I'm still half asleep. Staying up all night doctoring a sick dog is not fun. I'm at the stage where my brain is full of cotton wool and I can't remember what prompt I used. I'm sure you'll find it in there if you look
I fell asleep
content and replete in the arms of my lover. I wake to chaos.
Jerked rudely
from sleep when the warm furs are torn away, my somnambulant mind struggles
with the bright light, raised voices and sudden cold. At first, I can make no
sense of what is happening. Then my Prince cries out and I am awake in an
instant.
Our small tent
is filled with men – at least four of them. They are shouting – at us and each
other. One, who I now recognize as a particularly unpleasant Counsel member,
grips Castien by the upper arm, having clearly dragged him from our bed. From
the way my Prince struggled the man is hurting him. My lip draws back in a
snarl and I immediately spring.
I knock the man
to the ground and he releases Castien, with a cowardly squeak, as he falls
beneath me. He is a weak man; a bully, quick to hurt a small man like Castien
but with no fight in him for one such as I. Before I can raise my fist to break
his face, arms circle me and pull me roughly to my feet.
“Don’t hurt
him,” Castien calls and the man, getting to his feet, sweeps his arm, striking
Castien in the face with his open hand. Castien cries out and stumbles back.
Catching his foot on the sleeping skins, he falls heavily and is clearly
winded. He curls on his side, gasping for breath. At least the Counsel man has
the decency to look aghast at what he has done, but his concern is fleeting.
“This is your fault, demon.”
I anticipate
the blow when he backhands me and snarl in his face as I struggle hard to free
myself. The soldiers do not appear happy about what is transpiring but, at
least until Castien is able to stand, they have to take their orders from the
Counsellor.
“How dare you
lay your sick, perverted hands on our prince? Have you no decency? The King
will hear of this, and your betrothal to our Princess will be dissolved
forthwith.”
I wish I could
spit in his smug, self-satisfied face.
“He was never
betrothed to my sister,” Castien gasps. My heart reaches out as he struggles to
his feet, clearly in pain. A trickle of blood runs from the corner of his
mouth. He wipes it with the back of his hand, running his tongue over the
inside of his bottom lip.
I growl, low
in my throat and throw myself forward again. He hurt My Prince. He made him bleed. Someone strikes me to the back of
my head and stars burst in front of my eyes taking the strength from me.
“Behave
yourself, demon,” the Counsellor hisses, “and you just might live.”
“Take your
hands off him,” Castien demands. He stands very straight, although it clearly
hurts. “Tian was never betrothed to Jandra. He is, and always was, betrothed to
me.”
“Ridiculous,”
the man snarls. “Men do not have relations between themselves, unless they are
sick deviants. The King would never sanction this, and the Counsel most
certainly will not.”
“Do not talk
to me like that,” Castien snaps. “Remember your place. My father did sanction it, and the Counsel has
nothing to do with it. I don’t need your permission to love who I choose.”
“You do when
the love is forbidden and reviled. Neither the Counsel nor the people will
sanction what I have witnessed this day.”
“If you had
not violated the sanctity of my tent you would have witnessed nothing.” Castien
turns his attention to the guard. “Get your hands off my bonded,” he growls and
the grip on my arms lessen, only to be renewed at a snapped command by the
Counsel man.
“You would override
a direct order from your Crown Prince?” Castien sounds outraged and I feel a
tremor of fear run through the guards who hold me.
“I’d do more
than that if I had my way,” the man growls taking a step forward. Castien
shrinks back.
A roar from
outside heralds the King’s approach. A moment of panic flashes through the eyes
of the Counsel man but he quickly recovers. “Take him outside,” he commands.
The guards drag me into the harsh sunlight. I’m sure the man was expecting me
to be humiliated, being naked in the middle of a waking camp. He couldn’t be
more wrong.
“What the hell
is going on?”
“Father,”
Castien’s voice calls from inside the tent. It appears the Counsel man has
prevented Castien from leaving. There is a brittle edge to Castien’s voice and
I ache to go to him.
The soldiers
drag me further from the tent, into the center of the camp, so I can’t hear the
conversation taking place inside. What is clear, is that the king is not happy.
If I can’t hear the words I can hear the roar.
“Release the
Prince, or die.”
The call takes
everyone by surprise. The camp is immediately thrown into chaos, but it dies
quickly when it becomes clear we are at the center of a closing ring of
archers. The thrum of arrows finding non-living targets cause everyone to freeze
and there is no resistance when a small contingent of forest-men stalk into
camp and relieve the soldiers of their weapons. The two men who hold me drop my
arms, but before I am able to run to the tent I am faced by a tall, imposing
figure, dressed in forest green, with a close-cropped beard and golden eyes.
“Exactly what
trouble have you got yourself into this time?” he asks, crossing his arms
across his chest.
Even though I
am desperate to go to my Prince I cannot help the grin that breaks over my
face. “I am fairly sure it is trouble you would approve of, Father.”
Father laughs
and grips my shoulder in greeting, then we turn together to rescue my love.
Now go read the rest of the great flashers this week
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