Chapter 40
The bathwater had gone tepid by the time Richard climbed out, and the inn’s towel was so thin it might as well have been a handkerchief. He patted himself dry as best he could and dressed in fresh trousers and a loose shirt, hair still dripping at the ends.
The room at the Cup and Crook was a sorry thing.
Two narrow cots crammed against opposite walls, a tin bath in the corner, and a window whose shutters hung from their hinges.
Outside, a drunkard was bellowing a sea shanty about a man with two ships and two cocks.
Downstairs, the inn’s common room rumbled with music, stomping feet and laughter.
It would be, Richard thought wryly, a miracle if he slept at all.
Though Flint, somehow, had already managed it. The bandit was spread atop the covers in only his undergarments, an arm flung over his face, and his chest rising and falling steadily. He’d slept through Richard’s bath—exhausted, Richard suspected, from the cost of summoning the Tower yesterday.
Richard tied his shirt’s laces and considered his own cot—its mattress sagging in the middle. It was late. He really ought to sleep.
But his feet wandered, and he found himself knocking on the room next door. Kaelen had taken it, urging Richard to share with Flint—“You wished to befriend him, did you not?” He’d spoken as though he were arranging a diplomatic summit, and Richard had had to stifle a smile.
When no reply came from his knock, Richard pushed the door open. The room within was much like his own, only with a single cot and a balcony door. A breeze stirred the curtains. Beyond them, in the silver wash of moonlight, Richard made out the shape of a man at the railing.
Kaelen spun at the sound of footsteps, hand jerking towards his hip. But he was clad only in a towel, knotted low on his hips, with the hem barely reaching mid-thigh.
Richard raised a palm. “It is only me.”
Kaelen’s shoulders sagged, and he rested against the balcony’s railings. “Richard.”
Water still beaded along his collarbones and trailed down the centre of his chest. His wet hair was raked back.
“You will catch a chill standing out here.” Richard crossed the room and joined him at the rail. Their elbows knocked into each other. “What were you doing?”
“People-watching,” Kaelen said.
Richard followed his gaze. The Lowmarket sprawled beneath them.
Directly across the lane was the brothel, where scantily clad men and women hovered, flirting with passersby.
Two doors down, a wiry old woman was locking up her apothecary.
Further along, a man stumbled out the tavern door, vomited in the gutter, and staggered back inside.
“It is a shame we cannot see the sea from here,” Kaelen murmured. “It was more beautiful than I had imagined. And that glow along the beach—I had not seen its like.”
“It is the plankton,” Richard said. “Creatures smaller than the eye can perceive. They live in the water in their countless billions, and when the waves disturb them, they—well, they fear they are being eaten. The glow is a defence to dazzle their predators.” He hesitated, conscious of his own voice.
“I—I read of it in an encyclopedia of tiny creatures.”
Kaelen was looking at him with a strange expression—his head tilted and a corner of his mouth curving. “Such a book must have been enlightening.”
“The book was written by Master Halverin of the Veiled Coast,” Richard said. “He spent forty years studying the matter. The illustrations alone are—” He caught himself. “Well, you might find it dull.”
Kaelen’s mouth curved further. “Not if you were to read it to me.”
Richard blinked. “That would be rather tedious, for there are some five hundred pages.”
With a chuckle, Kaelen turned back to the street. The room’s candlelight lit the wet planes of his shoulder, the bunched curves of his upper arms, and the elegant dip of his lower back.
Truly, this was a body carved by the gods. Indeed, the statues of Emberlain seemed plain in comparison.
It is no wonder so many desire him.
The thought flooded a bitter taste onto Richard’s tongue. Why would Kaelen ever seek to be with someone who could not give his body the worship it deserved?
Richard searched for a matter to distract himself. “You spoke last night of being useless. I would have you take those words back.”
Kaelen’s face hardened. “It was true.”
“Do not be a fool.” Richard faced him fully, leaning a hip against the rail. “When the day comes that something must be cut down between me and harm, it is your blade I trust to do it.”
Kaelen’s jaw set. “And yet when that cottage bore down on us—”
“Ah yes, the enchanted cottage with talons the size of a man,” Richard said. “Tell me, what sword stroke would you have preferred to use? What stance, what guard? Show me the manual page that covers the disembowelling of a cottage with chicken legs, and I shall concede the point.”
Kaelen’s lips twitched, though he quickly schooled his face.
“Your blade is for the things a blade can answer,” Richard continued. “You have never failed to answer when it could.”
