Chapter 7 #3
In Osaria, taking a wife meant owning her.
And I'd wanted to defy that by refusing to follow that path.
The emperor had been making so much progress towards changing such things before Magdor had stepped onto the scene.
She was a heartless fiend who seemed to have no compassion for women despite her own gender.
Whatever her motives were, I knew it wasn't in the interests of anyone but herself.
It enraged me more than anything else that I would die in this pitiful world before seeing Magdor overthrown and my country soaring to greatness.
No one had batted an eye at the way the city had changed since that heathen’s arrival.
Maybe most men were quietly glad the laws hadn’t been changed in women’s favour.
Maybe they wanted to remain above the opposite sex.
But I still hoped there was goodness to find in some of my countrymen, so that when I passed from this world, I could at least believe someone would fill my place and fight against Magdor's tyranny.
If she got her hands on that strange coin, what the hell was she going to do with it?
I sighed wearily.
Fuck I hate losing at life like this. Am I really giving up? Cassius Lazar, royal guard, man of his word, lover of his kingdom.
Now I’m just a complete failure.
I wondered if my father would be proud of the choices I’d made.
He had loved his country as I did now, and my mother had always taught me to try and live by his example.
Which I had religiously. Day in, day out for all of my adult years.
But now I was a criminal, a lawbreaker. Would he have seen things my way if he had known of my suspicions about Magdor?
When I was a boy, I'd sworn to help make Osaria great one day. Was that dream really going to die in the clutches of a noose?
A clash of steel caught my ear followed by a loud grunt and Drake bolted upright with a wide grin. He turned to me, his eyes shimmering with all the strength of a man who knew he truly wasn't fated to have his manhood forcibly removed.
The door along the wall from our cells flew open and my heart beat harder as three men crept in like dark shadows.
“It can’t be,” I said in surprise.
“Told you they’d come for me,” Drake chuckled.
The Forty’s reputation preceded them, and my spine straightened at the threat these men brought into the room with them.
“ Balthazar , I could kiss you right now if I wasn't worried I'd get some of that Countess's moustache in my teeth.” Drake clutched the bars as he gazed out at his friends, his eyes bright and nothing about him showing any discomfort from his contact with the foul metal, though it must have been weakening him.
“Fuck you,” growled the man who I assumed was Balthazar.
They all had neckerchiefs pulled over their faces so I couldn't get a good look at him even as he stepped into the light of the nearest torch, but his body was stacked with muscles. “If you want out of that cell, you’d better start grovelling.”
“Grovelling?” Drake spat. “I don't grovel. And I know you'll let me out either way because the only reason you're here is because Egos wants me free. So quit trying to prove your balls are bigger than mine and get on with getting me the fuck outa here.”
One of the other men elbowed Balthazar aside, moving forward and raising a large crowbar in his hands.
“You two can sort this out in the ring, we don't have time for your bitch fight here.” He was a beast of a man, almost as tall as he was wide.
With a grunt of effort, he jammed the crowbar into the gap between the door and the wall and began to pry Drake's cell open.
There was a loud groaning of metal and the thieves looked around in anticipation of someone overhearing that sound before the door finally swung wide with a bang that reverberated through my skull.
Just days ago, I would have been primed to kill these men for what they were daring to do right now, but as I was on the wrong side of these iron bars and had little reason to stop them, I simply watched and wondered whether they could really pull this off before the guards appeared.
I gazed at Drake longingly as he stepped out of his cage with a bark of triumphant laughter, a free man; something I wanted to be with all my heart.
And as he moved further towards his men, leaving his cell behind, I wondered if this could be my chance too.
Thieves could be bought, persuaded. I wasn’t living by the rules of my position anymore.
I didn’t have to lie down and accept this, not when there was an opportunity right in front of me.
Adrenaline surged through my veins and a hundred thoughts sped through my brain at once. I darted forward, gazing out at Drake in a crazed hope, wondering what I could say or do to convince this lawless man to save me too.
I don't want to fucking die. Not when Magdor still has her claws so deep in my kingdom. Not when Princess Austyn’s fate is painted for her with the tar of that woman’s brush.
