Chapter 40

We were silent as we walked back to camp. We were silent as we retrieved and watered and quickly fed the horses. We were silent as we rode back, though I doubted we would have heard each other over the wind in our ears, Captain Hector pushing us at a rate that by nightfall had the horses foaming at the mouth.

I was of course sore from the riding, shuffling a bit in my steps as we made camp for the night. Christopher just looked numb to it all, keeping any words he would have had to himself. Sarah was docile in the same way, but there was a fire in her eyes, a flaming hatred in every gaze she gave Hector when his back was turned.

“Here, eat up and get some sleep,” he told us, handing each of us the rations that were on Brontus’s horse. He had tied it and his together, switching between them during the day to avoid wearing them out with his weight. “I’ll keep watch first.”

I opened the bag, not surprised to see more bread and dried meat. But I eat it heartily, filling my grumbling stomach. There was no fire, no conversation; in retrospect even Brontus’s cold demeanour would be welcome to how we were dismissed. The bed roll at least provided some comfort as I let the night take me.

~~~

“REN!” Rose punched and slapped my arm repeatedly. “You’re ok! Why didn’t you tell me you’re ok!? What happened!? Are the others safe!?”

“Ow! Stop hitting me!” I tried to push her arms back but her unconscious will must have prevented me from forcefully stopping her. Fortunately for my imagined pain she ceased of her own volition. “Yes. We got away… sort of. But Sarah and Christopher are all good. Sorry, things just… happened.”

“What happened?” she demanded to know again. “That thing that Christopher gave you faded quickly after you three started to run. And you just left me in the dark!”

“Hector showed up.”

That stopped her, her body stiffening. “...How?”

I recounted the events, momentarily having to beg her not to look for herself, giving as much detail as I could stomach. “It was… it was horrible, Rose. I mean, yes, the dragons were trying to kill us, but I think he could have ended them immediately. He just… chose not to.”

She shuttered. “He’s an evil person, Ren. Are you really so surprised?”

“I’m just surprised he was able to do it at all. Brontus was barely holding his own against one of them, while the other nearly did us in. And he just killed them, at his leisure."

“I’m starting to see a potential issue there,” Rose speculated. “I know he said he would set father free, but we should still have something on him, some blackmail for backup. But if he could take out two full grown dragons without breaking a sweat…” She tapered off, the implication all but spelt out.

“Yeah, yeah, I’ve been thinking that, too. Had all day to think about it. It’s a bit tense out there, so I didn’t know if I could use magic without him noticing. Sorry, I didn’t want to keep you in the dark.”

She nodded. “Smart move, that’s fair.” She started pacing, massaging her temples with her thumbs. “But… what do we know? That he is a military captain, that he killed a citizen for magic, which isn’t even a crime for him, that he supports Prince Alexander—”

“No.”

“What?” Rose turned back to me, stilling her feet at my objection.

“There is no Prince Alexander; Sarah told me that on the trip up.”

“That would have been useful to know,” she grumbled, narrowing her eyes at me.

I ducked my head a little bit, lips thinning in guilt. “Yeah, yeah, I’m sorry.”

“Ok, so who was he talking about then?”

“I don’t know. I hadn’t thought about it much since he made that offer, and it took me a bit to even remember where I had heard that name,” I confessed.

“And you never heard that name before?” she asked.

I thought about it for a moment, trying to recall the name in the past. “Well, there was Alecsander down the stree—”

“I don’t think that our treacherous uncle was talking about the five-year-old son of a farmer!” she snapped at me.

“Ok, ok, just throwing it out there.” I kept puzzling over it. “I mean, Scolffice gave a lot of history lessons; maybe he said the name, but you can’t expect me to recall something like that.”

“Maybe you can’t…” she mumbled as she sat down. Her eyes closed and she breathed slow and deep, like a meditation.

“Rose, what are you—”

“Shh!” she snapped. “Give me a moment…”

Then the world spun.

I was back at the desk in one of the lectures that Scolffice gave. “...And that brings us to three hundred years ago, when Chief Deputy Alexander conquered the untamed eastern mountains of their native dragon population…”

The world spun again but I remained in the same place. The same old droning continued, “...Only a little over a hundred years ago, Commander Alexander served as military advisor to the king, allying with…”

And again. “...is when Chief Deputy Alexander sided with the northern kingdom to…”

I had no reference for the timings, just Scolffice jumping around the room as the lengths of shadows sporadically lengthened or shortened instantly.

“And that brings us again to the War of the Sages a century ago, where Commander Alexander led an army of noble born against a disgruntled farmer rebellion, who had recruited…”

Then the room spun again and I was back with Rose in the dreamscape that she had yet to actually define with a location. “What was that? I thought you couldn’t see my memories?”

“I can’t.” She shook her head. “Not directly at least. I just latched onto a word and tried to trigger it, same as I do when I have a specific incident or time.” She took a deep breath, looking tired. “But it’s looser. And all you seem to know is that Alexander is the name of a past military leader. A couple of them, it seems.”

“I don’t think that helps if none of the princes are named that,” I input.

“No, it doesn’t,” she begrudgingly conceded. “Maybe it’s a nickname for one of them though? Talk to Sarah and Christopher about it tomorrow, after Hector’s not around. Between the two of them they should know something.”