Chapter 3: Chapter 2
It was one of those days when is hard to go through, in a particularly difficult week, in a particularly difficult month.
It was a rough year for Rob, in general.
All in all, beginnings are new endings, and his end started precisely when Sir Edward said:
"We find someone who's willing to marry you, despite your… condition"
Rob's fingers were trembling when he asked "and will it be beneficial for us?"
For us. For the people. For the kingdom.
"Of course"
And that settled it.
….
Water drops fell on Rob's head as he sat curled near a wall. He had never been in a dungeon before, and it wasn't being a comfortable experience.
At Least I'm not dead.
Even that fact sounded vain, like a thin wire of uncertainty. On the cold wall, rock against his clothes, life sounded like a dream. That's how every prisoner feels, he realized.
Because, a prisoner, that's what Rob was. Nothing more. Arrested for what? Killing a man. Killing Sir Edward. Killing using a bottle of - supposedly - poison and a translucent hand. Killing for unknown reasons.
I wish I had killed him, he thought, so at least this whole situation would be fair. It's not like Rob liked Sir Edward. The man had come with Rob from the Sunny Kingdom till the rainy one, and wasted every second of every minute remembering Rob he wasn't the usual husband, and he would never be.
Still, I don't think I'd kill a man.
It was a hard thing to imagine, death. Being alive, then being not. It was probably what was going to happen to him. In the Sunny Kingdom, there was the death penalty. How did things work on the Rainy Kingdom?
He was king, but knew nothing.
At Least, I'm going down as myself. And that was a comfort.
He heard steps coming from somewhere near him. Four people came into his field of vision. One was the King, two were royal guards, and the other was a man Rob had never seen before.
"I'm here to interrogate you," it took a moment for Rob to understand the King was talking to him.
It was a good thing, someone interrogating him. They would find out he knew nothing.
"Go ahead," he said, fearless. Go ahead, save me.
At Least now I have a chance. A royal guard opened the gate to his cell. The other entered. The guard who entered bent down until he was at Rob's level.
"What do you know about Sea Magic?" that was an easy question.
"Sea Magic makes you go crazy when you use it for a long time."
"Then why did you use Sea Magic to kill Sir Edward?"
That hand, the transparent one, was it Sea Magic? The kind of magic feared for all people, the bad type of magic? Made sense for him. He had never seen Sand Magic doing something like that before.
"I didn't kill him."
"Then how do you explain being found strangling him?"
"I wasn't strangling him, I was helping him. There was a hand…"
The guard slapped his face.
Rob's cheeks burned. The pain went to his eyes and small tears fell down. He had never received physical punishment, and it hurt. A lot.
"What are you…"
"Stop kidding and look into my eyes." Rob obeyed. It wasn't hard to do so.
"How many of you are in the castle?"
"How many of what?"
Another slap. This time even his teeth hurt.
"Stop kidding! How many of you?"
"I don't know what you're talking about!"
He put his hand on his face, anticipating the slap. It didn't come.
What was that? What were they doing? They couldn't just hit a king. They couldn't hit Rob.
There wasn't enough light in the cell to see the guard's eyes.
What is he doing? Why was the king just watching?
The guard pulled Rob by the collar.
"You know what I'm talking about. The Organization."
"What?"
The man sighed.
"Listen to me, Your Majesty," his voice was full of sarcasm, "I will try to be nice here. I'm just following orders. Tell me how many of you are in the castle and I will let you go back to your husband."
"This is absurd. I have never…".
Rob was thrown on the irregular ground made of rocks.
"Your Majesty", Rob called. Wasn't he going to do anything? His own husband? They weren't even giving a chance of him to speak.
"Make him talk", the King started to leave. The unknown man stood still.
"Your Majesty!"
He was ignored.
The two guards looked at him.
"Now tell us, Eleanor," said one of them, "How did you do that to Sir Edward, with your strength? Was it the bottle of Dragon's blood you had?"
Rob stood still.
Eleanor.
"My name is Rob," he managed to say. My name is Rob. I'm real.
The guard punched him in the face.
He watched as one of his teeth came out. Fell on the floor with a click, click, click.
With a click, click, click.
The sound echoed through Rob's head. Click.
"Oh, right. Rob, isn't it? Why don't you tell me why did you have a bottle of Dragon's blood on your pocket"
"It wasn't mine," Rob's voice sounded weird and his mouth has a metallic taste. Everything hurt.
The guard held Rob delicately for a whole second, brought his lips to Rob's ear and said:
"Okay, then"
And the next thing Rob saw was the guard's foot.
The kick was strong enough to make Rob fall on the opposite wall. All his air was taken away from his lungs. He tried to breathe and there was nothing. On the ground, Rob received another kick. This time he spat some blood out of it, which probably wasn't a good signal. He hoped the blood was from his mouth, not from something else.
"Talk!" The guard screamed, "spit it out, now!"
Rob could feel another kick coming, he could sense the Guard preparing it.
"Enough," the man Rob didn't know came closer.
"Sir, he hasn't told us anything"
"Enough," he said in the same tone.
"Yes, sir," the guard backed away.
Laying on the floor, the hand on his chest, Rob could only see the man's feet.
"Get up"
Rob coughed. The man sure wasn't talking to him. Did he look like he could get up?
"Get up"
Rob made a sound between pain and despair and tried to move a little. His chest hurt, a pain he had never felt before. Like swords and stones at the same time.
"You," the man probably realized Rob wasn't getting up, "hold my hand"
"What?"
"Hold my hand"
Rob held out his hand with effort. The man took his hand on his.
There was a noise. A small noise, like a tiny buzz, Rob could feel. Something coming from the man's hand. Something different.
Magic, he realized.
"I see," he let Rob's hand and walked away.
"I will talk to the King," and he left.
The guards stared at Rob for a whole terrifying second. And they left without a word. Rob let a breath came out.
Then, he started crying.
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