Tomaz, who had begun to busy himself with his bedroll, turned slowly back around to look at her. “What about him?” he asked.
The girl stood up, rolling up the map and tucking it under her arm.
“He’s a product of the Empire,” she said. She was facing away from the Prince, and he couldn’t see her face, but her voice sounded resigned and… sad. “He’s a product of a society whose teachings are that rebellion is the worst sin anyone can commit. You saw the power he has. Do we risk taking him to Vale? Taking him to our home, knowing now what he’s capable of? Knowing that he has been taught since infancy to hate us and everything we stand for?”
Tomaz studied her face for a long moment.
“He’s changed,” he said finally. “You can see it in his eyes. He sees us as his family now, not as members of the Exiled Kindred.”
“I know that, Tomaz,” she said quietly, and the Prince could hear, to his surprise, true affection in her voice. “But how will he see the rest of us?”
“We shouldn’t be having this conversation,eshendai; you and I both know that he has changed. He saved your life. And from what you described, doing so almost cost him his. He has great power, but he sees it as a curse, and if nothing else that gives me hope.”
“Hope for what, Tomaz? Hope that he won’t butcher us all while we sleep when he has a fond daydream about home? What if we take him to Vale and we find out that we were wrong about him?”
“Enough,” Tomaz said. The Prince was surprised to hear disgust in his voice. “You were choseneshendaito teach me, and I was chosenashandelto teach you. This is something you have never understood. People change. The Kindred took me in, one of the elite members of the Guardians, and I have become as loyal and proud a citizen of Vale as any man or woman that was born there. I remember them also taking in a scared young girl who didn’t know where to turn when she–”
“Stop,” she said harshly. “I know. But he’s the Prince of Ravens, Tomaz. The Empress isn’t some distant master or religious icon to him. She’s his Mother. And if you want to talk about who knows how difficult it is to abandon one’s family, then I think we can both agree that I know more about it than you.”
“We owe him a chance,” Tomaz said emphatically. “If nothing else,we owe him the chance.”
The girl paused. Finally, she looked down and nodded.
“All right. All right, we’ll take him to Vale,” she said. “But ... if it were up to me, he’d come as our prisoner or not at all. He’s the Prince of Ravens, and nothing will change that, no matter how many times we save him or he saves us. We’re the exception to his rule that all Exiles are bad. He just happened to find two good ones, that’s all he thinks. You can see it in his eyes. That’s the change you’re talking about. But if you, speaking to me asashandel, tell me that this is something I need to accept, then I will heed your word.”
Tomaz looked at her for a long time, and what the Prince saw in the big man’s face broke his heart. The giant didn’t speak, but instead turned away from the girl, and they both began to get ready for bed.
For a long time, the Prince stood in the shadows, not knowing what to think. He remembered the looks of happiness they had exchanged, the happiness of going home that he had wanted to share with them. But now he realized how foolish that desire had been. They wouldn’t want him to share in it. The Exiled Kindred would treat him just as Leah had, with suspicion and fear. And if he couldn’t go with them and he couldn’t go back, then where could he go? He turned around and walked away from the clearing once more.
It was a strange thing, not having a home. He had been cast out of the place he had grown up, cast out of the society he’d been born into. And now… was going to join a band of rebels?
Was he? When had he made that decision?
He was an outcast, it was true. But he wasn’t an Exile. He wasn’t, and just as Leah had said, some last shred of pride in the Empire clung to him and made him reject those that had rejected it. True, there was injustice; there were things to be improved. But that was the responsibility of the Princes of the Realm, endowed with the power of the Talismans in order to make a differencefor good in the Empire of Lucia. It was his responsibility, and he couldn’t run from that.
After everything… the girl was right. How had she known?
He couldn’t turn his back on his duty. He knew that, now more than ever. He was not, nor could he ever be, anything less than the Prince of Ravens, and it was his duty to remain with the Empire, even when it had turned its back on him. True, things were bad, he knew that now. But not so bad that the Empire was beyond redemption. Perhaps if the situation were presented to the Empress herself, perhaps to the right members of the Most High, then things could be improved. That was the way the Empire was supposed to work.
Wasn’t it?
He shook his head, dislodging the thought. Open rebellion was not the answer. He turned and looked back through the trees toward where the two Exiles were, reminiscing about their home. A home that had betrayed the Empire. They were traitors, and they were criminals.
But these two are good people, a voice said in the back of his mind.Good people who care about you, who have saved your life.People you cared about enough to use the Talisman to help them, to keep them from your own brother’s men and the justice of the Empire.
“Shadows and light,” he muttered under his breath. “They’re committed to overthrowing the Empire. Even the good that the Empire has in it.”
He stood there for a long time, as night truly fell, the twilight fading to complete black. Eventually, he made his way back to the fire. When he came into the clearing, he saw that Leah was curled up in a ball under a blanket by the fire, one hand on a dagger, ready for a fight even in sleep. Tomaz looked up from where he sat.
“I was about to come looking for you, princeling,” the big man rumbled with a smile that made the Prince’s stomach clench. The Prince forced his mouth into a grimace that he hoped passed for a smile and made an excuse about wanting awalk to stretch his cramped legs. He picked up the spare blanket and curled up under it in the crook of a nearby tree. As he did so, he saw that it had been purposely cleared of rocks and roots by a deft hand. He looked up and saw Tomaz wink at him.
“We know you like to sleep under trees. It was her idea.”
He motioned his head toward the sleeping girl.
“Thanks,” the Prince said, “but I’m not very tired at the moment. I can take the first watch if you’d like. After all, I have slept quite a lot recently. I’ll wake you when the fire dies down.”
Tomaz’s eyes widened in surprise, but he smiled appreciatively.
