Nuray pointed him in the direction of Cemil’s room. Then she stood back, letting him know he would have to make the journey alone.
“He won’t accept your medicine,” she told him. Then, “He won’t want you in there. You shouldn’t go.”
She was concerned for him, Osmund thought… though he didn’t want to believe the reason why. Nuray clearly deeply cared for Şehzade Cemil and the pain he was in. She also was quite clearly afraid of him.
So was Nienos, the orc soldier. So was Emre, the illusionist. He’d been able to read it plain as day off the both of them.
Osmund may have been building a light padding of muscle from hard work and good meals, but he knew he was no match for a soldier or a mage, and therefore, it certainly stood to reason, he stood no chance against Cemil himself if the man decided he wanted to get out his enchanted sword and poke him full of holes. Osmund swallowed, hard. Then he moved his foot forward.
The door to Cemil’s bedroom was plain wood, not so different from his own or from the rest of the doors in the governor’s mansion, but it had an attractive knocker made of bronze in the shape of a mystical creature’s head. Osmund knocked, quietly at first, then more urgently when no one answered him. He couldn’t chicken out now. Not when the man who’d given him his new life might actually need him.
With the medicine he’d concocted balanced carefully in his free hand, he turned the handle and stepped inside.
The air was smothering. That was the first thing that begged notice. The room was nearly completely dark, except for a double-wicked oil lamp and an incense burner that were placed carefully in a corner. But somehow, it wasn’t the incense that made everything feel so… choked.
Osmund turned his head and saw a person sprawled out on a narrow mattress laid directly on the floor. This person had Cemil’s build, his brown skin and dark hair, and yet one still might not have recognized him. He was only in his nightclothes, but that enchanted sword – ominously-glowing pommel and all – rested beside him, just within his reach. The sight of it made Osmund aware of the sweat beading on his temples.
“Cemil?” he managed softly, forgetting the title once again. “A-are you awake?”
The ruffled lump on the bed curled in on itself and made a sound like a wounded animal – a warning sound. “Go,” It – Cemil – rasped. “Get out.”
When people told Osmund to leave, he did. Back in Valcrest, disobeying Father could’ve meant a black eye, a bruised arm, a boot in his side. And so he was very good at obeying that particular command without fail. Until now.
Knees trembling, Osmund crept over to the bedridden figure. It was only Cemil after all, his eyes clenched shut, his long hair damp with sweat and clinging to his face. He was in so much pain. Osmund’s heart hurt just looking at him.
“I-I’ve brought you some medicine,” Osmund suggested, offering up the bottle shakily in front of him. “It’s a very powerful painkiller. Horses eat it in the wild when they’re feeling poorly. I noticed it g-growing in your garden. It’s native to the Tolmish countryside. I-I’ve taken it myself, it’s very effective!”
Cemil’s agonized shivers ceased for a moment. One amber eye peeked open. “Osmund?” he rasped, as if only just recognizing him.
With what seemed like great effort, Cemil propped himself up on one arm and took the potion from him. He stared at Osmund a good, long moment, his breathing labored. Then he swung back the little bottle and downed the entire thing in one swallow.
“You should rest now,” Osmund advised, trying to sound soothing as Cemil lowered his head again. “I think you’ll f-feel better soon. I really hope so.”
Cemil made a vague noise of assent, his eyes closing once more as he got comfortable on his mattress. He looked almost peaceful now. And he’d trusted him. Osmund felt very warm all over.
For some reason, he decided to keep talking. He’d been wanting to talk to Cemil again for so long, and the words came flowing right out. “I wonder if it’s native here, or if it was imported,” he continued in a voice similar to the one he used when he sat beside ill horses. (Maybe it was naïve to think it would have the same effect on a grown human.) “It’s a captivating flower. We call it the nightroot, though I don’t think most people use it for medicine like I do. I-I hope you don’t mind that I dug it up. It’s a blue flower with black markings and a distinctive red stem.”
Cemil’s eyes shot open. Evidently, Osmund had said the wrong thing. No, he realized quickly in mounting alarm, he’d said a very, very wrong thing.
The Meskato prince had peeled his upper body off the ground entirely now. His loose shirt stained with sweat hung loosely around his shoulders as he rounded on Osmund. Even in his present state, he was formidable. “What did you say?” he ground out in a low timbre, and every cell in Osmund’s body was beginning to scream danger.
“Nightroot,” he repeated weakly, like a deer in the woods caught in lamplight. “B-blue flower… black markings… red stem. I didn’t know it was important to you. I’m s-sorry!”
“████,” Cemil began, and Osmund realized he must be using the flower’s Meskato name, “is poisonous.”
Osmund threw up his arms in instinctive self-defense, now realizing where the dreadful misunderstanding had come from. “Only the petals!” he yelped. “The petals! D-don’t panic! I didn’t – oof!”
Cemil wasn’t listening. He had him on his back, full weight pinning him to the ground, and there was suddenly a sharp blade pressed snug to Osmund’s bobbing throat. Razor sharp, and somehow searing hot against his skin, it was as if it’d just been pulled from inside a brazier. That fiery sword.
Words failed Osmund entirely, and he looked up at Cemil in wide-eyed terror. He heard a mortifying, terrible whimper emerging from deep within his own lungs.
“Which of them sent you?!” Cemil demanded, his voice a pained rasp. Even with all his intensity, his pupils were still blown with sickness. “Who was it? Was it Bayram?” Then he cursed.
