Ch8: Better This... Than Him

Vibe: Heathens — twenty one pilots | Running with the Wolves — AURORA | Love and War — Fleurie

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The prince's carriage stopped hard in front of the main entrance — no slowing, no grace, as though the coachman had orders to make the whole estate flinch.

"Your Grace," Alan said quietly, "he was not meant to come in person."

"That is exactly why he did," the Duke answered.

The hall had been prepared in haste — too quickly to look truly ready. Nanthelm had only managed to open the shutters and light a few candles in the central holder. The room sat half-drowned in shadow: dark beams overhead, heavy drapes, and the crest cut into stone between the windows. The negotiation table stood in the center, but no one approached it.

The Prince did not wait to be announced. He walked in at once, wearing a smile that never reached his eyes. Black hair, a dark coat without ornament, movements level and precise — the cold certainty of a man who never had to justify his presence. Two men followed him. They stopped at the door, scanning the room with methodical eyes before the Crown Prince spoke his first word.

"Duke."

"Your Highness."

Short bows. Neither man rushed to break the silence. The candles burned without flickering; the air felt frozen in place.

"I decided not to rely on reports. The situation in the east raises too many questions. And you have again refused the sweep of the territories out there. So I will see to it myself."

Alan pressed his lips together, feeling his shoulders go numb.

/"This has nothing to do with the east."/

"My refusal is grounded," the Duke said evenly. "I have my reasons."

The Prince tilted his head, just as a hunter studies prey before the shot.

"And you believe the empire's affairs do not concern you?"

"I believe," the Duke said, weighing each word, "that sending my people to the far edge of the empire would be a mistake."

Alan felt the air in the room draw tighter.

"It is an imperial decree," the Prince reminded him quietly.

"It is an order that does not account for the real state of things."

Their gazes met.

"You are questioning my father's decision?"

"I am questioning the reliability of the information His Majesty received."

The Prince's smile widened. That was the ugliest part of it — it grew more visible exactly when something had struck true.

"Careful, Duke. That sounds as though you know more than the Emperor."

"I know my forest. It has changed."

"Strange," the Prince murmured. "The forest has always been there. And monsters are not meant to appear inside a duchy."

"But they are appearing. And they are moving closer."

Alan took an involuntary half-step forward. The Prince's gaze slid to him — a single second, no more — and the cold of it went straight to the bone.

"That is a local problem," the Crown Prince snapped. "The east needs your people specifically."

"My duty is to defend my own lands."

"Your duty is to follow the Crown's orders."

"If I send my people east," the Duke said calmly, "no one will be left here to hold back what is already closing in."

The Prince took a step — not toward the Duke, but sideways, as if to study an old tapestry on the wall. Alan recognized the maneuver at once: a predator circling for a weak point in the defense.

"By my reports, the monsters have not merely grown active. They are migrating — specifically from the east. And if that is true..." — the Prince's smile thinned — "then your forest may only be a consequence."

"Or a pretext."

The Prince gave a small shrug.

"Interesting," Erebus said quietly. "You speak with such certainty, as though you already know the two are connected."

Something shifted in the Duke's face — a muscle near his eyes twitched, and then his expression settled into a single frozen mask.

"I work with the facts I have."

"Of course."

Now it was the Duke who closed the distance.

"Monsters in the east, and sudden changes in my forest." His eyes held Erebus's without blinking. "And you know about both."

The Duke let the words settle before he went on.

"I would guess it is one and the same problem. Or someone very much wants us to think so. I do not play games with this."

"And I do."

"Because if they are connected," the Duke's voice hardened, "then someone is either controlling it, or deliberately creating the conditions to let it happen."

"Are you implying something, Duke?"

"I am only trying to understand who benefits."

For a moment the silence turned almost tangible. Even the candle wicks made no sound. The Prince's fingers curled, briefly, into a fist — a gesture shorter than a heartbeat — and then his hand relaxed again. The smile returned, but it was different now. Tighter. More deliberate.

"Careful, Duke. Assumptions like that can look... dangerous."

Alan caught the flicker in the Prince's hand and held his breath. It was not the words that frightened him — it was the pause before the last one.

/"He struck something."/

Alan glanced at his lord. The Duke's face stayed unreadable. Too unreadable.

/"He did that on purpose."/

The tension in the room climbed to its edge. But the Prince had the look of a man who had received exactly what he came for. Not a defeat — a confirmation.

/"If the Prince decides to answer this... it will no longer be a conversation."/

But the Duke did not look away.

