Chapter 13: Kingly Suggestions.

Chapter 13: Chapter 13: Kingly Suggestions.

...A few days later...

"...Not that this is the strangest thing I’ve walked in on," Binny remarked conversationally, "And it uh, certainly explains why the soldiers look a little less on edge but..." He paused, cocking his head as he surveyed the scene laid out before him. "...Do you want to maybe explain what’s going on?" It was amazing that he didn’t start laughing sooner.

"Oh, so this is funny to you?" Khobi snapped from the floor most vehemently, kicking an empty plate in his direction and missing by miles.

"Yeah," Binny cackled, unable to prevent himself from laughing at the way the redhead was (most furiously), lying in a heap on the floor, tied to a chair. "What happened?"

"...He was trying to get free and knocked himself over," Hasbar snickered from the doorway, earning a most heated glare from the angry redhead. Binny didn’t exactly think that tying him up was a very good plan –from what little they’d seen of Khobi, he tended to react very badly to being bound.

"No, I mean, why are you even tied to a chair?" he inquired, gracious enough to scuttle over and start tugging the chair back upright. Khobi mutinously glared at him out from under his long bangs.

"...My guards overreacted," he muttered.

"He left us no choice," Bongo informed the servant, sounding rather as though this was a last resort.

"Well, you were driving half the castle insane..." Binny reminded him rather pointedly, as the redhead began tugging on his restraints before heaving an irritated sigh of resignation since they didn’t seem to be budging, "Oh, so you can beat down a door but you can’t break a measly bit of rope?"

" –You should probably watch your mouth, servant," Hasbar warned airily, at the same time as Bongo heavily requested, "Please don’t rile him up...And Hasbar, mind yourself."

"But Captain, he’s just a serv –" A solemn stare from his captain apparently served to silence the smaller man.

In hindsight, Khobi should have expected the guards to take matters into their own hands. He just hadn’t expected to wake up one morning bound quite solidly to the sturdiest chair in the room. His fury had done nothing but ensured that he toppled over into a most uncomfortable heap and left to struggle against his bonds on the floor in a most demeaning manner. The Captain had apologised, and he seemed sincere enough, but that hadn’t exactly diffused Khobi’s anger at being tied up.

He hated being confined like some kind of prisoner. But more still, he couldn’t stand being bound like this. The rope burned with cruel familiarity, and losing the use of his limbs gave him a sense of helplessness that he hated with a passion. He wished like hell he could hate his guards for doing this to him, but, as strange as it seemed, he couldn’t.

Strangely, he felt as though there wasn’t any malice behind the action, even if he had admittedly been difficult enough to warrant some vindictiveness. The rope was tight but only so much to hold him in place.

All the guards stayed obediently outside his room, out of sight –weren’t in there throwing things, or jeering at him, and even out in the hallway, they weren’t laughing or mocking his state.

He was untouched and unharmed, and the Captain sounded serious when he said he found no joy in having to do that –but it had to be done to preserve the peace of the castle."...You’re not going to untie me, are you?" Khobi deadpanned, glaring at Binny almost accusingly.

"You got it," he replied lightly, "Wouldn’t want to step on any toes." Khobi didn’t believe him for a second.Irritably, he rocked in his chair again, scowling to himself and then down at his restraints. He had to get rid of these ropes.

And then he was going to have to think. He couldn’t just run again, as much as he claimed that he could, and as much of an easy plan that seemed. If he just kept blundering about blindly, he was guaranteed to wind up getting caught again.

And that would mean starting from scratch. And even though the door was a good outlet for this intense frustration, it was doing him no good.A glance out the nearby window helped, just a little. He could see the bright, clear sky, and even past the walls of the castle, he could see the peaks of mountains, beyond.

For the first time in years; for what felt like the first time in forever...escape was an option. He hadn’t quite gotten there yet; but getting free, getting back out there was a possibility.Out there; he didn’t know exactly where, but somewhere, there were people he wanted to find.

