Captive Prince (Captive Prince, #1)

by C.S. Pacat

Bound and under heavy guard was a male slave unlike any Guion had ever seen. Powerfully muscled and physically imposing, he was not wearing the trinket-chains that adorned the other slaves in the gallery. His restraints were real. His wrists were lashed behind his back, and his legs and torso were bound with thick cords. Despite this, the force of his body looked only barely contained. His dark eyes flashed furiously above the gag, and if you looked closely at the expensive cords that bound his torso and legs, you could see the red weals where he had fought, hard, against his restraints.

A gem in the rough? This slave was more like a wild animal, nothing like the twenty-four tame kittens who lined the hall. The sheer power of his body was barely held in check.

Dudes body is always barely in check, buckle up.

“He hasn’t been trained.” “The Prince, we hear, enjoys a challenge,” said Lady Jokaste.

HE DOES, DOESN'T HE?!?!

“Does he have a name?” asked Guion. “Your Prince is, of course, free to name him whatever he likes,” said Lady Jokaste. “But I believe it would greatly please the King if he were to call him ‘Damen.’” Her eyes glittered.

You bitch.

“That is certainly—an interesting choice of name,” said Guion. In fact he was appalled. “The King thinks so,” said Lady Jokaste, stretching her lips slightly.

You bitch, again.

When he realised where he was being taken, he began to struggle again, violently.

A slave entered a few moments later. Hand-picked, she matched all that was known of Damen’s tastes. Her skin was as white as the marble of the baths, and her yellow hair was simply pinned, exposing the elegant column of her throat.

our boy definitely has a type lolllll

The blow snapped his head to one side. Damen ran his tongue over the inside of his lip and tasted blood. “I did not give you permission to speak,” said Adrastus. “You hit like a milk-fed catamite,” said Damen.

You’re worth nothing. Prince Damianos is dead.”

CRYING. It's giving GOT vibes.

He had been pulled from the wagon into a closed courtyard and . . . he remembered bells. The courtyard had filled with the sudden sound of bells, a cacophony of sound from the highest places in the city, carrying in the warm evening air. Bells at dusk, heralding a new King. Theomedes is dead. All hail Kastor.

Everything gave the impression of patterns within patterns, the twisty creations of the Veretian mind.

It's very snake-like, don't you say?

It was dawning on Damen, through the clearing drug-haze, that his captors did not know the identity of their slave. A prisoner of war. A criminal. He let out a careful breath. He must stay quiet, inconspicuous.

The older brother and former heir, Damen well knew, was dead.

The young man had yellow hair, blue eyes and very fair skin. The dark blue of his severe, hard-laced clothing was too harsh for his fair colouring, and stood in stark contrast to the overly ornate style of the rooms. Unlike the courtiers who trailed in his wake, he wore no jewellery, not even rings on his fingers. As he approached, Damen saw that the expression that sat on the lovely face was arrogant and unpleasant. Damen knew the type. Self-absorbed and self-serving, raised to overestimate his own worth and indulge in petty tyrannies over others. Spoilt. “I hear the King of Akielos has sent me a gift,” said the young man, who was Laurent, Prince of Vere.

“An Akielon grovelling on its knees. How fitting.”

Laurent had stopped dead the moment he had seen Damen, his face turning white, as though in reaction to a slap or an insult.

HE KNOWS

“What’s your name, sweetheart?” said Laurent, not quite pleasantly.

Pellucid blue eyes rested on his. Laurent repeated the question slowly in the language of Akielos. The words came out before he could stop them. “I speak your language better than you speak mine, sweetheart.”

“They thought a slave nicknamed for their late Prince would amuse you. It’s in poor taste. They are an uncultured society,” said Councillor Guion.

I imagine it would be a lot like lying down with a poisonous snake, thought Damen, but he kept the thought to himself.

“You have a scar.”

learning the words of an enemy was as important as learning the words of a friend.

You have a scar. Damen’s fingers slid across his wet chest, reaching his collarbone and then following the line of the faint pale scar, feeling an echo of the uneasiness that had stirred in him last night. It was Laurent’s older brother who had inflicted that scar, six years ago, in battle at Marlas. Auguste, the heir and pride of Vere. Damen recalled his dark golden hair, the starburst blazon of the Crown Prince on his shield splattered over with mud, with blood, dented and almost unrecognisable, like his once-fine filigree armour. He recalled his own desperation in those moments, the scrape of metal against metal, the harsh sounds of breathing that might have been his own, and the feeling of fighting as he never had, all out, for his life.

Damen’s fingers dropped below the water line. The other scar Damen carried was lower on his body. Not Auguste. Not on a battlefield. Kastor had run him through on his thirteenth birthday, during training.

He looked fresh, unconcerned and fair, his golden hair bright above clothing of a blue so dark it was almost black. His blue eyes were as innocent as the sky; only if you looked carefully could you see something genuine in them.

