Chapter Forty-Seven: Too Vivid

Osmund found his feet again. He rose and wobbled, but before he could make it to Cemil, the Meskato prince was moving to meet him.

“Osmund,” Cemil managed. He wasn’t his usual self. His hands were shaking as he took Osmund by the shoulders, and rather than speak, his eyes swept repeatedly over him. He appeared strangely lost and confused.

A surreal sense of calm came over Osmund. He brought both hands up to cup Cemil’s face. “It’s alright, I’m alright,” he reassured him.

“He didn’t……?”

It was heartbreaking, hearing that anguish in his voice. “I can handle the likes of your brother,” Osmund declared boldly. “But, a duel?! Oh, darling, what did you just agree to?!”

Cemil’s gaze hadn’t stopped restlessly moving, but Osmund got the sense that he was no longer looking at him, or at anything at all. Though his body might be here, his mind was retreating.

This took priority. Urgently Osmund grabbed at his hand and pulled him into the tent. He steered them a wide berth away from the chair, the overturned basin, and the puddle of water around it.

Once the Meskato prince had been seated in his cot, Osmund started stroking his back. He wasn’t sure what else to do than try and keep him here, in the real world. “You don’t have to do it. You shouldn’t,” he insisted, voice firm. “You’ve got nothing to prove.”

“…There’s no other option.”

Osmund’s hand slowed. “Why do you need to play his game?” he grieved. “You’re better than he is.”

Cemil’s head shot up. “I don’t become emperor by just being better. I have to fucking kill those who’d stand in my way.”

“Why?”

What he’d meant by the question was: Why become emperor? Why do any of this when you’re so kind and so good? But Cemil, unable to read his thoughts this time, shook Osmund’s hand away, glaring through his own knees into the floor. “You’re naïve if you have to ask that.”

The moments ticked by in heavy silence. In the stillness, fresh images started creeping back in, too vivid. Bayram’s casual sneer. His self-assured manner. His callused fingers digging into Osmund’s jaw. Osmund’s hand jerked, suddenly itching to button the loose undershirt all the way closed.

“…Is that mine?”

He jumped and saw Cemil looking over at him, apparently noticing the shirt properly for the first time. Osmund avoided his eyes, ashamed to recall the carefree memory now. “I…put it on to wait for you,” he admitted.

He felt rather than saw the change that came over Cemil. The Meskato prince shifted and leaned forward on the cot, pressing his face into Osmund’s neck. Osmund shivered as the shirt’s loose collar was tugged free of his grasp, falling low around his shoulders until the fabric was bunched at his elbows, exposing his upper half completely. He was laid on his back with Cemil settling above him, and he closed his eyes and tried to breathe as he felt teeth gently biting at his neck.

“He really didn’t touch you?” he heard, a quiet murmur into his collarbone.

“No,” Osmund gasped. “Um, not really. But Cemil—”

Everything stopped. “‘Not really’?”

It had the feeling of an interrogation—but that was absurd. He squirmed uncomfortably. “O-only for a second, but—”

“Where?”

Osmund swallowed and fixed his stare up at the tent’s silken ceiling, unmoving and constant. “Just here,” he muttered, loosely gesturing at the left side of his bare chest.

Without delay, Cemil leaned in, and Osmund felt his teeth and tongue roving and claiming the area. This was—odd. Though the scenario was straight out of his daydreams, it wasn’t pleasant or enjoyable no matter how much he tried to relax. In fact, the longer he lay here without saying anything, the more urgently he wanted to jump out of his skin. “Cemil,” he attempted again.

Something about his tone must have gotten the message across, because Cemil pulled away at once. “Are you hurt?” the Meskato prince asked, all concern.

“No, I just…”

“What is it?”

But Osmund found he couldn’t speak. Eyes shut tight, he shook his head mutely until eventually the pressure of Cemil’s body lifted. The bedding shuffled as the larger man pushed away from the cot entirely, followed by the sounds of footsteps as he started to pace the tent.

Osmund lay unmoving for a moment, feeling his pulse thrumming in his ears. He was being ridiculous. He’d endured beatings, kicks, and slaps for years at the hands (and feet) of his father until it was routine, and in his own time had let countless men degrade him just for the thrill of their attention. There wasn’t a single bruise on his body from Bayram, so why was he acting so…so fragile? Cemil was the one who was going to have to face down his brother tomorrow if he couldn’t be reached!

After a few minutes collecting his breath, Osmund sat up in bed, loosely pulling the shirt back over his shoulders and watching Cemil, who was now standing with his arms tightly at his sides. His expression, turned in the direction of the chair and overturned basin, was impenetrable. “Cemil?” Osmund attempted, tentative. “I’m alright now. Come here, let’s talk.”

“He did this to you,” Cemil said, his tone peculiar.

Before Osmund could get another word in, the Meskato prince started pacing again. “He’s always done this,” he went on, voice uncannily calm even as it strained on every other word. “Back when we were children—he lived to torment me. Even now he can’t resist the opportunity to break anything of mine he can get his hands on.”

Osmund blinked. “I’m not broken,” he said quietly.

