Maric felt miserable as he led the way down to the stables, Dara behind him and Brayan at his side. He didn’t want to do this, but what alternative did he have? If Dara weren’t a slave he could do all kinds of foolish, extravagant things to express these silly feelings he seemed to be unable to squash, but Dara was Eth and that meant Dara was a slave and even a prince couldn’t change that. Maric was a little afraid of what he might do out of infatuation for this man if his father’s throne were his right now.

The rest of Maric’s men were waiting in front of the stables, horses ready to ride.

“You can ride double with Brayan,” Maric told Dara.

Brayan’s eyebrows twitched up slightly, a sign of disapproval that Maric had learned to read because Brayan respected Maric too much to give voice to petty complaints, but he complied and helped Dara up. 

Maric didn’t blame him for being unhappy with the arrangement. What Maric had wanted was to have Dara ride with him, but that would have been completely inappropriate and would not have been conducive to moving towards letting Dara go. The proper thing to do would have been to have Dara ride with Raedon, but Maric was increasingly struggling with the idea of keeping Dara in his place.

Maric decided not to think about it too much. He would drop Dara off and then it would no longer be a concern.

Normally a peaceful morning ride through scenic countryside would have brought out the chatter in Maric’s men, but they were silent today. They were good at picking up on and responding to Maric’s moods. Had they all figured out how he was feeling? Did they think less of him for letting a slave get into his head like this, get into his heart?

Maric noticed Garrod watching him and the older man gave him a sad smile. No. These weren’t just his men, they were his friends. He wouldn’t lose their respect so easily.

There was a middle aged woman waiting for them at the gates of the ranch, dressed in a straw hat, long pants, and a work shirt. She executed a perfect bow as Maric dismounted his horse, but the smile on her face somehow made the gesture friendly and informal.

Mathers stepped up beside Maric. “I’m honoured to introduce his royal highness, Prince Maric. And your highness, this is our Aunty Paige.”

Paige gave another bow, lifting her hand to pat her hat back down when it almost fell off her head. “It’s an honour to meet you, your highness, though it isn’t the first time we’ve spoken. I was introduced to you at the party last night, but I don’t blame you if you don’t remember me. I look a little different in a dress.”

Maric tried to think back, but she was right. He didn’t remember meeting her. Though he wasn’t sure if that was because she looked different or because Dara had been on his mind so much last night that he hadn’t been paying anyone the attention he ought to. “I’m impressed by your ability to shift between two worlds like that.”

“That’s high praise from a prince. I can’t imagine how many people you have to be, your highness.” She leant to the side so that she could peer behind Maric. “And this is Dara?”

Maric guided Dara forward with an arm around his shoulders. “This is Dara, yes.”

Paige looked him up and down. “You look softer than I was expecting. Raedon, didn’t you say that he was doing physical labour up until recently?”

“Ah—I have an innate healing ability, ma’am,” Dara explained. “The wear and tear of a tough life doesn’t show on me, but I promise you I’m used to hard work.”

Paige stared at Dara for a moment, then looked at each of her nephews and Brayan in turn. “This is news to me. That seems like an important thing that should have been mentioned.”

“It’s not important because I don’t want him hurt, even if it doesn’t leave any lasting damage,” Maric told her. “I hope we’re clear on that.”

“Don’t worry, I have no interest in hurting him, your highness,” Paige assured him. “It just seems like the kind of thing worth mentioning.”

“I suppose.”

“Explains why you were so worried about him falling into the wrong hands,” Paige siad. “I’ve seen the way some people treat horses when they don’t feel like they’re worth taking care of. I have a list of people who could pay good money who I won’t sell to because I’ve seen the way they treat their animals.”

“Well, I hope you’ll like Dara as much as you like your horses.”

“Well, that’s a big ask, but luckily I don’t have to like him one bit to treat him decently, your highness.” She smiled. “Your horse. She’s an Eth breed, isn’t she?”

“Ah…” Maric turned to Dara. “Dara thinks so.”

Paige nodded. “Pity she’s not a stallion. I’d like to see what mixing a little bit of that fire into my bloodlines would turn out.”

Dara shook his head. “You don’t cross yenkarth. The offspring invariably have every bit of the craziness of the yenkarth, but none of the loyalty needed to temper it. You end up having to slaughter them or set them loose into the wild because there’s no keeping them past a certain age.”

“I did warn you he tends to speak out of turn,” Brayan said.

Dara winced. “Sorry, ma’am.”

Paige waved a hand dismissively. “If you have something relevant to say, I’d rather you just say it. A ranch is no place for wasting time with manners.”

“It was similar in the barracks, ma’am. Nobody really cared what I said or did as long as I kept my head down and got my work done.”

“How do you know so much about these horses? Yenkarth, you said?”

“Oh—my family bred them.”

Paige held out her hands and looked between her nephews again. “Another thing nobody thought to mention to me.”

“Hey, don’t look at me. I didn’t know that one,” Raedon said, and Mathers shook his head as well.

“I also did not know this,” Maric said. “Do you mean your family owned a ranch, or…?”

“Ah…” Dara suddenly looked uncomfortable. “Yes.”

“You’re Eth. How does that work?”

“I was born in Ticia.”

Maric could tell by the stiffness of Dara’s posture, from the way his gaze was fixed on Farah, that this was information he had intentionally omitted.

“Eth aren’t slaves in Ticia, are they?” Paige asked. “They can own property and run businesses?”

“Mm,” Dara confirmed.