“See ya.” Drake saluted me, no hesitation in his eyes as he turned to leave and desperation built in my chest so keenly that I couldn't contain it. I understood the way it worked on the streets, even if I hadn’t grown up on them myself.
Out there it was cutthroat, brutal, dog eat dog and every man for himself.
The thieves had clearly only come for Drake because there was something in it for them, but maybe that kind of attitude could work to my advantage too.
If I could offer them something they might want, then they might just be convinced to trade me for it.
And I had nothing left to lose. They could have it all, because without my life, everything I owned was meaningless anyway.
“Wait!” I called as they headed towards the doorway, four shadows in the night, about to slip into the dark never to be seen again.
Drake glanced back, a slight frown lining his features.
“I can't carry dead weight.” He held a hand over his heart.
“Really, it's been nice to know you. Sucks you gotta die.
But that's how the cookie crumbles.” He turned away again and my mind wheeled to the only thing I had to offer.
They were thieves. What more did they want than treasure?
And I knew where a whole hoard of it was hidden.
I didn't give a fuck about money, but I did care about Magdor reaching that mysterious coin.
So if I could get to it first – destroy it maybe-
“Halt,” I commanded in my most authoritative tone.
The four of them halted, seeming surprised by me ordering them about as if I had the upper hand here. But I did. They just didn't know it yet.
“I'll give you thirty seconds, no more,” Drake said, folding his arms.
I glanced at the other men who I didn't trust in the slightest, but Drake had something about him which I did trust. He was honestly dishonest. He knew what he was and he owned it, and I had a feeling that meant he’d give me this one opportunity to save myself.
“There's a cave beyond the Lyrian Desert, it holds a fortune even The Forty couldn't spend if you had a thousand years to do so. If you free me, I'll take you to it,” I said in a rush of words which tripped over each other in their haste to escape.
Balthazar spat a laugh. “That sounds like the ramblings of a desperate man lying to get out of his cage. Come on, Drake.” He clapped a hand to Drake's shoulder, but he shrugged him off.
“Go on,” Drake urged, a glimmer in his eye that said I’d captured his attention, and hope swarmed into my chest. We’d spent hours trading truths while we awaited our fates in these cells, so I had to hope he could see that this was no bullshit and he would hear me out.
“Empress Magdor showed me it. She offered me a deal to get out of here. Only men can enter the cave – some old magic left over from the Fallen. But I refused her offer because I despise her.” Not the entire truth, but telling these scoundrels about a mysterious coin that held some sort of power that even the empress desired was not a good idea.
Especially considering I was going to destroy it the second I got my hands on it.
“Right, so you're saying there's some mystical cave with all the treasure a man could ever want and you’re gonna refuse to go to it and choose to die instead? As if anyone's that noble.” Balthazar chuckled under his breath, but I didn't pay him any heed.
I stared at Drake, willing him to see the truth in my eyes.
“Actually, I think this fucker might seriously be that damn noble for some reason,” Drake said, moving to the edge of my cell.
“I’ve listened to him blathering on about his love for this kingdom the whole time I’ve been here.
He’s rock hard for a taste of Osaria. And he hates the empress enough that I really do think he’d take his death over making a deal with her which could hurt his precious kingdom. ”
“It’s your kingdom too,” I pointed out through gritted teeth, but he just laughed.
“Oh yeah? Well my kingdom doesn’t seem to give one fuck about me or the people who live on the outside of the precious rings of its capital city. In fact, that whole upper and lower Fae bullshit spells it out plain and simple to me. I’m lower than the rest of you. So I’m worth a whole lot less.”
My jaw ticked at the point he made, but I didn’t have time for a debate in politics or the ways the kingdom was run.
I just needed him to understand me and where I was coming from.
It was my only shot at making it out of this hell.
Besides, bringing down Magdor was the answer to bridging the divide between the rich and the poor.
Once the emperor was out of her clutches, he’d see sense again, I was certain of it.
A shout came from out in the passage beyond the door and I tensed, knowing I had mere seconds to convince Drake to take me with him or I’d be damned to die with the rising sun.