But he may as well have been a ghost. “If he thinks he can do whatever he likes and that I’m too weak to retaliate, I’ll teach him otherwise,” Cemil concluded, severe and unyielding. “I’m not the child I was anymore.”

There was a grave chill in the tent. Osmund wasn’t sure if it was real or imagined, but somehow he felt it wasn’t just his scant clothing. He staggered out of bed. “I can’t let you face him tomorrow,” he announced, steadying his resolve. “You’re too affected by this. It’s a mistake! Just because you’re a prince doesn’t mean you have to—”

But when Cemil turned to look at him, his eyes were still so cold. “What do you know of being a prince?”

It was a heavy judgment, one that cut deeper than Cemil could possibly understand. “What I do know is that if I let you go, I might lose you!” Osmund pleaded.

Those were the wrong words to use. Cemil’s head tilted, face expressionless. “You think I can’t win?”

“I…I didn’t say that.”

“You think I should allow monsters like Bayram to decide what happens in this empire?” Cemil was advancing on him, his face livening with a spark of anger, and Osmund wasn’t sure it was better or worse than his impassive rage. “That I should close my eyes and let him do as he pleases, just as he’s always done?”

“That’s not what I said,” Osmund repeated, taking a step back before reminding himself this was only Cemil, and Cemil would never hurt him. “I-I know you have to worry about all that, but someone has to worry about you!”

For a single moment, Cemil’s face softened, and Osmund dared hope he had gotten through to him. “Stay out of my way and don’t try to stop me,” the Meskato prince barked after the flicker had passed. “Attach yourself to other men, if you need assurances so badly.”

This was an unexpected turn. “Other men?” Osmund echoed blankly.

Cemil waved, dismissive. “That orc. Or whoever else you’ve been with!”

“…You mean Nienos?” Osmund’s brain was still playing catch-up. “Wait. You think that I…?”

“I’ve seen you together on and off the road. A big mercenary warrior probably serves well enough,” Cemil taunted, ”but I’m sure a prince is the real prize.”

Osmund opened his mouth with the intent to swear that he hadn’t been with a single other soul since arriving in the empire. “What’s gotten into you?!” he protested instead, incredulous at the callous treatment he’d done nothing to deserve. But even as the question left his lips, he thought he knew.

The sword. He’d seen Cemil grasping its handle all evening, letting his negative emotions consume him. Is that why he stood before Osmund now so transformed by revenge and cruelty? Why all the warmth in this room had literally drained away?

You can control cursed weapons, until they control you, Sakina had said. Who knew what would happen if he actually used it against Bayram. Osmund bit his lip, brain working fast. In that moment, somehow, he knew—that regardless of what happened tomorrow, for Cemil it would soon be too late.

“I should have killed Bayram where he stood,” Cemil spat. His hand was edging toward the blade. “Damned with his duel! I’ll spill his blood now.”

“You can’t!” Osmund cried, throwing himself between Cemil and the exit. “That has to be just what he wants! He’ll be surrounded by his people, it’s a trap!”

“Now you rise to defend him?” Cemil huffed a laugh, and his voice twisted with that ugly, strange jealousy. “Who knows what I might have walked in on if I’d been slower to arrive tonight!”

It’s the sword talking, the sword. Still, he hadn’t been expecting Cemil to give him such an easy thing to react to. Osmund didn’t have to fake his heartache at all. “That’s not fair,” he croaked.

Even through the bitter veil of anger consuming him, Cemil seemed to realize he’d gone too far. His eyes regained a glimmer of lucidity, his body going still. “Osmund—”

But the time had come to act. Head lowered, Osmund turned and fled from the tent.

The night was warm, the air cloyingly still, a stark difference from the strange chill of that silk-lined room.

1…2…3…4…

Osmund counted the seconds until Cemil would emerge after him.

5…6…7…

He would come to fix his mistake. He would. Osmund’s entire scrabbled-together plan hinged on it.

8…9…

“Osmund…?”

Cemil stepped out of the tent, his hair in disarray, the movements of his body wide and stumbling, somehow unsure. In the ashes of his anger, he resembled a lost child. Albeit a very large one. “Osmund?” he called again, looking feverishly left, then right, then back again. He was so close Osmund could make out every detail on the stitching of his caftan. But of course, Cemil couldn’t see him.

Osmund had finally found a use for Emre’s bracelet.

Certain now that he was invisible, at least by sight, he gathered his resolve and steeled himself. And with a silent apology to the man he loved—who frankly had been acting like a dick—Osmund lunged.

The element of surprise worked in his favor. His weight connected with Cemil’s, and Cemil, big as he was, went down. Osmund had precious seconds to act while the Meskato prince was stunned and winded on the ground beneath him. With a single frantic movement, the Tolmishman got both hands on the sword hilt and yanked it free of its jeweled scabbard.

A flailing hand found and caught his wrist and grasped it tight, so tight Osmund felt his bones grinding together. “Who—what are you—” Cemil grunted out, his fury reawakening.

“I’m sorry!” Osmund cried, trying fruitlessly to pry himself free. “I’m sorry! Please let me do this!”

“—Osmund?!”

Again a single moment of surprise was all he needed. Osmund’s wrist came away and then, he was on his feet again. Charging through the night, unseen, until the sounds of human voices died away.