"Guards!"
Prince John's angrily anxious face screws into a knot at me as he grapples with his sword belt. Nora and I had taken him by surprise, striding into his room as if the gods themselves would not stand in our way.
"My prince," I sigh, raising my hands in surrender. "I do not come for bloodshed. Put down your sword."
"Kiss my ass. Guards!"
Pounding noises emanate from outside the door, which Nora has barred behind us by shoving the hearth's iron poker through the two gilded door handles.
"My lord prince," Nora cordially curtsies beside me, scowling beautifully at her former regent. "If it would please you to just listen for a second-"
"It would not!" Prince John roars, finally wresting his blade free of his sheath and lunging towards me. Reflex flings my torso to the side, narrowly missing a thrust that skewers the wall behind my head. Cold conviction grips me as I watch him tear the ruby sword free of the wall and stumble backwards. His blonde hair is plastered across his livid face, but he has regained composure.
His next series of strikes bite the golden chandelier over my head and the brazier to my left, knocking candles and coals onto the dry carpet, which sparks almost immediately into life, spewing brown smoke into the air. All three of us cough, and the prince strikes again. I weave around the sword one last time before the blade of that old, ruby sword lodges deep within the maple bed frame of his kingly four-poster. With one deft motion, I break his grip on the sword and fling the covers of his bed overtop of him, turning my attention to the blaze eating outward from the carpet.
Nora comically tries stamping flames out while plugging her nose and watering at the eyes, and the shouts from outside grow louder. The soft iron poker bends slightly under the pounding force of the guard, and Prince John struggles blindly, cursing under his covers. I can't help but let out an insane laugh when I piece all of this together. Then, Nora's green eyes find mine, and suddenly my laughter is replaced with a healthy dose of terror.
Fire flickers beneath my skin, begging to join the newborn flames spewing clouds of corruption beneath us. Instead, I force the fire deeper within me, building a deep, burning core of raging magic in my stomach. The fire from the floor crawls toward me like a hound towards its quarry, biting deep into my flesh before disappearing into my body and leaving a peculiar, sticky feeling behind. Smoky craters stream a soft black luster, and the accusatory gleam in Nora's eyes fades to incredulity.
"You bloody idiot, standing there and laughing."
"Hey now, I wasn't the one to start this fire," I shoot back, straightening my sword-belt about my waist.
"Gah!" The prince's steel breaks into our reverie with a quick flurry approaching my left. The sword slices to and fro, seeking flesh to bury itself into.
"Will you cut that out?" I roar, ducking another horizontal swing.
"Eat shit and die, Dawn Warden!" he shouts his not quite unexpected answer, wresting his blade free once more. He never saw Nora sneak up behind him, but when he thrusts forward, a foot intercepts his path and his blade stabs deep into the wooden floor of this spacious room. The prince recovers, and aims a backhand at Nora, but I drive my shoulder through his back, tumbling both of us to the ground.
Trapped beneath the weight of a muscular man in his armor, the prince squirms and curses, fighting desperately against my steel embrace. Squirming does him little good, although the sheer volume of his insults irritates my left eardrum slightly.
"Guards!" he crows.
"Open up!" voices shout.
"Shut up!" Nora screams, moving towards me.
"I'll have you hanged!" the prince seethes, wiggling like a scarlet fish between my arms.
"You tried that once, Your Grace," I pant, constricting my body about his own. "Why do you want me dead so badly?"
"Because I know all about you, abomination!" he hisses, squeezing up onto his knees with me constricting my back. "Son of my enemy, and wielder of the sword that belongs to the true line of Alakai!"
"Are you dense?!" Nora fumes, storming up to his kneeling form to stand over him. "That sword was Kil'dar's and now it belongs to Raphael by right. And your real enemies are marching on your walls!"
"You don't understand!" The prince roars, flying to his feet and breaking my grip.
"Then explain," I say simply, sitting back and crossing my legs. The confusion that washes over the prince's bugging features rolls palpably at my vulnerability.
"Raphael," warns Nora as John draws a dagger from his belt.
"If you must kill me," I deadpan over the turmoil in my stomach. "Do it."
"Raphael!"
"Don't interfere."
"No! Stop it, I'll-"
The prince cuts her off as he lunges toward me, slipping the lithe blade onto my neck and holding it there. Every nerve in my body screams at the cold touch of the knife under my jaw. One slip of his hand and my life will run red between my fingers. He trembles as he looks at me, emotions running onto his face like wet paint upon a canvas. The uneasiness in his eyes matches the screaming grip in my own heart, but I know what must be done. Fear will not stand in my way again, and it is this resolve that keeps my backside pinned to the floor, and my gaze level with his.
