Chapter Ten
In Tristan’s absence the next day, Eli entertained Austin with gossip of an ongoing love triangle between the head cook Lassie, Captain Inx, and new recruit Reba.
Austin adjusted his position in his chaise lounge, gazing out over the sands where the Troop’s morning training was underway: terraforming.
Since early morning, great rocks had arrived behind oxen, and the Troop had been set to hauling them across the shore.
The sand was too loose to pull the carts over.
A gritty, uncomfortable feeling resided over Austin.
Nothing felt right against his skin. Sounds were too loud, daylight too bright.
Connor was still through the Tear, and the distance vexed him like grit beneath the skin.
Austin pushed it to the back of his mind, something he had plenty of practice with.
Inx was hauling an obsidian black rock as large as himself down the beach with the help of the avian who’d had his face crushed into the sand the day Austin first saw the Troop. Neither seemed the least bit perturbed that they were hauling heavy rocks across the beach in stifling heat.
“Which one is Reba?” Austin asked.
“Reba’s the avian.” Eli pointed. “He’s hauling that rock with Captain Inx, though I think Inx is doing all the lifting there… Inx really is quite strong, not that it does him much good when he’s sparring with Prince Tristan.”
“He’d have better luck wrestling a whale.”
Eli laughed. “True! Jaris’s voice is gone after performing for the Troop late into the night, but he sent Kada to bed early so she’s fresh. Will I fetch her?”
“She can play the pipes.”
Tristan had told him last night that he would be gone for most of the day, and Austin felt oddly lost without the merman around to antagonise.
The staff were no fun at all to unleash his temper on, since even though they were growing used to him, they were clearly all afraid of him.
He looked idly across the Troop, thinking.
“I want Lassie to serve me breakfast. And fetch Reba and Inx, I want to see the flips they were learning yesterday.”
Eli’s eyes lit up.
“Right away.” He trotted down the steps leading from porch to sand and took off down the beach at a leisurely lope.
Eli efficiently set the stage, a mouthpiece for Austin’s desires.
Austin thought Captain Inx might object to dancing to his whim, but with a bow and good humour, Inx began a demonstration of his acrobatic ability.
Reba, seemingly, thought Austin wanted a description of how he’d learned the moves, and he was in the middle of explaining the steps to achieving a front flip—something clearly exceptionally easy for him, as he flapped his wings on take-off for extra air time—when Kada emerged onto the porch with Lassie, a silver platter in her hand.
Austin didn’t even look at Lassie, waving to the empty seats on the porch. “Wait there until I’m done eating.”
Reba looked wide-eyed at Lassie, and it took a nudge from Inx to continue his explanation. Reba executed a flip, and Inx, eyes only for Lassie, stepped forward and respectfully declared, “Let me show you a more skilled example.”
Austin glanced at Kada, nervously perched forward in her seat, and the girl startled, eyes wide with fright. She wrung her pipes until her knuckles whitened.
“Something to suit their demonstration, Kada.” Austin didn’t do ‘soft’, but he kept his voice level and calm.
She nodded stiffly and raised the pipes.
Austin grimaced as the first sound produced was an off-tune squeak.
He felt the wince of everyone, and then the weight of their attention upon him.
They’d seen plenty of his raging against Tristan over the past few days for the pettiest of perceived slights.
The greatest slight he’d suffered today was Tristan’s inattentive absence.
Austin kept his eyes on the training pair, ignoring the mistake.
Inx talked loudly, as if to distract from it, and Kada recovered herself and began to play. Mercifully, she was in tune, and the pipes, once she found her rhythm, were pleasant.
Reba and Inx were covered in sweat and bent double, panting from their exertion, when Eli spoke up. “I can’t really say who’s better. What do you think, Lassie?”
The look Lassie fixed on the two men before her was unmistakably admiring, but who was being favoured was impossible to tell. At Eli’s question, she looked nervously between the two, face reddening. “I think their athletic ability is impressive,” she admitted. “Though, they look rather tired.”
By “tired” Austin guessed she meant fit and glistening, going off the way she couldn’t tear her eyes off Inx’s chest.
Inx noticed and grinned at her. Lassie’s ears and neck turned as red as her cheeks. “I suppose the captain?”
Austin gestured to the low table. “Rest and eat. I want to see a spar once you’re recovered.”
Reba looked incredibly uneasy venturing onto the porch, Inx curious.
Eli stepped in again to talk and prodded the conversation to life.
Austin flicked a finger at Kada, and she correctly interpreted it as a signal that she, too, could rest. Eli drew from Inx an explanation of how he came to be in Tristan’s service.
When the merman brothers took the city, Inx had been one of the former guards. Inx would be spared if he swore fealty.
“Wasn’t exactly a leader left to be loyal to anyway.
” Inx shrugged. “Just the leftovers of the late monarch’s court, and she hadn’t been around since I was a teenager.
Besides, head of the guards or not, you try telling a preteen that can crack your armour apart with his bare hands that you don’t fancy falling in line. ”
“You could have left,” Austin said.
“It’s home. And Tristan’s service really isn’t so bad, unless Secretary Char manages to corner me and stick me on paperwork.
” Inx’s tone indicated that such a thing was far worse than the fall of a city, and Austin thought of all the paperwork he put Tammy through.
He wasn’t sure he’d personally suffer sitting through forms himself, though he recalled the scientists presenting him with hundreds of surveys to fill out over the years. I felt this, I felt that.
“Boring.”
Inx’s eyes brightened. A genuinely appreciative smile flashed Austin’s way. “Indeed. Prince Hal loves his paperwork, too. I suspect our dear secretary pins official mandates to his wall to read before bed…”
Lassie stifled a giggle. “He does not.”
