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Then he would take the deal. Then he would be the traitor.
Aurelius didn’t go to the Beautiful Bunch anymore. He didn’t go to the fountain in Green Heart Park. He didn’t go to Palaestra Xiphos.
He could still win if he wanted. He knew that.
But he was choosing not to.
It was pouring when he staggered out into the mud-squelching street for a piss—the heavy downpours you rarely got back home.
Back in Mestibes, I should say.
It won’t be home for much longer...
Just as he was wrestling his cock back into his fabric, something grabbed him from the darkness, spinning him around and slamming him against the rancid wall.
“Don’t even think about trying to get away,” said a nasty little voice by his ribs. A memory rose of a small, sharp-featured woman, one of the two Zosime always hung around with.
“Yeah,” came the voice of the bigger one. “The princess is looking to ’ave a little talk.”
On cue, Zosime emerged from the squall in full uniform. Rain ran down the length of her helmet—metal tears over dry eyes.
“I will make this brief, Herald. You are aware that my brother and your cousin’s courtship is soon to be finalized?”
“Yes,” he said, squinting out the driving rain. “But I’m leaving them alone. Congratulations. I’m out of the game.”
She glared at him—the kohl-black of her eyes as dark as the puddles underfoot. “Well, I want you back in the game.”
“What?” he said. He was too drunk for this. His head spun from the wine, from the rain, from the hit against the wall.
“You heard me, Aurie.”
“But, why? What would you gain from—”
The two goons slammed him back against the wall.
Zosime smirked. “You know what you need to know. Are you in? Or are you out?”
Ahead of him, the way back to Calix emerged—a sunlit path amidst the gloom. Breaking them up? It would be easy. He could think of a dozen ways right off the top of his head.
And yet...
“You hesitate?” said the princess. “I thought it was your mission here? To claim my brother for yourself?”
The rain turned cold on his skin. “I care enough to let him go.”
Zosime stared. Droplets plinked against her armor as she searched his face for trickery. There was indecision there. She was, in her own way, as torn about this moment as he was.
After a long time, she placed something into his unresisting hand.
It was a dark stater coin from the Ardoralia.
There was no mistaking it. The coin had the same chip that had been knocked out of the wood when it had pinged off some armor on the path to his prince. It was the very same coin that Aurelius had tossed across the crowd to get Calix’s attention in that tragic moment of his wrestling defeat, all those months ago.
It was Aurelius’s coin.
Just as it was Calix’s coin.
“He has kept it by his bed, Herald. Ever since that day.”