"I rely on facts alone."

"Excellent, then. In that case, I will stay at your estate for a while."

The Prince turned slowly to the window, where the tended rows of the garden stretched into the evening dusk. His voice came out indifferent, as though his thoughts had already wandered elsewhere.

"I want to see everything with my own eyes."

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"Mira, bring more water," the gardener called.

"Coming!"

The sky burned a hard, bright blue. Elara moved deeper into the garden, toward the next bush. Her fingers worked the branches on their own — her hands knew this labor down to the smallest motion, while her thoughts drifted somewhere far away.

She lifted her head. And went still.

A dark shape stood frozen in a second-floor window. Motionless, as though it were part of the room itself. Black hair, a dark silhouette cut sharp against the light behind him. He was standing there, looking — looking exactly where she stood.

Her heart slammed once against her ribs and went quiet.

/"Ten years."/

Through the glass, the distance, the shadows, she could not make out his face. But the posture was enough. The absolute, almost unnatural stillness that belonged to him and no one else. There had never been restlessness in him.

/"He found me."/

Her hands closed on their own. Leaves crushed between her fingers, staining her skin with sap, and she felt none of it. A spasm gripped her throat.

/"He is here. In the estate. Two floors directly above my head."/

"Ara...?"

The voice came out ordinary, touched only by mild surprise. Elara did not move. Mira followed her line of sight and went still as well.

The glass caught the daylight, and for one instant — brief as a flash — the eyes in the window looked entirely black. Not dark brown, not shadowed. Black.

"Don't look," Mira breathed.

Too late.

Nothing in the window changed. No movement, no reaction. He was looking through her — or at something behind her. As though the girl were simply part of the garden's scenery, one more shrub not worth the attention.

/"He knows."/

Then, with unbearable slowness, he turned back into the room, resuming his conversation. No rush, no visible triumph. As if nothing had happened.

Elara let out a breath and only then realized she had not been breathing at all. Mira stayed silent beside her, not daring to ask.

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"You have a fine estate," the Crown Prince remarked, as if in passing. "And many... interesting people."

The Duke ignored the remark.

"I would like to look more closely."

"Of course," the Duke answered evenly.

Erebus took a step forward. He was not looking at the Duke. He was looking through the window, to where a figure with silver hair flickered between the green rows. Even bound under a coarse headscarf, it caught the sun too brightly for an ordinary servant girl.

"And, perhaps," his gaze slid sideways and back to the men in the room, "meet your new servants."

Alan held his breath. The Prince watched his reaction openly, almost deliberately, forcing him to give himself away.

"I am certain," Erebus added, "there is someone among them who might prove... interesting."

The room seemed to draw in on itself.

"Have them all gathered," he said. "I want to take a look."

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Elara was still standing among the bushes when she heard Nanthelm's footsteps. His voice carried level and practiced, as though announcing the day's schedule:

"All servants are asked to gather in the great hall. Immediately."

Mira turned sharply. Their eyes met.

/"Hide the fear."/

Elara let the ruined leaves fall from her fingers. She wiped her palms against her apron. Slowly. Evenly. She had nothing to hide.

And she started toward the house.

Nanthelm had already turned the corner.

Elara walked at an even pace, shoulders lowered slightly, the same as every other servant making her way inside. Hands folded before her, eyes on the ground, breath measured. That was how he had taught her: "You are not hiding — you are simply not standing out."

The voice in her head — his voice — sounded almost calm.

/"Hide the fear. Fear shows first."/

They were nearing the doors of the estate. Through the parted panels spilled yellow candlelight and a low murmur — the shuffle of footsteps, hushed voices, floorboards creaking under those already inside.

A few more steps.

Then a hand closed hard around her wrist.

Sharp. Wordless.

Elara barely managed to turn her head. Mira did not pull — she simply changed the line of her own walk, and Elara's body obeyed the shift before her mind caught up. A step sideways. Another. They slipped out of the flow of servants as quietly as water slipping from its course — no splash, no resistance.

Silence settled around them. Mira exhaled.

"Quiet and fast. We need to go."

Elara's body had gone rigid, refusing to obey.

"He—" Mira began, and cut herself off. She read the rest in Elara's eyes. "Come on," she added, much quieter now. "I'll get you out."

And for the first time, there was fear in her voice.

They ran through the rear service yard — empty, thick with the smell of the stables and fresh hay. Beyond it, a field, the tall grass already damp with evening and cold against their ankles. Past the field rose the dark line of the forest, widening with every step they took toward it.

