Chapter 5:
The Royal Prince’s Concerns
CEDRIC
“I’M COMING IN, Bro.”
I’d called out as I knocked, but I didn’t expect a response. When I entered, I found the room dark and the curtains shut. The guards and servants silently slipped out, as they always did during my visits. I didn’t try to talk to them or even look them in the eye as they bowed and left; my gaze was fixed on my brother, lying in his bed. It wasn’t like I’d never thanked the staff for their round-the-clock care and protection, but the fact that Lance’s life was in their hands whenever I left terrified me.
I don’t know who might betray us again.
My golden hair, the same color as Lance’s, fell over my shoulders. My eyes, fiery just like his, stared down at him.
I crept toward the bed, the jingle of my accessories breaking the silence with each step. Lance barely responded. He wasn’t having violent fits like he used to, but that didn’t mean his condition was improving. Rather, it simply meant he’d grown so weak, he couldn’t move anymore.
“Ah… Ngh… Ack…”
Indecipherable sounds escaped his hoarse throat. His wide, dry eyes stared at nothing, occasionally twitching in an unsettling way. I could close his eyelids for him, but he’d just open them the next time he groaned. His body had wasted away beneath the blankets. A lone trickle of sunlight squeezed past the curtains to illuminate him.
“The gold mining is going well, Bro. We’ll probably be able to make another shipment to Freesia this month.”
Fargus, our prime minister, and Dario, our seneschal, had put this system in place after Lance’s condition deteriorated and Freesia demanded our gold. We were expected to provide huge amounts on a monthly basis, but a one-way trip to Freesia took ten days in the royal carriage. The strain of the arrangement accelerated our country’s decline. We weren’t worried about running out of gold yet, but it was our people who had to mine it, process it, and transport it to Freesia, so we weren’t getting out of this unscathed. Even I thought Fargus and Dario had sold us out to Freesia when I first heard about it.
I’d quickly found ten tutors to educate me on industry and trade. From them, I learned that this wasn’t a mistake, at least for the time being. I started taking control of the system myself once I understood it better. Someone else could come along and demand our gold in the future, but if we wanted to guarantee Cercis’s safety, we couldn’t let the quality or quantity go down. Thus, I felt most comfortable when I alone controlled the system. To that end, I’d filled my head with all the knowledge I needed for the job.
“Bro, they’re saying that Big Bro…that the place once called Chinensis…shipped out another group of slaves.”
Chinensis, like the rest of Rajah’s territories, began selling people into slavery once they were conquered. According to what I’d heard, they’d only sent criminals so far…but they would run out of convicts soon. Chinensis had once been a kingdom full of kindhearted, deeply religious people. They always welcomed me back warmly when Lance and I visited, even gifting us things like home-cooked meals. All of them had been proud that Lance, Yohan’s good friend, was going to be the next king of Cercis.
Now, Chinensians hated our country with all of their hearts. They believed that we’d betrayed them, set them up, and sold them out to the Rajah Empire—that we’d formed a secret pact with Freesia and tricked their beloved King Yohan so we could protect our country.
It wouldn’t have been so bad if I were their only target, but they’d cursed Lance and our citizens too, labeling all of them criminals. A large wall went up between our kingdoms to separate us. That order could only have come from the country once called Chinensis…from Yohan himself. They couldn’t forgive us…couldn’t forgive me.
Our citizens responded, declaring that Lance and I never would’ve done such things. They believed we’d been tricked and threatened into cooperating with Freesia. Then, after Chinensis had been robbed of everything they held dear, our people accused them of being traitors who wanted to harm us.
It wasn’t just government officials who despised each other, as had once been the case; hatred seethed between the entire populace of each nation. But I know it’s not everyone! There are people who care about each other, but all they can do is pray for the other’s safety now that there’s a wall between them!
I clenched my jaw, squeezed my fists, and glared at the floor. Lance wouldn’t respond no matter what I said to him. All he could do was inhale through his parched throat and grunt. There was no point asking him anything. Everything was my fault. If I weren’t so stupid…
“Unwanted Child.”
Yohan’s words replayed in my mind, and I shuddered. Tears spilled from my eyes. I wiped them away and desperately tried to think about something, anything else, but it was too late. I scratched at my throat as emotion welled up to fill it.
If Yohan hated me, then someday the Cercian people, who only liked me for my looks, would probably turn on me too. Maybe they already had.
“I’m going to leave the castle for a while, Bro. I’m getting engaged to a Freesian princess. Sorry that I’m gonna be the first one engaged, but don’t let it bother you. After all…”
I tried to sound hopeful to lighten the mood, but my words failed me. The smile slid from my lips.
“After all…”
The words that should have followed were far too cruel. Even one year earlier, when I was still such a fool, I could hardly face the notion. It was too great a horror for a member of royalty, let alone an ordinary person.
After Lance got sick, I spent my time absorbing knowledge from every book in the country I could get my hands on. The more I learned, the more I discovered just how stupid and ignorant I’d been all my life. The guilt nearly crushed me.
I bit my lip and let my head hang, wiping at my tears and dragging my hands over my aching throat. I clenched my fists and shook my head with a hard gulp. Why am I hesitating after all this time?
My hands were already stained with the blood of innocent Cercians and Chinensians. What would taking one more life matter? It was my only means of preventing even more bloodshed.
“You should be happy, Bro. It won’t be long now.”
I could hardly believe how small my voice sounded. My tears weren’t going to stop anytime soon, so I raised my head and looked at my brother, a great man reduced to little more than skin and bones.