The chain digs deeper into the sore skin on his wrists, but the only flinch I see is his jaw tighten. Torchlight flickers over the damp stone walls, standing just as bruised and defiant after the battle as he is.

His head droops forward, chin nearly touching his chest, and for a second - just a second - I think I’ve just watched a man fade into death. My breath leaves my lungs in a harsh, cool rush, reverberating off the stone surrounding us. It gives me a brief introspective of my true feelings, but emotion was push far out of the equation the first time Navvarrs invaded our cities.

I rush to the iron bars, boots lightly skidding on the polished concrete below me. Up close, it’s worse. His face is a battled field, bruising deep purples and cuts still angry and red. One eye is swollen shut, his lips crusted with dried blood, seeping onto his shirt.

“Cael.” I say softly at first, afraid to break whatever fragile threat he’s still hanging onto. I sneak my palm past the barriers of iron between up and press it to the side of his face. His skin is cold. Too cold

He doesn’t stir.

My breaths pick up frantically, still trying to be persevered as unfeeling to the guards standing not too far by the entrance.

“Cael.” I try once more, praying, sharper. Something in him twitches and the thought sinks heavily in my chest, somewhere between bitterness and grief. He’s didn’t lose his breath, he just wan’t saving it for me. It’s slight but the sluggish flicker of his good eye tell me the truth. It always does.

I step back. Not far. My palms press together so I can feel _something _because touching him - god, even wanting too in the back of my mind - hurts more then the still wearing down his wrists.

I swallow to pace my speech.

“I didn’t visit for fun. I needed to see you. Nor answers, I alredy know what you’d say”. I say softly. He lets out a slow unforgiving breath, eyes fixed somewhere beyond me. But in the darkness, I still see the way his jaw tightens, the way it does when he tried to stop himself from saying something. I realised he does want to look at me. He just doesn’t trust himself too.

I try break the ice.

“Your presence does something funny to me,” I say, watching his micro body language, “For the pat thirty minutes of travel, I’ve been watching me peripheral. I don’t trust many of the guards nowerday either. But just now…you can barely move a muscle but I felt my vision tunnel onto you only.” I exhaled, “Like I subconsciously trust you to protect me.”

He doesn’t answer with words but something shifts. A breath. A pause in the tight set of shoulders. A flicker in that one good eyes. I’m not sure if he believes me, or he’s trying no too. Because I know for face, from the words that used to slip off his tongue and the way we used to sneak between border just to see eachother, that’s he knows that feeling too.

“You shouldn’t” His voice is no more then a wisp - sore and hoarse, the syllables like splinters.

I shake my head.

“But I do.”

His silence is louder then any scream I’ve heard. I wait. Swallow. Wait again. When he finally speaks, his face turns and for a slip second I think with optimism.

“Don’t.”

Just that. Once word. Sharp as a blade. Dull as regret.

“Don’t what?”

His lips part, and then pressed shut. He slightly turns his face, just enough for me to see the bruises more clearly, and the dark gleam in his eyes that’s not just pain - it’s fury. It’s not targeted at me, but it’s lethal.

“Cael.” I speak. Still nothing. So I tilt my head, give him that same stare I used to give when we were younger, sneaking past the palace gates, when he’d refuse to go further. The one that always got him to take the step.

“I could order you to talk, you know,” I tease lightly, “I am technically then enemy now. Comes with perks.”

A breath huffs from his direction. Not a laugh but the closer thing to emotion I’ve seen since they dragged his body through the gates.

“I thought you hated being royal?” He murmurs, eyes fixed to the cloak on my shoulders, “You said crowns were just prettier cages.”

“And yet here we are.” I say, “You in chains. Menin velvet. Guess I got promoted.”

He laughs but it’s not kind. It sore and deep from within, the sort of sound that slips from a man who’s long since learned not to trust soft things. It’s been years since we parted, even longer of war, but he was never this dismissive. I need him to look on my eye, to see he can trust me better then the world out there. To see that I love him, and, unfortunately, I would go heaven and earth to be on his side.

“You’re a bigger fool then I thought.”

I blink. He lifts his head to see how his sentence landed. Externally - nothing. Internally - I’ve been gutted.

“I’m the one in chains, Elara. And you’re still looking at me like I’m the one who’s capable of saving you.”

“I’m not-“

“Yes, you are,” he cuts in sharp, “You always do when you shouldn’t. Even when I was breaking the world around you, one lie at a time.”

There it is. That vicious, poisoned tongue I wish I wasn’t enfixed by. The defence mechanism of a man who loved too well and was tough young how dangerous it was.

“You’re not as good at lying as you used to be,” I say folding my arms, “That’s one almost sounded rehearsed.”

He shifts. The chains clink softly, a dull reminder that even anger is luxury when you’re this broken. I can see the open wound through his shirt. This isn’t man who’s going to be able to leave with his breath without trusting someone to help. His lips slit open further when he inches a smile - _a smile_ - but he doesn’t seem to care. He’s always been like this. Beautiful and burning.

