31 Beneath the Surface (2/2)

Despite his regret, he believed he could overcome her hate and prejudice towards him. It would not be easy; he fully expected it to take a long time, years even. But patience was one of his best virtues. He was prepared to work hard and wait.

If, however, it was as he suspected and she actually feared him for whatever reason… would he be capable of forcing his company on her despite it?

'Teasing her was one thing,' Leal mused, his mood as shadowed as the windowless corridor he was tracing to reach the throne room. 'Winning her will be another. But to knowingly make her suffer to fulfill my desires…' Leal frowned. 'Some man that would make me.'

He had little clue as to what kind of character Lothar had. He was a genius swordsman – that's all Leal and others like him needed to know. He would have scoffed some days ago: why would anyone care what kind of man the insufferably talented bastard was? Devil or saint, he'd still be equally hated and venerated.

Now, Leal badly wanted to know who Lothar was. While Hilde did speak of him earlier, all Leal could guess from it was that he was a doting master to his precocious student. And why wouldn't he be?

He shook his head clear of unproductive thoughts. What he first needed to do was to confirm whether or not Hilde feared him, and if so, to try and find out why.

He decided to worry about what to do next after solving certain other puzzles, ones he humorlessly dubbed ”A King's Well-Laid and Potentially-Inflexible Plans” and ”A Queen's Costly and Potentially-Fickle Approval.”

And here he'd been thinking that there was nothing to his father's mission – all he had to do was go through with it and emerge at the end in one piece. Now there's a whole mountain range in Leal's way that seemingly sprung out of nowhere.

'Old man, what were you really thinking?'

”Psst!”

Leal stopped walking, all his senses on full alert. His sword hand automatically reached for his weapon before he could recall it'd been taken for ”safekeeping” earlier. He fought down his frustration at that. He could not afford for his attention to be any more divided. It had already cost him this situation of being sneaked up on – that hadn't happened to him in years.

From a secret pocket on the inside of his coat, he drew out a small, slim blade before turning precisely to where the call had come from, around the corner of an intersection he just passed, which was still quite near the Queen's private study.

It was good that the foot traffic along these parts was practically nonexistent at the moment. There's a chance he hadn't at all been careless at continuously scanning his surroundings; there's a chance the other person was simply more skilled at basic spycraft than he was.

Keeping his back to the wall, he approached the hardwood door to what might be a sitting room, based on what he could make out past the slightly ajar doorway. When he was close enough to push the door completely open were he so inclined, he saw a familiar face peek in from the other side, reminiscent of the way it had done earlier in the Queen's private study.

Leal nearly choked on the curse he just managed not to utter as he stared coldly at Princess Hilde's attendant.

'So…' Leal thought. 'She'd choose not to spread my secret – not yet, at least.'

With mounting distaste, Leal suspected he knew the reason she'd opt to stay silent. The pink and frilly interior of the room the female attendant had chosen contributed to the conclusion he reached.

He made to step back and walk away, strangely disappointed that even in Arnica, he'd meet with the same behaviors he had to contend with back in the Lysean court, nearly on a daily basis. Having been subjected to such provocations even before he'd reached his teens, he quickly became disillusioned of the opposite sex and their treacherous charms.

Leal had been staunchly of the belief that not one of them could ever move him, not even the bloom that was hailed to be the most beautiful in this land, whom he was supposed to pay court to.

Little did he suspect that it would be the tantalizing blend of contempt, disregard, and closely aligned interests that would clobber him out cold. It had to be those three, he was certain, as well as a sprinkling of other elements he couldn't yet define. Anything less would have flown right over his head.

Much like that dart did, which he heard whooshing from behind him just in time to get his earlobe out of its path. The tip embedded on the corridor wall before him, right at his eye level.

He did not even attempt to counterattack. He'd already lost.

”Would the careless Prince down yonder step in here please?” said King Madelon's Arnican spy, who was supposed to be in Princess Hilde's employ. Apparently not.

Huffing and already despairing over the fact that he will never hear the end of it back home, Leal went.