Chapter 3: The Hand Over.

Chapter 3: Chapter 3: The Hand Over.

"Father!" Xena voice called out angrily from behind him and he drew to a halt with a sigh, ignoring the snicker that Vogrid made behind him.

"What is it, sweet daughter?" he inquired innocently, turning to see her striding down the corridor with a firm frown on her face. Servants ducked aside, shyly dropping their gazes as she swept past.

" –Do not ’sweet daughter’ me," she sniffed, "A surprise for my cousin? Father, the whole castle knows what that means!"

"Your point being?

"Did you see that man? He’s not like the others you’ve gifted to Loac," she murmured softly, shaking her head and clutching her hands together tightly, "...To make him do such things would seem...degrading."

"Did you see that man?" Gurdet retorted flatly, startling her with his tone, "You know his story. He has been held by Silas Luminousi for years, I’m sure he’s already well acquainted with all that is degrading and humiliating. Silas would have made sure of it, he hated his uncle, and his family, after all..." Though he hated to admit it, he found his own voice softening, but Xena obviously didn’t hear it, as her lower lip trembled in a disappointed, most un-queenly fashion. It was the kind of rare expression she wore when she looked to him not as her king but as her father.

"I can’t believe you’d be so cruel."

A swish of her long, raven hair, and she was sweeping off down the hallway, her dress trailing after, and young maids scuttling to pick up the train to keep it off the stone floor. Durget watched her leave with a sigh.

"It seems that Princess Xena does not approve," Vogrid remarked coolly from a few paces behind him.

"Oh, whatever gave you that impression?" Gurdet remarked sarcastically, gazing around the hallway at the servants who were steadily darting about. No doubt that they all had their ears wide open, the servants always did but liked to pretend they didn’t. If one believed the whispers, it was said that the servants of Crade knew all that went on within its walls. There was always someone listening. "...In any case," he added, as he continued off towards his chambers. "Xena shouldn’t just go leaping to conclusions like that."

For a heavy moment there, Gurdet failed to hear Vogrid familiar footsteps trailing after him, and when he looked back, he saw it was because his attendant was rooted to the spot, eyes narrowing suspiciously behind his glasses. He was an imposing figure, tall, stern-faced and proud, much like his father, and still so young to be wearing such a disdainful expression. Sometimes it was hard to remember that this man was the same age as his sweet daughter.

"Your majesty..." Vogrid suddenly remarked, his suspicion evident in his voice, as though he was trying to piece together exactly what his king was implying. He’d been in the king’s service for long enough to be wary when Gurdet acted his most innocent, especially when it came to his daughter and nephew. It would never get back to the king, of course, but sometimes the servants whispered that he, and Silas were of the same cut and mould. "If I might ask...Loac...isn’t going to like this surprise, is he?" Gurdet couldn’t help but chuckle to himself.

"Oh," he snickered slyly, his lips curling up into a grin, "...A lot of people are not going to like this." He could feel disapproval radiating from the young man behind him, and took the time to give him what he felt was a most reassuring smile. From the way Vogrid adjusted his glasses and deepened his scowl, it had not had the desired effect.

"Well, if you must know," he continued with a small shrug,. There was no point in keeping secrets, in any case. What fun was there to be found in that?"Xena has made incorrect assumptions about my plans for Prince knobi" He heard Vogrid footsteps slow, intrigued. Gurdet smirk widened, was that the quiet gasp of gossiping servant he could hear?

"It’s not my intention to have him service our dear Loac"

Somewhere outside, thunder rumbled ominously. Gurdet chuckled to himself as he glanced over his shoulder and caught Vogrid staring at him with an expression that looked quizzical. The king couldn’t help it, he really couldn’t, not when this turn of events promised to make things ever so interesting. Let the servants talk, let them whisper.

All the better.

"He’s here to marry him."

***

Khobi Frost was no stranger to nightmares. They felt almost real, he always could feel the warm, stinking breath of each monster,the sting of a blade piercing his flesh, the crawling touch of every hand upon his skin.

up until just now, he’d thought he’d faced every kind of nightmare to haunt his dreaming mind.

But he was wrong, and perhaps this was the cruellest of them all, a dream he couldn’t find it in his heart to wake from.

In this one, his room, if it could ever have been called his, was vivid and changed. This room was dry and warm, and he could even feel the soft touch of sunlight trickling in through an open window. Gone was the dripping of water down the stone walls, dank smell of mould and air. He didn’t want to wake from this,didn’t want to open his eyes to feel the warmth grow stale,to feel the sunlight fade and find that the soft furs had turned back to dirty, creaking wood.

Someone was humming, a song he hadn’t heard in a long time. It was faint, but he was sure he knew the tune. somewhere far beyond the dark castle walls that he knew lay beyond this dreaming world.