Brayan took a step forward. “Well, it looks like this arrangement will work out nicely and we have a lot of other things we need to get to before we leave, so…”

Maric nodded. “Yes, we should get going. I—one moment.” He grabbed Dara’s arm and led him far enough away from the group so that they could speak without being overheard.

Maric didn’t even know what he wanted to say, what he wanted to do, just that leaving things with that moment didn’t sit well with him. Dara offered him a smile and Maric wanted to cry as he mirrored it.

“You should have told me that,” Maric told him. “About—about all of that.”

Dara’s head tilted almost imperceptibly to the side. “Would it have made any difference to anything?”

“No. None at all.”

“Mm.” Dara gave him a sad smile, leant up, and pressed a gentle kiss against Maric’s cheek. “Be who you want to be. I believe in you.”

“I hope you can be who you want to be, too. Whatever that is.”

Dara’s gaze dropped and his smile dimmed. “I don’t know about that.”

“Don’t you tell me that. And don’t tell anyone I said this, but you’re stronger than me. If you can’t do it, what chance do I stand, huh?”

Dara met Maric’s gaze again. “You don’t know what you’re asking.”

“And you do?”

“True.” Dara was silent for a long moment. “Okay. I’ll do it. I’m not even quite sure myself what that means, but I’ll try.”

Maric nodded. “Good.” There was so much more he wanted to say, but this had already gone somewhere far more sentimental than he’d intended and the ache in his chest was only getting worse. “Goodbye, Dara.”

“Goodbye, Maric.”

Maric swallowed and pressed his lips together in a tight line as he turned back to his waiting men. Why did Dara have to say his name? Why did he have to make Maric feel this way?

Maric mounted Farah without a word to anyone and trusted Brayan to organise his men. Five minutes into the ride, Maric realised he hadn’t said goodbye to Paige before he left and that was rude, but he couldn’t bring himself to care.

Why did he feel so broken and empty? Why did he miss Dara already? He hadn’t even truly known him. The more of himself Dara had revealed, the clearer that had become. But oh, he wanted to. He wanted that man who looked into his eyes and saw the flawed, weak heart of him… and smiled, soft and forgiving.

And he wanted to turn around and ride back to that ranch and demand Dara tell him how the hell he could look at him that way when he had been born in Ticia, into a life of freedom with a family and a future. How did he feel anything but absolute loathing for Maric and all that he represented?

Brayan rode up beside Maric and the gentle questioning look he gave him only made Maric feel worse. “Do you want me to leave you alone?”

Maric had thought he did, but he found himself shaking his head.

“I knew you had feelings, but this…”

“I know. It’s stupid.”

“No. I wouldn’t say that.”

“No. You wouldn’t say it.”

Brayan sighed “I wouldn’t think it, either. It’s hard for you to make close connections to people and he was fulfilling an emotional need for you. I understand. You’re allowed to have feelings, Maric. I’m glad you have feelings, even if they complicate things sometimes.”

Maric turned to look at Brayan. “Am I a bad person?”

Brayan just looked confused. “What?”

“That’s how I’m feeling right now. Because Dara was born in Ticia and I can fill in the blanks in that story. We’re a part of the army that took him away from his family and forced him into the hell of a life that he had to live for all those years.”

“That was before your time, Maric. Mine, too.”

“So? Nothing has changed. Everything’s the same as it was then.” Maric shook his head. “I knew these things went on, but I never really thought about them. I didn’t want to, I suppose. We’re not on the frontlines, but what if we were? What would I even do if I came across some poor Eth child?”

“You’d let them go, Maric,” Brayan said like it was obvious.

“How are you so sure?”

There was a moment of silence before Brayan answered. “It’s what I did when I worked the frontlines, before I was assigned to you.”

“What? You never told me that!”

“It seemed unwise to tell the man I now take commands from about all the times I disobeyed orders.”

“My father’s orders.”

“Mm,” Brayan said. “Ultimately, I suppose. But then your orders are ultimately his as well, at least in theory.”

Maric let out a long, slow breath. “I hate that.”

“I know.”

“How did you do it?” Maric asked. “With the Eth, I mean. I assume you weren’t openly defying orders.”

“There were a few of us,” Brayan said. “New recruits are assigned to clear non-combatants away from battles. No need to wipe out a bunch of farmers every time a border city changes hands. We’re supposed to take any Eth we come across captive because there’s good money to be made from slaves, especially if they turn out to have a useful magical ability, but as you’re now realising the reality of that is awful.

“The first Eth we came across was a woman with a little girl, not more than three or four years old. She was trying to hide herself and her daughter under a cloak so that we wouldn’t know they were Eth, but we knew. We all knew and we looked at one another and we made a silent agreement to look the other way because nobody wanted to tear that child away from her mother. In the time I was there, we never spoke a word about it and we never handed a single Eth in.”

“You’re a good person.”

The smile Brayan gave him held an open fondness Maric wasn’t used to seeing on his face. “There’s no such thing. But I don’t regret disobeying that order.”

Maric nodded slowly. “I think I have to do something. I’m not sure what just yet, but I don’t want to hate myself anymore. My father could live… I don’t know. Another thirty years or more. I don’t think I can just sit back and wait that long”

“You have my loyalty.”

“Thank you. This goes beyond duty. Beyond what I can reasonably ask of you. If there’s anything you ever need from me, ask. Let me return that loyalty.”

“All I really want is to do my job well, but I’ll keep that in mind. Thank you.”

“You should. Take it from me. You never know when that might change.”