The Cursed Archer

Chapter 6: Trips And Tricks

It took Archie hours to find his way back to the castle. At one point, he was convinced that he was lost, but eventually, he saw the river and followed the stream until it led him home.

He reached the stables by sunrise and got to work almost immediately. He did not say anything to anyone, and his mind was still unable to process what had happened and how. Parts of his nightmare kept flashing in front of him each time he closed his eyes. At first, it bothered him, but as the hours passed, he felt as if he were himself in a dream.

Archie felt like he was in a haze. A fog was surrounding him, and nothing around the stable boy seemed real. His own body did not feel like it was his. It reminded him of the time Sammy made him try some mushrooms he had found in the forest. Except when Archie opened his eyes the next morning, he was not out of the maze yet.

Archie woke up in the same field again.

And then the morning after that too.

It was the same dream. The same people. The same man slit the throats of three victims as he collected their blood in a goblet. Archie could feel their terror, he could hear their screams even when he was awake. When he looked at his hands, they were covered in crimson. But when he would go to wash them, they would already be clean.

Archie felt like he was both the murderer and the victims. It was not possible, but neither was anything that was going on with him.

Archie was in the training ground with his students. Halfway through their session, he went to get some water. As he picked up the flask— what he saw in his palm was a familiar dagger. Archie gasped, looking at his other hand to see the goblet filled to the brink with red liquid.

Archie turned around, his eyes wide in shock as he saw the three boys lying on the ground.

Lifeless.

"No... no... what have I done?" Archie whispered, his gaze full of horror at the scene in front of him.

He did not do that, did he? He did not just kill... no! There was no way that Archie did that. He did not even remember it. But his memory was beginning to have a lot of holes that he could not fill. What if he had killed them but could not recall it? What if he was going insane?

It was not a what-if.

He was going insane. And now he had done something he could never come back from. Archie was frozen still. It did not feel real. Nothing felt real. Where was he? What was he doing? Who was he?

"Archie?" A hand on the stable boy's shoulder finally broke him out of the trance.

Archie stared at Kenric, who had his brows furrowed in confusion. Archie immediately glanced at his hands, where he was gripping his leather flask tightly. He turned to look at the boys, who were running around and playing.

They were alive. Archie did not hurt them.

"It was all just in my head," Archie mumbled, puzzling the warrior prince even more.

"What did you say?" Kenric questioned.

"Ken..." Archie trailed off. He had not spoken to Kenric about all of this. Or had he? Archie could not remember that either. "Something is wrong... Something is terribly wrong with me."

Kenric pressed his lips in a thin line as he stared at his lover. Archie did not look like himself. Not at all. His skin was pale, his eyes hollow and he was missing the light that Archie always carried with him. His lips were chapped as if he had been biting them too much. His hands were trembling and it looked like he was going to pass out any second.

"Boys!" Kenric yelled, demanding the attention of the young students. They stopped what they were doing in an instant, lining up and waiting for the knight to go on. "Today's practice is over. Archie is feeling a bit sick, so you can all head home."