Elska opens one eye, then promptly closes it again. Okay, less slumbering than I thought. Or maybe I just wasn’t that silent.
‘I made you a pain reliever,’ I say to Kyor, aware he’s watching me. ‘It’s strong. It’ll help.’ On the other side of the room I decant a small portion of the potion into a cup that’s relatively clean. It’ll have to do.
Everything here will have to do.
I return to his side and as Kyor takes the cup in his good hand, I help lift his head enough that he can sip from it.
‘That tastes foul,’ he complains.
‘It’ll do the job. Suck it up and drink it, princeling.’
He levels a glare at me but drinks the rest of the tincture dose without complaint. As my stomach rumbles, I grab a couple of the remaining stale rolls and determinedly take a bite. It takes some effort to crunch my way into it, but I’m too tired and too hungry to be fussy. There’s no chance Kyor can expend this type of energy just to eat, not when he’s as weak as he is, so I use my dagger to hack a second roll intosmaller chunks and dip them into water to soften so they’re easier to consume. In terms of a meal, soggy bread is definitely not fit for a prince, but he eats without complaint.
With Kyor seen to, I pour some water into a bowl for Elska.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say, rubbing my eyes. ‘They don’t have spare meat to give to you here.’
‘She’s okay,’ Kyor tells me. ‘She’ll hunt later when the others have joined us.’ He looks around. ‘Where the hell are we?’
‘The slums in Galreck. We rode ahead.’
He blinks. ‘You found me a healer in the slums?’
‘You’ve just got to know the right person to ask. I presumed you wouldn’t want one of the court physicians tending to you?’
‘No,’ he agrees instantly. ‘The last thing I need is Father’s sycophantic spies reporting back on me.’
A knot coils in my stomach. No doubt part of that is because he is ashamed of me, of riding with me.
I’m his dirty little secret.
I try to push the bitterness away. I’m grateful he’s still alive, and that is what I should focus on.
‘It’s so cold,’ he mutters, and I realise he’s shivering.
‘It’s the slums,’ I shrug. ‘Residual magic from the heart of the cities doesn’t make it out this far, and fires are at a premium. I managed to get us a flop, but I burned the only log we had when the healer was working on you. You’ll feel warm enough soon. Robbard’s tincture will make it so you can’t feel anything but goodness.’
It’s a dangerous potion. The type of pain reliever that stops you feeling the warning signs from your body. My father warned me of countless men and women who had abused the tincture, making their lives and injuries worse, but I have no intention of letting Kyor do that.
‘It’s so fucking cold,’ Kyor complains again between clenched teeth.
‘I know.’
Being here with Kyor, in the slums, brings back all the years of living with Kay in abject squalor. It’s not like it’s even been a moon since I won our wealth and powers back, yet somehow, since the Retterheld, I’ve already forgotten the acute misery of being wretchedly poor. Of livingwith nothing and no one to protect me, with no warmth, no food, and no safety.
I climb back onto the pallet that passes as a bed and settle myself so I’m draped across him as much as possible, sharing what paltry warmth I can.
‘I hate being cold,’ he confesses.
‘Too used to the finery of the High Hold?’ I tease lightly.
He shakes his head a little. ‘Bad memories. When I was a child, if I did something wrong, Father would make me strip naked outside, and he would throw a bucket of ice water over me. He would leave me standing there until my lips were blue and my teeth were chattering. He and Mother would always row when he did it, and though it never stopped him, I loved her for being bold enough to scream at him for it.’
I’m so taken aback, so fucking horrified, that I can’t find words to respond to his confession. I knew about the burning – Korvane using his power on Kyor to test his resolve by seeing how long he could burn him for – but leaving him in ice, too? What the actual fuck?
Andthisman is our king? The one who oversees the health and wellness of all his subjects? It’s no surprise there are rebels willing to lay down their lives to kill him. If he treats his own son in such a way, the rest of us don’t stand a chance.
‘Sometimes it wasn’t me. Sometimes he made me watch while he tortured others,’ he continues. ‘He thought it was good for me. That it’d make me strong. Hardy. Follow his orders without hesitation or thought.’ As the words spill, I realise that this unexpected confession isn’t because of his near-death experience; it’s because the Robbard’s tincture has loosened his tongue.
