what deep dark machinations lay behind his words. Does he quest to restore the crown to its old heights, does he collude with conspirators within, or perhaps even those without.” And then he looked up at her, and seemed to peer at all her secrets. Sasha couldn’t help but flinch. “Do you want to know what I want, Captain? What I truly, truly desire, more than anything else in this world? My greatest secret, my greatest desire, the one that has a nation hold its breath every time I speak,”

  He held her eyes and Sasha held his.

  “I want to be free,” he told her. And then the edge of his lip curved up in a weak smile and his eyes fell back down to the flame. “There it is, there’s the Mage King’s wish. I can have money, whores, a palace, furs, silks, and more, and more, and more, and more. But I cannot decide where I shit or piss, where I lay my head or rise, what I chase or don’t—I cannot even [Mage] without asking for permission,” He said, snapping at the final sentence.

  The wind was colder now, and the fire dying under its weight.

  “And I am no fool, Captain,” the King continued. “I have long since come to accept that my arms shall only spread as wide as my chains might let them. That if I run I will either be found, returned, or killed. Either by the Republic, by its allies, or by its enemies. But I thought that perhaps, I could live with this. Because I have family. And then one died, and then the other tried to kill me. And now, I think, perhaps the Captain should have left me in the snow.”

  ###

  Snegovetska Central Post

  Zimnyaya Street 3

  Snegovetska, Cheremshanka Governorate

  Bessmertnyy Empire

  General Volkov

  Bezdna Palace

  Bolshoy Sobytiya 33

  Lyubov, Bessmertnyy Empire

  23 Morozek 2227

  AN UPDATE TO THE ZNANIYE INCIDENT

  To General Volkov, Twin Consul of the Bessmertnyy Republic,

  Following my last dispatch regarding the neutralisation of the Zakadochnyy, there have been further developments you should be made aware of.

  Mister Navtej Volkov fell under suspicion of conspiring with the Zakadochnyy. Shortly after, he poisoned the King. His Majesty survived.

  The King and I tracked Mister Volkov to the southern border near Snegovetska. There was an engagement. We were unable to detain him. He crossed into Lezviye, and I believe he is well beyond our reach now.

  We are currently in Snegovetska, awaiting further instruction. This morning, we received an unexpected summons from Governor Viktor Kudrin, who claims the matter is of utmost urgency. He reports signs of a Voin force advancing toward the city.

  We will attend the meeting and assess the situation directly.

  Respectfully,

  Captain Sasha Osin