So That Was It
Thalia could find no excuse. Her lips only worked soundlessly. She wanted to put on her usual brazen front, but she was so far past her physical and mental limits that her mind simply would not turn.
She yanked her hood forward, hastily hiding a face thrown into disarray by the shock. Then she tried to walk straight past her brother, who still blocked the entrance—but Gareth seized her wrist with a sniper’s speed.
“I asked why you were ransacking Barcas’s tent.”
“Let go of me!”
She wrenched her arm hard, but Gareth’s hand clung like glue and would not come free. He hauled her body roughly toward him and snarled like a furious wolf.
“Tell me what scheme you were trying to pull!”
The grip that seemed to crush bone made Thalia bite down on her lip.
Brute of a man who only knows how to use his strength.
She kicked his shin without mercy. He must not have been wearing any armor yet; Gareth swore under his breath and hopped. She did not waste the opening. She tore her arm free, bolted from Barcas’s tent, and ran as if the ground itself were on fire.
From behind her came the crash of things being smashed—Gareth giving chase, by the sound of it. But Thalia never looked back. She tore wildly between the tents until, before long, her own carriage came into view. She flung herself inside, bolted the door tight, and curled into a corner of the seat.
A worry rose that Gareth, furious enough to boil over, might try to break the carriage open. But long minutes passed with no sign of any uproar. He must have abandoned the pursuit because of watching eyes.
Thalia let out a breath of relief and buried her face against her knees. Then, all at once, disgust twisted her features. She was sick of herself—of behaving like the greatest fool alive.
Why had she lost her reason and gone to check on his safety? And showing Gareth that emotionally frayed face left a sour taste in her mouth as well.
He didn’t notice something, did he?
She chewed her lip raw, then carefully peered out the window. Knights were striking the tents. They did not seem to have registered the disturbance she had caused. Pressing her face close to the glass, Thalia rolled her eyes this way and that, then drew the curtain shut again.
As the sky brightened, the knights mounted and began to form ranks. Barcas was among them. She watched him through a gap in the curtain as he inspected the front line the way he always did—until he started toward the carriage she was in, and she hastily hid herself.
Had Gareth told him something? Was he coming to interrogate her?
She was wringing excuses out of her mind when Barcas stopped near the carriage, gave some order to the knights, and then moved back to the head of the column.
Thalia’s shoulders sagged with relief. Then a royal guard’s booming voice carried over.
“We will be departing shortly.”
She made no reply. The knight had not expected one; without another word he spurred his horse forward. A moment later, her carriage began to move as well.
Thalia sank back into the seat and looked up through the curtain at a sky bleaching white. It seemed another tedious day was about to begin, with nothing having happened at all.
The march that had started at dawn was halted before the sun had even begun to sink.
Gareth, his patience at its end, unilaterally declared that they would travel no farther that day. Strictly speaking, the schedule of this journey lay under the authority of Barcas, the commander-in-chief. But few would dare defy an order from the next emperor. And so, with Barcas’s tacit consent, they were forced to pitch camp on empty ground with the second holy site—Ulgram Hill—nearly in sight.
To the soldiers who had wanted to leave the plain as soon as possible, it was a galling situation. For Thalia, it was a blessing. She had neither eaten nor slept properly, shut all day inside a jolting carriage, and her strength had hit bottom. She lay on the carriage seat, blinking dizzily.
Then, from outside, came that thoroughly tiresome voice.
“Your Highness, I’ve brought a little fruit.”
Thalia’s brow furrowed. That a knight she had so thoroughly rebuked only yesterday would come meddling again struck her as almost uncanny.
Unless he has some scheme of his own, why would he fawn over me like this?
She snapped at him, sharp and cold.
“Get lost.”
“You said you couldn’t eat because you didn’t know what might be in the food. Fresh fruit that hasn’t been prepared should be fine, shouldn’t it?”
She shut her mouth, too weary even to answer. The knight then had the gall to throw open the carriage door and thrust a tray of fruit under her nose.
“I’m worried this really will turn into a funeral procession. Please, stop being so stubborn and at least eat this.”
She stared at his face in sheer disbelief, then dropped her gaze to the silver tray. A red-ripe apple, plums, green grapes—things of that sort.
She looked down at them for a long moment, then muttered in a voice so drained it seemed she no longer had the energy even to be angry.
“How am I supposed to know you didn’t smear poison on the skins.”
By now any reasonable person would have given up. The knight did not so much as flinch. He heaved a heavy sigh, picked an apple from the tray, took a large bite, and held the tooth-marked fruit out toward her.
“Satisfied now?”
“You’re telling me to eat what you were just eating? That’s filthy—get it away from me!”
The knight looked as if he wanted to wring her neck. Thalia turned her back on him regardless. The truth was she was desperately hungry, but she had no desire to put food that had passed through someone else’s hands into her mouth. Force it into her stomach and she would only bring it all back up again.
“That’s enough. Stop bothering me and get the hell out of here.”
“Is ‘get out’ the only thing Your Highness knows how to say?”
The knight’s increasingly overstepping manner made irritation surge up her throat. Thalia shot to her feet. A brief wave of dizziness hit her, but she braced both legs and held herself upright, unwilling to show weakness. The moment her vision cleared, she left the knight still watching her face for cues and stepped out of the carriage.
The sky had already shifted from deep blue into a pale orange. She looked at it for a moment, then moved toward the edge of the camp to escape the glances flicking her way.
She wanted to go somewhere empty and rest in quiet. But the moment she left the group, the knights would stick to her heels. After a brief deliberation, Thalia headed for a thicket of dense woods a short distance from where the supply wagons had been parked.
From this far, they can still see where I am with the naked eye—so they won’t hover around pretending to guard me.
She sat with her back against a great tree and drew the cool evening air deep into her lungs. How long she stayed like that, she could not say—until a faint laugh sounded close by.
Thalia’s eyes snapped open. She was not the only one who had sought out a quiet place to rest. Through the sparse spruce trees, Aila was strolling at an unhurried pace.
Thalia’s face contorted. Body and mind were worn to the bone. She did not think she could endure that face, so full of happiness.
She sprang up from the ground. She was about to leave when another figure, hidden behind a tree, came into view.
The man she had begged, only that morning, simply to stay alive.
Thalia stared at him with vacant eyes. One hand on Torc’s reins, quietly following Aila, Barcas looked more at peace than she had ever seen him. She had grown so tired of his cold expressions and the crease between his brows that this quiet face felt strange.
Is that the face he always wears in front of Aila?
She was gazing at him blankly when Aila caught Barcas’s arm, rose onto her toes, and tilted her face up. The instant Thalia understood what she was asking for, her breath stopped.
She did not want to see it. A scene she would never be able to cut from her mind for the rest of her life—one she would turn over and over again—she did not want it in her eyes.
Even as she screamed inwardly, she could not tear her gaze from the two of them. Perhaps, somewhere, she had wanted to watch him refuse her coldly. But Barcas answered Aila’s wish like a faithful hound.
The moment she saw him lower his head toward her, Thalia turned and ran. She had not gone far before someone caught her.
She looked up with startled eyes. Gareth, his cheeks flushed as if from drink, had seized her arm and was staring down at her. Under that assessing gaze she hastily bowed her head—but the moisture at the corners of her eyes had already been seen.
“Don’t tell me you…”
Gareth muttered, letting out a hollow laugh. Thalia twisted her arm violently, trying to break free. The crown prince did not budge. He looked down at the face that still had not managed to wipe away its emotional turmoil as if it were some rare spectacle—and then, at last, he burst into laughter.
“So that was it?”