By the time Reba and Inx had eaten and were wrestling on the sands, a portion of the Troop had snuck away from carrying rocks to watch and cheer them on.
They grappled like there were stakes, a competitiveness rising in both men, indicating they genuinely wanted a win.
By the time a bleary-eyed Jaris joined them on the porch, Kada was on her feet, blowing out a frantic tune on her pipes.
Inx caught a strike on his chitin-shielded forearm and grabbed Reba by the wing. The men fell to the sands, Inx on top, knees planting onto the strong joints of Reba’s wings. Reba tried to dislodge him but, exhausted, lay back in the sands, gasping.
“I yield,” Reba panted.
A cheer from the Troop went up, and Inx raised two victorious hands high in the air.
His smile flashed at Lassie, and then he was on his feet, helping Reba shakily to his as well.
Reba didn’t seem too bothered by the defeat, though he grumbled something that made Inx put an arm around his shoulders and squeeze.
There was a hum in the air after the intense fight, and an uncomfortable disquiet filled Austin at the thought of sitting there waiting the rest of the day.
He looked at Eli. “Put together a competition. I want to see the best fighter.”
Eli leapt into action. He dispensed orders for the Troop to come and prepare themselves, spoke with Lassie about arranging food and drinks, and Jaris bent heads with Kada, discussing their musical input. From thin air, a chalkboard appeared, and lots were drawn.
The entire household turned out on the sands to watch, the competition accepted with startling enthusiasm.
Soon enough, Austin understood that was due to the Troop’s appetite for competition, as they threw themselves into fights with whole-hearted determination to win, all wielding whatever biological advantages they had to their full extent.
Eli approached Austin, holding a plate in offering. “Some food, if you’re hungry? You haven’t eaten yet today, and it’s almost dinner.”
Austin ate a few mouthfuls, recognising that the growing agitation inside him was likely just hunger. He drank the juice too, and then he went back to watching the Troop.
Eli stayed crouching at Austin’s side. His eyes were bright and gleaming, unable to tear his gaze from the fighting for even a moment. They were in their third round, winners fighting winners, and exhaustion was now battling determination.
“They think you’re scouting their fighting power for the monarch,” Eli whispered.
“Who?”
A surge of objecting cries drowned out Austin’s question. The pit fighter Oran slammed Reba onto the ground and kicked his wing joint, making a loud thunk.
“Oran’s the winner,” Jaris called quickly, before a second kick could strike the already downed avian. There was an unhappy grumble from a few men as Reba got shakily to his feet, shaking out his wings with a wince. Inx watched Oran closely as he strode, grinning, across the sand.
Eli muttered, “Asshole.” Then leaned closer. “What are you going to give the winner?”
Austin blinked. He didn’t look at Eli, not wanting to give away his surprise.
He’d been throwing around his weight without much thought.
It hadn’t occurred to him that anyone actually expected anything from him.
And there was quite the crowd now, the entire estate turned out to watch.
The thought of all of them looking at him expectantly as the winner was declared and Austin disappointing them…
Austin studied Reba. He’d revived himself and was cheering on the next fighting duo.
His eye was swollen from getting elbowed in the temple, and a busted lip had discoloured his shirt with stains of blood.
He seemed to be holding his wing at an uncomfortable angle.
Inx walked across the sand to Javis and whispered something in the man’s ear.
Austin pitched his voice low. “Give them?”
“A competition should always have a reward.”
Austin dealt out punishments to those nearest him. His presence was universally considered an unwanted, unpleasant thing. And even if he was in Ireland with Cessair’s resources at his disposal, he wouldn’t give someone part of something so tainted as a reward.
The match ended. Some adjustment was made, and the next match lot was called: Inx and Oran.
The ensuing match made it clear that Inx had been taking it easy on all his opponents thus far.
Oran was struck hard, grappled to the ground, and had his ribs fallen upon by sharp knees.
Inx drove his chintin-armoured arm beneath Oran’s jaw, snapping half his poisonous spines. A cheer went up.
Inx helped Oran back onto his feet, but the look the men exchanged was far from friendly. Inx retook his position leaning against the porch, Reba sneaking him a grateful, admiring look. Oran limped away.
The stress of what to give the winner loomed greater as the competition neared its climax.
His enjoyment evaporated. Uncertainty took its place, making his heart race and his thoughts turn sharp-edged.
Austin gritted his teeth, fighting down the feeling.
A yet untouched bottle of wine drew his eye to the table.
“Give me that,” Austin ordered, and felt his own eyes widen at the vicious rip in voice.
Kada and Eli yelped in surprise. Jaris produced a horrible discordant note on his guitar, and everyone, every single person, covered their ears and flinched away.
A horrible silence followed his unpleasant, harmful voice. The two men who’d been fighting stood shock-still on the sands, the spectators went deathly quiet, and those nearest him didn’t seem to even be breathing. The atmosphere had spoiled so suddenly it felt like violence against Austin’s skin.
His teeth ached.
The urge to leap up and retreat raced through him, but dozens of eyes upon him killed that compulsion mid-formation. Austin wouldn’t let himself look so weak in front of all of these people.
Without meaning to, his top lip curled back. He embraced the snarl. “Leave,” he ordered, expecting their flinches this time. The only way to have spared them was not to speak at all, but sitting there as they all stared was intolerable.
Everyone moved quickly. The Troop and spectators were gone in seconds, the disrupted sand the only evidence of them having been there at all. The porch emptied out even faster.
By the time Austin had drawn in two shaky breaths, he was alone.