Chapter 14: Scars That Tell A Story.

Chapter 14: Chapter 14: Scars That Tell A Story.

Khobi barely stirred when he heard the knock on his door and the tell-tale sound of the barricade outside his door being shifted aside. Instead, he sank just a little deeper into the bathtub and huffed air out his nose like an unruly child might at bath-time. It wasn’t a particularly cold night out, but there was something comforting about the warm water and being able to see the stars, even if only through his window.

He’d spent a long time, not being able to see the stars.

The water, too, was providing relief to his aching arms –it had taken every ounce of his strength to catch his weight on a protruding window-ledge when he’d misjudged a step on the wall and tumbled. It hadn’t been pleasant plummeting down the side of the castle, he knew what it was like to crash land on stone and didn’t intend to repeat it.

Maybe it had been a bad idea to try in the dark. How hard could it be, he’d thought. It was just a castle. He’d done worse; climbed more treacherous walls –the Trash Pit at Briyagi was sheer and rocky and always dripping, the pit itself always cried blood. And yet, he’d been able to claw his way out of there, rarely fallen. Maybe rage had made that easier, adrenaline from the fight? Or maybe he’d just been stronger back then –there’d been a time when it had practically been his cell, after all. Silas had probably intended to let him die down there one day, except that Khobi refused to. And then, when it had become obvious that rather than destroying him, the Pity was making him stronger, Silas had been forced to stop sending him there.

Khobi knew that he was by no means weak –weakness didn’t let you survive in Briyagi. But it was obvious enough now, that he was by no means strong enough. When he got out of this place, there were lowlifes of all sorts in the wilderness, and beasts and other cruel kings and foreign lands –and he would need to be strong enough to take them all on. And even if he’d only taken on the castle guards in hand to hand combat, he knew that they themselves weren’t enemies to be taken lightly.

The creak of his bedroom (read: prison) door was what pulled him out of his thoughts, and his red eyes slowly slid across to the entrance to find a familiar face gazing at him in the light of a candle.

"Good morning, Khobi," Binny greeted cordially, as though it were mid-morn and not the middle of the night, "You’re up early today." Khobi huffed into his bathwater again and sank down again, expression darkening when he felt the servant’s grin widening, "Cranky, too."

One of the guards outside scoffed.

"Don’t worry about him," Montrel could be heard drawling with a touch of irritation, "...He’s just sulking because we caught him again."

" –It was a cheap move!" Khobi rose out of the water to snap back hotly, before clamping his mouth shut again and sending water spilling over the sides as he slouched into his bath again.

"Still counts."

"I don’t know why he’s sulking anyway," Fricha yawned gruffly, "We said there’d be no more ropes, didn’t we?"

"Well, it’s not like there’s much point," Montrel grumbled mutinously, and there was a light popping sound as though he’d just stretched out the kinks in his back, "We all know he can get out of them."

"I’d like to know how he slipped those ropes," Fricha mused, as Binny busied himself with laying fresh clothes out Khobi’s bed for him. Then, the guard added, a little lower, and almost to himself, "...I guess you learn some things in Briyagi."

And, as if on cue, that was the moment when Khobi chose to drag himself out of the bath water, and Binny hurriedly gathered up a towel for him to dry off.

In the dim light of the candle, he found that he could see all too clearly what Khobi had learned in Briyagi.

He averted his gaze as rivulets of water ran down the body of the prince standing before him. They rolled down the grooves of his hard-earned muscle, licking at the grazes and scrapes and already-healing bruises that Khobi had received in the time he’d been in Crade. But they weren’t what made Binny turn away, no –what made his steely eyes soften, not in pity, but in a kind of understanding, were the deep, mottled purples that blossomed across his torso, his thighs, his chest, the kinds of bruises upon bruises that lingered long after the blows that had delivered them.

"What?" Khobi snorted gruffly, stepping out of the bath and dripping water onto the floor as he snatched his towel from Binny’s hands.

"Nothing," the servant replied quietly, speaking for the first time without a teasing lilt to his voice. Instead, he cocked his head, quite inquisitive, in fact, and his voice was soft as he added, "You really aren’t a Lord."

"...I said so, didn’t I?" Khobi muttered, wrapping the towel around his waist and moodily heading back over towards his bed to inspect the clothes he’d been gifted. But no sooner had he made to move than the servant was at his side, his eyes seeming greyer and less playful than usual.

"I’d say maybe, you’re more like a servant."

It wasn’t a question, and although the mere notion would usually make Khobi’s blood burn –because even if he had spent half his life in servitude, he would not let that define him –the softness of it caught him off guard. He’d opened his mouth to contest Binny’s bold statement, but found himself rendered silent by the memory of the Briyagi sharpness –akin to wariness –in his eyes and in his movements. He thought back to the servants he’d had dealings with in Briyagi.

They hadn’t asked for that sort of life, had they? Just like him, he supposed.

There was silence for a long moment, broken only by the snoring of one of the guards outside the room. It unsettled Khobi, and made him wary, because from what he’d seen of Binny, he was rarely silent. But before he had any time to ask what the hell had him all weird tonight, he spoke.

"Look, I know you don’t know me. And you don’t know this castle," he muttered, "...And I know you have no love for the nobles or any reason to make life easier for those sorts of people..." Khobi took a moment to look back over his shoulder just then, as Binny picked up his candle once again. Perhaps Binny hadn’t expected him to look back, because in those usually so deceptive eyes there was suddenly a rare truth –something cracked and humourless painted in the bags under his eyes.

" –But let them sleep." With that almost imploring whisper, whatever Binny had revealed was back behind a mask, and his grin was back on his face. It didn’t reach his eyes, though, and when he shifted, his tunic slipped slightly, and the golden candlelight couldn’t hide a purpling bruise marring his creamy skin and creeping up towards his collar. Khobi couldn’t help but flinch at the sight, his towel clenched in his hands and a familiar ache throbbing against a matching mark that sat just above his hip on his own body. And of course Binny noticed, and he merely shrugged apathetically, as he added to his plea,

"...It makes life easier for my kind of people."