"What?"
"It is not your fault she died. How many times do we need to have this conversation?"
"She was out that day because of me."
"She was out because she wanted to work."
"Because I was so unpleasant for her to be around." I was a terrible husband, but in my defence, my father shouldn't have married me off as a teenager.
"Rexxan," she repeats, exasperated. Her hand rests on my forearm, gently undoing the gold cufflinks on my linen shirt and sliding the sleeve over my skin. White scars from ancient battlefields slice through the tanned skin of my arms, but they're not what she's looking for. Her glowing blue eyes land on the scars that cover the top half of my forearms. "Do they hurt today?"
They're excruciating. Every single day. "A little. Yours?"
She smiles, but it's resigned, and I know we're both just lying to each other; worn down and wearied by a lifetime of lying to please others. "Rarely. Mine are ever so small compared to yours. I got off lightly."
"No one alive that day got off lightly," I grumble, removing her hand from my sleeve and rolling it back down. I still remember the screams the day that fire rained down from the sky. I witnessed my parents die, then my brother. I watched it happen right in front of me. I had a new wife too, and a newborn son. I couldn't save her from the fire either, and as quickly as I had been married, I was widowed.
My marriage was arranged by my father to an Evergreen noblewoman I'd never met. I never loved her, but she was good to me. Alia gave me a son and volunteered as a healer in her spare time. Her death hit me hard, and I have always blamed myself. If my son had not survived, I'd have killed myself that day.
I shudder, trying to banish the visions of fire raining down over the entire earth, all caused by the actions of one delusional individual who saw fit to cause the eruption of Pyra, the giant volcano to our north. Ocealia lost her brother and mother, and so became Queen when she least expected it. We are united in grief, friends throughout the ages.
She straightens up, stepping away from the balcony. "I must rest. I've had a long month of travelling."
"Of course," I walk across the balcony to open the door for her. Retrya, a tall woman with a shaved head, brown skin, and biceps that rival Ellatar's, gives me a warm smile and kisses my cheek.
"Rexxan, thank you so much for having us here."
I kiss her back. "You're both welcome here."
They like it here, I know. My people are more relaxed, more accepting, perhaps, than those in her own kingdom. She may be the queen, but Ocealia has never found the courage to marry her long-time partner, worried about what her more traditional people will make of it. It is not my place to intervene, and they've always been happy despite not being married, but I know they feel they can breathe a little easier in my own kingdom.
Ocealia tiptoes up to press her lips to my cheek and smiles as she walks past me. "I wish you'd let the world see you as you really are, Rexxan. Goodnight."
I don’t understand what the fuck that is supposed to mean. The women in my life love to make cryptic comments at me at the moment, and it's wearing my patience down.
I only sleep a couple of days a week, thanks to my Evergreen bloodline and the fact that my grandfather, Xal, was the God of the Skies, so as the evening sky gives way to the pitch-black night, I head into my weapons room. I grab my lightest sword, a bow and some arrows, and shrug on a black cloak over my black leather hunting gear. I step into heavy dark boots, stalking out of my halls and down to the palace stables.
Beneath the cold, callous ruler, I am a hunter at heart. It's what I had chosen as a career until I unexpectedly became king. My father had me and my brother trained and educated in everything under the sun. By the time I was ninety-five, I could heal to the highest standard, survive months in the freezing wilderness, speak every language, command armies, play instruments, and even build boats. But it is in hunting that my heart has always been. I'd spend my life out in that forest if I could.
I whittle the night away out in the Dark Forest, hunting for spies and other foul creatures. It is not a safe place to be, but my magic weaves its way around the trees, and the animals don't run from me. This forest is an extension of my being, a part of myself in the same way that I am a part of it. I stride past trees that I knew as saplings, rivers that I knew as streams, centuries trodden paths that I myself created as a boy. I follow the giant tracks in the mud, tracking a wolf from the Cataclysmic Flats that I suspect has been sent by the enemy to kill my people.
It's no small task, but after three hours and a violent fight, I kill it and rip the tag off the collar, freezing with intrigue when I hear another rustle behind me.
I slip another arrow into my bow, listening carefully to the steady beat of unfamiliar footsteps as I turn slightly west. Through the trees, I catch a glimpse of a human form, hooded and cloaked.Oh, joy. A fly in my web.
"Trespassing is forbidden," I say, lowering my bow. No other human could pose a threat to me, so I let my arrow hang lazily at my side. "Come out."
Silence, save for the gentle breeze caressing the forest canopy. My disappointed sigh is lost in the humid air. "If hide and seek is the game you want to play, I'll gladly join.” In the darkness, my fingers pull the arrow back. I watch the figure move through the trees, and I know they think they've got away with it. I almost laugh at the stupidity.
They think the confines of my palace end with the gates and the stone walls, but they’re wrong. Every tree, every river, every cave. It’sallmy palace, and you cannot outrun a King in his own palace.
It's not usually like me to be merciful, so perhaps I am in a wine-induced good mood, because I find myself aiming to slow them down rather than to kill. I release my fingers, and a decisively female yelp fills the stagnant forest air.
"You bastard!" Comes a soft voice, shouting, but somehow delicate too. "I was going to come out!"
Shit. I'm glad I didn't shoot to kill. She looks small. A figure stumbles out from the trees, hooded and cloaked in black. I can't see her eyes, but a dark glossy ponytail creeps out the hood and down to her waist. She freezes a little when she sees me as if needing a moment to take me in. I'd take pity on her, but countless knives and daggers sit across her thighs, waist and wrists.
This is no lost traveller.
