He almost said more, but then closed his mouth. He couldn’t continue. They had stopped moving, sometime along the way, and for a long moment the three of them just sat and stood in the silence, the Prince looking intently at the hunting trail beneath his litter, and the two Exiles looking intently at him.
Tomaz was the first to move. He crossed the distance to the Prince and placed two enormous hands on his shoulders, nearly engulfing his head.
“I had no idea,” he said simply. “For what it counts, to survive that as the man you are, you’re stronger than I will ever be.”
The Prince felt the corners of his eyes prickle, and a lump formed in his throat. He sat there for a moment, holding himself in check. And then he looked up, cleared his throat gruffly and nodded to Tomaz. The big man, his stony black eyes watching him closely, nodded as well, and dropped his hands.
“There’s a stream not too far from here—I’ll go fill up the waterskins. I know it’s a bit early, but I say we camp here for the night unless anyone has any objections?”
“None from me,” Leah said softly.
“All right,” the Prince said quickly, anxious to change the subject.
Tomaz nodded, grabbed the waterskins, and headed off into the trees. The Prince pulled himself to the edge of the litter and slowly slid himself to the ground. He let out a small groan as a hundred aches and pains suddenly came crashing down on him.
“Oh shadows and light, that hurts.”
“Are you all right?” Leah asked, looking concerned.
The Prince slowly straightened up, his back letting out several loud cracks, and stretched. He took a deep breath, and in spite of all that had happened in the last few weeks, he realized he actually did feel rather good.
“Yes,” he said, surprise coloring his voice. “Yes, I think I do feel all right.”
“In that case, help with the food,” she said, motioning to the packs on the horse. She was untying the strings holding the litter.
“How did we get back to Tomaz?” he asked, opening a pack at random and looking into it.
“Other pack,” Leah said. “And you and I got back to Tomaz on these horses. Both Trudger and Malial were put down by the Defenders. Tomaz was pretty torn up about losing Malial, they’ve been together for years now. But, in the end there was plenty of good Tibour stock running around after you fainted, so I picked three, tied you to one of them, and rode them back.”
“Fainted?” the Prince asked, pulling open the other pack.
“Yes. Fainted.”
“I didn’t faint.”
Leah looked at him with an amused expression over the backs of the horses.
“Oh, you didn’t?”
“No,” the Prince said. “I fell unconscious due to the strain of saving you. See, it sounds better that way. Much more like something a Prince would do.”
Leah rolled her eyes, and he smiled.
“You fainted, princeling.”
“Fine. But while rescuing you. So, still princely.”
She laughed and shook her head. She undid the final strap holding the litter in place and it fell to the ground in a clatter of wood.
“Whatever you say. You’ve been riding in this for almost a week now, sleeping like a little baby. Aside from the occasional muttering about Lady Monsunne, of course.”
She smirked at him and bent to pull the wood they had used for the litter frame out from the tangle of blankets they’d stretched across it.
“You know what’s funny?” the Prince asked.
“I never should have said that to you, you use that expression too much now.”
“Yes, but, you know what’s funny?”
