Chapter 19: - Everything

  “Where’s the fucking zlakta?” The big man roared. “I won’t ask aga—”

  Exia dashed at him, blade out, and chasing the enemy’s neck. He was rejected by a blocking arm, stumbled from the impact, then sent fully to the floor as a backhand wickedly whipped into his face.

  Exia felt blood in his mouth, heard Ksenija move, heard the man scream and curse, and looked back to see him with a blade sticking out of his arm and molten fury melted into his features. “You little whore!” he roared, grabbed her by the neck, and flung Ksenija across the room like she weighed nothing.

  Exia saw Ksenija slam first into a row of mannequins, bounce wrongly against the wall, and drop to the floor in a heap of dust and debris. Exia couldn’t see her through the clouds, he couldn’t see if she was alive. He could not see if she was dead.

  “I’m going to kill you!” he roared, clawed his way up to his feet and swung his glinting edge at the man. His swing was wide, his footwork sloppy, his head spinning. Exia only managed to stumble aggressively towards his opponent, and for his troubles he earned another backhand to the face.

  The strike cracked harshly on impact. His cheeks burned. Exia fell. The world spun, and blood leaked from a new gash in his mouth. He eyed the heap Kseinja had fallen into and could see her form lying there, motionless, but breathing—that he could tell from the steady rising and falling of her chest.

  He tried to crawl towards her and found his limbs unresponsive things. Exia could only watch, watch as the world spun, watch as Ksenija laid there, watch as Navtej stood with terror etched into his eyes as one of the men held a blade to his neck, and watch as the other bastard tore the place apart in search of a zlakta.

  The thug grew more and more frustrated as he searched, aside from Nav and Exia’s half that was still left on the floor, he was barely able to find anything more than a few coins and a few notes hidden in various nooks and crannies—Ksenija always did know how to take her precautions. Even Exia hadn’t figured out where she hid her money either.

  In a fury, the man turned over a shelf that held nothing but disappointment within it. He roared, paced, and cursed.

  “Come on, it’s got to be somewhere here!” His relative roared—the one that held Nav.

  The man—the one who’d been searching—turned his eyes on Ksenija. “This is your place isn’t it, girl. Your friend Galya told us as much. Took a little persuasion, but you know how protectective mothers get of their sons. Tell me where the zlakta is and we won’t break your tiny little fingers,” he ordered, but Ksneija didn’t respond. She didn’t do much of anything really, anything but lay there. Don’t do it. A frown etched into the man’s eyes at that. He walked up to Ksenija, nudged her with his boot. No response. Don’t do it.

  “Is she dead?” the other asked, concern etched into his features now.

  He turned to his ally. “No, she’s still breathing. It’s just—”

  Ksenija sprang to her feet like lightning, fury in her eyes, motion in her fingers. She pulled out the blade she’d put in the man’s arm, and with both hands wrapped around its handle, stabbed it into his gut.

  It sunk an inch in before the enemy caught her by the hand. There was a struggle, a brief one, Ksenija roared, hissed, spat, and snarled, but was easily overpowered by her enemy.

  The blade floated in the open air, blood dripping from the edge—the Torgovyye’s—he glared down at Ksenija with rage boiling beneath his eyes. In that moment, he held all the power, he could disarm her, he could shove her to the ground, he could end the fight however he wished.

  The Torgovyye twisted the blade in her grip, pointed it at Ksenija, and sank the weapon into her belly.

  Ksenija gasped, panic sank into her eyes, she clutched desperately at the blade’s hilt and fell to the floor as a wet redness began to soak into her clothes.

  “Ksenija!” Navtej screamed.

  “No, no, no, no, no…” Exia whispered. It all felt unreal, like at any moment now, he would wake up and find this all a rather disconcerting dream. But it wasn’t.

  The man’s—the killer’s—features softened as he looked down at girl he’d stabbed.

  “What the fuck did you do?” His relative roared. “We can’t get shit from the girl if she's dead!”

