Page 6

Physicians looked up at him in surprise, but none dared to object. They broke into a scramble, some lifting the bleeding soldiers off their feet and carrying them through the tent alleys.

Xerxes rubbed his eyes and headed for his quarters. “General!” he shouted, his voice echoing across the rock cove. A torch warmed his cheek as he passed it. A second later, he stopped and turned around when he heard no footsteps behind him. He leaned to peek around the nearest tents, but the middle-aged man who complained too much was nowhere in sight.

Xerxes stifled an eye roll as he marched the rest of the way through the camp toward a tent at the back with the royal crest stitched into the fabric, a tent he shared with the General. Normally a king wouldn’t share sleeping quarters with anyone, but with how many supplies they’d lost over time, there wasn’t enough space for him to be picky anymore.

He threw the flap aside as he came in. “Gen…”

General Reza lay on his bed, fast asleep. The arrow was missing from his arm, and a thick white bandage wrapped the spot—a treatment that must have happened on the walk while Xerxes had been distracted by his own thoughts. Reza’s blanket was scrunched at his ankles like he’d been kicking at it. Xerxes contemplated yelling to wake him, but if Reza’s actions these last weeks told Xerxes anything, it was that older men needed more time to recover, and Reza was ill on top of that. Was it cruel to wake Reza, even though they had to pack? Xerxes hugged his arms to himself and paced across the tent. He whirled when he reached the end, and he caught Reza peeking an eye open before quickly slamming it shut again.

Xerxes halted at his bedside. “General!” he barked.

Reza jumped, then peeled his eyes open and dragged them over to Xerxes.

“Divinities, why are you pretending to sleep if you know I’m here?”

Reza sighed, kicking the covers off his cot where they hit the sand in a pile. He swung his legs over the bedside, yawned, and smoothed down his brown-gray beard. “I’m not the General, Your Majesty. I stopped being the General of this army the moment you showed up here to lead it. Every soldier with Per-Siana blood across this vast desert is looking to you for answers. You’re the only one here looking to me.”

Xerxes’s lips parted. He took in a breath to speak but closed his mouth instead, jaw sliding to the side. Finally, he muttered, “Maybe I should have left you at the foot of that dune when you got shot.”

Reza rasped a laugh and smacked his belly. “No, instead you dragged me back and made me run across the desert while injured.” He stood, retrieved his blanket, shook the sand off, and spread it neatly over his cot. A wince crossed his face when he reached to fold it, and Xerxes glanced at the blood leaking through his shoulder bandage. “I wish you’d left me by that dune,” Reza added with a murmur not quiet enough.

Xerxes made a tsking sound. He chewed on the inside of his cheek for a moment and brushed sand off his leathers and boots. Then he eyed the General’s back. “I’m deciding what to do next. The Division One leaders are going to want an answer from me. Of course we should run, right? Or do we… do something else?”

Reza folded his burly arms and turned to face Xerxes with an obnoxiously indecipherable look. “If your men want an answer, Your Majesty, then give them one. Stop being so afraid of your own mind to make a decision on your own.” The words hung in the air for a second like a dagger over Xerxes’s head, waiting to drop. And as if he hadn’t just said something so unthinkable, Reza sailed past Xerxes and left the tent. The sound of the General’s whistling joined the noises of the camp, getting quieter the further away he got.

Xerxes stood stone-still, his fingers frozen at his sides, his feet stuck in place. Not only had Reza just blatantly committed a crime by leaving the King’s presence without permission, but…

“Stop being afraid of your own mind.”

Xerxes’s toes curled in his boots, his flesh going taut like he expected it to turn grey and slick like a monster. But he didn’t change. And he wouldn’t. He knew that.

Tension drained from his muscles. His hands unclasped themselves as moisture glazed over his eyes, and he shook his head slowly. “I can’t,” he whispered after Reza, even though the General couldn’t hear. “I can’t do this alone, you classless buffoon.” It wasn’t about skill; after a lifetime of training, Xerxes was one of the best strategists and swordsmen in the army, but the General must have already known that.

He charged out of the tent, searching the walkways for Reza, a speech on mandatory royal etiquette ready on his tongue. It didn’t matter that they were out in the desert, rules were rules. But the mist-saturated tent city gave no clues of which direction the General had gone, and Xerxes slowed his march. Soldiers rushed by with fear-stricken faces and bags slung over their shoulders. Horses were being fed, wagons being loaded. Only the lookouts were heading off into the desert with their horns strapped to their belts and jugs of water in their hands.

Reza’s gravelly voice came from behind him, along with the sound of heavy, raspy breathing. “I’m injured, Your Majest—Xerxes. Don’t I get a break?”

Xerxes turned with a fresh glare. He reached into the hidden pocket of his leathers beneath his breastplate and yanked out the map, then held it up before Reza when he unfolded it. “Where would you suggest we go now?” he asked flat out.

Why did his voice come out like it was begging?

Glowing firelight bled over the crinkled paper as Reza sauntered toward the hand-drawn map with a sigh, twisting a lock of his beard. After a moment, he peeked around it at Xerxes, scratched his chin, then folded his arms. “Xerxes, you do know I’m not actually your advisor—”

“No one else here has experience enforcing the borders like you do, General, not even me. So where would you send our divisions? If the men were asking you for an answer?” Xerxes clarified, shaking the map a little until Reza took it.

Xerxes clasped his hands together in front of him. His leg twitched with the urge to pace, but he kept still. A pair of lantern-carrying soldiers bowed as they slipped by.

The General exhaled, his gaze tracing the lines of the drawing. He lifted a finger and pointed. “Here,” he said, and Xerxes’s shoulders relaxed. “There’s a desert oasis with a pool to replenish our water supply, and there might be animals nearby we can hunt. The priority right now is to hide somewhere that has water and food. If we seclude ourselves in the wrong part of the desert, we’ll die of thirst if they trap us in.”

Xerxes nodded as he thought that over. Reza was being optimistic. Even if they found an oasis, it likely wouldn’t provide much food. “Of course. You’re right.” He took the map back and rolled it up. “We’ll do that then.”

“But Xerxes…” The middle-aged man’s brows were pulled together, his mouth tipped into a frown. “It won’t matter where we go. Alecsander will follow our tracks. He’s going to come for you.”

Xerxes tightened the scroll, studying it for creases. He spotted one at the corner and smoothed it out. Then he glanced in the direction of his tent, wondering how he was going to stuff his entire blanket into his satchel. Normally servants would have done it for him, but with such short notice of their move, he imagined they were all busy—

“Xerxes.”

Xerxes’s attention snapped back to Reza. “What?”