Walking in the sun with black armour on was not a good idea and Theo was cursing himself for saying they’d walk until they found somewhere to stop that night, though Tristan wasn’t complaining like he thought his friend would be. Instead his friend was staring off into the distance with a frown covering his face, jumping when Theo’s hand lands on his shoulder.

“What’s got your head in the clouds?” Theo asks and his friend shrugs.

“Just… Did you feel the ground shake before those others guards came to fight you too?” Tristan counters and Theo tilts his head.

“Nope.”

They’re silent after that, continuing to walk and looking for anywhere they could spend the night; they stop when they see a house in the distance. They glance at each other before setting off at a run, getting closer to the properties fence and squatting while they watch to see if anyone’s home. They wait until its dark before they move towards the house, seeing a barn behind it they head for that and pulling the doors open. Theo cringes at the loud noise it makes as it opens, Tristan shrugging and moving inside and letting Theo pull it closed again. The inside was exactly what they were expecting; hay everywhere, so the boys get to work of making mounds of it that they could hide behind. They were only just getting it partway done when the door is slowly pulled open, Theo throwing Tristan to the ground behind one of the mounds and flopping down on top of him with all his weight to hide the both of them since he didn’t have time to get to his own mound. They ended up face to face, with Theo looking off to the side and focusing on listening while Tristan studied his friends face; he’s never been this close and he could see the small freckles that covered his face. They’re not noticeable unless you’re this close, Tristan realises.

“I know you’re still in here, you might as well come out,” a sweet voice says and Theo meets Tristan’s eyes with raised eyebrows.

“What do we do?” Theo asks and Tristan frowns, trying to slow his racing heart.

“We don’t have much of an option here, Theo,” the blonde thinks for a moment and sit back off his friend, standing from their spot and reaching to help Tristan to his feet both of their eyes going wide when they see an older woman standing in front of them with her hands clasped in front of her body.

“Now, tell me why you’ve come into my barn?” She asks and the boys share a look before Theo takes a step closer.

“We’re on the run, from who we don’t know. All we know is that they slaughtered our family and is after us.” Theo speaks calmly but truthfully and the woman’s face contorts into sympathy.

“Who could do such a thing?” She mutters before holding out her hands with a smile. “Well, no use staying out here. They’d probably come looking in here before looking in the house, common. I’ve got a bed or two you can have for the night.”

Theo slowly follows the woman as she walks out, Tristan reluctantly going after his friend; he studies the older woman. She’s got brown hair that’s greying at the roots and she’s thick around her curves, and she’s small in height. She’s smaller than Theo; Tristan smiles.

The three enter the house and look around, seeing a small kitchen beside a living room and some stairs leading upstairs where the bedrooms and bathroom probably were.

“Now, sit. When did you last eat?” She asks and they shrug, sitting at the table in the middle of the kitchen. The woman sets out some bread, meat and cheese for the boys and they hesitate for a minute before starting to eat; they were very hungry. “Why was your family killed?”

“We don’t know.” Tristan says over a mouthful of food and Theo glares at him for it; he’s a prince he should know better. Tristan just rolls his eyes and continues eating.

“Where are you heading?” Theo likes that the woman is helping them but didn’t think it was smart to tell her in case the men following them threatened her life to tell them.

“For your safety, it’s probably best we don’t tell you.” Theo states and she nods in understanding.

“Well, you can stay as long as you need to rest up before you leave. You’ll find your room upstairs to the left of the stairs,” she says; standing and leaving the room before they can respond. They finish the food she laid out in front of them and Theo moves to lead Tristan upstairs, turning into the room on the left and seeing one large bed. They both stop dead in their tracks, Tristan’s face going red and Theo’s head tilting to the side.

“Well, it could be smaller than what it is.” Tristan states, laughing a bit and Theo chuckles, moving to the side of the room near the window and started stripping off his armour and swords; placing them on the floor and Tristan is soon copying him though he struggles with the straps of the armour and frowns, waiting for Theo to help him.

“You’re hopeless! What would you do without me?” Theo jokes, going to undo Tristan’s straps, the Prince taking in the freckles over his cheeks again when he gets closer.

“I’d probably be dead by now without you.” Tristan says, his voice low and Theo grins, meeting his friends gaze.

“When we get to Capsicka, you can repay me with women. Maybe get yourself some too, we’ll need it.” Theo laughs and Tristan forces a grin.

“What would our mother’s say hearing this?” Tristan says and Theo thinks for a moment.

“My mum would probably say something like ‘Theodore, I told you no more women! You’ll never get married with a reputation like this.’” Theo’s laughing, pulling the armour over the Prince’s head and placing it beside his own, falling onto his back on the bed. Tristan soon follows him down, lying beside him on the mattress. It wasn’t all that comfortable but it was a bed none the less and they were both very thankful for the old woman. The room stays silent as they lay there, falling asleep moments apart of each other.

The next day, the old woman puts them to work as they had broken into her barn; making Theo chop wood and Tristan in the barn fixing up the hay and distributing around the barn equally, like it had been before they came. He could see Theo through the open doors of the barn and stopped to study his friend as he chopped the wood. Of course his torso was bare of any clothes and Tristan tilted his head as he slammed the axe down onto the wood, effectively splitting it down the middle and making his muscles ripple from the blow.

“Staring won’t get him, you know.” Tristan jumps and turns to the side to see the old woman, who they had found out was named Viola.

“What makes you think I want him?”

