Jackal Among Snakes

“I’m sure that she’ll turn up sooner or later, my prince. That child, Mina, she’s…” Count Elgar of Veden shook his head.

Induen tapped his fingers against the dining table, staring Elgar down with his cold blue eyes. The Count had golden hair and eyes just as Mina did yet shared little with her beyond that. Induen did not like him. “Your daughter is missing, yet you don’t seem to care.”

Elgar placed his elbows on the table and clenched his hands together. “She’s been doing that since she was very young, my prince. She’ll disappear for days, sometimes weeks on end. Typically I need only send a message to Duke Enrico—she always heads there, the foolish girl. I apologize for her discourtesy.”

Induen narrowed his eyes. Though anger was there, something else marred his features more—confusion, perhaps, or curiosity. “You’ve not sent her away?”

Elgar raised a brow. “Why would I do that, my prince?”

“Stupidity, maybe,” Induen mused, leaning back in the chair and scratching his temple. Count Elgar clenched his jaw tightly at the insinuation yet did not rise to combat it. “Do you hate your daughter, I wonder?”

Elgar furrowed his brows. “Who would hate their child?”

“Well, my father, for one. He never liked me much. I killed his wife, you know. The whole childbirth incident,” Induen pointed out. Both looked serious, but then Induen started to laugh. “Joking, joking. Of course. Of course,” Induen smiled widely.

“Mina is missing, Prince Induen. I don’t know what else to tell you,” Elgar stated once again, leaving no room for argument.

Induen leaned back in and slammed his hand against the table. “Yet you send not a single knight to look for her?”

Elgar stared back. “I have explained my reasonings. That girl had wasted enough resources in frivolous searches throughout her whole life. The waxpox still abounds, and I’ll not have my guards contract it in a fruitless quest to collect her.”

Induen’s gaze was cold and dead. Elgar swallowed as they stared at each other, alone in the dining hall. Just then, the great double doors burst open. Induen turned his head, surprised. The confidence in his posture veritably withered away as his eyes widened.

“Brother!” Orion shouted out cheerily, moving towards Induen with long strides. The prince wore thin casual clothes, rich and black, yet even still he made the formidable Induen look small.

Induen rose to his feet and stepped back, placing the chair between himself and his brother. “Orion. Why are you… here?”

Orion pushed the chair aside with his foot and embraced Induen. The elder prince’s face visibly contorted in displeasure and anxiety, and his hands hovered a fair distance away as though he feared to touch his brother.

Prince Orion pushed away, holding Induen by the shoulders. “I’ve heard of what you’ve been doing here. Working with the sick, stopping the plague from spreading… I cannot describe the joy that welled within once I heard of it. It brought tears to my eyes. And seeing outside… you have done so well.”

to say when he talked with Orion. He always did his best to avoid his younger brother. He never felt older when they spoke. He always felt deeply uncomfortable, almost belittled, after any

in?” Count Elgar inquired. “I did not

and tone cold. “I climbed the walls. I trust this is no problem, Count Elgar. The royal family is not barred from anywhere in the lands

every step, making the Count hurry. He shut the doors behind him. As though his sternness was a façade, he

my family, yet now it was especially so—there is so much to speak of, so much to do. It has been too

are you here?” Induen reiterated

me to come, did you not? Ah, but—even if you did not, I wished to talk to you. Let us begin…” Orion pulled a chair back and sat, facing away from the table. “…with the more dire news. Our brother, Magnus, was

mental note of everything Orion said and stepped forth cautiously. “So close to you, I hear,” he said, implying

broke into tears. He placed his elbow on his knee as his hand supported his face, tears of molten silver pouring between the cracks of his fingers. “I was foolish. My brother died not minutes away from me, and I was entirely ignorant. The thought will haunt me for

once they fell. His brother’s strange tendencies and constant

things persisted in the wetlands. I have finally ventured deep within them, and I have discovered the truth of the fall of the Archduchy.” Orion rose up. “Foul beings with

stared at Orion’s hands as

of lives burnt, scarred or simply withered away entirely by their revolting rage. But I—no, that is not fair to say. Argrave recognized this! Argrave put a stop to

swirled. “What?” he asked, low

the spread has ceased,” Orion ventured. “Argrave found out the root cause. He heralded a traitor, used her to put an end to this virulent vendetta! And now, the disease will never spread

are you talking about?” Induen demanded, voice

his hands out. “A non-believer and would-be slaughterer called the Plague Jester harnessed the power of the wetland gods to conjure and spread this plague all across the land.

the news. Before he realized it, he was stepping away from Orion, heading to where he and Mina had planned out their tackling of the

him as odd the first day he’d seen it. He thought it mere luck… yet this strange happening persisted. He remembered wondering if, perhaps, Mina had been right all along. He wondered if he

the past few weeks. Innumerable tents, messages, edicts, all to curb the plague… and all of it

friend. And now she’s gone.

to hurt his hands. He turned back to the desk, over which he and Mina had drafted out plans for days on end. He stepped to the

But then he paused. He

Those were not the actions of someone who knew it was to end. Induen lifted

inform me urgently, she could. She wanted me to

entered the room once more. Induen took

Why did you

said, his voice surprisingly

back. “You