“You are twenty-one in spring.”

“Do whatever you want to me. I’m not going to rape a child.” Laurent’s expression flickered.

“Why not?” he said, abruptly. “Why not?” said Damen. “I don’t share your craven habit of hitting only those who cannot hit back, and I take no pleasure in hurting those weaker than myself.” Driven past reason, the words came out in his own language. Laurent, who could speak his language, stared back at him, and Damen met his eyes and did not regret his words, feeling nothing but loathing.

Maybe he just wanted another chance to fight something. Preferably an insufferable yellow-haired princeling.

I liked it best when you were on your hands and knees. Cur.

Cur means DOG?!? LAURENT.

“Don’t be presumptuous,” said Laurent, coldly. “Too late, sweetheart,” said Damen.

Laurent turned, and with calm precision unleashed a backhanded blow that had easily enough force to bloody a mouth, but Damen had had quite enough of being hit, and he caught Laurent’s wrist before the blow connected. They were motionless like that for a moment. Damen looked down into Laurent’s face, the fair skin a little heat-flushed, the yellow hair wet at the tips, and under those golden lashes the arctic blue eyes, and when Laurent made a little spasming motion to free himself, he felt his grip on Laurent’s wrist tighten.

The cross, Laurent had called it. It was a flogging post.

“I was on the field at Marlas,” said Laurent.

“They wouldn’t let me near the front. I never had the chance to face him. I used to wonder what I’d say to him if I did. What I’d do. How dare any one of you speak the word honour? I know your kind. A Veretian who treats honourably with an Akielon will be gutted with his own sword. It’s your countryman who taught me that. You can thank him for the lesson.” “Thank who?” Damen pushed the words out, somehow, past the pain, but he knew. He knew. “Damianos, the dead Prince of Akielos,” said Laurent. “The man who killed my brother.”

“How’d you end up here, anyway?” “I wasn’t careful,” said Damen, “and I made an enemy of the King.” “Kastor? Someone should stick it to that whoreson. Only a country of barbarian scum would put a bastard on the throne,” said Orlant. “No offense.” “None taken,” said Damen.

Six years ago, Damen had been nineteen. Laurent would have been—thirteen, fourteen? It was young to fight in a battle like Marlas.

And with the Veretian King dead, and the Crown Prince dead, the King’s brother had stepped in as Regent, and his first act had been to call parley, accepting the terms of surrender and ceding to Akielos the disputed lands of Delpha, which the Veretians called Delfeur.

You have a scar, Laurent had said.

The bowls contained paint for his face. He had not had to suffer the humiliation of paint since Akielos. The servant touched the paint-wet brush tip to skin, gilt paint to line his eyes, and Damen felt the cold thickness of it on his lashes, and cheeks, and lips.

The first was a series of fine, near-invisible strings, on which hung tiny rubies spaced at intervals; they were woven into Damen’s hair. Then gold for his brow and gold for his waist. Then a leash, snapped onto the collar. The leash was gold, too, a fine gold chain, terminating in a golden rod for his handler, the cat carved at one end holding a garnet in its mouth. Much more of this, and he was going to clank as he walked. But there was more. There was a final piece; another fine gold chain looped between twin gold devices. Damen didn’t recognise what it was until a servant stepped forward and snapped the nipple clamps in place.

“The paint’s smudged,” said Radel to one of the servants, after assessing Damen’s body and face. “There. And there. Reapply it.” “I thought the Prince didn’t like paint,” said Damen. “He doesn’t,” said Radel.

A public flogging, Damen had said. “Uncle,” said Laurent.

The blue-eyed composure was faultless. Laurent, Damen thought with contempt, was good at talking.

Laurent moved off a few steps. Damen saw him lift a hand to the back of his own neck, as if to release tension. Saw him do nothing for a moment but stand and be quiet and breathe the cool air scented with night flowers. It occurred to Damen for the first time that Laurent might have his own reasons for wanting to escape the attention of the court.

“What’s your name?” said Damen, softly. “Erasmus.” “Erasmus, it’s good to talk to another Akielon.”

Erasmus instantly prostrated himself, pressing his forehead to the ground. Damen stayed where he was. Kneeling and shackled was quite submissive enough.

lol

“He’s not very talkative,” remarked Vannes. “It comes and goes,” said Laurent.

“I’d happily perform with him.” It was the pet with the red hair. Ostensibly, he spoke to his master, but the words carried. “Ancel, no. He could hurt you.”

“Your uncle wants to see you.” “Does he? Let’s make him wait.” One pair of unlikeable blue eyes stared at another. Nicaise sat down. “I don’t mind. The longer you wait, the more trouble you’ll be in.” “Well, as long as you don’t mind,” said Laurent. He sounded amused.