Chapter 6

Chapter

Six

SILAS

I walk out into the trees where I find a man sprawled out on the ground. "I really hope you're dead, Madden," I call.

He perks up and looks over at me. "Nah, nah. I was just watching you," he says as he pets a rabbit I'd seen outside my house. This annoying fucker has the ability to see through the eyes of animals and he's decided to use his specialty to irritate me.

"Ah, a meal for my beast," I say as I pick the rabbit up by the scruff.

"No! No! No! I tease. I totally wasn't watching you. I one hundred percent didn't see you bathe or the way your heart throbbed when the prince you're destined to kill waltzed onto the scene."

"You're right. Why should I feed the innocent rabbit to Zepher when I have you?" I say as I start dragging him by his leg. When I give him a tug, his long blond hair that is braided gets snagged on a branch.

Madden bats at it as he looks at me. "HA! You, my dear friend, are hilarious . I just love you so. I was a little disappointed how quickly you got into the bath, but may I say your ass looked mighty fine. Very nice. Very, very nice—Silas, a joke! I tease!"

"Zepher, you may feast," I say as the wyvern hits the ground. The rabbit races off in terror and I watch as the wyvern who is about the size of a horse grabs for the irritation on the ground. Unlike dragons, wyverns don't use forearms to walk but their wings. She has some ability to grip with the claws on her wings, which allows her to gather up her feast… much as she's doing to Madden at the moment.

I don't actually dislike Madden, but we've been around each other long enough to know that we have the most fun when we pester each other.

"Zepher, ol' buddy, ol' pal, you wouldn't eat me, would you? Ha ha. No, right? You love me," Madden says as Zepher bites his arm. Not hard enough to puncture the skin, she likes him too much for that, but to pull him closer to her. It's like she's found herself a chew toy. Madden grabs Zepher in a headlock as she play growls and flails around a bit.

"What do you want, Madden?"

"You know it's foretold you would kill the prince, so why put it off? If I didn't know any better, it almost seems like you're becoming buddies with him. Just go ‘Oh sweet prince, peruse your eyes upon my body in this dark room. Don't mind the rug strategically placed there to roll your body up into.'"

"I'm not killing the prince."

"A seer has seen it. It is locked down as tight as your pants whenever I look your way," he says.

"No thanks. I'm good," I retort as Zepher, bored of the slobber she's left all over Madden, comes up to me for scratches. "Who's a good girl?"

She chitters at me, quite pleased with the scratches.

"So you're going to the prince's ball, eh? I suppose you can off him there. Just be like ‘My prince, I know you're enjoying the ball, but boy do I have two balls for you' and then simply murder him. And then while you're on such a good roll, murder the king too. You will forever be deemed the best of the best if you do."

"And if I don't? Why don't you do it?"

He examines his nails for a moment, clearly pretending to do anything but answer my question. "It seems rather dangerous, you know? I don't want to get hurt."

"Oh, but you want me to die?" I ask.

"Well… I mean… I would probably attend your funeral but really, you're such a waste of a pretty body. If you die, I could give your body to—A joke! A joke! I won't give your corpse over to anyone, especially not a necromancer."

"Lovely," I say sarcastically before walking up to him. He scrambles to his feet to face me. I jab him in the chest much as I'd done to Callisto. "I am no longer part of this. The war is over. The rest of you need to face that."

Madden cups my face. "Did we have to get this close for you to threaten me? Or is it perhaps… my lips you're after?"

He purses them but when Zepher comes over and starts chewing on his head, he quickly backs off. "Fine. I will go tell everyone that you are now not only a handsome waste of space but an unhelpful waste of space. And I will murder the prince myself. With… my very own… hands…"

I stoop down and pick up a rock before going, "Madden!" and throwing it at him. He doesn't even react before it's smacking him in the face, reminding him that he's not meant for quiet assassinations. "I'm sure the prince is very concerned with your prowess."

"Thank you," he says as he hurries off while making some weird noises. "I will call myself a mighty steed to whisk me to the palace gates to commit this murder. Any moment now, a beast with unimaginable strength will descend upon me and we will murder together." We're both waiting for the "mighty beast" when a tiny deer gallops up to him.

Madden hesitates while he stares at the deer that is all too pleased to have been called. It's obviously not what he had been hoping for, but he's too damn stubborn to call for something else and sizes it up.

"Do not take that deer. You will crush its body."

"I… I am too embarrassed to call for something else," he says as he kind of hugs the deer as it starts walking off. He just walks beside it before finally disappearing into the woods. Zepher is fixated on the deer, so I have to pull her head toward me.

"Do not go murder that deer. It already suffers from having to be around that intolerable man."

Zepher, pleased my attention is back on her, chitters and makes all her weird noises as she pounces on me.

"And you need to keep from showing your face in the town," I say as I scratch behind her ears. Even so, my attention is fixated on that odd feeling I'd gotten when I'd touched Callisto. What the hell was that? It wasn't his magic… no… it was like something clinging on to him… something dark.