He trembles as the knife slips, drawing a shallow scratch of pain onto my neck, but the blood that oozes out is nowhere near enough to end my life, nor was it meant to, I know. His scent clouds about me he holds his knife to my throat- spiced wine and the overpowering aroma of lavender. We sit there like this, each willing the other to move.
"You owe me your life, Prince John," I chide, moving his knife away with a finger much more steady than I feel it should be. The pounding on the door increases as Prince John lets out a choked wail, plunging the dagger into the ground and stepping off of me. "You will not kill me."
"Why," chokes Nora, shaking on the prince's bed. "Do you want to kill Raphael so badly?"
"My father went away when I was still a boy, and never sent so much as a word home," he begins, holding his softly weeping face in his hands. "After a couple years, I had thought that he had forgotten all about me- that he didn't want me anymore. Imagine my surprise when my father wrote me from the warfront last year, telling me that once I found the Dawn Warden and killed him, he would come home."
"My Prince," I mutter tentatively. "Your father is dead, and has been for a long time."
"I know." He is positively weeping now, rubbing his red face on his cloak with as much dignity as he can muster. "I think I knew all along, but I never wanted to believe."
"I know what it is to lose people. My adoptive father, my father, and my trainer have been slain because of who I am. I have suffered enough without your help, my prince." I look upon my prince in scorn as I reply, forcing my hackles to stay down.
"The Dawn Wardens are traitors!" He seethes, still sobbing slightly. "Their order denies sovereignty to the crown."
"If you truly believed that, I'd be dead by now."
He pauses, and the anger slips from his brow, leaving behind a pale, tear-streaked boy grieving with two of his sworn enemies.
"My father, King Maximus, always told me that the Dawn Warden should be revered and respected for daring to stand alone to against the wrath of tyrants. He never told me to kill anyone before. He hated killing. I remember how grim he looked the day he called his banners and marched off."
"Your father was a good man," I solemnly nod.
"Did you ever meet him?"
"You mean you don't remember?"
"Open the gods-damned door!" roars a guard, ramming into the door. Nora has set about wedging everything she can under the door, and starts as the door jars.
"This won't hold forever, boys," she chides with an undercurrent of anxiety palpable through her firm warning.
"My prince," I begin, choking back a grin. "When we were lads I broke my wooden sword over your head for talking bad about my friend."
"I don't recall."
"You had that same sword! You don't remember our duel?"
He shrugs as I reply. "I'm sorry, that doesn't ring a bell."
The door thumps inward some more, and Nora screeches across the floor. "Guys!"
"Doesn't matter," I shake my head. "But my prince, now that I have your attention I wanted to tell you that your city will be besieged very soon by the false king of Ocean Province."
Instantly, a shadow crosses the young prince's face, casting his shining cheeks in an expression of chilled determination where tears once roamed. "Madness," he mutters. "Go back to your barbarian people, Raphael of the Mountains, and lie to me no more."
"My prince," I huff, firing to my feet. "The Barbarian tribe of Chat'thakka is no more, and I bore witness to their demise."
"So did I!" shouts Nora, spread-eagled against the besieged door.
"But, if what you say is true," the prince ponders, features cast directly from grief into a brainstorming pallor. "King Nestor is dead too. And the barbarians..." Suddenly, he snaps upright as the pieces click together in his head. "David."
Nora steps back from the door just as three burly men bust it down and pile on top of the ornate, wooden shards. "My prince, you called," they gasp in unison, sweat running rivulets down their face and into their breastplates. The prince spares them a disappointed, disgusted glance before returning to me.
"I would have you stay and help defend my city. We will have need of every sword we can get our hands upon."
"Your Grace," I reply, kneeling solemnly to his feet and saluting with my fist across my chest. "T'would be an honor." He nods his head pensively, and then turns to his guards.
"You! What's your name?" he spits.
"Er... Ban, m'lord."
"Summon the small counsel, and be thankful I do not cast you from the ramparts for taking so long to heed my call. You and you," he points successively at each of the other quaking guards in turn. "Go send my fastest messenger to Kil'desh telling the Lord in the Sand to bring his army, and summon the engineers. I will have need of every scorpion and trebuchet they have."
He turns to us, once more a picture of royal elegance and curt command. "I will send for you shortly to sit the small counsel and give testament to what you've seen."
I walk over to Nora and grin. "We did it," I whisper, elation singing its bright melody through my bones. She looks up at me, and shakes her head.
"Raphael," she whispers back, brushing a thumb along the blood caked at my neck. "You're such an idiot."
"It takes an idiot to carry a sword, My Lady," I reply, quoting Isaac from long ago. Rolling her eyes, she shoves lightly at my chest and walks out the door, incredulity trailing behind her like a gown's train.
"And somebody," roars Prince John, drawing a golden circlet about his brow, "Get this gods-damned carpet out of here!"