"Please explain to me," Started Kian as we walked to the stables, "your rule again."
I narrowed my eyes at him and said, "I only hurt those who deserve it." Kian grasped my arm suddenly and jerked me back to stand in front of me.
"Now explain to me-"
"I do not need to explain myself to you!" I exploded. Kian blinked and opened his mouth to say something, but I beat him to it. "I just do as I'm told because I'm held by your father against my will." I was steaming by now. My blood was boiling hot and I just couldn't stop. "Now why don't you tell me what your rule is? You're not held against your will. You're not blackmailed. You are no better than me you son of a-"
"You have no right to talk to me in that manner!" Kian's blood was just as hot as mine.
My mouth shut with an audible snap. Scowling, I inched dangerously closer to Kian so that I could feel our breaths meet in the air between us.
"You are no better than me, prince," I hissed. "You could very easily march back into that house and give that pitiful man back his money, just like how you want to ever so badly. Then you could go grab some of your thousands of coins and give that to your father." I sucked in a breath, keeping contact with Kian's eyes. "But you won't, will you?" When Kian looked away, I sighed. "Now who's really the bad guy?"
Before Kian could do anything, I spun on my heel and sped walked into the stable. As soon as I got to Story's stable I fumbled with the knot that tied her to the railing.
What's wrong, asked Story noticing my anxiousness.
"Nothing," I said through clenched teeth. Finally, I got the knot undone and I jumped onto Story. Go, I ordered Story.
Yes ma'am.
***
Kian and I did not stop once on the way back to the palace. Neither of us wanted to spend the night together in the forest so we just kept riding till we made it back to the palace. It had just hit twilight when Story and I trotted into the stables and Kian and his horse were a few minutes behind.
Once we got in the palace, Kian led me down unfamiliar hallways; we obviously weren't going to the small room I was oh so familiar with. I came to the conclusion that we were going to the King's chambers to give to him what we had sought out to get.
Kian stopped in front of a door that didn't look any grander than the next. When he raised his hand to knock, I stepped in front of him, twisted the golden knob viciously, and threw the door open wide.
"Saar!" I yelled as the door hit the wall with a loud bang. "I brought presents!" I stepped over the threshold into the small silver walled room.
King Saar flinched at the sound of the door banging. He took one look at me and noticeably cringed into the chair he sat on that was positioned behind a large wooden desk in the center of the room.
Saar glanced to his left and I followed his gaze to a man that leaned against Saar's desk. This man met my eyes with eyes the color of a green meadow. He was all angles. His jaw was sharp and chiseled; his cheekbones were profound; even his wild, dark brown hair stuck out in many different angles. Freckles were spread across his nose and cheeks and some peaked out from underneath his blue tunic.
My eyes fell to the rest of him, curious as to who this man was. The tunic he wore hung on his strong, but very slender torso. Instead of a sheathed sword strapped around his waist, he had a quiver fastened across his chest and a long bow laid a top of the King's desk. Peeking out from under his collar was a trajectory rune that was fairly strong.
So he had good aim, I thought, but what was he doing here?
The man's eyes also ran up and down my body, but when Kian shifted on his feet behind me, the man's eyes slid to Kian. A smile lit up on his face and he stepped out from behind the desk. "Ah, brother," he exclaimed.
"Cress," said Kian as he stepped out from behind me. The man, apparently named Cress, opened his arms wide and wrapped them around Kian, clapping him loudly on the back.
"It is good to see you, little brother," laughed Cress.
Oh so this was Kian's brother, but they look nothing alike. Kian trumped Cress in muscle and size, but I bet Cress trumped Kian in intelligence and how much people liked him.
"And you," said Cress as he directed his attention towards me, "must be Laika." He smiled warmly at me and placed himself in front of me. "A pleasure to meet your acquaintances." Cress grasped my hand and brought it up to his lips. Practically growling, I snatched my hand from his grasp as if his lips had singed my skin. Cress only let out a deep chuckle.
