The King's Blood

games with Vicarian when they had all been children together. There was a bowl of water beside the entrance, and the strips of wet leather cut more than dry would have. Others carried sticks or the wide wooden handles of axes without the metal head. It had taken so little time to take the youth of the empire, noblest blood in the world, and turn them into thugs. Dawson stood until his knees buckled. Laughter filled the air. He couldn’t defend himself. Couldn’t shout them down. So instead he locked his jaw and denied them the pleasure of hearing him cry out. Likely it only goaded them to worse violence. That was fine. He wasn’t here to take the easy path.
    He found himself on the floor, the water pail pouring over him. He sputtered, trying to draw breath from someplace in between the deluge and the stone. A voice he didn’t recognize called the halt, and someone kicked his side as casually as he might have punished a lazy dog.
    Hands gripped him under his arms and lifted him up. His mind felt fuzzy, confused, and distant. He was being carried somewhere he didn’t want to go, and all he could remember was that it would be beneath his dignity to complain. A door opened somewhere and he landed on filthy straw that despite its thinness and the stink of it felt as comfortable as his own bed. His mind failed him for a time. Next he felt anything, it was a soft cloth cleaning the raw wounds over his ribs where the skin had split. Everything hurt. The old man tending to him wore chains on his wrists and neck and a filthy smock. It took Dawson what felt like a great deal of time to remember where he’d seen that face before.
    “My thanks, Majesty,” Dawson managed. His throat seemed to have spasmed at some point, and his voice sounded strangled though there was no one touching it.
    King Lechan nodded.
    “Don’t speak yet,” he said. “Rest.”
    There were no marks on the king of Asterilhold. No bruises on his face or old blood blackening his prison garb. Here was the man who had plotted to slaughter Prince Aster, and it was Dawson whom they tortured as a game. He wanted to find it unfair, but he didn’t. He understood the difference between how you treated an enemy and how you treated a traitor. They didn’t see that they were the ones betraying the traditions and nobility of Antea. They were the ones handing the throne to a bloodthirsty clown and his foreign masters.
    Only, of course, it had been his fault as well. He should never have agreed to let Palliako be protector to the prince. It had only seemed convenient at the time. It had seemed innocuous. How could he have known it was the stray spark in a dry forest?
    He rolled to his side as the enemy king protested, and forced himself up to sitting. He almost vomited. He would have if there’d been more in his belly. The cell was smaller than he’d thought. Ten feet from side to side, twelve deep. His kennels were larger.
    The door opened and the high priest stepped in. The congenial smile was gone as if it had never been. No scowl took its place, and no frown. Basrahip might have been wearing a mask of himself cast from stone. Nothing about him moved. Dawson was gratified to see the lump of a bandage under the priest’s cloak where the knife had bit. Four men in leather armor with swords and daggers at their sides followed him, taking the door like the personal guard of a king. Dawson turned his head and spat out a bright red clot of blood.
    “Where is Prince Geder?” Basrahip asked. His voice was distant thunder.
    “There is no Prince Geder,” Dawson said.
    “You’ve killed him.”
    “No. He’s not a prince. He’s Lord Regent. That’s not a prince. Aster is prince and king, and Palliako is nothing more than a placeholder until he takes his father’s throne.”
    The priest’s eyes narrowed.
    “Where is Geder Palliako?”
    “I don’t know.”
    One of the guards drew a dagger. More torture, then. Dawson was ashamed to feel himself drawing back from the prospect.
    “And the little prince? Aster?”
    “I’ve been looking for him since this began.”
    “To kill him.”
    “To give him my loyalty and my sword against you and Palliako.”
    Basrahip finally managed an expression. His wide brow kinked and furrowed. He sat on the ground in front of Dawson, his legs tucked under him. Dawson saw the guards glance at one another, confused.
    “You are speaking the truth to me,” the priest said.
    “You’re not worth lying to,” Dawson