Kaelen hung his head, and his sodden fringe fell forward to hide his eyes.
“The generals do not see it so,” he said quietly.
“They think me too soft. Too untested to lead. General Barlow never fails to remind me that my position came only from King Haldric’s promotion.
He and General Sarn and Lady General Ivelle have never trusted me.
” He gave a joyless laugh. “And they are right to question my abilities. I am not prepared for war.”
“And pray tell, who is?”
Kaelen’s eyes widened. “What?”
“You say you are not prepared.” Richard shook his head. “Well, neither am I. War does not care for meticulous plans and measured sacrifices. I have read enough to know it is a beast that takes and takes, and scars generations to come. You are wise to fear it.”
He inched his hand along the railings. His fingertips brushed over Kaelen’s knuckles.
“What matters is not the man you are when the sun is shining. It is the man you become when the sun is not. You are not finished, Kaelen. You are still becoming. One day, when the terrible beast is upon us, you will be exactly what our realm needs. I believe in this.”
Kaelen stared at where Richard’s hand rested atop his.
“I am gladdened,” he said hoarsely, “to have your trust.” He exhaled a shuddering breath. “But I am scared of what comes, of Galdran—” He grimaced. “I wonder what shall be asked of us before this is done.”
Kaelen’s fingers splayed out, then gripped Richard’s, interlocking their digits together.
“There is a thing. I have not spoken of it. I—I am not certain I should now. But it has sat in me a long time, and tonight, it sits less easily than it usually does.” He met Richard’s gaze at last, his eyes watery.
“Queen Aralynn...she once told me of six prophecies.”
Richard winced. “Six?”
His mother’s visions of the future were rarely bright.
To bestow six of them upon Kaelen was cruel. Why would his mother have done so?
“It was after I broke my arm in the fistfight with Sir Varkos,” Kaelen said quietly. “Seven years ago to this day, almost. I was only a squire. Eighteen.”
“I remember.”
“She wished to warn me,” Kaelen said. “One of her prophecies has already come to pass exactly as she said it, and I was glad, for it was a prophecy as sweet as the others had been abominable. But every day since, I have been waiting for those others. They haunt me, and I do not know if I can—” He broke off and rapped his knuckles against his forehead. “I am sorry. I should not—”
“Kaelen.” Richard pulled away his hand to squeeze those broad shoulders instead. “Kaelen, listen to me.”
Kaelen’s stare was bleak. His frame trembled.
“My mother was sparing in what she told me,” Richard said.
“Likely because she knew my mind and how it would chew on a thing once given it. But sometimes, she flinched when she looked at me. On my thirtieth birthday, I woke to find her weeping by my bedside. Such was the nature of her prophecies. How they tortured her.” He slid his hand up and cupped Kaelen’s cheek.
The knight’s breath hitched, and his eyes fluttered shut.
“The only sane response is to set them down,” Richard said.
“Whatever my mother told you, Kaelen. Whatever you have been carrying. Lay it on a shelf. Take it down only when it is useful. Otherwise, it will live your life for you, and you will look up one day and find you were never present in any of it.”
Kaelen smiled sadly. His hand rose to circle Richard’s wrist. “It is not so simple.”
“These things rarely are.” Richard licked his lips and pulled his hand away. “Not for those whom the gods have deemed strong enough to face such obstacles. It is, I have always thought, a peculiar form of compliment.”
Kaelen huffed. “You are full of wise sayings.”
Richard snorted. “My siblings would beg to disagree.”
He regretted his words immediately. He’d been trying to forget those three faces.
Kaelen peered at him. “You miss them.”
“I certainly do not,” Richard muttered. “They behaved abominably.”
“You could buy them something,” Kaelen said. “The markets near the city square open at dawn—Master Clemens has bade me gather circus equipment tomorrow morn. Perhaps you could go to the markets too and purchase a necklace for Elara, or some ring for Corwin—”
“I shall buy nothing.” Richard sniffed and lifted his chin. “Indeed, I have quite decided never to speak to either of them again.”
Kaelen laughed, his head tipping back. “Come now. You are being petty.”
Richard scowled. Petty? Him? In what world—
A brawl between two brothel visitors drew Kaelen’s attention, and Richard sidled closer.
“And you?” Richard asked, hoping to sound casual. “Do you intend to bring back a gift for anyone? For—for Ravi, for instance?”
Kaelen cocked a quizzical brow. “Why would I buy a gift for Ravi?”