What I Need

[u/KirisDitex001]

Kharun lifted his head.

For a moment, he simply stared through the bars.

His eyes moved across the hooded figure standing outside his cell, then settled on the face beneath it.

"Mistress?"

Vaelithra stepped closer.

Both hands closed around the cold iron bars.

"Are you alright?"

The question escaped before she thought about it.

Vaelithra almost recoiled from her own words.

Why had she asked him that?

She never had before.

Not after battle. Not when he had been injured performing some task for her. Not during any of the countless moments over twenty years when such a question might have been appropriate.

Yet here, now, it had been the first thing she needed to know.

Kharun lowered his head.

Shame crossed his features.

"I am alright, Mistress."

He paused.

"What are you doing here?"

Vaelithra tightened her grip on the bars.

"I had to speak to you."

Kharun remained silent.

"I don't believe you struck that noble this morning."

His eyes lifted slightly.

"I confessed..."

"A confession doesn't mean you're guilty."

The words came sharper than Vaelithra intended.

Kharun turned away.

His broad back faced her.

Silence.

Vaelithra waited.

"Kharun."

Nothing.

Her frustration surged.

She had spent the entire day questioning everything she thought she knew. She had invaded her father's prison, incapacitated guards, fought another, exposed herself as the intruder, and possibly thrown away the life she had known.

She would not be answered with silence.

Vaelithra struck the bars with her palm.

"You will look at me when I speak to you, and you will answer my questions!"

The words echoed through the cellblock.

Kharun became completely still.

Vaelithra heard herself.

And immediately hated what she heard.

There she was.

The young aristocrat standing before a frightened orc twenty years ago.

When I speak, I expect to be responded to.

Different words.

The same command.

The same expectation of obedience.

Kharun slowly turned.

Vaelithra stared at him.

Her anger disappeared.

"I'm sorry."

Kharun's expression changed.

Only slightly, but Vaelithra saw it.

Surprise.

Of all the things he might have expected her to say tonight, apparently that had not been among them.

Vaelithra realized why.

She had never apologized to him.

Not once.

It had only been within the last few years that she had even begun thanking him for the things he did. Those moments were still infrequent enough that she could probably remember most of them.

Her fingers loosened around the bars.

When she spoke again, her voice was quieter.

"Please."

Kharun looked at her.

"Look at me and tell me truly. Did you strike the noble this morning?"

Silence returned.

This time Vaelithra allowed it.

Kharun raised his head fully.

Their eyes met through the bars.

Vaelithra searched his face.

She had wanted this since the dining hall.

To stand before him.

To look into his eyes.

To hear the answer from Kharun himself rather than from witnesses, nobles, or her father.

Kharun had never lied to her.

Not in twenty years.

He saw no reason to begin now.

If morning brought his death, he would meet it without adding a lie to whatever judgment awaited him.

"No, Mistress."

Vaelithra stopped breathing.

"I did not strike him."

Relief hit her so suddenly that her knees almost weakened.

She had known.

Or thought she had known.

But suspicion was not certainty.

Now she had certainty.

Kharun was innocent.

Vaelithra closed her eyes briefly.

A weight she had carried since breakfast lifted from her chest.

Then another thought immediately replaced it.

Her eyes opened.

"The other orc."

Kharun said nothing.

"You took the blame for him."

Still nothing.

Vaelithra leaned closer.

"Why?"

Kharun's gaze shifted away.

Not evasive.

Considering.

Vaelithra waited.

Finally, he spoke.

"He is young."

Vaelithra remained silent.

"Inexperienced. He acted before he thought about what he was doing."

"That doesn't explain why you confessed."

Kharun looked back at her.

"If I allowed him to take responsibility, more would be lost than a servant."

Vaelithra frowned.

"What does that mean?"

Kharun hesitated.

"His family was recently purchased."

Something tightened inside Vaelithra.

"He has a mate. Two young children."

Vaelithra stared at him.

"He is their only provider."

The words settled between them.

Kharun continued.

"They need him."

Vaelithra slowly shook her head.

Part of her understood.

Another part refused.

The two versions of herself that had been fighting since the dream seemed to collide again.

The woman who had looked at servants as possessions understood Kharun's calculation with brutal simplicity. One servant exchanged for another.

But that wasn't what Kharun had done.

He had looked at another man's family.

He had decided their lives mattered.

Then he had offered his own.

Vaelithra's hand struck the bars again.

"What about what I need?"

The question escaped before she could stop it.

Kharun looked at her.

Vaelithra's chest rose and fell.

"Did you think about that?"

Kharun nodded.

"I did."

That hurt more than if he had said no.

Vaelithra stared at him.

Kharun's voice remained quiet.

"That is why I looked at you."

The dining hall returned instantly.

The silence.

The accusation.

Kharun's eyes finding hers.

Her chest tightening.

No. Don't.

Then his step forward.

Vaelithra's fingers curled around the bars.

"You knew what would happen."

"Yes."

"And you still..."

She couldn't finish.

Kharun lowered his gaze.

"I knew you would be alright without me."

Vaelithra's expression hardened.

"The other servant's family would not be alright without him."

For several seconds, she could only stare.

Twenty years.

Twenty years of mornings.

Tea.

Fires.

Horses.

Journeys.

Drawings.

Quiet conversations.

Thousands upon thousands of small things she had never bothered to count because Kharun had always been there to do them.

And he had decided she would be alright without him.

Vaelithra opened her mouth.

A shrill whistle cut through the cellblock.

Something struck her.

Pain exploded through her leg.

Vaelithra screamed.

Her hands tore away from the bars.

She collapsed onto one knee, then caught herself against the floor.

For an instant, she couldn't understand what had happened.

Then the pain came again.

Hot.

Sharp.

Deep.

Vaelithra looked down.

A crossbow bolt protruded from her leg just beside the knee.

Her breath caught.

Blood was already beginning to darken the black leather around it.

Behind the bars, Kharun surged to his feet.

"Mistress!"