Knight, Heir, Prince

Quietly, taking care not to wake Stephania, Thanos slipped from the room. Once he was clear, he ran for the stables, shouting for a servant to bring him his armor.

It was time for justice.

CHAPTER TWO

Berin could feel the excitement, the nervous energy palpable in the air the moment he stepped into the tunnels. He weaved his way underground, following Anka, Sartes by his side, passing guards who nodded with respect, rebels who hurried every which way. He walked through the Watcher’s Gate and felt the turn the Rebellion had taken.

Now, it seemed, they had a chance.

“This way,” Anka said, waving to a lookout. “The others await us.”

They walked down corridors of bare stone that looked as if they had stood forever. The Ruins of Delos, deep underground. Berin ran his hand along the smooth stone, admiring them as only a smith could, and marveled at how long these had stood, at who had built them. Maybe they even dated back to the days when the Ancient Ones had walked, long before anyone could remember.

And that made him think, with a pang, of the daughter he had lost.

Ceres.

Berin was yanked from that thought by the clang of hammers on metal, by the sudden heat of forge fires as they passed an opening. He saw a dozen men toiling away as they tried to produce breastplates and short swords. It reminded him of his old smithy, and brought back memories of the days when his family hadn’t been torn apart.

Sartes seemed to be staring, too.

“Are you all right?” Berin asked.

He nodded.

“I miss her too,” Berin replied, putting a hand on his shoulder, knowing he was thinking of Ceres, who always lingered by the forge.

“We all do,” Anka chimed in.

For a moment the three of them stood there, and Berin knew that they all understood how much Ceres had meant to them.

He heard Anka sigh.

“All we can do is keep fighting,” she added, “and keep forging weapons. We need you, Berin.”

He tried to focus.

“Are they doing everything I instructed?” he asked. “Are they heating the metal enough before quenching? It won’t harden otherwise.”

Anka smiled.

“Check for yourself after the meeting.”

Berin nodded. At least in some small way he could be useful.

***

Sartes walked by his father’s side, following Anka as they continued past the forge and deeper through the tunnels. There were more people in them than he could have believed. Men and women were gathering supplies, practicing with weapons, pacing the halls. Sartes recognized several of them as former conscripts, freed from the army’s clutches.

They finally came upon a cavernous space, set with stone plinths that might once have held statues. By the light of flickering candles, Sartes could see the leaders of the rebellion, awaiting them. Hannah, who had argued against the attack, now looked as happy as if she’d proposed it. Oreth, one of Anka’s main deputies now, leaned his slender frame against the wall, smiling to himself. Sartes spotted the larger bulk of the former wharf hand Edrin on the edge of the candlelight, while Yeralt’s jewels shone in it, the merchant’s son looking almost out of place among the rest as they laughed and joked among themselves.

They fell silent as the three of them approached, and Sartes could see the difference now. Before, they’d listened to Anka almost grudgingly. Now, after the ambush, there was respect there as she walked forward. She even looked more like a leader to Sartes, walking straighter, appearing more confident.

“Anka, Anka, Anka!” Oreth began, and soon the others took up the chant, as the rebels had after the battle.

Sartes joined in, hearing the rebel leader’s name echo around the space. He only stopped when Anka gestured for silence.

“We did well,” Anka said, with a smile of her own. It was one of the first Sartes had seen since the battle. She’d been too busy trying to arrange to get their casualties away from the burial ground safely. She had a talent for seeing to the details of things that had blossomed in the rebellion.

“Well?” Edrin asked. “We smashed them.”

Sartes heard the thud of the man’s fist against his palm as he emphasized the point.

“We destroyed them,” Yeralt agreed, “thanks to your leadership.”

Anka shook her head. “We beat them together. We beat them because we all did our parts. And because Sartes brought us the plans.”

Sartes found himself pushed forward by his father. He hadn’t been expecting this.

“Anka is right,” Oreth said. “We owe Sartes our thanks. He brought us the plans, and he was the one to persuade the conscripts not to fight. The rebellion has more members, thanks to him.”

“Half-trained conscripts though,” Hannah said. “Not real soldiers.”

Sartes looked around at her. She’d been quick to argue against him taking part at all. He didn’t like her, but it wasn’t about that in the rebellion. They were all a part of something bigger than themselves.

“We beat them,” Anka said. “We won a battle, but that isn’t the same thing as smashing the Empire. We still have a lot ahead of us.”

“And they still have a lot of soldiers,” Yeralt said. “A long war against them could prove costly for all of us.”

“You’re counting the cost now?” Oreth countered. “This isn’t some business investment, where you want to see the balance sheets before you get involved.”

Sartes could hear the annoyance there. When he’d first come to the rebels, he’d expected them to be some big, unified thing, thinking of nothing but the need to defeat the Empire. He’d found out that in a lot of ways they were just people, all with their own hopes and dreams, wishes and wants. It only made it more impressive that Anka had found ways to hold them together after Rexus died.

“It’s the biggest investment there is,” Yeralt said. “We put in all we have. We risk our lives in the hope that things will get better. I’m in as much danger as the rest of you if we fail.”

“We won’t fail,” Edrin said. “We beat them once. We’ll beat them again. We know where they’re going to attack and when. We can be waiting for them every time.”

“We can do more than that,” Hannah said. “We’ve shown people that we can beat them, so why not go out and take things back from them?”

“What did you have in mind?” Anka asked. Sartes could see that she was considering it.

“We take villages back one by one,” Hannah said. “We get rid of the Empire’s soldiers in them before Lucious can get close. We show the people there what’s possible, and he’ll get a nasty surprise when they rise up against him.”

“And when Lucious and his men kill them for rising up?” Oreth demanded. “What then?”

“Then it just shows how evil he is,” Hannah insisted.

“Or people see that we can’t protect them.”