AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Does your side hurt?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Good. There’s a saying in the Court of War that the endless winds always come back around. Do bad things, and they come back on you, Prince Arin.”
“Yes, I am aware.” I clamped a hand to my side and grimaced at the wetness. The bandage was already soaked through. I may have broken the stiches. Damn it all to Dallin’s bottomless ocean and back.
I shoved from the chair too fast, making the balcony spin. Draven’s firm grip caught my arm. “You were told to rest,” he said, and I couldn’t tell if he was angry or if that was the tone of his broken voice.
“Yes, well…” The nausea waned and I brushed him off. “Thank you, I just… I can do this.” After pulling off my jerkin, I removed the shirt, stopped in front of the mirror behind the washbasin, and peeled back the bandage. Razak’s two stab wounds had gaped like two puckered mouths. They’d been sewn shut, and the stiches remained in place, weeping some from strain. My head spun. I gripped the washstand.
“Why didn’t you kill Lark?” Draven asked from somewhere behind me.
The representatives of Justice had asked the same. Why hadn’t I killed the traitor among my court? They’d heard the rumors from those who had escaped the feasting hall. I’d held a blade to Lark’s neck, but even after my father’s death, I hadn’t killed the man Razak had admitted to being a spy.
“Why?” Because despite his lies, his game playing, despite years of his manipulation, I knew the taste of his lips, the feel of his body quivering against my own, and I knew his heart, beneath all of that, was good.
“Because.” I sighed, looking up at Draven’s reflection behind mine. “Despite my best efforts, I cannot change who I am.” I wasn’t a killer, and even if I had been, Lark had danced his way around my heart. “I am the Prince of Love, whatever that means now. I am not capable of killing, not even someone who betrayed me… as Lark did.”
“You knew who he was, even before I told you?” Draven persisted. “Didn’t you?”
“I suspected, yes.” I poured water into the basin and splashed it over my face.
“Then why were you so enraged by the truth that night in my chamber? Why did you attack me?”
“Not for the reasons you think.” I could say no more. If the Court of War learned how I’d spared Lark because Icaredfor him, they’d think me Razak’s puppet too. I’d known Lark hailed from the Court of Pain, but I hadn’t known the details Draven had imparted that night. I hadn’t known how Lark had once escaped his court, or how he’d been found in the slums, singing for scraps, and other things… It wasn’t right, Lark being used like that. Draven’s information had shocked me into a rage. The Lark I knew to be hiding beneath all his flamboyant layers did not deserve that life. I’d had to keep his secrets hidden, and in my fury, I’d perhaps cut Draven a little too deep.
I patted my face dry on a towel and turned to face the warlord. “Your voice is returning.”
Draven touched the small bandage at his neck. “A little more each day.”
With my court gone, I didn’t need to be the man I’d created—aloof, untouchable, his emotions guarded against all. It would take some time to shake that act, but I could begin here, now.
“Iamsorry, Draven,” I said. “I’m sorry for all of it. I thought I could be as cruel as my enemy, but I was wrong. It cost me everything.” Grief tried to choke me. I swallowed it. “I suppose there is a lesson in all this somewhere.”
“Don’t fuck with the Court of Pain?”
That was certainly one.
“I’m sorry too,” Draven said. He approached, and it was only now I noticed his two curved daggers, one at either hip. Most of the warlords and ladies openly carried weapons. But did he mean to use them on me? He stopped and looked me in the eye. “I’m sorry for all the love you have lost. Despite your actions, I would not wish what befell you upon anyone.”
A nod was all I could muster. Any more, and I might not fight my way back from despair. “Despite the name, there was little love in my court. Our family was not as harmonious as we made it appear.”
“Few are,” he said, as though speaking from experience. “You have wine?”
“Wine? I doubt it. Unless your prisoners are routinely left with wine in their closets?” As with their weapons, the people of War liked to have wine close by at all times. It seemed to be a terrible combination, but in my short time here, almost everything was terrible.
Draven began searching the wardrobes and dressers I hadn’t yet had time to open. “Ah ha! Welcome to War.” He triumphantly raised a bottle he’d found and then the cups, then set about pouring us both drinks.
Draven seemed like a good soul. He’d saved me when he didn’t have to. I owed him more than angry retorts and bitterness. But with my body, head, and heart bruised, I was having a hard time finding much good in anything. “Thank you, Draven.”
He handed over a glass of wine. “No need for thanks, Arin.”
“No, I mean for… saving me. And I’m sorry, for being an asshole.”
He laughed, raising his glass. “Let’s drink to that.”
I tasted the drink, found it spicy and warm, and swallowed it down. I’d heard how War cultivated enormous vineyards that were half submerged in the ground to keep them from wilting in the sun. I’d heard a great many things about the Court of War. They were warriors, all, men and women alike. Every child was raised with a weapon in their hand.
