Chapter 20 #2
Topp wasn’t particularly high-class for a prince. He dreamt about a cabin in the woods. A sanctuary where he could take in more animals. Small creature comforts like his favorite imported coffee and a good fire.
But he had found a line, and that line was made of wretched, rotting bodies.
Piled all around and above him were bodies in various states of decomposition.
The stench alone was quite possibly going to be what finally took him out of this world.
Unlike him, shoved in amongst the corpses, Rollie sat up on the driving bench, chortling and yapping away with his friend, Mortie, the local dead dealer.
Mortie was a strange fellow. He took in the dead and cared for them.
Buried them. Burned them. Studied them.
Topp hadn’t known that Rollie even knew how to chortle, but there was that sound, driving him toward his own premature death due to insanity.
He closed his eyes, trying to block it all out, but with every bump that tossed him up and then back down onto the bodies, his eyes reflexively flew open, forcing him to endure this endless ride wide awake.
Eventually, the wheels stopped squeaking and feet hit the ground near the wagon with a thud. The stained linen cloth over all the bodies was thrown off, and the moon shone down on the prince. He blinked up at its fog-covered yellow light. It had been hours then, hours of riding with the dead.
Rollie grinned down at him, and Topp’s blood pressure threatened to burst. “Let’s get a move on, Your Highness. We’ve got a traveler to catch.”
“Get. Them. Off. Me.” If only he could murder someone with his eyes.
“Now, now. That’s just disrespectful. That’s someone’s grandma losing her bowels over the top of you.”
This isn’t happening. But it was. Mortie strolled over, oblivious to their bickering, humming to himself as he gently moved the bodies off the prince, leaving him with suspiciously wet clothes and a strong desire to strip naked despite the damp cold.
Rollie hadn’t bothered to wait for him, already weaving through the cemetery plots with obvious familiarity.
Squelching after him with a grimace and a grumbled thanks to Mortie, Topp found Rollie waiting next to the cemetery’s rear gate.
Dead grass covered the land as far as the eye could see.
He sometimes forgot that they were lucky to have the decaying Lovestone Woods in Relaclave.
Much of Kava looked like this now—withered grasses and cracking trees.
“Do you really expect me to travel with you smelling like that?”
Topp bit down, refusing to give in to Rollie’s obvious baiting. He would never understand how Elysia could stand this little prick of a man.
Rollie buttoned up his coat, still grinning as if he knew it was only a matter of time before Topp exploded. A dark human-shaped shadow expanded, growing taller as it came around the side of a chalky mausoleum. Unlike the shadow, the human attached to it was incredibly small.
Wool cap shoved over thick corkscrew curls, and scarf wrapped halfway up her face, the woman was all eyes. Even with the scarf muffling her voice, no one could have missed her revulsion. “What in the realms is that smell?”
Rollie looked up at the moon and smiled.
“I had no idea when I woke up this morning that today was going to be so utterly amazing. You know, I don’t really like surprises.
Or leaving my tunnels and studies, but somehow this does make it worth it.
” He motioned between them. “Topp, this is Lucy. She’s one of the rebels who managed to escape with her life the night you fucked us all over. She’ll be traveling us out of Kava.”
Topp pretended that ignoring Rollie was getting easier.
Ignoring him was just a muscle. It was going to burn before it got better.
Or he would snap and kill him like a bug.
One of the two. He turned to the new arrival, shoving his guilt down where they couldn’t see it.
“The smell would be me. Rollie thought our best means of escaping Relaclave without me being seen was…with Mortie.” He hooked his thumb back at the older gentleman, who was now hard at work excavating new graves.
Appalled, her mouth turned down as she looked at Topp and the wet marks on his trousers. “Rollie, I told you I could meet you in the city.”
“Ah, I wanted to chat with Mortie. It’s good to get some air, you know?”
Topp glared at Rollie. “Is that right?” Glancing down at the small woman, he faltered. “Are you sure you’re going to be able to travel us both?” He gestured at about the level of her height and looked at her apprehensively.
Both of her extremely small, mittened hands went to her hips. “Are you implying that I can’t do my job because of my stature?”
Gods, he was tired. And apparently, he couldn’t say anything right. “I only meant the pair of us might be heavy—I don’t know how traveling works.”
She softened slightly, but her voice retained a prickle. Turning to Rollie, she lifted her chin. “You were right. Squinchy.”
He was giving up. He was going to take a vow of silence for the rest of this fucking trip.
She held out a mitten to each man and took hold with a surprisingly firm grasp. Narrowing her eyes, she stared them both down. “If either of you let go, it’s not my fault where you end up.”
Topp glanced between them. “Where are we going?”
Ignoring him, Lucy looked at Rollie with a pout. “You’re sure I can’t come along? I could help.”
Rollie shook his head, not even noticing how the woman’s gaze trailed over him. “You know you’re needed here.”
