A Prince's Pride

*Milo*

The last three days have been horrible, probably the worst in my life. I waited a few minutes before leaving Aaron’s room, intent on tracking him down and talking through all this, but a guard stopped me. Apparently, Aaron ordered me to be on house arrest in the palace and I’m not allowed to leave. In his absence, Riley is holding court and the Small Council is overseeing the King’s day-to-day duties.

I don’t want anything to do with the proceedings of the Crown right now. I’ve been spending a lot of time lately with Queen Elaine, but there hasn’t been much improvement. Many people have tried telling her that Aaron is going after Criston, that they know where he is, but she won’t believe them. She insists that Criston’s in the palace, creeping around, and keeps throwing daggers into her closet.

I’m sitting in the Queen’s bedroom at one of the tables, reading through her notes. She wrote this page two days ago and, although they’re in English, but they don’t make sense. Many of the notes have my name in them, though it’s thrown in seemingly randomly, not making sense with the words around it.

It’s becoming apparent to me that Criston intends to find my son and kill him. He and Milo are so cute together. I haven’t eaten today, but a rabbit stew has appeared on my table. One of the servants says he sat it there, but I know Criston made it. I can smell it. I wonder if Milo likes rabbit stew. My son is happier these days, though not at being king. I saw his coronation and Milo was there. I bet Milo would look good with a crown. Criston…Criston…where are you hiding? Milo might be in danger of Criston but, that’s ridiculous. Milo doesn’t like rabbit stew, does he? I must ask Criston for his recipe for Milo stew, the rabbits love it. I hope Criston is enjoying his vacation to the lower isles. Aaron must be having a rough time on the trip. Did they feed the rabbits? The rabbits! That’s how they’re doing it, rabbits on the water. Could the rabbits be in charge? Are they guiding the Red Hand? I must tell the King…

At the bottom of the page, she wrote “Criston = Rabbits” and circled it so many times, I could probably push the spot through with a finger.

“I don’t like rabbit stew, Your Majesty,” I tell Queen Elaine. She looks up at me from one of her new pages of notes, her hair wild, her eyes bugging. 

“You don’t?” she asks. She stands so quickly, her chair topples over behind her, walks around the table to me, grabs me by the face with both hands, and tilts my head up to hers. “You must tell me, Milo. Is Criston made of rabbits?”

This would be highly comical if it weren’t so sad. 

“I don’t know, Your Maj—”

“Please, dear,” she says, letting my face go and walking calmly to the other side of the table. She seems lucid now. She comes in and out of this state, but it’s never for long. “Please call me ‘Mother.’ You and my son are to be married, you know.” She looks at me and smiles sweetly, her wild expression long gone. “You know, you two really are lovely together. I’ve never seen him happier than when he’s with you. Why, I think given the time, my husband—” she freezes then, her eyes bulging again. Her hand plunges down the front of her dress. Knowing what’s coming, I dive under the table, and hear the thunk as the blade lands in the back of the closet. 

“Milo,” she whispers, “go and check. See if I got him.”

I stand and walk to the closet, not bothering to be sneaky. Inside the closet, I find the Queen's fine gowns, many of them ripped to shreds. The other servants and I have offered to take them away for her, but she won’t let us, insisting that he, whoever he is, won’t come if the closet is clear. She said it isn’t Criston, but calls him the Whisperer. She’s even bought new dresses to entice him, swearing he enjoys running his hands over the fabric.

I move the dresses aside and, at the back of the closet, find nothing but the wooden back, marked with gouges from the daggers she’s thrown at it, and the new dagger stuck in the wood. We’ve stopped asking her where she’s getting them. She won’t answer, insisting they’re a gift from the Gods. I pull the dagger free and walk out of the closet. 

“There’s nobody here, Your—” she levels a stare at me, so I say, “Mother,” instead. This seems to calm her down for a moment until she starts furiously rearranging her notes, including the one I’d been reading.

“If you don’t like rabbit stew, then my research is ruined,” she says, scooping up a stack of papers. Before I can say anything, she moves to the fire and throws the papers into it.

As I’m watching the paper blacken in the flames, the Queen’s door opens and I see Mirra, the Queen's Royal Attendant, come in. She seems startled to find me there and blushes slightly. I think she has a crush on me.

