Chapter 125 - 124: The Prince Horse.

Chapter 125: Chapter 124: The Prince Horse.

​"What?!" she hisses, eyes wide in poorly concealed shock. Montrel and Khobi Frost, and even Bongo look mildly alarmed, glancing from the lane, where Rogard Spidra’s father has joined him in the ridiculous showboating, to the startled lady sitting amongst them.

"He...he wanted to marry me?"

​"Everyone wants to marry you, sweet daughter," her father reminds her patiently,

"You’re next in line for the throne."

​"But...the guy’s old enough to be her dad," Montrel grimaces, and the princess wrinkles her nose as much as a princess is allowed as she comes to a similar conclusion.

​"I’m well aware, Montrel," the king replies dryly, and Montrel’s mouth abruptly snaps shut as he realises just who he’s spoken to so freely.

Being around Khobi Frost so much has given him a bad habit of running his mouth.

"I’ve been turning him away for years. But I can imagine he’s trying to convince his son to ask for your hand right this very second."

He nods down at the lane to where Rogard Spidra and Rogard’s Father appear to be conversing in hushed tones.

"How cheap. He’s a fool if he hasn’t realised yet that the secret to getting a crown is hiding how badly you want it." A look from his daughter has him rolling his eyes and offering her another cup of wine, which she takes.

"Oh don’t look so concerned, Princess Xena. You really think that after all these years I’d let him have you so easily?"

​"You keep acting like it’s your choice who I marry," she sniffs, raising the wine to her lips as the crowd slowly starts to settle. Her father mimics her tone, eyebrows raised high into his hairline.

​"You keep acting like it’s yours."

​Bongo, by now much used to the bratty exchanges between father and daughter, sees Montrel and Khobi Frost exchange bewildered looks, and shrugs.

Thankfully, the inevitable relaunch of their age old argument is halted by the king himself.

​"Ah, it’s time. Good," he announces suddenly, like he’s been waiting for some sort of cue and has just received it.

Before anyone can ask what exactly it’s time for, he rises to his feet, and unbelievably, a hush falls over the entire crowd.

​

...

Gurdet Hector could not be more pleased with the reaction. It was something that he always managed to find a little joy in; that he possessed a presence large enough to quieten a rabid mob.

He savours it today, as they all wait with baited breath for him to proclaim the young Lord Rogard Spidra today’s champion.

​He doesn’t keep them waiting too long. Rogard Spidra put on a spectacular show today and deserves to be acknowledged for it.

He lets his speech go on a little longer today than the one before --the Lord Vogrid Vector hadn’t been the most gracious of victors and hadn’t shown much interest in being worshipped the way a winner should; a shame really, Gurdet Hector took a great deal of pride in his congratulatory speeches.

He could have waxed some delightful poetry about Vogrid Vector’s skill with a bow, but alas the man had just wanted to take his gold and go.

Hadn’t even asked for any other prize, like any other man would have, and had barely bothered to attend his own celebration feast.

​Gurdet Hector’s certain he won’t have that same problem today.

There’s little more that Lord Rogard enjoys than hearing his son being praised, and he seems delighted and altogether rather smug to hear his king speak so highly of him.

​He’s just finished reminding the crowd for the third time, of the kind of dedication and precision that jousting requires of a man, when behind him, Khobi Frost yawns.

​Loudly .

​The look the Lord Rogard Spidra sends towards the royal booth is entirely disrespectful, and Gurdet Hector’s can’t help but find it utterly hysterical.

​But he’s a king, and he has more composure than that so he carries on like nothing’s happened.

Perhaps he has been going on a little too long. Partly concealed from the audience by Khobi Frost’s chair, Montrel does his best at stifling a snigger and fails miserably.

​"You will be, of course, rewarded most handsomely for your victory today," he continues, word for word what he’d told Vogrid Vector the day before.

It’s always the same, after a tournament. Gold is usually enough of an incentive to fight, but there are things in this world that men desire more than wealth --things that a king has the ability to grant.

"Unless there is another prize you would desire?"

​The question is standard, but still makes Rogard pause, and Gurdet Hector doesn’t miss the glance he spares for his daughter, like he knows exactly what he should ask for.

The man would make for a handsome son-in-law, if only Rogard’s Father weren’t such a snake.

​But the bold request that Gurdet Hector’s waiting for doesn’t come. Instead, the young Spidra just dips his head dutifully, and announces, with a small shake of his head, that the gold, and the opportunity to fight for his kingdom, is reward enough.

A strange, strange statement, considering Rogard’s Father, and from the look of thinly-bridled fury said father sends his son, explicitly not what he was supposed to say.

​Even stranger.

​"Very well, my lord," Gurdet Hector decides, raising his glass in toast and wondering what could make such a dutiful son so wilfully defy his father, "Tonight we drink to you."

Another cheer goes up at the promise of more wine and good food, and with that, the days event comes to a close.

​Almost.

​The cheers die down almost as abruptly as they struck up again; fading on the wind like a sad, frightened echo, and a silence, colder and more brittle than those that came before it, takes its place.

​Montrel sucks in a breath as he sees what has got the entire audience so still --a lone rider, sauntering down the lane, all in armour and riding a pitch black horse that shines like a clear sky at midnight.

He knows that horse; he’d know it anywhere.

​And down in the lane, Rogard knows, too.

​It’s a real beast, that thing. It’s bitten him before, and tried to kick him more than once. Beautiful, but a nightmare for the grooms, and too wild for most riders, like he’d never really been tamed.

As far as Rogard knows there’s only one man in the castle that’s ever been able to ride it.

​"What’s wrong?" Khobi Frost asks thickly, turning as he senses the soldier tense at his side. Montrel doesn’t reply immediately, gaze fixed down on the rider steadily approaching Rogard like he’s got all the time in the world; unfazed by the thousands of eyes fixed on him, and when Khobi Frost looks up at his face his expression is tight, and grim.

​"...That’s Loac Trent’s horse."