Her playfulness disappeared, but she still gave him one last reminder. “Can be back in an instant. Just send a signal.”
And with that she winked, and they were dropped onto the warm sun-beaten steps of a temple in Sherod, a small seaside village in Aruza.
Topp blinked at Lucy in shock—there weren’t many travelers who could handle that great of a distance.
She’d traveled with three people over not only the entire landmass of Kava, the mess of small kingdoms below it, but also the Flustran Sea to reach Aruza.
Lucy disappeared with a little wave and a confident grin.
Topp stretched, enjoying the satisfying crack in his sternum as the sun sank into his skin for the first time in the gods knew how long.
He’d never minded the lack of heat in Kava, but a little sunshine could fix a multitude of ailments.
It was amazing more people didn’t die of some wet, fungal disease with the ceaseless rain and perpetual damp.
He looked at Rollie’s translucent skin and grinned. “Hope you like sunburn. And that girl was into you.”
Rollie blinked and answered seriously. “How would I know? I’ve never been in the sun.” He stopped, brow creasing. “Into me?”
Thrown for a moment, Topp paused. “That’s not what I… You know what, fair enough. But you probably should find a hat at the very least and keep your long sleeves. And yes, she’s interested in you.”
Rollie nodded, staring at his hand like it might become red before his eyes before turning abruptly back to Topp. “How do you know that? She didn’t say anything.”
He stared out at the blue sky with one hand shading his eyes, smiling at the sight. “The way she looked at you. Was obvious.”
Rollie reared back, his voice vaguely uncertain. “You couldn’t possibly know that.”
Topp sighed, dropping his hand and looking at him. “You’re gonna have to trust me on this one.”
Based on the intense expression on Rollie’s face, the prince had finally found one thing he was smarter at than the genius beside him.
He pointed up at the temple. “So, we’re starting with the original temple of pleasure then?
That’s one way to ease a heartbreak,” he muttered with his focus drifting over to the temple’s entrance.
Rollie’s gaze snapped to him. “She finally dumped you? Took her long enough.”
Topp let out a long, slow breath, refusing to look at his new travel companion.
“Nice, Rollickus, thanks for the tender care. And no—actually I don’t know.
” Now that he thought about it, he wasn’t really sure when they had officially ended things.
The night on the beach? In Bellia? It didn’t matter either way.
“That doesn’t make sense.”
Topp stripped out of his heavy coat, folding it over his arm. “No shit.”
“You couldn’t possibly have been the one to end it.”
He began to walk up the sand-covered steps. “Unlike you, she did actually like me, you know. Lys and I had a lot of fun before it all went to shit.”
Rollie looked at him as they heaved themselves up the large steps.
Sun beating down, he squinted at the prince, shaking his head.
“She fell for the carefree, responsibility-avoiding prince who was never going to come near her secrets and escaped with her to the woods. You fell for the compliant girl who was happy to keep her distance and never asked for more.” He wiped sweat off his pink forehead.
“But Elysia isn’t compliant, she’ll lie to your face and do what she needs to do behind your back without even blinking.
And you’re not carefree, you’re bitter and angry and blinded by ambition.
Relaclave carved you down to your truths. ”
Topp let out a rough laugh in the back of his throat, giving Rollie a considering glance. “But you couldn’t tell that girl liked you?”
Rollie shot him a look. “Not the same.”
His thighs strained as he took another step.
Oddly enough, something about the honesty of Rollie’s comments comforted him.
If only because it made him realize it would always be more complex than that.
He might have liked her sweet, compliant court mask, but he had loved seeing the devious wheels of her mind spin.
It was only when their ambitions and secrets had clashed that everything came apart.
The ultimate truth, the one his mind wanted to avoid, was that it didn’t matter. He’d wrecked their lives without blinking and left the woman he’d loved to die. He knew exactly what kind of man that made him, and it wasn’t good.
Hot air burned his lungs. It was a game of kings, gods, and fate now. The only kind of person he needed to be was one who stayed alive long enough to save his kingdom and avenge his family.
Grunting, he yanked Rollie up another step before the man teetered backward and broke his neck. “Enough feelings. Pick up your fucking feet before you fall to your death.”
Red-faced Rollie nodded, sweat dripping down his temples as he stood, pinching his side. Topp’s expression flattened. He should have known Rollie was going to hold him up. He never even came above ground, for the gods’ sake.
A sweet jasmine breeze floated past, and Rollie swung his head, sniffing the air. “I normally hate perfume, but that smells amazing.”
Topp’s instincts kicked in, his head swiveling as well. The scent smelled unnaturally good. Lesson number one of nature—the most beautiful things were often the deadliest.
The thought had barely passed through his mind when his muscles locked, and his knees hit the hard steps. Collapsing, his head cracked against the sandstone steps. His green eyes attempted to search for Rollie, but neither of them were able to move.