“Oh, Milo,” she says, not making eye contact with me. “I didn’t know you’d be in here again. It is so good of you to sit with the—”

“Is that rabbit stew?!” demands Elaine, striding towards Mirra.

“No, Your Majesty. It is chicken noodle today."

Elaine turns toward the fire and stares at it is if it's speaking to her. Mirra looks at me sadly, but her eyes snap back to the Queen when she starts to shout.

“No, Elaine! No!” she shouts. “You can’t crack up. Aaron is counting on you.” She turns to me, the wild expression back in her eyes. “Milo, come here, we need to try again. We never thought of chickens, did we? Yes, chickens must be the answer.” She moves her notes aside, grabs a fresh piece of paper, and sits down as she starts to write again.

“I’ll just leave this here, shall I?” Mirra says, setting the bowl on a small table near the door. “See to it she eats it, won’t you, Milo?” 

I nod and Mirra leaves, shutting the door behind her. I grab the bowl and feel the soup is still warm. I realize I haven’t eaten today. I haven’t eaten much since Aaron left to pursue Criston.

“Here,” I say, bringing the soup to her. I right the chair she’d been sitting in and sit next to her, glancing at her notes.

We never suspected the chickens, did we? What if that’s how they’re doing it? Milo doesn’t look like a chicken, he’s in the clear. Of course he is, he’s my son. But the Red Hand could be made of chickens and they’re going to peck us all in our sleep. Milo doesn’t sleep, of course, he’s not a chicken.

I look away and take a spoonful of the soup up, then tap the Queen on her shoulder.

“Oh, no, Milo, you eat it. You hardly touched your rabbit stew.”

“It’s your lunch, Elaine,” I say, deciding not to call her Mother. It feels too awkward when she’s in this addled state. “You need to eat.”

“I am the queen,” she says, “and I command you to eat. A mother always looks after her children.”

I am hungry, and I do need to eat, but I can't bring myself to it. I'm too miserable, not knowing what will happen between me and Aaron. Instead, I set it down next to Elaine. 

"Oh, lunch!" says Elaine as if she didn't know it was in the room. "Thanks, Milo." She picks up the bowl and starts to spoon the soup into her mouth furiously fast. When she only has a little left in the bowl, she stares at her spoon as if entranced by the piece of chicken on it. 

"That's it, Milo! That's it!" she says suddenly in a triumphant voice, clutching my arm. "If we eat all the chickens, they can't run the Red Hand and we'll take them down. Tell the King, won't you, Milo? He trusts you so."

"I'll tell him," I promise her. 

*Aaron*

Desparr is a small town to the east of Crown City. The SOAs here have rented a cabin near the border of the town, on a road that leads to the hideout of the Red Hand, a small house in the woods that sit atop a steep cliff. 

I'm on guard duty, crouching by one of the upper windows to the cabin that looks out onto the road. The SOAs assured me I didn't need to sit guard duty, but I insisted. However, Oswald still kept on guarding me until I ordered him to sleep. He feigned sleep for a while, but eventually his obviously fake snores died down to slow, deep breathing. 

I'm glad he's asleep. I don’t know when I’ll next be alone and I need to think about everything with Milo. I can't deny that I'm angry at him for lying, but blaming him for the attack, for Corianne, and for my father may have been too far. Now that I've had three days to think about it, I don't think the attack would have been prevented. We would have caught Criston and a few of his Red Hand associates, but they've already proven they're resistant to giving us information. 

But then again, my father would have been alive and he'd have happily resorted to torture to get what he wanted out of them. Would they have resisted torture to keep the attack a secret, or would they have broken and told us everything? There's no way of knowing now. 

And there's still the fact that Milo kept the information from me for so long. That he lied to me in the library. His words from them come back to me 

I trust you, Aaron. If you trust Corianne, then so do I.

But it was a lie. I don't blame him for my father's death, but it's possible that his mistrust of Corianne led to her being pushed off that tower. If he'd just trusted me…

I can't stop the tears that leak from my eyes. Not for Corianne. Not even for my father. They're for my future. I had a plan to become king and marry Milo. With him by my side as my king consort, I knew there would be nothing that could stand against us. Now, I don't even know if I want him to be my king consort. I love him, but if I can't trust him, how can I trust him with the fate of our people?