"Maddoxia, please," sighed the King smiling slightly as he shook his head. Cress's face scrunched up in disgust and he turned to face his father.
"You are still the only person who calls me by my first name," informed Cress. King Saar only grunted in a reply. Cress returned to meet my gaze, the side of his mouth hooked in a smile. He looked over my face, his eyes full of wonder. I scowled at him and his face only brightened more. Cress opened his mouth to speak, but as soon as he did, I looked over his shoulder and side stepped around him.
"Saar!" I sang as I walked up to his desk. The King looked up from a scroll he held in his hand and smiled faintly at me.
"What is it you bring me?" asked Saar. I met Kian's eyes and he stepped up to the King's desk and opened his fist over top of it. A leather bag full of coins dropped onto the wood with a loud chink.
King Saar looked at the small pouch disappointingly. Kian noticed this and his fists clenched tightly as a fire burned in his eyes. He looked like he wanted to punch his father.
"Oh!" The King's attention was returned to me. "There's one more thing," I said excitedly.
I shoved my hand into my pocket and brought out the rune soul. "Are you in need of a mathematics rune for one of your accountants, Your Majesty?" A smile stretched across the King's face and he stood and walked around his desk.
"I do, now that I think about it," started Saar," have an accountant who's young and rather stupid." Saar reached his hand out to take the soul. "I'll keep it here for safe keep-" Hastily, I pulled my hands, with the rune soul in them, out of the King's reach, holding it high in the air as if a child were jumping to get it.
"I am sorry King," I apologized, moving my hands close to my chest to shield the rune soul from his vision, "but you cannot touch it. If anyone, but me touches a rune soul it is, for some odd reason, obliterated. I haven't the faintest idea as to why. I'm just special I guess." I gave a childish smile then continued. "Do you have a vial?"
The King fumbled and stuttered as he processed what I just said. "Uh, yes! Yes I do." King Saar went back behind his desk and pulled open the drawers. While Saar searched his desk, I could feel Cress's gaze on me as if he were trying to dissect me and find out what I am made of. It filled me with this uncanny feeling.
"Ah," sighed the King as he went around his desk once again with a clear vial in his hand. He handed it to me and I put the rune inside then handed it back to him. Saar held the vial in his hands as if it were a fragile egg, fascination in his eyes. "I'll set up a time with my accountant so you can, um," Saar cleared his throat, "put it in him."
"Great," I nodded. "Now," I said turning to Kian," if you'll escort me back to my cell, I am-"
"Wait," interrupted Cress. He narrowed his eyes at Kian. "You have her sleeping in a cell?"
Kian looked back at Cress with half confusion and half anger. "Laika is a prisoner-"
"That is absurd," belted Cress. He spun around to look at the King. "If I may, father." Saar nodded and Cress spun back around quickly to continue chastising Kian. "A woman such as herself, spending the night in a cell? I'll escort Miss Laika to one of our many available rooms and send a maid to draw her a bath." Kian stared at Cress with wide eyes as if Cress was parading around the room naked.
"Care for a tour?" Cress asked me courteously as he opened the door and stepped aside to let me through. He smiled at me cheerfully and I looked back at him the same way Kian was. Cress's meadow green eyes were swimming with kindness and wonder, but not a speck of fear I was so used to people looking at me with.
My eyebrows came together as I searched for an answer I could give him, but before I could decide, he looped his arm in mine and pulled me out door.
***
"Well," said Cress cheerfully, "what would you like to see first?" I looked up at him and I was about to demand he tell me what was wrong with him when my stomach growled loudly.
Cress glanced down at my belly and let out a bout of rumbling laughter. "The kitchen it is," exclaimed Cress. I was very hungry so I wasn't about to argue with that.
"So?" I spoke after we started walking down the hallway. "Maddoxia?" Cress's nose wrinkled and now it was my turn to laugh.