“I’ve had time to practise.”

“And you still fumble when you talk to me.”

“I stopped pretending you didn’t matter.” He says, “I didn’t want you to see me like this.” His eyes close, lashes brushing the bruised swell of his cheek. He’s…shattered. Not by battle, but by this begrudgingly slow conversation. Not that I expected him to open him arms and me to run into them, but a bit more then silence would be nice.

“You think that’s what I care about? That’s you looked like a beaten up angel. Give me a break Cael.” I whisper back sharply. This whole thing is the most agressive whispering match I’ve even had, which is bold since I’m planning treason.

There’s too much to say. Too many years, too may what-ifs, and now the world between us is carved in swords and blood and betrayal. His father, my father. His people, my people.

So instead, I sit. Right here on the cold stone floor. Right outside his cell, dress be dammed.

His brows twitch upwards.

“You’re not exactly giving me a great conversation sitting up.” I snap. He snuffs something like amusement barely surfacing.

“Elara.”

I smile.

“There he is. I though I lost you to moody silence forever.”

His head tilts back against the walls, the moonlight from his bar window casting shadows over the angles of his ruined face. He truely is gorgeous.

“You never could shut up.”

“You liked it.”

“I tolerated it.”

“You loved it.” I say grinning. He glances at me, then away but this time it’s softer.

“You’re still trouble. You don’t fight fair.”

“You don’t fight at all anymore.”

There a pause. A pause for a little too long.

“Elara, there’s a pole in my ribs.”

“What?” I say diverting my eyes to his shirt. The open would on the side, has and open pole through it. But for the first time, he smiles. I stutter, my gaze flickering over him as I scoot forward to the bars. The fabric is stained deep crimson. The pole, rusted iron, snapped sharp at the end, is wedged clean through, just below his ribs. Not deep enough to kill, but definitely deep enough to ruin my already fragile composure.

“_Cael,_” I hiss. It’s not the sight that gets me, but the scent. “Are you insane? That could puncture your lung-”

“Already missed it. Pretty sure.” He grins, teeth a little too red to be reassuring. “Besides. It’s what I get for starting a fight with a solider who had a bad day.”

“You’re bleeding through your shirt, you arrogant-” I stop, fingers tightening. I want to reach for him but it somehow a still feels inappropriate. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

He shrugs, winces.

“You were talking,” he says, like it’s obvious. “Didn’t want to interrupt.”

Despite myself, a chuckle bubbles up. Desperate. Slightly unhinged.

“You absolute _idiot._”
“You’ve said that before.”


“And I’ll say it again when you’re _sane_ enough to hear it properly. Jesus Cael. Did the guards- oh gods.”

He closes his eyes for a second, breath uneven. “Elara.”

“What?”

“That’s the first time you said ‘when,’ not ‘if.’”

I stare at him, properly. The body of blood, wrists of chains, sheer ruin of what were surrounded with - and still, _still_, I only want him standing beside me, free and furious and mine.

“I’ve already planned your escape,” I say. “You think I’m going to do that just to have you bleed out in a prison cell?”

His lips curve again, that old crooked smile peeking through the bruises.

“I always did like when you took charge.”

“Shut up.”

“Make me.”

“Maybe I will.” I pause, leaning in a little closer, voice lowering. “But only after I pull that pole out and make sure you’re not actively dying, you idiot.”

He huffs a half-laugh and tips his head against the wall again.

“Elara.”

“What?”

“When we run,when,what then?”

I falter. Because that’s the thing we’ve both avoided saying. _After._

__

__

_After I commit treason against my country and family and his country and family, throwing my throne away and putting my life in the hands of myself only for the first time._

__

__

“After that…” I start, “We burn out kingdoms to the ground, down to ash, and we rebuilt. Our people will figure it out. Their not the ones who starts this mess. My father did. Your mother and father.”

He struggles with a breath, but then I realise it’s a laugh.

__

__

“You seriously think we can outrun them?”__

__

_“No _but I think we can outsmart them, and outfight if needed. There’s a convey leaving Navvarr in four days. Supposed to be war supplies but I’ve arranged for…some other things Disguises. Horses. A passage through the southern side. Because I want a life where you’re not in a cage and I’m not wearing a crown that doesn’t fit. _I want us_. And a world built where that works.” I flicker my gaze down him, “and I want someone to remove that pole before you topple over.”__

__

__

Cael’s eyes find mine again. Not sharp. Not mocking either.

“You’re terrifying you highness, you know that?”

“And you’re bleeding through your shirt. So I guess we’re even.”

__

__

I thread my palm through the gap in a shake. And offer. But my instructor has other ideas and my fingers curl under his jaw, tilting it up. He smiles like he needed the help.

“_I mean it._” I whisper.

_“I know_.” He breaths.

When I bring our face together and kiss him, slow and soft, it’s not goodbye.

It’s a promise. One we’re both willing to bleed for. __

__