Chapter 4
A sepia velvet cloak weighs on my shoulders, dragging my posture into a hunch.
The hood conceals most of my face, but I also wrap a dark cloth over my nose and mouth to ensure no one can identify me.
Xavelor wore a facial covering too, but his was made of silver, and meant to command distance, not disguise it. His mask marked him as the prince.
Mine is to hide the resemblance. Not to him, but to the king.
Bernadette was the one who convinced me to take similar precautions. She didn’t say it outright, but her expression revealed that I’m expected to step into his place now. To mirror him.
Even if I’ll never feel like I belong in his skin.
I check my reflection in the long oval mirror near the wardrobe.
Nothing about my appearance is remarkable, thanks to the dull blend of colors.
I’ve even managed to tuck away stray curls of brown hair within the hood.
It’s a bit unnerving how much I resemble the mages of the king’s court—those who have cast aside their humanity to use magic for the benefit of the Faundor line.
Luckily for me, that’s exactly the look I’m going for.
A shiver unbends my spine until I’m standing straight.
I turn from the mirror and snatch my bag of provisions.
I leave a note for Bernadette on my bed, asking her to send word to the women’s families who’d wanted to meet me for marriage arrangements.
I won’t have time for that now, but I don’t lack decorum.
They should be notified before traveling such distances to meet a prince whose circumstances have totally rerouted his political and marital futures.
No one accompanies me as I stride from my chambers and head for the servants’ quarters. No one offers a disturbed glance when I stumble into the large kitchen and reach for a glossy apple from a heaping burlap sack. No one watches as I stuff the apple in my bag and depart.
Triumph fills me as I turn around the stone wall, my hand gliding along the steely rock corner.
Behind the servants’ wing, chickens cluck and horses whinny at my arrival.
Derryl, the young stable hand, eyes me with suspicion.
The boy is young, but like many of our servants, he’s inherited the indentured duties of his father.
His eyes travel from my dark boots to the hood covering my face.
If anyone could recognize me, it would be this kid.
“Prepare Claude for me, Derryl,” I say, whirling into the decrepit brick building.
The boy responds with a quick nod and moves to the stall where my black steed neighs.
The air smells of manure and dew and fresh, grassy hay.
It’s a pleasant contrast to the overpowering floral scents wafting throughout the castle’s corridors.
On a wide, dusty windowsill, white lilies turn their heads toward the yawning sun. I face it too, then pull down my makeshift mask, retrieve the crisp red apple from my bag, and bite into it.
I peer through the glassless window, across the fields where servants till fertile ground with long rod hoes and shovels. Many are older men, but some women wipe sweat from labored brows as they drive metal into the soft earth. A sigh drifts from my nose.
Once I completed my schoolwork, my days instantly grew stale.
Most of my time was spent either sprawled on a bench in the castle library to read a stolen book from a neighboring kingdom or practicing archery on my own in the training grounds.
After a year and a half of poring over the same boring stories and failing to hit my targets, I have long since been ready for something else to do.
As exhilarating as blending in with servants is, I’m more anxious to journey beyond the boundary of the castle’s courtyard, into the bustling human village that clings to the walls of Arioch’s center.
I grit my teeth against the waxy skin of the apple. If only this excitement wasn’t brought about by my brother’s death. Then I’d be able to embody it without the rising guilt.
Derryl clicks his tongue, and I turn around. The boy peers at me behind wispy waves of sable-colored hair, his expression bored. He leads Claude toward the opening of the building, and I follow behind to take the reins.
The boy passes the thick brown straps to me, then shoves a pair of worn leather riding gloves into my other hand. He offers a quick, awkward bow before returning his attention to the other horses.
I give my attention to Claude. A majestic beast, and the burliest of the horses in our stables.
He has a sleek black mane, trimmed short over his neck.
Glistening coal-colored fur covers the length of his muscular body.