But as much as he didn’t want to, he knew he should get up. They’d be coming for him soon, and who knew what would happen if they found him still locked in sleep. It was that, that forced his body to move, as it had for years now, trying to draw him from slumber. But somehow, his body felt so sluggish today; it felt sleepy and lazy, and everything seemed to ache with a kind of dull pain.

But that sort of thing wasn’t foreign to him, and he knew that it wouldn’t serve as any kind of excuse, so he ignored the pounding of his head and cracking of his limbs,he struggled to drag himself awake.

Red eyes slowly flickered open, but instead of waking to darkness, he was greeted with intense, bright light that made his eyes water and his vision blur.

That was real, warm sunlight on his face, and there was a soft mattress underneath him.

...Not a dream?

The humming was getting clearer now, and as Khobi’s vision began to clear, he became dimly aware that there was someone in this strange room with him. His eyelids fluttered in confusion, still not entirely certain that he could believe what he was seeing, but no matter how many times he blinked or rubbed his eyes, there was no denying that this certainly wasn’t Briyagi.

It was the light that convinced him most. Somehow, it had always felt so dark in Briyagi.

Slowly, he peered down at his bandaged hands and inspected them, turning them over and feeling the cloth rub against the raw skin of his wrists. His throat stung with the same rawness, and he could see cuts and bruises riddling his dirty arms. He stared at them for a moment, hazy memories suddenly pouring back to him, the memory of being taken in the dead of night and gagged even before he’d woken, the ache of being shoved upon horseback like some kind of baggage, the sound of soldiers snickering amongst themselves...and then water....so much water,filling his lungs and threatening to bog him down... And then the unfamiliar faces of a strange king and a beautiful princess...

So that hadn’t just been a nightmare.

"Ahh, so you’re finally awake."

***

Someone was speaking. It was a light-hearted voice –a man –and it forced Khobi’s gaze to shift from his hands, up to settle on a dark-haired figure hovering across the other side of the room, apparently inspecting the contents of a large tub. As if feeling eyes upon him, he glanced up, hoisting an empty bucket aloft as he did so.

"You know, I was starting to wonder if they’d hit you too hard," the man remarked, almost conversationally as he traipsed past with his burden. There was a water pump on the other side of the room that he seemed to be making for. "...Gods, rooms like this are so inconvenient for us servants," he added, with a sigh of complaint, "Having to lug water across the room? Do you know how long it takes to fill a bath like that?" It was a good thing he didn’t seem to be expecting an answer, because Khobi was too thrown by the man’s nonchalance to offer one. Brow furrowing in confusion, he watched this man,a servant, if his complaints were to be believed,start working the pump until his bucket was filled to the brim with water.

He had black hair, dusted with the same ashes or dirt or something that seemed to be clinging to his grey tunic. Even partly still in a daze, Khobi could pick out that he didn’t seem to be armed,not a Briyagi man, for certain, the servants there all wore black and wore weapons like accessories. At first glance, he didn’t seem to be a threat, but Khobi had a certain kind of instinct when it came to people...and though he couldn’t explain it, something about this guy made him uneasy.

"Where am I?" Khobi inquired warily,wondering if the guy would answer. It couldn’t hurt to know at least that much, especially with his head throbbing as it was...

"Infirmary, m’lord," the man replied simply, as he began hauling the bucket back across the room towards the tub. He turned briefly to glance at Khobi, propped up in bed and a little disoriented, and the redhead caught a flash of piercing grey eyes before the servant returned to his task, "That’s generally where people get taken when they get knocked unconscious by half a dozen guards."

"Knocked unconscious..." Khobi muttered distantly, reached up to his pounding head and wincing when his fingertips brushed against the texture of dried blood. There was a thunderous splash as the bucket’s contents were unceremoniously dumped into the tub, and the sound did nothing to soothe his headache. "Someone hit me?"

"Yup," the man replied, looking dissatisfied with his handiwork and tutting disapprovingly, "I mean, yes, m’lord. A few times, actually. I don’t know why you thought it was a good idea to try and run..."

It hadn’t been a good idea, hadn’t been a smart idea at all, really. But Khobi remembered a kind of anger welling up in him as he was shepherded down a strange hallway by men he didn’t recognise. When, by some miracle, he’d escaped the raging floodwaters, he’d thought that that was his chance to flee. He’d thought that the men that had dragged him out to god-knows-where were all dead, and he was finally free from them. But of course, the worst of them had survived, and though he’d tried to beat them back, before he knew it, he was being kicked to the dirt all over again, and collared like some kind of animal. For a moment, kneeling before a new king, though, he’d had hope. And then he’d realised that he had just been handed over like property.