My Enemy, My Love

ℭ𝔥𝔞𝔭𝔱𝔢𝔯 𝔗𝔢𝔫

King Thyme [Sea]

The last few weeks had bled together like ink spilled on parchment — dark, muddled, impossible to separate. I scarcely remembered the details of when the battle had begun or how it ended. I only remembered the descriptions of the smell. Burned earth, blood, smoke that clung to the back of men's throats until I could taste it myself with every breath.

And I remembered the silence that followed.

They had brought word of Anurak's death two days after he had fallen, though I had known before they spoke it aloud. Some instinct had pierced through me — the kind of instinct that binds you to a person so completely that even death cannot cut it clean. My best friend was gone. Gone, just like that.

Every day since, I found myself reaching for him. I would look for him at meals, for his sly grin, his biting wit, only to be met with the hollow chair. It was unbearable.

And yet the world did not stop. No sooner had the ashes of the camp cooled than new dispatches arrived. The West was relentless. Reports poured in from every border — North, East, South — each more dire than the last. Villages reduced to rubble, provinces trembling at the mere whisper of their armies. Yes, there had been victories, brave stands, skirmishes won by men who clung to honor with bloodied fists. But they were never enough. Not against the sheer tide of the Western army.

So now they turned to Bangkok. All of them. The provinces, the noble houses, even the smaller kingdoms that had once prided themselves on their independence. Letters came daily, begging for protection, for allegiance, for mercy. My desk had become a graveyard of sealed pleas, each one heavier than the last.

I should have been answering them. I should have been holding my kingdom together. Instead, Luka sat across from me in my study each night, shoulders draped in shadow and candlelight as he scrawled reply after reply in my stead. His quill barely paused, his jaw set, his eyes flicking over words with a precision that unnerved me.

I stared at the flame of the nearest candle, numb, as his voice finally broke the silence.

"You haven't read a single letter tonight," Luka said without looking up. His tone was calm, but the rebuke lay underneath.

I dragged a hand over my face. "I've read enough to know what they all say. Desperation doesn't change its shape."

His quill scratched on the parchment. "Desperation doesn't, but politics does. They're offering titles, concessions, land — anything to tie themselves to us before the West swallows them whole."

I let out a hollow laugh. "And we're supposed to save them? We can hardly save ourselves."

Luka glanced up then, candlelight catching the sharp lines of his face. "Do you want to surrender before we've even fought?"

"I don't know what I want," I admitted, my voice low, raw. "All I know is that Anurak is dead, the West is marching, and every word I write feels like a lie."

For once, Luka's expression softened. Only slightly, but enough that it unsettled me. "You're not the only one grieving, Thyme."

I met his gaze and felt that familiar tangle tighten in my chest — grief, resentment, and something else I dared not name. He knew how close I'd been to Anurak, though he had never mocked me for it as others might have. Luka could be cruel, but never in that way. It was almost worse.

"I can't..." My throat closed, but I forced the words out. "I can't do this. Pretend I'm strong enough for all of them. That I have answers."

"You don't have to pretend," Luka said quietly, setting his quill aside. "Not with me."

The words startled me, more than they should have. I turned my eyes back to the candle, afraid of what I might see if I looked at him too long. "That's easy for you to say. You thrive in this. Letters, power, deals — you breathe it. I drown."

Silence stretched. Then: "Perhaps we are drowning together."

I blinked, my grip tightening around the edge of the desk. The firelight wavered between us, and for a moment it felt as though the air itself had thinned.

"I didn't ask for this," I whispered.

"Neither did I," Luka replied. His voice carried none of his usual bite, only weariness. "But here we are. And we have to hold the kingdom. For them." He gestured to the piles of letters. "And for him."

Anurak. His name echoed in the unspoken space between us.

I felt my chest seize. I wanted to rage, to cry, to collapse, but instead I leaned back in my chair and shut my eyes. "Write whatever you want," I muttered. "I can't."

Luka did not press. He only dipped his quill again and bent over the parchment, steady, relentless. The only sound was the scratch of ink and the guttering of candles as the hours bled away.

I sat there, distant, hollow, watching him work, and wondered if the world would ever stop asking for more of me than I had left to give.

But at the back of my mind, I knew only this: that I wanted to fight, too. 

I had to.

For my people. 

And for Anurak.

<<<<>>>>