  “I…I didn’t mean to…she just came at me, came stabbed me—twice—I—”

  “We’re getting the fuck out of here! It’s all gone to shit anyway!” the other groaned. He turned, grabbed his ally and dragged him to the door, out of it, and then they were gone.

  It was only the three of them now. Exia, Navtej, and Ksenija—a dying Ksenija.

  Exia rushed over, Navtej a moment later. There was blood, everywhere—on her shirt, on her fingers, on the ground, and in her scarf. She gazed up at Exia, not with defiance, might, or a ferociousness; she gazed up at Exia with terror—letting out soft gasps and trembling whimpers in between ragged breaths.

  She would die like this—he couldn’t help her, Nav couldn’t help her, and she certainly could not help herself. He knew someone who could—but that would ruin everything, that would end his freedom, that would sequester him to not just days of imprisonment, but nights as well. He could not take that risk. No, it’s not a risk. It’s a certainty. He made his decision.

  “What do we do, Exi? She is losing blood quickly!” Nav panicked.

  Exia turned to him, forcing himself calm. “Head back to the Manor.”

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  Navtej paused, stunned, then frowned—frowned with a hate and heat so intense Exia could have sworn they were enemies on the opposite sides of a war. “We are not going to leave her to die!”

  “Head back to the manor, and tell the guards to prepare a chirurgen!” Exia snapped, perhaps at himself, perhaps at Nav, perhaps at the whole fucking world for turning everything on its head in one bloody moment. It really didn’t matter. “Tell them the King is bringing a guest, and that she is badly injured and in need of medical assistance, tell them whatever you have to to make sure they’re ready when we get there.”

  Nav’s features creased out of scorn, into a flicker of hesitation, guilt at that hesitation, and then certainty. He nodded, and then he was sprinting out the door.

  Exia turned his attention to Ksenija, still dying, still terrified, still…everything. She reached out a bloody hand and held his in hers, squeezing tightly. “Exia…” she whispered weakly.

  He looked at the blade. He could pull it out. He could leave her to die, catch up to Nav before he could alert the guards, and keep the nights as his and his alone. He could do anything. He was the King of Bessmertnyy, and she a peasant girl whose life meant nothing—nothing at all—compared to his needs.

  With a coldness in his heart, Exia leaned down, dragged Ksenija up to her feet and slung an arm over his shoulder. She groaned, trembled, but did not resist. “It’s okay…” he reassured her, but felt no reassurance himself. “It’s all going to be over soon,” he told Ksenija. And headed straight for Bezdna palace.

  ###

  Exia awoke with a headache. He was strapped to a chair—knew there was some joke there about this not being the first time, but couldn't bring himself to make it. He was in a room, windowless, cold, damp, and with only two flickering bulbs at a far wall each—one illuminated him, the other illuminated the Captain.

  She—like him, it seemed—was just stirring awake. She rolled her neck, froze and hissed when the headache hit her, and groaned in dismay at its intensity. Her red hair seemed like wildfire—scattered in all directions and clinging to her like smoke.

  She set her eyes on him, recognition hit, relief then that her ward was still alive, and panic at the realization that they were both bound to chairs. She tried the bonds by her arms and legs, and none gave.

  At the far end of the room was a table, on it, their gloves—They seemed to both notice it at the same time.

  The Captain turned to Exia. “Do you think we might be able to—”

  “Shimmy towards it?” Exia asked. “No. we’d only land on our faces, and or alert whoever’s holding us here.”

  “Shit!” she hissed. And then she turned her gaze away from him, as if meeting his eyes were a strain. The rift between them hadn’t healed, hadn't even begun to; if anything it had simply festered under a plague of greater concerns.

  Exia felt nothing at that. Not before, and not now with greater concerns looming above yet again.

  “Do you know who's holding us?” The Captain asked, voice formal, stiff.

