Chapter 6

It appeared to be grudging permission.

Still flattened against the cold floor like a pathetic slug, Kosha crept forward, inch by agonizing inch. Lucien watched his approach with the expression of a man observing some filthy, disease-ridden creature crawling toward him. Even so, the prince rolled back his silk sleeve and extended his broad palm.

Detecting the chaotic magic still circulating through the royal body required at least a minimal degree of direct physical contact. A sufficiently skilled, high-ranking mage might have conducted the intricate examination without touching the prince at all, but for once in his miserable life, Kosha felt profoundly grateful for his magical deficiencies.

Otherwise, when would someone as lowly as me ever have the chance to touch Lucien’s hand?

His bruised fingers, thin as brittle twigs and wrapped beneath layer after layer of heavy bandages, moved uncertainly across the broad, immaculate expanse of the prince’s palm before settling over several crucial pulse points.

Lucien’s skin was calloused and hardened like that of a veteran knight, yet it was far warmer than Kosha had expected. Drawing a shallow breath, he spread a faint, probing field of magic across the prince’s flesh.

He had never performed such a delicate magical examination before, and sheer nervousness tightened every muscle in his frail body. To his immense surprise, however, the magic responded far more smoothly than expected. Somehow, channeling his meager power had become noticeably easier since he had been dragged into this sprawling castle.

Is desperation playing tricks on me? Is the ancient magical foundation beneath Osterbrache unusually powerful? Or is something else happening?

An invisible pulse seeped into the intricate lines of Lucien’s palm.

A faint green glow appeared beneath the prince’s skin, and slender branches of emerald light wound slowly up his muscular forearm.

At the sudden flare of magic, several tense knights immediately placed their hands on the hilts of their swords. The oppressive atmosphere tightened into a suffocating knot. They were clearly prepared for Kosha to attempt some lethal magical trick, although the boy possessed neither the ability nor the courage to try.

They abducted me, beat me, and they still trust me this little?

Kosha wisely confined the bitter complaint to the safety of his own mind.

The green light spiraled rapidly around Lucien’s forearm, forming intricate patterns that Kosha did not recognize. Peering through the tangled, filthy clumps of his own hair, he watched with wide eyes that now shone with the same clear green radiance.

Lucien’s intense bluish-gray gaze narrowed as he studied the kneeling mage. Soon, the magical light faded beneath his skin, and the answering gleam in Kosha’s eyes vanished with it.

Kosha tilted his head and frowned. The medicine appeared to have produced the desired liquefying effect, but…

He had become strangely, desperately reluctant to surrender the warmth of Lucien’s hand. Perhaps he could leave his bandaged fingers there for only one moment longer.

“You,” Lucien whispered.

The low, chilling voice cut through the silence like a razor.

Slow-witted and starstruck as ever, Kosha had no time to react. A large, impossibly strong hand plunged through his disheveled hair and beneath the filthy folds of his collar, closing around his withered neck like a steel vise, as though Lucien fully intended to twist it apart.

Hk… ugh…

The long fingers tightened without mercy.

Kosha’s tongue protruded involuntarily as he choked. His breath vanished, darkness swelled at the edges of his vision, and the pressure became so immense that his eyes felt ready to burst wetly from their sockets.

Are a mage’s bones more brittle than an ordinary person’s? What if my neck snaps right here?

Kosha thrashed without understanding why, his weak limbs flailing uselessly as he fought for a single breath.

If I die now, then Lucien…

The entire world flashed blinding white.

In the next instant, the crushing grip disappeared.

Kosha crumpled onto the stone floor in a pathetic, wheezing heap, hovering so close to unconsciousness that the chamber seemed to pitch and roll beneath him like a ship at sea.

“Cough, cough… h-hah… hah… sob… ugh…”

Air tore into his burning lungs in a violent rush. Clutching his bruised throat, Kosha gasped frantically, unable to slow his racing heart. Thick saliva spilled from his lips, and the agonizing coughing refused to stop.

“Fragile, aren’t you?” Lucien’s voice drifted down from above, heavy with sneering contempt.

A leather boot approached and pressed firmly into Kosha’s stomach with a dull thump. It was more a deliberate shove than a full kick, but to a frail and starving mage, even that casual impact was devastating.

Kosha gagged and rolled helplessly onto his back.

Only then did he manage to blink away his tears and look around the room.

It was utter, inexplicable carnage.

The royal knights stood at maximum alert, their steel swords half-drawn, while shattered debris lay scattered across the floor in chaotic disarray. The opulent chamber looked as though a small but violent earthquake had torn through it.

Did I do this?

Kosha’s bleeding mouth fell open in shock.

No. Surely I could not have.

Could I? Really?

Then an even more absurd and domestic thought intruded upon his panic.

How in the world am I supposed to clean all this up?

The sheer ridiculousness of worrying about housekeeping in the middle of a life-or-death crisis left him momentarily bewildered. He glanced around nervously, trying to determine whether the heavily armed men truly intended to force him to clean everything, when a voice devoid of emotion broke the silence.

“So, you are a mage after all.”

Sneering down at the boy, Lucien nudged a silver letter opener lying near his boot. The metal skittered across the stone with a sharp, jarring shriek.

“And a deeply pathetic one at that.”

Amid the wreckage of the chamber, Lucien alone remained perfectly composed and immaculately clean, without so much as a scratch marring his perfection.

“One dose remains, correct?”

Struggling to gather the tiny shreds of his shattered composure, Kosha bowed his head repeatedly against the stone.

“Make it count,” the prince ordered.

The hard toe of Lucien’s boot pressed into the boy’s side once more, the lazy gesture calculated to humiliate rather than seriously injure. Kosha shivered and squeezed his eyes shut, terrified that Lucien might suddenly decide to crush his ribs beneath his heel or deliver another bone-breaking kick.

“Otherwise, killing you will hardly be a challenge.”

Kosha fell silent. He swallowed hard, tasting blood, as the atmosphere in the room rapidly became suffocating once more.

It was a well-known fact that when a mage died, the magic they had created broke apart, unless it had been bound within an exceptionally powerful artifact. Killing Kosha was therefore one brutal but possible way to resolve the situation immediately. The real uncertainty lay in what would happen to the host once the magic collapsed.

Magic was an unstable form of energy.

Like storm winds, sunlight, or crashing waves, it could not simply return to nothing without producing some kind of reaction. If that volatile magic was already circulating deep inside another person’s body, the consequences became impossible to predict.

With extraordinary luck, the physical result might be limited to severe indigestion or nausea.

Without it, the magic could quite literally detonate.

Which means that if Lucien kills me now, the unstable magic inside him might make him explode too. Good heavens. That is horrifying.

The image drained every last trace of color from Kosha’s bruised face. He shook his head frantically, suddenly more desperate than ever to survive. “I will do my best. I swear I will finish it perfectly.”

“See that you do.” Lucien’s response was chillingly casual and brutally indifferent.

Turning his attention back to the armed knights, the prince waved one hand dismissively. “Clean this up. It is filthy, and it smells of peasant.”

A terrified servant hurried inside carrying a basin of fresh water, while a pair of armored hands seized Kosha by the scruff of his neck. His torn clothing tightened once again around his bruised throat, and he wheezed pitifully as they hauled him bodily from the ruined chamber.

***