45
Edric moved swiftly among the soldiers bustling back and forth.
Barely an hour after the battle had ended, the campsite—which had been nothing short of a scene of carnage—was rapidly being brought to order.
While soldiers recovered weapons from the wyvern carcasses and dismantled ruined tents, laborers hauled crates and bundles onto wagons, and maids took on the grim task of collecting the dead and wrapping them in silk.
Taking quick strides through the camp, Edric counted the toll by eye.
Seventeen bodies in all.
Factoring in those swallowed whole by the wyverns, roughly twenty-five to thirty people had perished. Including the wounded, the losses were devastating. His fists clenched tight.
‘A pack of wyverns appearing during the Season of Fire…’
Wyverns typically woke from hibernation near the end of the Season of Rest and did not gather in packs until the Season of Water. After mating, they scattered in pairs, making it exceedingly rare to see more than a dozen banded together in the Season of Fire. Above all, this terrain was hardly suited to sustain beasts of their size.
‘To write this off as sheer bad luck… something feels entirely wrong.’
Edric squinted at the carcasses strewn across the low hills, but he forced the lingering doubts aside. Now was not the time for idle speculation. He strode without hesitation toward the spot where the knights had gathered.
“Commander!”
Varkas, who had been barking orders to the knights, turned toward him.
Edric flinched involuntarily, his feet halting. In the flickering torchlight, his commander’s face was smeared with dark blood. His own state was likely no cleaner, yet Varkas—his cool, chiseled features washed in crimson and his eyes glinting with a chilling edge—exuded an oppressive, eerie aura.
“Did you find her?”
Varkas asked, his voice characteristically level.
Gathering his wits, Edric hurried through his report.
“I found tracks where a wyvern fell to the north. It appears to have plunged straight down into the canyon.”
Varkas turned his gaze northward. The torches held by the knights cast only faint flickers into the ominous darkness of the forest. There was no telling what other savage beasts might be lurking in the brush.
Edric spoke with rising urgency.
“We must dispatch a search party at once. There’s no time to—”
“What search party?!”
Edric snapped his head around at the abrasive rasp. The Crown Prince, his thick black hair wild as a lion’s mane, was marching toward them, trailing attendants in his wake.
Edric quickly inclined his head in respect. The Crown Prince bypassed him without a glance, stopping directly in front of Varkas.
“She’s obviously dead anyway! Stop wasting time on useless errands and prepare to break camp this instant! What if another swarm swoops down while we’re idling here?”
Edric’s jaw set hard at the callous disregard.
Shaken by the sudden disaster, Gareth’s face was noticeably paler than usual. Having never crossed paths with so much as an ogre, let alone a wyvern, it was understandable that he would be terrified. Even so, Edric could not summon a shred of sympathy for the trembling, pathetic Crown Prince.
Suppressing his resentment, Edric turned his gaze to read Varkas’s reaction. He was strangely quiet.
Surely he wouldn’t bow to the Crown Prince’s demands?
Even if she were born out of wedlock, Talia Roem Guirta was an imperial princess, the blood of the Emperor himself. Moreover, was she not the eldest daughter of the reigning Empress? Leaving an imperial daughter behind as monster fodder just to indulge the Crown Prince’s spite was unacceptable. It was an insult to their very honor as knights.
Edric pressed on, desperate.
“If you permit a search party, I will search for Her Highness myself. So, please…”
“Insolent whelp! Who gave you leave to open your mouth in my presence!”
Gareth erupted in fury, seizing Edric by the collar.
Edric stared up with quiet eyes. He was all too familiar with the prince’s volatile rage. He kept his voice as measured and polite as he could manage.
“Forgive me. But we cannot leave the Princess behind like this…”
“Princess?”
Gareth let out a harsh bark of laughter, spitting each syllable straight into his face.
“Listen to me, you fool. There is only one Princess in this Empire: Ayla Roem Guirta. That bitch Talia should never have breathed air to begin with. Being torn apart by monsters is precisely the end that wretch deserves—”
“Enough.”
The quiet command made Edric jump, his eyes darting to his superior. No matter how outrageously Gareth behaved, Varkas had never failed to observe formal protocol. The fact that he had cut the Crown Prince off—and stripped all honorifics from his speech—left Edric momentarily stunned.
Gareth looked equally dumbfounded, his eyes bulging wide. But Varkas did not waver.
“Your Highness should return to your tent and rest.”
Varkas spoke flatly, then turned to the knights waiting behind the Crown Prince.
“Bring a mage here immediately. Select ten of the swiftest men to form a search party.”
The knights scattered instantly to obey. Watching them break away in disbelief, Gareth shoved Edric aside and closed in on Varkas.
“Are you… defying me because of that girl?”
“I was ordered by His Imperial Majesty to escort all three of you.”
Varkas’s voice was void of feeling.
“Surely Your Highness’s desires cannot take precedence over an imperial command.”
“Save the excuses!”
Gareth barred Varkas’s path.
“Do you think I haven’t seen how protective you’ve been of that girl? Tell me the truth. What is she to you—!”
“Gareth!”
A sharp, clear voice rang out, slicing clean through the poisoned air.
Edric, who had been watching the two men with bated breath, turned around. Accompanied by two attendants, the First Princess was walking gracefully toward them, parting the line of knights.
The moment the wyverns fell, she had marshaled the maids to tend to the wounded. Still cloaked in an exhaustion she had had no time to wash away, Ayla approached her brother, her gaze steady.
“Lord Shearkan is right. We cannot leave Talia behind. Whatever else she may be, she shares our blood.”
“Are you out of your mind?”
Gareth glared at his sister, betrayed.
“After the humiliation Mother suffered because of her, you dare say that?!”
“Please, be rational.”
Ayla cut him off, her tone authoritative. Though she had entered the world only a few minutes before him, she carried herself with far greater maturity.
Meeting her brother’s furious glare, she spoke in a deliberate, unhurried cadence.
“If we return to the Imperial Palace having abandoned Talia, not only Lord Shearkan but you as well will be dragged through endless gossip. Why incur such risk?”
Edric stood frozen, taken aback by the chilling detachment coming from the First Princess, who was celebrated far and wide for her grace and compassion.
Ayla added gently, as though soothing a temperamental child:
“At the very least, let us recover her body so she may be given a proper funeral.”
END