  “Ksenija Lyubushkina,” Exia rolled the name in his tongue, and found himself in a distant place, in a distant world, and as a distant person. “I haven’t seen her since…since I was a kid.” He’d heard of her though, lost many resources just keeping tabs on her—the spy, the mercenary, the Blood Mage.

  “So you have a bond with her—of course you do”—and the woman nearly hissed those words out—”What are the chances of us getting out of here?” The Captain asked.

  “None. Not if she doesn’t want us to,” Exia told her with a certainty.

  “So what’s the plan?” The Captain asked.

  “Make her want us to,” Exia replied.

  The Captain began speaking, probably for clarification, but was cut off by the grinding of a metal door. Inside stepped a face Exia could never forget. Black hair. Black eyes. Red Scarf. She smiled, perfectly, beautifully, excellently. “Hello Exi.”

  “Sen,” he smiled back. Oh Nav, you smart, smart , bastard. Who else could hold me back but her? But let’s see if your gamble pays off. “You’re going to need to let me go.”

  She shook her head and clicked her tongue. “Well, you see, Nav asked first, so…”

  Exia winced. “What are you and Nav involved in?”

  “Part of being a spymaster is knowing how to keep secrets, Exia,” She told him.

  Exia blinked. “You don’t know do you?”

  “I don’t know,” she shrugged, smart enough not to waste time on a lie once it had failed.

  “Nav didn’t tell me, he threw me off a train rather than tell me, he poisoned me rather than tell me, he ran to the edge of the country rather than tell me. So he did not tell you. Because he’s trying to protect you.”

  Silence sank into the cold room. The two met each other's eyes. Ksenija’s lip arched into the start of a grin. She scoffed. “I remember what you were like. Always wondered if we’d meet again, wondered how you’d measure up to the image I had of you in my head. I see now that was a grave underestimation.”

  Exia looked at her warmly. “I need to help Nav, Ksenija. He’s in trouble, real fucking trouble, and he’s not letting me help him—”

  —“But you've changed too”, she continued, as if barely hearing his words. “Or rather become more of yourself. King Exia,” she said his title as if it were a slight against him. “Trying to rule…”

  “I’m trying to help!” He snapped.

  “Navi’s a big boy. He can make his own decisions.”

  “It doesn’t matter what decisions he makes if they get him killed!” Exia hissed, heart racing. “And if he dies because you locked me here, if he dies and you kept me chained, if my Brother fucking dies, Ksenija, I will stop at nothing to make sure all the people who took him from me pay. Not only with their lives, but with so much more,” he told her, venom dripping from his tongue.

  Ksenija met his heat like she always had—unflinching, unyielding, never backing down. She walked over to him, slid a key into his bolts and unlocked the latches. One by one, by one.

  When he was free she looked down at him with eyes as hard as steel. “I’m doing this because you convinced me, Exia. Not because of your threats.”

  “I know,” he whispered. “I know.”

  She walked over, freed the Captain and made her way out of the room without another word spoken.

  Exia got to his feet, walked over to the table, and slid his gloves on.

  “Navtej is probably still on the ice—depending on how many hours we lost here—we might still be able to catch him during a rest period,” The Captain noted, reaching for her gloves.

  Hand of Zcigmagus.

  Exia wrapped a blue limb around her hand, pulled it back, and lifted the woman into the air before she could fully register what had just happened. “What are you—” she cut herself off and began to struggle, but her might was nothing compared to a Mages', and he barely felt it.

  Exia tied a tentacle around her neck, he tightened it, tightened, and tightened, until he was certain the Captain could take no more air in. She clawed at it with her free hand, and when she was certain that would yield no luck, she reached for her too–far gloves. Finally, with weakening arms, and clouding eyes, she set her gaze on him, and Exia saw true fear in them—she wondered if he was going to kill her. And then her consciousness slipped, and her body went limp.

  Exia let go, and the Captain hit the floor softly.

  He waited to feel nothing. And instead felt everything.

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