Prince of Time

Chapter Thirty-Eight - Nothing

“Etheron!” Ane raised a triumphant fist to the sky. “At last!”

“Shush!”

They all froze, looking around them slowly.

“So, just for clarification,” Ane said, carefully. “Did anybody else here a voice telling me to be quiet?”

“Walk three paces left,” the voice whispered. “And round the rock.”

They followed these instructions and there, crammed into the tiny space behind the stone, was Teliwen, Knight-Commander of Etheron.

“Teliwen?” Zeno gaped. “What are you doing behind a rock?”

“Keep your voices down!” Teliwen waved frantically. “Come out of sight. Quickly!”

They shuffled into her hiding space, cramped and uncomfortable.

“Why’ve you come back?” Teliwen asked, softly. “What do you want?”

“Your father said to come back to raise a country for war,” Tobiah told her. “We return with war.”

“No good,” Teliwen shook her head. “No good at all.”

“Why not?”

“The reason I’m asking for quiet,” Teliwen explained, impatiently, “is that there is an entire army camped just in that valley you were about to blunder mindlessly into. Etheron is under siege. There will be no helping.”

“That’s impossible!” Zeno burst out. “There’s so many soldiers stopping us getting here! That must be the entire army!”

Teliwen put a hand on his arm, comfortingly. “Death and destruction will always find more followers than hope and reason.”

Zeno was shaking. “We can’t fight them. Gods, we can’t fight them! Not Merdia and Harian and Etheron together! We can’t fight them!”

“Sssh,” Teliwen soothed him. “It’s ok, Zeno. We’ll find a way. We always find a way.”

“Even if we have to summon all of the western kingdoms,” Tobiah vowed. “Even if we have to call in armies from the east. Even if we have to cross the mountains or the seas. We will destroy him.”

Zeno ignored him. “And if there is no way? No way at all? If we are doomed? If, for the first time in history, right cannot win?”

Teliwen put her arm around his shoulders and rested her head against him.

“Then we’re all dead,” she said, simply.

Maple had slept fitfully, the pain in her leg having dulled to a throbbing ache but the crushing rocks providing no comfort at all. When she awoke for the fifth time, it was lighter in the ravine and the sky above was faintly blue.

 Nicanor lay asleep, head resting on one of the packs. Maple wished to say that she didn’t have the heart to wake him. As it was, she reached out and punched him hard in the stomach.

“Ooof,” Nicanor shook himself awake. “Violence this early in the morning cannot be good for the digestion.”

“It’s light,” Maple gestured. “And I’m hungry.”

He reached into his pack and pulled out a not-quite-stale loaf of bread. He tore it roughly in half and handed one part to her.

“I’ll try to find help,” he said, with his mouth full. “I’ll leave you with half the provisions. If you go, it will be dehydration or exposure.”

“Thank you,” Maple said, tartly. “I’m glad to hear it.”

Nicanor shrugged. “Brutal honesty in the light of day.”