Page 18 of The Wild Prince's Favorite
Kassein barely glanced back no more than a couple of times; his men were loud enough that he could tell how far they were and how much longer they’d last before they had to take a break. Normally, he wouldn’t have bothered to wait for them any time they stopped to catch their breath after a more strenuous part than usual, but it wasn’t just about taking a break; it was slowing down to listen. Tievin’s words hadn’t fallen on deaf ears, despite his lack of response. If Kein was around, he had to watch out for his dragon more than for the barbarians, beasts, or any landslide. Because of the wind, even his enhanced hearing would have a hard time catching the sound of a wing flapping before it got too close, and it might be too late by then. The dragon’s loud growling was usually the best and easiest way to locate it, but no one could guarantee the predator wouldn’t attack without warning... The scales on Kassein’s chest were still painful, stretching the nearby skin and slowly building over the deep wounds. With every reach for the next rock, he could feel the pull on his skin and his muscles complaining from the strenuous exercise so soon after a harsh battle. His body’s protests weren’t something the Prince ever listened to.
This pain was nothing. Nothing compared to the betrayal he had endured back home. The glare of his older brother, fed up with him, and the sadness in his mother’s eyes. The disappointment on all of their faces. His anger, that no one could tame nor understand. The shame of one Wild Prince and his mad, blood-thirsty dragon wreaking havoc, the only one amongst his seven perfect siblings. No wonder they had sent him away; he couldn’t bear to stay with the rest of his family either. The echoes of his argument with his father still haunted him, even after all these years. He couldn’t understand. He could never.
“Commander! Barbarians incoming!”
He glanced up and immediately took out his sword. Those barbarians had definitely waited for them to be in a difficult spot to attack, but he wouldn’t let them have their way. Before they got to them first, Kassein jumped up like a beast ascending a hill, ahead of his men, closing the distance between him and the enemy in a matter of seconds. He saw in those barbarians’ eyes that they’d realized their mistake too late; when cornered, a beast was even more dangerous. He killed them in one blow, his long sword in one hand, the other holding on to the mountain, his body crouched against the rocks and above the emptiness. His men cheered from below as the bodies fell, but he didn’t care.
Kassein jumped back down to his men, taking the lead again while they were all excited about that first blood. There were only two barbarians just then, but no doubt there were more ahead. Those people rarely attacked blindly and without backup. It was always like this: at first, a few would try to attack by surprise, singling out some of his men to kill them if possible, before cornering them into an area where it would turn into a full-on battle. Thus, it was vital that Kassein and his men quickly found an area where they could all stand and get ready for the next attack. He kept going ahead, taking out assassins when possible and watching out for their surroundings.
“Sir! The dragon!”
Kassein glanced up, having heard it a split second prior too. An orange streak flashed in the sky, and as if it had waited to be seen, Kein furiously growled. Kassein glared at the beast before it disappeared again in the heights; this was horrible timing... Strangely though, he was sure his dragon had seen him, but it wouldn’t attack. Instead, he could hear more of Kein’s furious growls, not far from their location. As if the dragon was after something else, fighting another battle nearby. Kassein heard more barbarians too. They were shouting, moving quickly in thenearby area. This was unusual for their enemy; their common strategy was to be as quiet as possible and then attack all at once when ready, but right now, they were making a lot of ruckus when they were still too far. As if something else was going on. Was his dragon fighting the barbarians elsewhere? That would have explained it, but something felt amiss. The barbarians were shouting from different locations around the mountains, as if they weren’t localized in one area as usual. Or had they scattered because of Kein? He had to check.
“Commander!”
He didn’t wait to see how many of his men would follow and keep up. He rushed, climbing even faster, following the shouting and his dragon’s growls. Perhaps it was his dragon blood urging him to find his dragon and see what was going on with crazy Kein this time. Perhaps it was just the thrill to witness something unusual in those mountains, to surprise those tribes they understood little of, but he felt the urge to just go, quickly. He had to see what was causing those barbarians to get so riled up. He climbed higher and faster, getting rid of any enemy that appeared on his way. None of them could survive more than a handful of seconds before his sword swung through the air and dyed the snow crimson. He didn’t have time for a clean kill either; blood spilled over him as he didn’t even wait for the bodies to fall down. He could hear some of his men behind him, trying to catch up, panting and calling him. He didn’t wait for them; there was something happening ahead, and he had to hurry.