Mira nearly ran, not looking back.

"Did he see?" she whispered, still moving.

"I don't know."

And that was worse than a 'yes'.

Mira stopped short and looked back at the estate: stone walls, windows, the weathervane above the tower. No sound anywhere around them.

"Listen to me," Mira said, breathing hard. "If they call for you — you don't come out."

"And if they find me?"

Mira said nothing. That silence was already an answer.

"There's another way."

She tipped her head toward the forest. Elara went still.

/"No."/

"No one goes there."

Mira looked her straight in the eyes.

"But he'll come here. And he'll find you." She gripped Elara's hand hard enough to hurt. "We don't have time, Ara."

Somewhere in the estate courtyard, footsteps echoed back — too heavy for servants.

"If he comes out here..."

Both girls looked at the wall of trees at once.

Up close, the tree line looked nothing like it did from the garden windows. Not a dark strip in the distance — a solid wall. Dense trunks, twisted, packed close against one another. Black shadow pooled between the massive trunks, shadow that even midday sun could not burn through. Something inside that forest stayed impenetrable, and threatening.

"I'm not going back to him," Elara said quietly, but with iron certainty.

Mira nodded, the decision made.

"Then we go."

They pushed into the trees. The grass beneath their feet changed instantly — taller, thicker. Shadow closed over the girls the moment they crossed the invisible line into the thicket, sudden as a candle snuffed out. The cold dropped around them at once. The air smelled of wet earth, moss, something rotting under the leaves. And beneath that, something else — faint, sweetish, a smell Elara had never known before.

Mira stopped dead at the very edge of the invisible boundary.

"I go no further. No one will." Her voice stayed even, but her fists stayed hidden in her skirt. "I need to get back. The estate is enormous — it will take Nanthelm a while to gather everyone. I will try to buy you some time."

"He will ask about me."

"Let him," Mira whispered, already backing toward the sunlit field. "Just run, Ara!"

Elara turned and looked into the dark ahead of her.

The trees stood like a wall. Not a single leaf stirred, though a restless wind moved through the open field behind her. Between the massive trunks lay a silence unlike anything outside it. It was not empty. It was full. Full of someone's presence.

/"Better this... than him."/

And the girl stepped into the dark.

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"All of them?"

"Yes, Your Highness."

The servants stood in a straight line along the wall of the great hall. The candle wicks burned without a flicker — the air felt compressed. Erebus walked slowly down the line. His eyes moved over every face without pause.

Alan stood frozen by the doorframe.

/"He is looking for someone specific."/

The Prince stopped before one of the girls. He lingered there longer than he had at the others. Then took another step. And went still again.

"Lift your head."

Mira turned to stone. Erebus studied her closely — not her face. Her hands. The dark soil packed under her nails, impossible to scrub away in a hurry. Fresh calluses from garden shears.

"You work in the garden?"

"Yes, Your Highness."

"Alone?"

Mira hesitated before answering. A tiny, almost imperceptible delay. Too small for an ordinary eye. Not too small for his.

"Yes."

"Interesting."

The Prince closed the distance until she could not have stepped out of line without touching him.

"From the study window," he murmured, almost gently, "one always sees more than certain people would like. Which means the other already knows she is being looked for."

The air in the hall went heavy at once. Mira flinched — the motion of her shoulders did not escape his notice. That was exactly what he had been waiting for.

"I..."

She lowered her head, all resistance gone. Erebus smiled, satisfied. Slow. Predatory.

"Of course. You were not alone."

The Prince's gaze darkened, and he turned sharply on his heel, tossing a short order over his shoulder:

"The garden."

The Duke did not move at once. For a moment his gaze shifted to Mira's pale face. That was enough.

/"Hold still. Do not move."/

Then Christopher followed.

"Your Highness."

The Duke's voice came out calm. Not loud, but sufficient to stop the motion.

"If the garden interests you, I will show it to you myself."

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"She is here."

"You are certain?"

"Yes."

"We have searched everywhere. Only the forest remains."

One of the Prince's soldier reached, unthinking, for the hilt of his sword.

"Your Highness... it's dangerous in there."

Erebus turned his head toward him slowly, his eyes burning straight through the guard.

"I know. That is exactly why she went in."

"But—"

No one dared finish the sentence.

"Find her."

Yet no one took even a single step toward the trees — and that instant of defiance was impossible to miss. The Prince marked it. His expression darkened.

"That is an order."

And even under the threat of a tribunal, the soldiers hesitated.

Because the forest frightened them more than he did.