His uncle, his aunt, the only friends he’d ever known...Some day; one day, he’d see them again. But first, he needed to get out of here.

...

"What do you mean you had him tied up??" Xena exclaimed in incredulously, shock visible in her pretty pink eyes as she shot her father a look as if to say did you know about this?

Bongo knew his place, he really did, but that didn’t stop his eyes from briefly glazing over in weariness at the memory of why they had had to go to such lengths.

"I can assure you, Your Highness, it was not our intent to keep him prisoner, as such..."

"Oh, it wasn’t, was it?" she remarked lightly, "Funny, seeing how you seem to have him imprisoned."

"What does it matter if they tied him up, Xena?" Gurdet sighed dismissively, "A little rope never hurt anyone."

"All the same..." the princess mumbled, obviously still displeased and not entirely agreeing with her father’s sentiment, "He’s been in Briyagi. He’s probably had enough ropes to last a lifetime." She cast her gaze back to Bongo, who met her stare as unflinchingly as he could meet her father’s.

"We had no other choice, Your Highness," he informed her, "...I regret to admit that negotiations had failed."

"You were negotiating with him?" Gurdet raised an eyebrow curiously.

"As you say, Your Majesty, he is our guest, and therefore I assumed compromised were to be allowed," Bongo answered in a neutral deadpan tone as dry as he felt he could get away with. To his inward alarm, however, the king actually chuckled at his words, seeming pleased.

"Ahh, Bongo," he remarked; tone amused enough to worry the Third Captain, "I’ve thought it before, but you do have the makings of an excellent husband. How would you feel about marrying my daughter?"

If there was ever a time for Bongo to look visibly shocked, that would have been it, but, true to form, he managed to hide it quite well. Better than the princess, at least, who had spluttered into her tea in a most unladylike fashion.

" –It....would be an honour, of course, Your Majesty," he replied dutifully, bowing respectfully but privately wondering if this was one of the king’s jokes that he and his men never managed to figure out.

"Father, I’m not marrying him," Princess Xena immediately insisted firmly, with a kind smile of apology in Bongo’s direction.

"Why not?" Gurdet sniffed, with all the airs of a grown man pouting, "He’s unmarried, a diligent, high-ranked soldier of noble birth, polite and respectable and not unattractive, and, to my extensive knowledge, doesn’t gossip, whore, or torture anything of any kind."

"Your Majesty...you flatter me."

"Of course I do, I’m trying to sell you to my rather picky daughter." It was, unfortunately for him, clear from the look on the princess’s face that she wasn’t going to be convinced no matter how much of a genius idea her father seemed to think it was. "Fine," he added with a sigh, chuckling again when he saw that his Third Captain’s shoulders relaxed slightly as though a touch relieved. "Xena, are you sur –"

"Father."

"Girls these days just can’t see the true value of a man."

"If mother had’ve been able to, she probably wouldn’t have married you."

"My sweet daughter is so unkind," Gurdet lamented lightly, "And, as much as she dislikes the thought of Prince Khobi bound, I assume that was why the castle enjoyed an all-too brief period of peace?" It had been bliss; none of Khobi’s aggressive thudding echoing through the halls, and no nobles whingeing about all the racket.

"Indeed, Your Majesty," Bongo replied, before frowning in resignation, "But now there’s no point in ropes. He’ll just get out of them again." Gurdet seemed to share his exasperation, but Princess Xena smiled at him, nursing her tea in her lap.

"I’m sure you’ll think of something," she assured him lightly, "But, Captain? If I were you I’d keep an eye on that window of his." She raised her teacup to her lips and took a dainty sip, letting her eyelids flutter closed to savour its sweetness. And when she opened her eyes again, there was a kind of sharpness there that reminded Bongo all too much of her father, and perhaps even a shy flicker of what might have been a sorrow that was rooted in someone else.

But he could have been mistaken.

"He’ll definitely try again."