Kassein finally climbed to a cornice that was good for him to stop and take a peek at the situation. From this height, he was still only about a third of the way up the mountain he was on, but it was enough to glance down and see some of the nearby valleys. There was definitely something going on. He spotted a handful of barbarians running down the closest mountain. Theyhad visibly come from different areas, but they were all headed in the same direction. He tried to glance farther down, see what it was they were after, but soon enough, another of Kein’s growls pulled his eyes back toward the sky. His dragon was flying above the area like a vulture with its eyes set on its prey. Kein growled, a high-pitched, scream-like growl, and then suddenly dove. Kassein followed his dragon’s movement with curiosity for once since he wasn’t the prey. Kein attacked one of the barbarians; the man screamed right before he was torn apart by the dragon. Were those men simply running away from the dragon? Why go down, then? He had seen enough of those barbarians to know they had a hundred hideouts in the mountains. Moreover, they were all shouting something, which sounded pretty much like madness, given that they were the targets for a dragon that was far from deaf... Kassein glanced back down just to check on his men. They had also found a small plateau to stop and were visibly resting. Since they were all gathered on a flat area, they should be fine. One of them suddenly spotted him, pointed his finger, and called him, but Kassein didn’t have time to wait. He jumped down. Following a mountain slope that was taking him in between some deep valleys, he tried to find another cliff to stop on. His men were on the other side of the mountain now, but it wouldn’t take him long to find them again.
Just as he was hesitating between going farther down or trying to climb to the side of the mountain, he spotted them. In a crevice, four barbarians. All the others were clearly headed the same way, but he understood why Kein wasn’t able to attack them: they were in a tight crevice in between two mountains, a spot that would have been hard to access for the dragon. This shouldn’t have been so frustrating for the dragon to act like this, though; he had plenty more to hunt elsewhere. But as he kept watching, it became obvious that Kein was trying to get to that area. The dragon would growl, dive, but his claws could onlyreach some cliff above them and scatter the snow. Kassein stared at the tiny group again. That’s when he realized something was off: someone was lying on the snow, but trying to fight off one of the men. He squinted his eyes, confused, when he realized it was a woman. One of the men suddenly grabbed her long, black hair, pulling her head back, and he suddenly felt his anger rising. For once, he finally understood what his dragon wanted.
He jumped again, heading right for that area. He glanced up just once, as Kein furiously growled and once again, attacked one of the barbarians heading there as well. Kassein ignored his dragon and kept going down. He was going so fast it was almost a free fall; he only caught the rocks once in a while to slow his descent, or jumped to a small cliff just to jump less than a second later. He didn’t have to think much about it; seeing a man pulling on a woman’s hair like this, the way the four of them were surrounding a woman lying down, their stances, he just didn’t need to understand much more. He hurried, feeling the same restlessness and impatience as his dragon did.
He could hear Kein growling nearby, but for once, he didn’t have to watch out for his dragon’s attack; just temporarily, they were on the same side. In fact, he could even feel his dragon’s silver eyes on him, warning him to hurry up, or else...
Kassein kept jumping and diving, regardless of his body aching. He scratched over the scales he already had, scraped his finger’s skin, and disregarded his own safety completely while hurrying down. Even for one with the miraculous Dragon Blood, a fall from a mountain to crash on rocks below could be deadly, but he wasn’t one to care much for his own safety, not when he had something on his mind. Thus, he kept going at a crazy fast pace, much faster than the men who were running opposite to him to get there too. Why were so many men after one woman? Were some of them coming to her rescue? That was unlikely. From their attire, he could tell they were all from the same tribe.Moreover, they kept shouting, and the one answering them was one of the three surrounding that woman... His dragon growled and took down one more man right when Kassein was finally getting there. He jumped into the crevasse, taking all the men by surprise. They all recognized the enemy at once, though. The one who had been pulling the woman’s hair let go immediately and they all pulled out their weapons: curved blades and strange, two-bladed, pointy daggers. Kassein felt the anger rise as he was now close enough to see the situation under a clearer light: the woman was heavily injured, while none of those men were. She wasn’t unharmed, yet they were. All the blood on the snow belonged to one person, and as the man had let go of her hair, her head had fallen down against the white ground as if she was too tired to keep it up. Her eyes were open, but they were those of someone clearly exhausted, almost unconscious. It only fueled his anger more.
The three barbarians attacked, but just like their peers trying to escape a dragon, they had no chance. Kassein swung his sword one, two, three times, one neat movement for each kill. Everything went quiet around him for a few seconds. And then, Kein growled above his head. He glanced up, but as expected, his dragon could only fly in annoyed circles above them, its tail swishing the air. Its big size wasn’t an advantage in irregular spaces like this. Still, Kein soon resumed hunting the barbarians coming their way, so Kassein knew he probably wouldn’t have more enemies to face.
