Soldier, Brother, Sorcerer

“To serve you, my lady,” the girl said immediately. It was the right answer, of course, but there was a note of sincerity to it that Stephania liked. She would find out the real answer in due course.

“And you, Felene?” Stephania asked.

She watched the thief shrug. “Whatever the world has to offer. Preferably with plenty of treasure, drink, companions, and enjoyment. Not necessarily in that order.”

Stephania laughed softly, pretending that she didn’t hear the lie there. “Of course. What else could someone want?”

“Why don’t you tell me?” Felene countered. “What is it that you want, princess? Why go through all this?”

“I want to be safe,” Stephania said. “And I want revenge on the ones who took Thanos from me.”

“Revenge on the Empire?” Felene said. “I guess I could side with that. They threw me onto that island of theirs, after all.”

If she wanted to believe that revenge on the Empire was what Stephania wanted, then let her believe it. The objects of Stephania’s anger were more easily defined: Ceres, then Thanos, along with anyone who helped them.

Silently, Stephania repeated the vow she’d made back in Delos. She would raise her child to be the perfect weapon against its father. She would raise the child with love; certainly, she wasn’t a monster. But it would have a purpose too. It would know what its father had done.

And that some things could never be forgiven.

CHAPTER FOUR

Lucious had spent most of the voyage to Felldust feeling like he wanted to stab someone. Now that he was getting closer, the feeling only intensified. He was standing there in filthy clothes, the sun baking down on him, fleeing an empire that should have been rushing to obey him.

“Watch where you’re going, boy,” one of the sailors said, pushing past Lucious so that he could fasten a line in place. Lucious hadn’t bothered to remember the man’s name, but right then he wished he had, if only so that he could complain to the captain of this tub about his crew.

“Boy? You know who I am and you dare to call me boy?” Lucious demanded. “I should go to Captain Arvan and have you whipped.”

“You do that,” the sailor said, in the bored tones of someone who knew he was perfectly safe. “See where it gets you.”

Lucious balled his fists. The worst part was the feeling of futility. Captain Arvan stood on the command deck with the boat’s wheel in his hand, the man’s bulk swaying with every wave that rocked the boat. He’d made it perfectly clear that Lucious mattered to him only as far as his money lasted.

As it had ever since he’d left, anger brought with it images of blood and stone. His father’s blood, smeared across the stone of his ancestor’s statue.

The one you killed me with.

Lucious started at that, even though the voice had been there, clear as a morning sky, deep as guilt, ever since he’d struck the first blow. Lucious didn’t believe in ghosts, but the memory of his father’s voice was still there, answering back whenever he was trying to think. Yes, it was just his own mind playing tricks, but that hardly made it better. It just meant that even his own thoughts wouldn’t do as he wished.

Nothing would, at the moment. The captain of the boat he’d found passage on had taken him on grudgingly, as though it wasn’t an honor to have Lucious aboard on his journey. His men treated Lucious with contempt, like some common criminal fleeing from justice, rather than the rightful ruler of the Empire, cruelly usurped from his throne.

From Thanos’s throne.

“Not Thanos’s throne,” Lucious snapped to the empty air. “Mine.”

“You say something?” the sailor asked, not bothering to look around.

Lucious stepped away from him, punching the wood of the mast in annoyance, but that only made pain flash through his knuckles as he took the skin off them. If he’d had his way, he’d have taken the skin off of one or two of the crew as well.

Still, Lucious kept his distance from them, keeping to the clear sections of deck where he’d been told he could go, as if he were some commoner to be instructed on to where to stand. As if he couldn’t rightfully lay claim to any and every vessel in the Empire if he wanted it.

Yet the captain of the boat had done exactly that. He’d left Lucious with clear instructions to stay away from the crew while they worked, and to cause no trouble.

“Otherwise you’ll be over the side and swimming to Felldust,” the man had said.

Perhaps you should have killed him like you did me.

“I am not mad,” Lucious said to himself. “I am not mad.”

He would not allow that, just as he would not allow men to continue to talk down to him as if he didn’t matter. He could still remember the cold state of fury he’d been in when he’d struck his father, feeling the weight of the statue in his hand, lashing out with it because it was the only way to keep hold of what was his.

“You made me do it,” Lucious muttered. “You gave me no choice.”

Just as I’m sure none of your victims gave you a choice, the inner voice said. How many have you killed now?

“What does it matter?” Lucious demanded. He strode to the rail and yelled out over the rush of the waves. “It doesn’t matter!”

“Be quiet, whelp, we’re trying to work here!” the captain of the ship called down from where he steered the thing.

You can’t even do the right thing in the middle of the ocean, the voice within him said.

“Shut up,” Lucious snapped. “Shut up!”

“You dare to talk to me like that, boy?” the captain demanded, stepping down onto the main deck to confront him. The man was larger than Lucious, and normally fear would have run through him then. There was no room for it right then, because memories pushed it out. Memories of violence. Memories of blood. “I am the captain of this vessel!”

“And I am a king!” Lucious shot back, lashing out with a punch that was intended to catch the other man on the jaw and send him reeling back. He’d never believed in fighting fair.

Instead, the captain stepped back, dodging the strike with ease. Lucious slipped on the wetness of the deck and in that moment the other man slapped him.

Slapped him! Like he was some whore who’d spoken out of turn, not a warrior worth fighting. Not a prince!

Even so, the blow was enough to drop him to the deck, and Lucious made a small sound of anger.

Better stay down, boy, his father’s voice whispered.

“Shut up!”

He reached into his tunic, searching for the knife he kept there. That was when Captain Arvan kicked him.

The first blow caught Lucious in the stomach, hard enough to roll him from his knees to his back. The second only clipped his head, but it was still enough to make him see stars. It didn’t do anything to silence his father’s voice.

Call yourself a warrior. I know you learned better than that.

Easy to say when he wasn’t the one being beaten to death on a ship’s deck.

“Think you can knife me, boy?” Captain Arvan demanded. “I’d sell your carcass if I thought anyone would pay for it. As it is, we’ll drop you in the water and see if even the sharks turn up their noses at you!” There was a pause, punctuated by another kick. “You two, grab him. We’ll see how well royalty floats.”

“I am a king!” Lucious complained as strong hands started to pick him up. “A king!”

And soon you’ll be an ex-king, his father’s voice supplied.