“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about! Believe me!” Osmund pleaded. The room seemed to swim, the infinite shadows ready to yawn wide and swallow him whole. He was so aware of his own pulse, throbbing defenselessly just beneath where the sharp edge rested. “I don’t know who that is! I-I haven’t done anything! Please!”
“I should have known!” Cemil went on in a delirious rage, not even listening to him. “I should have known better than to trust a pretty face who happens to turn up at my door!” His voice darkened. “You’re going to die for nothing. Bayram cares nothing for you, whatever he promised you he lied!”
Osmund couldn’t help it. He knew he should continue trying to explain, to reason with Cemil who was clearly still half-out of his mind, or at least to beg for his life. But he had one last response for when someone started roaring threats in his face like this, and he hated it. It was a childhood reflex, a final effort for when all other attempts to secure mercy had failed.
He started to cry. Really cry.
His throat still burned where the blade had kissed it, but Osmund felt its pressure lifting, just a bit. He couldn’t rein himself in after that. He sobbed and wailed like a little boy. He could hear father’s scorn booming in his ears, as if his ghost were here: Weak sniveling pathetic child, are you really a son?! How dare you blot our family name with these disgusting theatrics!
The tears came and came. He expected at any moment a swift end to his misery, but no pain came. Osmund was aware he had cried a shamefully long time by the time he was finally able to control himself. He gave a great wheezing inhale and swiped his arm across his teary eyes. The blade was gone, and so was the pressure on his body.
Fearing what he might see – but realizing he was not actually about to die – Osmund sat up and blinked furiously until he could make out shapes in the dark room again. Cemil sat a ways apart from him. His body was set like a stone.
“Cemil?” Osmund tried again, like he had when he’d entered. His voice was pitifully cracked from its exertions.
But Cemil didn’t respond. He was staring blankly at the floor. His breathing, Osmund noticed, seemed almost normal.
After the longest five, maybe ten, well-who-really-knew-how-many minutes of his life, Osmund heard:
“I feel better.”
Relief burst in like a flood. “Good!” Osmund chirped. He was nearly as relieved by this news as he was to finally be free of that wicked, tense silence. “That’s good! I-I’m so glad it worked!”
Cemil did not seem nearly as glad of this as he was. His gaze was still fixed somewhere on the floor. Osmund wondered, a bit anxiously, if perhaps Cemil were not as better as he thought he was. He’d been careful, so careful to brew the potion correctly… He’d had the concoction himself ten times or more, and he’d never done it wrong.
“Osmund…” he heard, and lifted his head to listen. Cemil’s lips opened and it looked like he was going to continue, but then he turned away again, evidently unable. Osmund was starting to be concerned. He rose to his feet, drying his face with one final determined swipe, although it was much too late to pretend he wasn’t a sad little crybaby.
He sat himself down in front of Cemil to study him. The şehzade was stubbornly avoiding his eyes, and without even thinking about it, Osmund reached out and angled that beautiful face up towards him. What he saw shocked him so much that he completely forgot to be flustered over touching Cemil so intimately.
There was a distinctive glimmer in the prince’s eyes. At first Osmund thought it only a trick of the low light, but as soon as he’d noticed it Cemil moved his face away again. His behavior all but confirmed the truth of what Osmund had seen.
“You were only helping me,” Cemil murmured, his voice heavy with anguish, this time of a different breed. “I’m ashamed. I’m… I’m sorry. Already I have broken my promise to you.”
He feels bad for scaring me, Osmund realized in a warm rush. Of course he does. He’s a good, decent man. “Don’t feel that way!” he exclaimed, hurrying to reassure him. The whole incident already seemed like a ridiculous memory to him, and he didn’t want Cemil to waste his time fretting. “You were just a little confused and sick, and you didn’t hurt me! I’m completely fine now, there’s nothing to feel sorry about!”
Cemil turned to him with an expression like he was going to firmly argue, but his eyes widened when he saw Osmund up close. “You… there’s blood,” he said, gaze fixed to Osmund’s neck.
Osmund flushed at the look’s intensity, and brought one hand up to feel the spot on his throat. Sure enough, his fingers brushed over a slow, wet trickle that he hadn’t noticed before. The blade was quite sharp; it must have grazed him after all. “This is nothing!” Osmund said, at the same time that Cemil asked:
“May I… touch?”
Well, that was unexpected. Osmund startled, aware of his face turning an even more vibrant red. “I mean that I,” Cemil started to clarify, looking more out of his element than Osmund had ever seen him, “can help. But, I know that you may not wish me to... be so close. After that.”
Osmund couldn’t tear his eyes away. He was totally transfixed by Cemil, who was leaning in so close his warm breaths brushed up against Osmund’s skin. To be the object of his full concentration was like fire, and Osmund’s whole body burned with it. “Help?” he finally squeaked. “How?”
Cemil cursed, apparently deciding to take immediate action as he lifted his hands. “It will only take a second,” he promised. “Tell me to stop, and I swear I will.”
Osmund kept perfectly still, reminding himself to breathe as he felt the warm pads of Cemil’s fingers graze up beneath his chin, around the tender place on his neck. The Meskato prince seemed afraid to press down with more than the lightest touch, but Osmund found that he, mysteriously, wasn’t afraid in the least, himself.
And then, warmth. The most comforting, reassuring warmth he’d ever felt.
He couldn’t help it – he jerked in surprise. Cemil pulled his hands away at once, but his work was already done. Osmund prodded the spot in amazement; not even the tiniest scratch remained.
“You… have healing magic.”
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