"My mother named me," he explained. "Where she is from it is tradition for the mother to name the first born son instead of the father. So my mother named me after her grandmother." I threw my head back in laughter and Cress's face cracked in a smile. "Go ahead and laugh. Thanks to my father he gave me the middle name Christopher, Cress for short, that everyone, but my mother calls me by. But when my mother passed away, my father started calling me Maddoxia." I looked up at Cress and his face was emotionless. The air was suffocating.
"Was your mother from Hama?" I asked. The question lightened the mood and lessened the density of the air around us.
"Yes. How did you know?"
"Hama is a strange place," I said plainly. "Strange place for strange traditions and names."
"It is very strange, isn't it?" Cress said this with a distant, happy look on his face as if he was remembering something.
"Have you been to Hama," I asked.
"Yes, once." Cress turned his head towards me and our green eyes met. "It was for my grandfather's birthday and it was a interesting visit. Hama is just a weird place full of crazy people."
"Sounds like my kind of people," I laughed and Cress laughed with me. Our laughter was interrupted by a low rumble that came from my stomach and was quickly followed by more laughter from us.
"Come on," chuckled Cress. "Let's get you to the dining hall."
***
"It smells so good," I moaned as a quivering maid set a silver dome in front of me on the dark wood dining table. The moonlight that pierced through the large windows, that lined the two walls exposed to the outside, reflected off the silver as the maid lifted it. I began to salivate at the mouth of the smell of the delicious chicken and potatoes.
"En-enjoy," whispered the maid as she curtsied stiffly. When I met the small maid's gaze, she cringed away in fear. I immediately noticed that she had no rune and she rung her red hands nervously. I was curious so I slipped into her mind and learned her story. This maid worked relentlessly at the palace to bring money home to her mother whom was dying from an unforgiving disease. Although she be timid, she was beautiful and had a compassionate heart from what I observed in her head. I had no reason to let her fear me.
I smiled and praised, "Thank you so much." The maid was obviously taken back, but quickly recovered and her stiff expression softened. She smiled slightly, curtsied once more, and then hurried back through the door from which she came.
"Well," said Cress who was sitting across from me, his head propped up in his hands, "dig in." I gazed down at the luscious looked food and before anything else could be said, I began stuffing my mouth.
A couple minutes pass by before I pulled my eyes off my plate and looked up at Cress. I wasn't surprised when I saw the Cress had been staring at me intently as he rubbed his right fingers against each other, making a soft noise.
"What is with you men?" I asked, my mouth full of potatoes.
"I'm sorry?" said Cress as he blinked in confusion. I swallowed before I continued.
"That's twice today that I have been stared at whilst stuffing myself with food. First, by your brother and father and now, by you. Must be some genetic thing."
"I apologize," laughed Cress. "I was just caught in my thoughts." I resumed eating, but I kept my eyes on Cress. He looked out the window for a few moments, but soon turned his head back towards me and opened his mouth to speak.
"What village are you from?"
I nearly spit all my food out onto him. Cress smiled at my obvious shock. As I slowly chewed and swallowed the last bit of my food, I searched for a way to answer.
"Is that a question relevant to the work I will be doing here?" I asked.
"Nope."
"Then you," I said as I pointed my fork at Cress, "do not need to know."
"Why not?" asked Cress nonchalantly. "I'm just trying to get to know you better." He had that same look on his face; as if he was trying to dissect me.
"Well do not hold your breath. That is why it is called a personal life, Your Highness."
"Please, do not call me that," pleaded Cress. "Just call me Cress." Cress had a strange, faraway look on his face. When I tried to reach into his mind I was met by a strong wall that would take some digging into. So I gave him a slight nod and then stood up.
"Would you like to see the rest of the palace," grinned Cress as he stood up too and walked to the door to hold it open for me.
"Yes, of course." I walked past him and gave him a smile, but the smile soon vanished.
What is with this guy, I thought with a scowl in my face.