Prince of Traitors

Jasper

"How's your face?" Owin asks, sitting beside me in front of our campfire. I glance over at her as I hold the cool compress she made me to my bruised face. It smells like mint and chills my skin.

 "Better. This helps, thanks," I reply.

"Good. You'll be purple for a few days but that'll bring the swelling down," Owin says. She's stitched up and applied a salve to her own wounds, and changed her shirt. I had offered to help, but she'd declined. She looks tired, with circles under her silver eyes, but she's stayed up, treating both our injuries while Nim and Kieran are off hunting for our dinner. Our horses are tied to trees nearby, grazing. The box of chocolates sits open beside the fire, Owin occasionally popping one into her mouth.

Nimia skips to us from the darkness of the trees, brandishing a big rabbit. "Look what I caught!" she says proudly.

Owin grins at her sister. "Nice job," she says. "You know how to skin it, or has Kieran been spoiling you all this time?"

Nim sticks her tongue out. "He always makes me do it." She sits beside Owin and takes out her dagger, expertly readying the rabbit for us to eat. My stomach growls.

Kieran emerges from the woods, but doesn't come closer to the fire. He clears his throat. "I need an audience with His Highness," he says through gritted teeth.

I glance at Owin, but she's watching Kieran with stern eyes. I set down the compress and stand. Kieran turns and walks into the trees, and I follow him, stuffing my hands into the pockets of my quilted jacket.

We stop just out of earshot of the camp, but close enough that we can see the flickering orange light of the fire between the trees. Kieran turns back to me and crosses his arms over his chest. He says nothing. He just stares at me, his silver eyes cold.

I look at him for a long time. "You know you don't have to call me 'Your Highness,'" I begin. "I'm just a person—"

Kieran speaks with no preamble. "You need to go."

I blink in surprise. "What?"

"I don't care if you leave in the middle of the night, in the morning, whatever, but you need to go," he says.

I'm taken aback by the glare that crosses his face. I sigh. "Can you at least tell me why?"

"You've put two of the most important people in my life into danger over and over again," he snaps. "You can't stay."

"But they're okay. They've been alright for as long as I've known them. Owin and Nimia can clearly take care of themselves. Besides, we made a deal—"

"I don't care. Break it."

I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from saying something stupid. I'm quiet for a moment while I collect my thoughts into words. "Kieran, I know you don't like me, but you have to know I never meant to hurt them. Ever. Owin would never—"

"Just in the past day, Owin was almost gutted and Nim was almost kidnapped by bounty hunters," Kieran growls. "Bounty hunters who are after you, Your Highness." He steps closer to me. He's only an inch or two taller than me, but the way he crowds me makes it seem like he's much, much bigger. "Owin forgives you for your idiocy for some reason, but I won't. So tell me, what could you possibly say to convince me to not just leave you behind?"

I open my mouth to retort. But what goes through my mind makes my heart sink, makes me avert my gaze from his. There's no excuse for the girls being put in danger, no matter how much Owin and Nimia like and trust me. There's nothing I can say in my defense, not really. I exhale. "Nothing," I say finally. I raise my eyes to Kieran's again. "I've got nothing to give you. Just my good intentions."

Kieran scoffs. Laughs a little, rolls his eyes. Utterly amused by my answer. He wears a smirk that doesn't reach his eyes and says. "Well, Your Highness, I can't do shit with good intentions."

I grit my teeth so hard they might crack. Pain shoots through my bruised jaw and my hands curl into fists at my sides. My face heats. Kieran begins to turn to walk away from me, but I'm speaking before I realize what I'm doing.

"Are you fucking serious?" I snap.

Kieran looks over his shoulder at me. "What did you say?"

"You think I planned all this?" I sweep my arm back toward the camp where Owin and Nimia wait. "You think I wanted any of this to happen? For Owin to get hurt and Nimia to almost get kidnapped? Do—do you think I want to be stuck out here in the woods, hundreds of miles from home?!"

Kieran bares his teeth, about to snarl something at me, but I don't let him speak. "You don't like me," I growl. "I get it. I'm not fucking fond of you, either. But you don't get to blame me for every shitty thing that happens out here!"

I step closer to him, crowd him like he did to me. "I never asked for this. I never asked for bounty hunters to come after me! I never asked to find my father choking on his own fucking blood!" My voice rises, my throat grating, until I'm yelling in his face, and then I'm shaking, my nails digging crescents into my palms inside my curled fists.

Kieran is fuming, trembling with rage. He looks like he wants to throttle me. His mouth is pressed into a tight line, his eyes cold. But he says nothing. My vision blurs, and I step back from Kieran, wiping away the tears that threaten to spill over my cheeks. All of the stress, the exhaustion, and the fear that I've kept shoved down inside me comes bubbling to the surface. It leaks out of me like a hairline crack in a cup, and then bursts like a dam breaking.

I don't wait to see if he says or does anything. I turn and stagger back toward the camp, wanting nothing more than to forget the icy, stunned expression on Kieran's face.