I jump when a voice whispers about a foot to my right. "Are you okay, Your Majesty?" I quickly wipe my tears and look into the darkness. I can barely make out the SOA there, crouched in the shadows. 

"Why are you spying on me?" I whisper back, not wanting to disturb Oswald. 

"Sir Oswald commanded me to watch over you while he slept."

Typical.

"I'm supposed to be on watch."

"I'm sorry, my king, I'm just following orders," he says, moving toward the window so the moonlight hits his unmasked face.

I let out a small gasp. I know him. His name is Exavier Cromwell.  The Cromwell house is an old and powerful house in Midoor. Exavier and I were close friends as teenagers and he was the first person I ever came out to. His father found out he was gay too and forced him to enlist in the military, thinking it would man him up. If he's an SOA now, he must be doing very well in the military. 

"It's fine," I say, turning to look back out the window. A group of teenagers is walking down the road toward the village, passing what looks like a bottle of wine between them. They aren't old enough to drink, surely, but I couldn't care about that right now if I tried. 

"Are you okay, though?" he asks.

"I'm fine. I'm just…unsure about things."

"I know how that is," says Exavier. 

We sit in silence for a few moments, each of us looking out the window. 

"Crazy how things turned out, huh?" he says. "You being king, me an SOA."

"Well, I was always going to end up as king one day. Congrats on your position. Your father must be so proud."

He cracks a grin and I smile back at him. 

"He is, actually. So is my wife. I'm bi," he adds in response to my raised eyebrows. "I didn't realize until I'd met her. She's about seven months pregnant."

"Well, congrats again," I say. 

"What about you?" he asks. "Some special lady or…?" He lets the unasked question hang in the air. 

"Or," I say by way of an answer. 

He smiles again. "Lucky or."

"Maybe not," I say. "We're kind of going through something at the moment."

"Happens to everyone. You just have to sit back and think, 'Is losing them worse than what they did?' If so, you'll figure out a way to get past it."

This makes me think. I love Milo more than anything. I'm not sure if we would have been able to stop the attack, even if we had known about Criston from the beginning. Still, it's likely Corianne's death was Milo's fault. But was it? He said she confronted Criston after knowing he was a member of the Red Hand. Still, if he'd shown me the pictures instead of her, maybe her death could have been prevented.

"Your Majesty," says Exavier, sounding tense now. I follow his gaze to see a large group of people walking through the woods, barely visible in the moonlight.

"Wake everyone up," I tell him and see him pull on his mask. "Tell them we're moving on the Red Hand."

*Milo*

Night has fallen and the Queen has been pacing around her room for nearly twenty minutes straight, muttering to herself about rabbits, chickens and, most recently, hyenas. There aren't even any hyenas in Midoor. 

I turn my head towards her door when a knock sounds. 

"Come in!" I call. When it opens, Zelda Offrand walks in, carrying a goblet. 

"Oh, hello, Milo," she says, smiling at me. "Your Majesty, you must drink this all down so you may sleep tonight."

"I'm not a child," snaps Elaine, but she walks up, takes the goblet, and drinks it down in three large gulps. "It's been so nice to see you, Milo, but I must rest. We've made some real progress today. Let's try again when I wake up, shall we?"

"Alright," I say as I help her into bed. She closes her eyes and falls asleep almost immediately. 

Zelda and I leave the room, shutting the door quietly behind us. There's a guard standing outside who's meant to escort me around the palace, making sure I never leave its walls. 

"Are you sleeping in the King's room tonight?" asks Zelda. 

"Those are His Majesty's orders," I say. 

Zelda turns to the guard and says, "Go on ahead of us. I will make sure Milo makes it there."

"I'm sorry, Madam Offrand, but the King—" 

"Is not here," says Zelda, cutting him off. "With the authority of the Small Council, I'm ordering you ahead. I will take full responsibility if anything happens."

"By your word, Madam," says the guard, bringing his fist to his heart. He walks off in the direction of Aaron's room, leaving me and Zelda alone in the corridor. We start following his path, but walk slowly, though I know Zelda can walk much faster than this. 

"She seems much better when you're around, Milo," she says. I don't need her to tell me she's talking about the Queen. 

"How so?" I ask.

“She has more frequent periods of lucidity, she’s more complacent with eating and taking her medicines. Little things, true, but very helpful.”

I pause for a moment, then ask, "What's wrong with her, Zelda?"

