Chapter 20 Rorin
Rorin
"You need to be more careful." Marjorie snaps as she guides us into her quarters. There's a trail of blood staining the stone floors as we march through the castle, her reprimands and our footsteps echoing against the walls.
"I— ugh! will try and remember that next time." I grunt, the pain lancing through my shoulder. She tosses me a sidelong glance and waves us into her rooms, Bennett whistling at the grandeur of it.
Marjorie has my men put me up in a small bed against the wall, my head dropping back onto the cool stone as she bustles around her workshop. There’s a familiar humming coming from deep inside the room, followed by the clatter and crash of things shattering on the ground.
The voice curses, and the three of us exchange a look.
"Is that Murph?" Will whispers, leaning into me.
My shoulders lift in a shrug, and I hiss, forgetting for a moment that I still have a hole in one of them.
Marjorie comes rushing back over to me, her arms filled with jars that she lets spill out on the mattress next to me.
"You're not going to use your Wield on him? "
Her piercing green eyes cut him a glare as she hovers over the jars, "I need the salve!" She shouts out, and the three of us share another look. “If I die from blood loss–”
“Quiet. You won’t die.” She barks, and thankfully, not a full minute later, Murph appears.
He stumbles out from behind her wall, his hands filled with three separate containers. When he takes notice of us, Murph’s face lights up. "The Broken Prince… back again in the kingdom shrouded in the bleakest of shadows." He muses.
Marjorie snaps her fingers at him and speeds over, dropping the jars onto the bed. She plucks the salve she wants off the mattress and smears the pungent orange balm over the wound.
I bite back my cry at the sting, and she huffs, "stop fidgeting." She barks, slathering another layer on.
"I thought that was you, Murph!" Will exclaims, extending his hand out towards the mage. He gingerly takes it before collecting the jars Marjorie didn’t use and dipping back out of the room.
"Stop fidgeting!" She snaps again, and I clench my fist, digging my nails into the soft skin of my palm. "Do you want to be healed or not?"
"I do! I don't, however, think that you want me to be healed.
" I snarl, my teeth gnashing together. She flicks my ear for that comment and shouts for Murph to grab her dressing bandages.
Once she has them, she roughly wraps the cloth around me, binding the upper half of my torso and the entirety of my right shoulder to keep the wound from reopening.
Will’s eyes narrow into slits as he stares at the massive amount of gauze. "Doesn't he need stitches?"
"Are you the healer?" She gripes.
"No…"
"Then shush!”
His lips clamp together, and he backs away from the bed, watching her finish pinning the bandages in place. She tells me to wait a few minutes before attempting to get up, and I bob my head.
Marjorie leaves us with Murph, who stays humming at his workbench. I suck in a few more deep inhales and try to ignore the burning spreading across my skin from the salve she's applied.
"I don't understand why she didn't just heal you." Will gripes again, now that she's out of earshot. Bennett and I answer him with silence, neither of us having any explanation past the fact that I'm sure Eveera is the reason behind it.
She's the reason behind everything, my conscience adds.
I try lifting off the bed, and my limbs immediately give out, my body collapsing awkwardly against the mattress. My two men lunge forward, keeping me from falling onto the floor.
"You move too quickly." Murph chirps. "Need more time to rest."
"I'd rather — oof — rest in my own bed."
"You'd rather rest with the Queen of Serpents, but she pays no favor to you."
I scoff bitterly, no, she fucking doesn't.
"Murph." Bennett cuts in, "what are you doing in here?"
The older man looks over at us, his face still cheery as he scrutinizes our group from behind his pair of thick-rimmed glasses. "The Lady in Black is very knowledgeable." He replies simply, as if that answer should be enough.
"She's sadistic." I grit out. He ignores the jab at his mentor and rattles on to my men about his time spent here with Marjorie. They listen intently as he details all the work he’s doing while my head lolls to the right, looking over at the doors.
I long to be walking through them, instead of sitting in here waiting to be well enough to move.
"You just had to fucking stab me." I send the words through the seal, hoping she hears me.
When we reunited in Suram, I'd felt so much relief. So much so that I'd allowed myself to believe for a few hours that once she found out about our nuptials, we would be fine.
What a ridiculous thing to believe.
"Ahem." Our heads swivel towards the voice to find Felix standing in the entrance, his face grim. He scans his eyes over my bandaged self quickly and shakes his head subtly, “there's a discussion to be had." He says curtly, his lilted accent sounding thicker than normal.
Scooting myself to the edge of the mattress, Bennett offers me an arm. I wave him off, not wanting to be escorted into any room that could have Eveera present. She already knows she bested me — I don't need her gloating more than she already will be.
We wave our goodbyes to Murph and try to keep pace with Felix.
"What's this about?" Will calls out.
"There's been a development with Rorin’s father," Felix answers, and my blood chills.
Fan-fucking-tastic. Because we needed more bloody issues.
He leads us out onto the balcony overlooking the army’s training yards, and I can see Matthis' head bobbing between his lines of soldiers, shouting orders.