The saddle and stirrups are black too. No gilded buckles or patterned straps would insinuate the wealth of his rider. Perfect .
My foot finds its hold in the looped stirrup, and I swing myself over the saddle, adjusting my weight evenly.
Before this week, I’d never used this saddle, and I’m not sure others had either.
My thighs remember the sturdiness from the day before, when I’d trotted the castle grounds seeking a master.
With the pain comes nostalgia, and I can’t refuse recalling fond memories of the past.
When I was five and Xavelor eight, he was worse than me at riding. My mother had been so proud of me then, happy that I bested my half brother. I try in vain to smile at the memory.
Leaning forward, I gently nudge the side of Claude’s face with the remainder of the apple. He swings his head around and swallows it whole. I chuckle.
With barely a nudge to his sides, we burst forward.
Arioch’s castle town, Bellmane, surrounds the outer walls of the courtyard and bends around in one massive semicircle. Little stucco houses cram together around busy streets where merchants and farmers sell their goods.
Once I’m in the thick of the bustle, I dismount Claude and tie him next to a seller’s cart.
The humid air is soured with the scents of freshly butchered meats and vats of bubbling chili oils. Though it is early in the morning, merchants are enthusiastic about selling their goods. The locals are their most reliable customers.
Today I visit not in search of any contraband books, but for the prospect of finding a master. All week, I’ve been sorely disappointed by the blatant refusals of those I am acquainted with. Though I traveled through Bellmane as a boy, it has never been to seek out a master of disciplines.
Rumor says elves and fairies of the Aldorin forest might attend festivals under other guises to claim food and good fortune.
How favorable would it be to be in the innocuous presence of a magical being, to request for them to serve as my master and mentor?
I’m doubtful this could happen, considering their outlawed existence beyond the enchanted wood and Bellmane’s distance from Aldorin’s border.
Instead, I strain to find a stray mage, cloaked in black and wound in cloth to cover its magical wounds.
Today the market is filled with black- and brown-clad peasants clanging beers together and slurping pig and cow meat from the bone.
Seeing no sign of a black-cloaked mage anywhere, I begin to search for the creatures with sagittate ears that stick from their hair like daggers.
Wishful thinking. No magical creature would travel so far from the safety of their forest. It’s more likely they’d cross into my father’s land, where they could most easily return home.
I’ve not yet met an elf, nor a fairy—two of the strongest sentient beings in the magical forest. Years before my father was born, magical creatures were erased from the kingdom’s center, banished to Aldorin.
When needed for healing, the king would pluck a particularly skilled elf from his or her home and enslave the being until the sickness vanished.
Otherwise, an impressive bounty would be paid to any who captured a magical being lurking outside the forest.
When Arioch was founded, kings would venture into Aldorin to hunt down the best elves, fairies, trolls, and pixies to make sacrificial offerings to our ancestor, Arioch Faundor.
During my grandfather Augustus’s reign, however, a treaty was established that prevented humans from entering the forest and discouraged magical creatures from leaving.
Thus, our chances of spotting them alive are limited to their unlikely decision to venture out.
Not that I would turn one in. I’ve always wanted to have the chance to just speak with one.
To try to understand them. My mother had been the same way, and Bernadette never said anything about my interest in the creatures of the enchanted forest. I’m sure the books I’ve read barely scrape the surface.
My favorite stories were penned by humans, after all.
Therefore, they are all biased. I’ve always wondered how accurately the authors were able to describe the creatures, if the men had even witnessed one alive long enough to document its behavior.
My spine twitches at the memory of the few magical beings I have seen, already dead by the time soldiers brought them to the dungeon’s tainted altar.
Something that, as king, I can and will abolish.
No more sacrifices.
With a huff, I stride past children blowing at the sails of paper pinwheels.
A cold rushes over me. I don’t understand how elven or fairy children can be so different from our own that they’d be killed without question if they were ever seen among us.
Frowning, I continue toward a line of merchants shouting about their wares.