“Fine, probably you’re right. But even if he does, the man isn’t exactly loyal to the crown and especially not to me. Why would he help?”
“You’re right,” she admitted, “Petran is not loyal to the crown, but he is loyal to the truth, that above all else. It’s the reason why the people love him so. He will share the truth of the prince’s existence—of his birthright—not in service to you but simply in service to the truth.”
He frowned. “Maybe. It will be dangerous.”
She shrugged. “The truth is always dangerous, Prince. After all, it’s the reason why Feledias saw fit to throw Petran into the dungeons in the first place just as it’s the reason why your brother will never—can never—stop until Matt is dead.”
She could have given him more reasons, a thousand to show him that her idea—while dangerous—was their only option, but she did not. Instead, she only stood silently, watching him, knowing that the tornado chose its path the way it would and no one—certainly not a foolish old woman with her best years far behind her—could leash it and guide it the way another might guide a dog. Besides, while Feledias was always known for his cleverness, for his ability as a tactician and a troop commander and Cutter, his brother, known only as a killer, Maeve knew the man well enough to know that he was no fool himself, possessed of a cunning many would not have credited him with.
Still, he took his time, considering. Then, finally he grunted. “It will not be easy, sneaking into the capital and into the dungeons to free him.”
And that was all. For all his faults—and as far as she was concerned, Maeve thought the man had many—one of those things she had always admired about her prince was that, once a task was before him, no matter how grim, he did not hesitate as most did. Instead, as with so many other things in his life, he charged directly at it as if it were some enemy to be conquered. “No,” she said, “it won’t be easy. But then…when is it?”
He nodded then let out a heavy breath. “Okay. We’ll leave tomorrow.”
She put a hand on his shoulder, felt him tense beneath her. “You’re doing the right thing.”
He grunted, turning back to stare at the flame. “I hope you’re right.”
She watched him then. Others, not knowing him as well as she did, might not have seen the tenseness in his posture, might not have noticed the worry lines in his eyes, but she did, and she knew that that tenseness, that worry, was not for himself but for the boy. The love, it seemed, that he had felt for the mother had been transferred to her son.
“Will you rest?” she said. “If we are to go to the capital, we have a long journey ahead of us.”
“Later,” he said, and though it was only the single word, she could hear the dismissal in it. Not a rude one, but one that spoke of deep thoughts, one that spoke of the many fears and worries plaguing him.
“Goodnight, Bernard,” she said softly. He did not turn or answer, his gaze, instead, remaining locked on the flames, on the corpses burning somewhere inside of them. Life all around him but now, as was so often the case, his gaze was locked on the dead.
She left him there, with the dead and the fire, left him surrounded by weeping villagers and the darkness. The darkness which hid none of the grief, the pain, which could be heard in the sobbing wails of those the Fey had left behind. The darkness that did not hide her worries, her regrets, and her fear, a fear largely surrounded around the way that, for the first time ever, she had seen her prince’s mask—that mask of invincibility, of certainty—slip. Would it slip again, that mask? And would that slip happen when they needed it most? In the end, would she and those with her die not, as she had so long feared, because of the monster her prince could be, but because of the man he was?
No, the darkness did not hide her fear or her regrets. It did, however, hide the form of a figure lurking at the fire’s edge, just as it hid the deep, dark bruise on his face, one so very recently acquired. It also hid his expression—a mixture of terror and excitement. It hid, too, the man’s gaze, locked unerringly on Cutter’s hulking form. The man standing, lurking in the shadows, had lost his wife and more recently still, his pride. Some, in the face of such loss, would have crawled into a corner and closed their eyes, doing their best, in their grief, to forget about the world and hoping, too, that it might forget about them. But this man did not do that. In him, those losses, so recent, so fresh, served, as they sometimes did, like chisels, chipping away at who he was, at the life he had built for himself, and when all else was scoured away, there was nothing left but hate. No hope at all—save, perhaps, the hope of revenge.
The darkness hid the man’s features as they twisted in anger, but worst of all, it hid his furtive movements as he turned and disappeared into the shadows, heading for the village’s edge, leaving one prince behind in search of another.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
The lion does not thank the man who feeds it, just as it does not wonder at the life of that which it devours.
It takes the meat, eats it, just as, if the man is foolish and comes too close, it will take the hand which feeds it.
To the beast, after all, meat is meat.
And men, the gods help us, are not so very different. Not so very different at all.
—Words found in a