"Grief," she says simply. 

"Can grief really do that to a person?"

"Oh, yes. It is rare, but strong grief like the one the Queen suffers can cause psychosis. I have never seen it this advanced before, however, but the Queen's grief is unrelentingly powerful."

I don't need her to tell me that. I remember all too well how Elaine laid in bed for several days, barely eating or drinking, unable to move for sadness. When she stood up the first time after her husband’s death, she was manic.

"Aren't there other things that could be causing this?"

"Well, yes, poisons and elixirs can do such a thing, but as the Queen's food is being tasted by servants, I highly doubt it is such. Additionally, there are viruses that can attack the brain, but we would see others around the Queen afflicted with the same."

"She wants me to call her 'Mother.'" I’m not sure why I said it, but I felt like I needed to tell someone.

"Well, you and her son are together, and you will be the king consort one day, that's not so strange." I let out a snort of disbelief. "No, I truly believe it, Milo. It will be a difficult path, but I don't see the King straying from it. Nor you," she adds. 

"I guess so." I don't really want to talk about Aaron, so I change the subject. "Is there any possible cure for the Queen?"

"Time heals all wounds," she says. "I just wish I knew where those daggers were coming from. We've confiscated about sixty so far."

As we approach Aaron's room, I don't miss how the guard looks relieved, as though he thought I would run off. 

"Will you be at court tomorrow? Princess Riley has asked me to attend. She's holding it around noon."

"Oh, no," she says. "I will be working on a cure for the Queen. Perhaps you can convince her to go. Getting her back into her normal routine would be good for her."

I feel slightly let down by this. Of all the people on the Small Council, she's by far my favorite. 

"Alright, I’ll try. Goodnight, Zelda."

"Goodnight, Milo. Don't fret about the Queen. She's a strong woman. We'll cure her." She smiles at me as I walk in and shut Aaron's door. 

I climb into his bed and pull his pillow to me. It still smells like him, though it's growing fainter by the day. I bury my head into it, hoping this ghost of him won't be the only thing I'll have to cling to, and close my eyes for sleep.

*Aaron*

As dawn breaks, early morning light shimmers through the leaves surrounding us. We're hidden behind trunks, ready to strike when the meeting ends. I'm anxious with anticipation. I just want to get this over with. 

We wait for nearly an hour before the door opens and members of the Red Hand start to emerge. I've ordered my soldiers to wait for Criston to be visible, but they can't wait forever. If the Red Hand walks past our trees, which stand between the cabin and the road, they'll spot us. 

As they draw nearer, my eyes scan the crowd. No Criston. It doesn't matter. We can't wait any longer. 

"Go!" I shout. 

My soldiers spring out from behind their trees, weapons drawn, and advance on the Red Hand. As they draw nearer, SOAs drop from the branches above, landing deftly, taking the Red Hand by surprise. I hear metal on metal as the fighting erupts, but Oswald and I circle around it to get to the cabin. As we come up to the door, I see through a window Criston and another guard in the grass behind the cabin, running for the cliff. 

"On me!" I say to Oswald as I begin to run after them, going through the open window rather than around the building. When we reach the open air beyond the wood, Criston's guard falls back and turns to face me, but Oswald attacks him, taking the attention. The guard still manages to aim a sword swipe at me, which I duck under and run full out toward Criston as he draws his sword.

I attack, swinging my sword in a wide sweep, but Criston steps back, then aims a jab at me, which I deflect with my blade. Criston tucks his leg and rolls at me, so I roll sideways to avoid him and end up on my back. He gets to his feet before me and lifts his sword, intending to impale me, but I kick out at him, staggering him long enough so I can roll onto my stomach. I push myself up onto my knees just in time to avoid his downward arc.

I stand and we circle each other, our blades raised. Adrenaline pumps in my body. I charge, swing, miss. He counterswings, I dodge. I have to admit, he's very good. Too good, in fact, when he feigns a swipe, which I try to deflect. He drops to his knee and lands a thrust with the handle of his sword into my stomach. He kicks my hand, sending my sword flying, then pushes me backwards with his shoulder.

I manage to do a backwards roll and come up on my knees. I'm too winded to do anything but look up at Criston as he lifts his leg. 

His foot connects with my chest and he kicks me backwards off the cliff.