Chapter 10
X.
The gathering around the bars of my cell far exceeded the capacity in the corridor, but it flattered and heartened me that I had so many who called me a friend. If nothing else, it would all be worth it just for that, to know I wasn’t truly alone at the end.
A gaggle of guards sitting at the end of the hall frowned at the group outside my cell.
“We’re allowed to visit!” Grigga declared as she shot a glare at them.
“You are such an idiot,” Klessa despaired. “I said shine, not show off.”
“It doesn’t matter,” I assured her.
“Of course it matters,” Drook grumbled. “You’re one of us.”
“She was going to kill me eventually when I stopped being amusing to her. I just ensured I did not have to suffer for years of my life.”
I had lived in my chicken costume for months. I could not imagine years. While still in the padded costume, I had torn off the collar. I also discarded the tunic, mask, gloves, and hood upon my arrival in the cell. What were they going to do, kill me?
I wore a scruffy beard now in the absence of an opportunity to shave.
“I don’t regret it,” I said.
Agara sat at the bars too, silent but glowering.
“There’s nothing to be done,” I said. “She is intent on having me executed, and I will welcome the release.”
“You really did push her from what I heard,” said Grigga.
“Intentionally,” I explained. “A small punishment would have been so much worse. Ironic, no? Death is the only sentence I can live with.”
Agara threw her hands up and stood. “Kvasnik, we want to fight for you, but you’re not making this easy.”
“Don't fight for me,” I told her. “Please,” I begged all of them, “please don’t. None of you needs to be punished for defending me.”
My friends looked at each other helplessly.
“After I am executed," I told them, “have a toast for me. Celebrate my release. And when you speak of the jester prince, I’ll be there, in your stories, in your thoughts. That’s enough. What a legacy — to have been regarded so dearly!”
“Do you know when it’s going to be?” Agara asked.
“Soon, I imagine.”
“Maybe we could break the lock,” Trokei whispered.
“None of you is allowed to cause trouble on my account. Please, go back to your apartments and your daily activities. It’s better if I'm by myself now. The tsarina will surely get a report of this, and I do not trust her to leave you unharmed.”
“You've heard Kvasnik.” Klessa stood from her stool and turned to the assembled group. “He wants to be alone, even if he is a stubborn arse for wanting it.”
“I haven’t slept and I need rest,” I explained, not lying about my present circumstances, but definitely lying about why I needed to be alone.
The others grumbled but shifted as if to begin their departure. They filed by the bars reaching in to shake my hand, pat my shoulder or cheek, and reassure me that if I would not let them petition the tsarina, they would ensure that The Kind and Fair received an earful on my behalf.
Klessa herded them out, and I loved them all for their refusal to give up on me, even when I asked them to.
Hours later, I still didn’t sleep. All my brave words meant nothing when I had the silence and space to think about the reality of execution.
I presumed it would be a beheading. But what if the executioner was unskilled?
What if he took multiple swings and butchered me beyond tolerance before actually landing the blow that separated my head from my neck?
What if Alexei would be called in to watch, and I had to witness my brother’s shame of me as the last thing I would ever see?
“Kvasnik?”
I looked up at the speaker.
Klessa stood at the bars again, this time alone.
“You didn’t have to come back.” I pried myself off the floor and joined her.
“You have no idea how upset we all are.”
“I have an idea.” I smiled a little, grateful that anyone cared.
“No, you don’t, or you wouldn’t have done it.”
“I was raised to be a selfish prince. What else could you expect?”
“Don’t try your poor jests on me.”
I sighed, properly chastised.
“Have you come to blame me some more then?” I asked. “I’ll sit here, and you can tell me about every fuck-up I’ve made. You will be here for hours since I’ve managed to mess up so much.”
“I have no doubt of it.”
I waited for her to berate me, to remind me I was an undisciplined, unchecked prince who had never had consequences before. An obnoxious noble who was accustomed to being forgiven with a smile and some smooth placating. None of it would have been true, but she didn’t know that.
“Why did you do it?” she asked at length.
“Everything in court is fake,” I confessed.
“I had a former admirer try to convince me that she still cared about me. I had ladies fawning over me all night. And all of this after they’ve spent the last few months ensuring my isolation and perpetuating my humiliation.
And then they expected me to believe their sudden change of heart. ”
“But why did you do it?”
“Because I spent the night being manipulative and false, playing to the group that might best further my interests. I loathed it, Klessa. Even if I somehow managed to win back everything I lost, I would still have to be one of them. I would still have to play that game for the rest of my life, hoping I could maintain my balance on the uncertain terrain of royal favor. After everything she’s put me through, that fate seemed the more unbearable one.
” I sighed. “I’m so tired of lying. It was rash and ill-conceived, but I was truthful, and now I’ll die for it.
But for a moment, I had something no one else of court could claim — honesty. ”
I sat again, this time beside the bars so that Klessa could join me if she had any intention of staying beyond the answer to her question.
“You brave, stupid man.”
“How neatly you sum up my life.”
She sat down too and drew her legs up under her.
“Drook said it was likely some principle you decided to defend. I didn’t think you would be so dumb, although I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, seeing how quickly you came to my defense. And now I have to tell him that he was right.” She leveled a glare at me. “How dare you.”
“Thank you for thinking I had more intelligence than I do.”
“You’re plenty intelligent. I think your heart is in the right place — which is the trouble.”
“What a crime that is.”
She reached between the bars and put her hand on mine. “Can I do anything?”
“Perhaps, given the circumstances, you can forgive me just this once for being raised a blithering idiot prince.” I bit my lip and looked at her. “I am terrified.”
She squeezed my hand.
“And —” My voice cracked, and I turned away when the tears started flowing. “I won’t even get to die wearing my wedding band.”
She pulled my chin back around and grabbed my arm. She yanked me to her, embracing me through the bars. All the months of misery and humiliation finally crashed into me. The tears flowed like a flood from a broken dam, and Klessa clung to me through it all.
“I’m sorry,” I finally whispered when I reached the hiccupping, snotty stage. “I know how you disdain such weakness. Please don’t despise me for it.”
“Never, Kvasnik,” Klessa said as she withdrew. She took my hands in hers and held them. “We love you.”