“The way you look at him gives you away hon,” he frowns at her and goes back to his own work, Viola laughing at his red face.

Hours later, Tristan is sitting inside eating some bread when Theo walks in the door. He’s smiling with a flash of happiness in his golden eyes and when they meet with Tristan’s forest green eyes he grins widely at his friend.

“Tris, I was wondering where you’d gone!” The blond exclaims, causing the Prince to chuckle at his enthusiasm.

“I got hungry.”

“When aren’t you hungry?” Theo questions, laughing when Tristan’s face goes pink.

All laughter coming to a halt when banging sounds on the front door, Viola running down the stairs in one of her night gowns with wide eyes. She motions for the boys to hide where she had shown them to if anyone came around; a cupboard down the hall which locked from the inside. It was just barely big enough for the two boys but they shuffled in and when Viola shut the door, Tristan reached passed Theo to lock it. They were standing face to face again and Theo was pressing Tristan into the wall, a hand covering Tristan’s mouth to silence his heavy breathing. He had his head tilted towards the wall so he could hear anything but when no sounds came through the walls he dropped his hand from the Prince’s mouth.

“I can’t hear anything going on so I’m guessing they can’t hear us either.” Theo informs Tristan who nods then realising Theo couldn’t see him vocalises his agreement with a small okay. Both of them freeze when the door behind Theo rattles followed by a deep voice.

“Why won’t this open?” It’s gravelly and hoarse; obviously the man who’d grabbed Theo.

“Oh, that hasn’t opened in years!” Viola responds and from the silence that follows, she’s lead the man away from their hiding spot and the boys relax.

“Why are they after us?”

“Probably because you’re the heir to the throne and they don’t want you on it, I can’t imagine why they wouldn’t. You’ll make an exceptional King one day.” Theo says and Tristan feels his heart swell in his chest, a hand finding its way to Theo’s face slowly. Theo stiffens under his touch but let’s his Prince caress him.

“That’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.” Tristan whispers and Theo sighs.

“If we make it out of this alive, I’ll say a nice thing to you once a day.”

“Deal.” Tristan lowers his hand moments before the there’s a knock on the door and he unlocks it, pushing Theo out before walking out himself.

“You have got to go now, wherever you’re going and get there fast. These men aren’t playing around, run as fast and as far as you can. I’ve packed your bag full of food and other supplies; get your gear on and your weapons and run.” Viola says ushering the boys upstairs and getting their clothes out from where she’d hidden them that morning. By the time the boys are dressed, have their armour on and are ready to go, the sun is setting and the sky is getting darker making it the perfect time to run. The black armour blends in with the surroundings, especially since the moon and stars weren’t out that night.

They don’t bother talking, Tristan keeping a hand on Theo’s shoulder to make sure they wouldn’t lose each other in the darkness but trying not to step on the back of Theo’s feet as they run as quietly as they can through the bush when they get to it.

“How long are we going to run for?” Tristan whispers and Theo doesn’t answer for a while, keeping his ears and eyes open for any signs of anyone following them.

“Probably until we get to the next town, or the next river to wash before continuing our way. I think we’ve got maybe a month of travelling left.” Theo answers, pulling Tristan to keep running and to stop talking. Which his friend obliges and shuts up.

The sun finally starts rising hours later and the boys are still moving through the bush, always heading north and in land; that’s where Capsicka is. By the time the sun is high in the sky, the boys are panting and slowly walking towards their destination, only stopping every now and then to relieve themselves; eating and drinking as they walked.

Theo halts walking, putting a hand on Tristan’s chest to stop him from walking any further and he turns his head at the sound of water hitting water; a waterfall? Theo grabs the Prince by the arm and drags him to the right, where he can hear the sound coming from and sure enough they come face to face with a small waterfall. It was twice the width of Theo and twice the height of Tristan with a deep, large pool at the bottom of it; careful to make sure there weren’t any creatures swimming in the water they both jump in once their armour is off, not bothering to change their clothes since they’d be walking for another while and would need to reserve their spare clothes.

“Theo, what are you going to do when we get to your fathers friends’ place? Do you think we’ll really be safe?” Tristan asks quietly when they’ve surfaced and Theo thinks for a moment.

“I think we’ll be as safe as we can be in this situation and I’ll probably sleep for a while and then bury myself as deep as I can in a woman.” Theo smirks and Tristan rolls his eyes.

“Maybe you should expand your tastes; a man might keep you satisfied since you can’t keep one woman to yourself.” Tristan jokes, a laugh coming out and Theo grins widely at him.

“Well, seeing as how you haven’t got someone to call your own yet, I don’t see how either could keep my tastes satisfied.” Theo says, causing Tristan to poke his tongue out at him and splash some water at him. “Come on, we better dry off and keep moving.”

They get out and wait for their clothes to dry before putting their armour back on and heading in the right direction, not stopping until the moon is high in the sky. That’s when they find somewhere to sleep for the night, surrounded completely by trees they climb one and go through the bag to see if they’ve got any rope; which thankfully Viola had put some in there for them.

“Maybe she thought we’d need to tie someone up.” Tristan murmurs with a shrug at Theo questioning look. Theo shrugs after a moment and moves backwards so his back was to Tristan’s chest.

“Since you’re bigger, I’ll lean on you to sleep and we’ll tie the rope around us both and the tree trunk to keep us from falling.” Theo explains when Tristan froze at the contact, though he soon relaxes and helps Theo tie them both to the tree. Both of them falling asleep a little while later.