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When I unfroze the cutpurse from my time bubble, I realized the man was younger than I originally thought. His body shook as if he were in the first throes of a seizure. His color faded to a dull, pale green. Not the grey-green of a skinwalker, but as if he was terrible ill and on the verge of death.
“Please, Justice, behead me now,” he cried. “I can’t endure this agony anymore.”
Before I could answer, Prince White Eagle ordered him taken to the Balance gaol to await trial and to contact him at the palace when the justice assigned to his case needed witness statements. The peacekeepers trussed up the cutpurse and dragged him away to Balance as he wept bitterly, still begging for me to take his head.
I had seen all manner of reactions when a suspect faced the possibility of execution, but I’d never in my thirty-two winters heard one beg for death like this man did.
“Back to the royal carriage,” the prince ordered. Long Feather fell into step on my right while the prince strode on my left. The royal guards marched in front and behind me as they escorted us back to where I’d leapt out of the royal carriage. Obviously, the prince wasn’t taking a chance of me running off on my own again.
“How is the civilian that damned cutpurse attacked?” I asked.
“One of the mounted guards has ridden to the Healers Guild house the next street over,” the prince bit out. “And don’t change the subject, Anthea. What the demon were you thinking?”
“That a woman was attacked and robbed in broad daylight on a street too close to the palace,” I snapped. “No idiot is so bold with an automatic death sentence.” I forced myself to breathe deeply and evenly in order to calm my rapidly beating heart. “Is it correct to connect this man’s actions with what you wish to discuss at the palace?”
“Yes.” The prince’s single word closed any further discussion of the matter.
I swallowed hard. The last thing I needed was to make any enemy of the queen’s husband. But my gut said something else was going on besides the cutpurse’s strange behavior. Whatever it was, the prince wasn’t going to discuss it in public. I wished I had the opportunity to truthspell the cutpurse before the peacekeepers hauled him to Balance. Had he attacked the woman because the terrible pain he claimed he was suffering?
Even if his affliction couldn’t be cured by a master, no Healers Guild member of sound mind would allow a patient to suffer. They’d use pain powder or soma tears if it were the wasting disease.
We reached the intersection as a Healers Guild wagon stopped next to the injured woman. Jonata had tended to her wound while Luc consoled her companion. Someone had collected the rolls and surviving melons and placed them into the fallen women’s baskets. They sat near her companion’s feet.
Yar tied the guild horses to the closest hitching rail. The berda journeyperson and their male apprentice ignored the prince and me as they jumped down, their supply bags in hand, as rushed to their patient. Jonata rose and stepped out of their way, but the injured woman cried out and reached for my warden.
“Stay,” the healer journeyperson ordered. “Keep her calm.”
Jonata crouched by the woman’s head and kept her soothing tone as she stroked the woman’s face and described the beauty of the Sea Peoples’ islands to distract the woman from her pain. The prince waited rather impatiently until the journeyperson said it was time to load the victim into their wagon.
After the healers drove off with the woman, her companion, and their baskets of goods to their guild house, the prince ordered our group back into their respective carriages. He seized my left upper arm to emphasize his command.
As much as I hated being handled in such a manner, I didn’t resist. Looking back at my actions, I realized I’d forgotten everything I learned during my time in Jing. Standora was not my city, and I’d left the prince consort vulnerable to a secondary attack. However, I needed to wait until White Eagle calmed before I offered any apology or amends. The man’s temper wasn’t easy to rouse, but when it was, he was notorious across the queendom for the violence he could inflict.
Once Luc and I were seated, the prince climbed in and glared at me while one of his guards closed the door. I endeavored to keep my expression neutral as I return the prince’s gaze. From Luc’s glances, perhaps I wasn’t as successful as I believed. The prince relaxed a tiny bit once the carriage was moving once again.
“Anthea, you must learn that the entire world does not rest of your shoulders,” he finally said.
“The emperor and empress of Jing have said as much,” I replied. “And all of you are correct, but this was a minor thing—”
But it wasn’t the prince who delivered the expected lecture.
“I can’t follow you into a fight like I used to,” Luc bit out. “And how many Balance wardens must die before you learn to think before you act?”
“Long Feather and Jonata are alive after our six-month journey to Chengzhou and back,” I grumbled.
“Reverend Father Biming lost one of his wardens saving Jonata,” Luc snapped. “Face facts. The whole reason you chose them to accompany you was because they are the youngest and most impressionable of the Orrin Balance squad. They go along with all your mad schemes—”
“I didn’t release one of my wardens from his vows in the middle of our mission—” I started.
“Stop it! Both of you!” The prince rubbed his temples. “I swear you two bicker worse than an elderly married couple.”
“We beg your forgiveness, Your Highness,” Luc murmured. “The last six months have been rather trying.”
I said nothing and settled for glaring at him.
“And I thought many people exaggerated Anthea’s penchant for seeking death until I witnessed it for myself,” the prince replied.
I sucked in a deep breath in an attempt to cool my temper. “I am not trying to get myself killed, Your Highness. The cutpurse would have disappeared into the city if I allowed him to escape. He could have done worse than stab an innocent person running her morning errands.”
“Anthea.” The prince shook his head. “What if he’d been an assassin luring you to your death?”
I opened my mouth to answer before it struck me the prince was correct. I had a breather over the last six months because Po and Shi Hua were the Assassins Guild’s primary targets. Now, that Po sat on Jing’s Dragon Throne and Shi Hua was pregnant with his son, they had plenty of extra protection. Worse, I gave neither of my wardens the opportunity to join me in the chase.
“I beg your forgiveness, Your Highness,” I finally said. “I had the luxury of not being in Issura over the last half year. I allowed my awareness of the true situation to pause for that time period.”
The prince grunted. “That’s the closest to a real apology I’ve heard from you. But you need to remember that the first half of the Skoloti prophecy was fulfilled when Emperor Bao Quan Po took the Jing throne. The second half has yet to be. According to Balance Herself, we have over twenty more years of this war. If you’re the key to the final battle, we have to keep you alive until then. So, no more running off like a disobedient child.”
I bristled at his description of me, but mainly because I hated to admit he was correct. “I hear your words, Your Highness. I will…endeavor to restrain myself in the future.”
“Very well then.” He smiled. “If you fail to do so from now on, I assure you the queen will confine you in the palace dungeon.”
He may be jesting, but I had no doubt Queen Chiara would do exactly that.
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