"Armond, you are walking too… quick-ly…" Her voice dies down as she steps out of the arched hallway. The heat of her gaze sends shockwaves underneath my skin as she drags her golden eyes down my torso, surveying the bandages.
"Admiring your handiwork?" I snark, and her expression smooths out.
Eveera moves haughtily through us to stand against the railing. She grabs onto the edge of the railing, both of her hands going white-knuckled when she takes in the ranks, "we lost—"
"More than we would have liked." Armond finishes for her.
She rolls her shoulders back, straightening her spine, and releasing a long sigh, "did the—"
"Each clan received a death toll, and as previously discussed, they are willing to continue the arrangement. More of their soldiers are set to arrive on the pretense that they confirm you're… alive."
"I'm alive, alright." She grumbles before turning back to face us, her hand dropping to scratch at her wrist, "anything else?"
Armond gives her a long look, "you know that there is, Highness." I make a conscious effort not to let my eyebrows hit my hairline at his blunt tone. Any of the times I've been around him, never have I seen him so casual and almost parental with Eveera.
Her left eye twitches, and the scratching becomes more obvious when she snaps, "so speak."
"Not here, Eveera," Felix interjects.
"Fine. We'll go back to the fucking council room — gods know we don't spend enough time in there." She wastes no time shoving past our group and stomping her way through the castle. We follow on her heels, the injury in my shoulder twinging with each hard step I take.
Her Wield flings open the doors, and our group files in while she pulls off the large map hanging on the wall, throwing it down onto the table.
Scraping her hair together, she piles it on top of her head and pierces through it with a sharp metal rod. A few rogue curls struggle to be contained, falling in front of her face, and she huffs at them in frustration. Her eyes lift, her hand jerking down at the chart, “well?”
Armond dips his chin and moves to stand next to her. "Here." He taps, "and here." His fingers thumped on top of two border points between Evendell and Sorrel.
"They're pushing on the border?" I ask, and he nods grimly.
"They cannot possibly be thinking of absorbing another kingdom?" Will asks in disbelief.
Felix folds his arms over his chest, looking at Will and Bennett with the same hesitation he held for us when we first arrived.
His demeanor has softened with me due to our roles, but I do not doubt that if the opportunity arose, he would counsel his queen to abandon us — abandon me.
"They already are.” He adds, frowning downward, “the only thing saving them now is that Sorrel is no stranger to having to defend her borders.
And she's not taking kindly to Evendell breaking their treaty, under Baelor's decree or otherwise. "
"I just don't understand." Will states.
"Well, there's a shock." Eveera bites.
He glares over the table at her, "we've been at war for months now. I don't understand what more they could want."
"We haven't been at war — we've been playing a bad game of chess, and all that's happened so far is the eradication of each other's pawns."
Will's mouth drops, "those pawns are people! For someone who claims to care so much about hers you sure speak little of them."
She raises her head sharply, "I do care for my people.
But the ones that you are referring to specifically are soldiers.
They stopped being ‘only people’ the minute they put on the uniform.
We all did." Silence descends over the group for a beat before she opens her mouth again, "you saw what happened on your borders in Vellar — you lost men, you wasted resources, you burdened the cities that hosted you.
The same will happen to Sorrel as long as they try pushing back. "
"Their Wielders are strong, but the majority of them now defend their capital and courts.
They've not needed a strong presence at their northern border in years.
" Max's voice startles us all, Eveera's gaze snapping over to the entrance where he stands, tossing an apple up and down.
"Which means they might be open to us offering a contracted alliance.
" He gives me a pointed look, "then again, based on our recent activity over there… maybe not."
Eveera narrows her eyes, "what do you mean by your recent activity?"
He smirks and takes a bite out of the fruit, "princeling here went on a bit of a rampage looking for you.
Questioned everyone who may have come into contact with you and Ezra.
" My blood freezes at the sound of the man's name, and from my peripheral vision I see her face go stony.
"For someone who doesn't like to use his Wield, he used it plenty the past few months, leaving bodies left and right anywhere we went.
It's a mystery Eiser and Baelor, or his daughter, didn't track us down faster. "
"Bodies?" She asks, her voice accusatory towards me.
"Max." I snap, and he takes another loud bite.
He wags the apple between us, "he hasn’t told you?” Eveera’s head shakes. “Fuucckk." He draws out, whistling dramatically.
Her fingers come up and pinch her brow. "Armond. Felix."
"I'll arrange the negotiation meetings with the head of the Vast clans," Armond answers, seeing himself out of the room.
Felix looks over towards her, "I think it would be in our best interests to seek out an assembly with Sorrel's King and the Consular General of Suram. Try and rally what's… left of this Realm." The weight of that statement hangs over all of us like a noose.
The remainder of our group stands there staring each other down, listening to Max chew his apple. "Leave us." She commands, and they scatter like rats. The minute the doors are pulled shut, she whirls on me, golden irises edging with black. "What the fuck did Max mean?"