Fallen Prince
Page 29
“They’ll be leaving within the hour,” he said. His eyes narrowed slightly while he considered the land ahead. “From that look on your face, I imagine you saw him—the Warrior everyone is talking about.”
My brow flinched; I waited to respond.
“Tobias?” Lox tested, but then he shook his head. “He confused many of the soldiers, particularly those who’d trained under the late captain. Do you remember Lady Amalia, Cyric?”
How could I forget? She’d shouted at King Molec the first time I’d been to the palace. She’d made it very clear she was Tobias’s mother. There was a rumor she’d left the city, and I hadn’t seen her since then. I nodded.
“Well, she was originally from Yanartas—a Cirali Warrior herself. Which is no doubt why Tobias ended up betraying Akadia. At the time of Tobias’s birth it was rumored that she’d had another son, a twin, and that she had sent him back to her homeland. There was no legitimate father you see…. It seems that the rumors were true.”
I thought of the man riding a chimera I’d seen on the battlefield. I’d worried at the time that I was going crazy, until the other soldiers started mentioning him. Then I’d figured something similar to what Lox was explaining.
“Today was a victory,” Lox went on. “But the Cirali Warriors won’t stop coming. And there’s no telling how the eastern countries will respond.”
I locked my jaw, then looked out at the city as he was. Its rugged streets were being cleared of Katellians. Houses were being pillaged. Wagons of loot were being loaded up. And past all this, a wall of stone was being built up to surround the city. Beyond it laid the lands of the three eastern countries, Ghand, Democedes, and Selket.
I knew Lox was right.
The war was just beginning.
End