He cleaned his sword, and slowly walked up to the woman. She had fallen unconscious while he was busy killing those men, her body lying still in the snow. From one glance, Kassein could tell a bit of what had happened; her hands and feet were the most injured, bleeding all over. She had probably gotten hurt while trying to run from those men. He glanced up and realized she had likely not chosen to trap herself down here, but fallenoff that cliff right above their heads, into this small crevice. This explained why most of her injuries hadn’t been caused by those men’s weapons... Still, she was in bad shape.
Kein growled impatiently again and Kassein glared back. The dragon was probably done with its hunt, and didn’t enjoy waiting... Kassein sighed, put his sword in its sheath behind him, and walked over to the woman. He couldn’t help but stare at her face; she looked young, but her eyes, nose, and lips were reddened by the cold. Tears had drawn faint lines on her face, and even unconscious, she was slightly frowning. From the pain? Kassein got down on one knee, and very gently, put his arms under her legs and shoulders. She was lighter than he had anticipated, but she groaned as he lifted her; she had definitely broken a few bones from her fall. Her long black hair fell off her shoulder as he got back up. She had really pretty hair, black as a crow’s feather and smooth as silk, like he’d never seen before. In fact, it was the first time Kassein had ever seen a female barbarian. From her clothing and skin color, she was definitely one of those barbarians, so why had those men chased her? Would this be considered taking her away from her people if he took her back with him? Either way, he didn’t have a choice. None of her people had come to her aid, far from it, and if he left her here, she’d die of the cold and blood loss in a matter of hours. Her feet were so severely damaged, all he could see was blood dripping from her wrecked shoes.
Kassein didn’t hesitate much longer before climbing out of the crevice carrying the foreign woman. Because she was so light, it wasn’t too hard for him to get back, although he had to move much more slowly and carefully than before. It took him a little while to find his way back to his men, and all along the journey, he felt Kein hovering over his head. His dragon had gone surprisingly silent ever since he had picked up the woman, but Kassein could feel it watching like a hawk. This got him quitenervous, but this was also the first time he and his dragon had been in the same vicinity without trying to murder each other; nervousness made sense.
“Commander! Where did…?”
His men’s questions died as soon as they noticed the woman he was carrying. They exchanged glances, visibly all confused, but none dared to protest or question him about this unprecedented situation. The woman’s horrible state and the way Kassein was carrying her gently spoke volumes already.
“We’re going back,” Kassein simply said.
Although they had all waited for this raid to battle some barbarians, none of them voiced their disappointment. Instead, they quickly gathered into formation again and followed their leader. They also quickly noticed the large shadow that kept hovering over them, and while they were frightened the first few times, they quickly stopped reacting to it, leaving their questions suspended on the way back to the camp. Kassein didn’t glance at his dragon again; he was solely focused on that woman and bringing her back as quickly and safely as possible. Was she even going to make it? She looked too weak and in critical condition. This prompted him to hurry back even faster, and he reached the camp in half the time they had needed to go up. They weren’t expected back so soon either; the sentinels had to run to go get Tievin, and by the time he arrived, Kassein was already marching into the camp, gathering curious eyes around him.
“Wha–... What is this?” Tievin exclaimed as he saw the woman in Kassein’s arms.
“Call a doctor,” the Prince simply said.
It was an order this time, not a request. Still dumbfounded, Tievin gestured impatiently for a nearby soldier to go and fetch the closest medical unit. As he was still moving his hand, the large shadow suddenly flying above them caused all the men around them to panic.
“Dragon! Dragon incoming!”
But Kein landed with a loud growl and, to the men’s surprise, with no visible intention to harm its owner. The men hesitated, swords drawn, and directed all their eyes to the Commander in Chief for an explanation, or at least an indication as to what to do. Kassein was standing there, still carrying that woman, only slightly turned toward the dragon. It was a surreal scene. The dragon and the Prince stared at each other for a long time. The dragon growled in a menacing manner, but didn’t move. It was just showing its fangs as Kassein was squinting his eyes at it, the two of them completely still in this strange stand-off.
“Your Highness, the medical unit is on their way.”
“...To my tent,” Kassein simply hissed.
He turned his back to the dragon and began walking toward his tent. Tievin’s jaw dropped, but no sound came out. He glanced at the still-growling Kein, and after a few seconds of trying to make sense out of this situation and failing, he sighed.
