Chapter 4

Light shone on his serene face, not even expressing anything in sleep. It looked like the Prince hadn't moved since he had first dozed off, as he was lying very stiffly on his back, facing the newly painted ceiling. Seiko, his male Yamani attendant, walked into his room to open the very Yamani-fashioned curtains and let in some light in the hopes of waking the sleeping Aikido. As soon as the sun's light touched his pale features, the Prince's eyelids fluttered, then opened. He groaned as he sat up stiffly, muscles sore from sleeping in one constant position. "Why did you have to wake me, Seiko?" he demanded irritably. "We still have one more hour before father calls us to have breakfast with him at the High Table. And I fell asleep late last night reading a fantastic book by-oh."

"Finally!" Seiko cried out in mocking tones, throwing his hands into the air and then turning to grin widely at his friend and master. "His majesty catches on. We're not at the Yamani palace but at the Copper Isles one." Seiko kept on grinning, and Aikido told him honestly that sometimes he really wished to slap that grin off his face. Seiko just laughed out loud and then went on grinning as he opened every curtain to the sound of Aikido's groans and protests.

Aikido and his attendant were very close. They had grown up together from the day they were born until this very moment. When they were younger their parents – well, for Aikido it was a nurse, as his father could not be interested in such things – were perpetually separating the two as they got into numerous little 'skirmishes' where they pulled out fistfuls of each other's hair or knocked down the towers they were making. Often they had contests that had to be stopped by bothered parents and nurses. A few of these were 'Who Can Yell the Loudest', 'Who Can Get the Worst Punishment', and 'Who Can Successfully Scare Away the Noble Sitting Next to You'. Seiko usually won these. Later, when they were over the age of eight, Seiko was told he was below Aikido and was to be his servant, of sorts. But they never stopped treating each other the same as they did as four year olds. Yes, they no longer had such contests or battles, but they still liked to tease. It was refreshing to talk and tease with Seiko after a long day of putting on your best smile for the Yamani Nobles.

The female Yamani attendant who had come with them was a pretty, petite girl of twenty named Kolba. When Seiko and Aikido were about seven years old, they invented a new game called 'Marriage' in which one of them was the groom and the other the Priest. All they were missing was a bride. Until Kolba was conveniently introduced to them. She was the daughter of Seiko's mother's friend, and from her birth it had been planned that she would be one of Aikido's close attendants. She was put in the playpen with Seiko and Aikido at the same time they discovered they needed a bride. Ah. Perfect. Another poor soul to torture. At first, they all took turns with the different roles except for Kolba, who always had to be the bride. She got fed up with this and punched Aikido on the nose in the end. So she was allowed to be all the roles. But usually she ended up being the bride. Soon enough, Seiko realized he liked it best when she was the bride and he was the groom. So he and Aikido had a little battle. As always, Seiko won, and so he got to be the permanent groom with Kolba as permanent bride. The game ended a while after that. Now, at twenty and twenty three, Kolba and Seiko were married for real. The ceremony had been two years ago, but they still did not have any children, and they still did not leave Aikido.

Finally, Aikido was dressed and ready to go out to see Dove. He had clothed himself in a humble brown Kimono, and he was ready for an intense game of chess.

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Dove was seated in the 'living room' of sorts. It was furnished with puffy futons and comfortable chairs, as well as chess tables and small tables to eat off of. It was officially the 'Entertainment Room', though Dove referred to it as the 'Chess Room'. She had once sat in here and played chess with the forty year old astronomer, Duke Qovold Engan, and they had joked about maybe someday being married. She wondered if he was feeling the same uncomfortable feeling she was; that she had made a mistake.

There was a bang and Dove's head snapped toward the door. She stood up, her whole body tense and rigid, as she waited for what was coming. It wasn't assassins. It couldn't be assassins. Aly wouldn't have let them-Dove became even more wary; Aly had gone with Nawat to see if the rumors that there were spidrens in Malubesang were true. She had been lured away. Of course! It was so clear now! Someone had taken this opportunity to kill both herself and Aikido. Or, perhaps, it could even be a Copper Islander who didn't like the thought of a Yamani King and decided to kill him.

Dove looked innocent and like a simple little book reader. But those days spent in exile while she and Sarai were taught fighting skills were not for nothing. Dove, after much nagging on the part of Aly, had finally taken to the habit of having one hidden dagger at hand. Presently she wished she had thirty, but one would have to be enough. The young Queen pulled it out from her waist and grimly put her hand on the doorknob. In the same instant, she heard a small click as the lock was turned. Someone had locked her in just in time. Desperately, Dove threw herself at the door, intending to force it open, but her skimpy weight wasn't nearly enough. She cried out in alarm as she felt a body thump against the door, thinking perhaps it could be Aikido, injured or worse. She renewed her feeble attempts with a new vigor, but it still didn't work.

There was a scream that Dove knew was Aikido's. She was even more desperate now, but still the door didn't budge. Tears were running down her face as she heard more yells, screams and clamor from outside her door. She was helpless. She couldn't do anything to help. She would be safe and cozy at the end of this battle even if everyone else was dead. Then Dove had an idea. She jammed the dagger into the lock and turned and yanked and pulled on it until she was sure it had been destroyed. She kicked at the door with all her strength, even though it hurt her slippered feet immensely. Dove had tears running down her eyes by now, but she didn't care. Desperately she kicked and kicked until she heard and felt the piece of wood placed to keep the door intact should the lock break snap in two. She threw herself backwards as the door swung out and the two bodies that had hit it in falling fell into the room. Dove grimly said a small prayer for the bodies of those she knew to be the enemy and then, lifting her skirts, took off at a run down the corridor, dagger in her little hand.

Dove, not looking down, tripped over a fallen body. She recognized it as a Yamani man around the age of 20+ and prayed to Kyprioth it was not one of Aikido's beloved attendants, comforting herself with the fact that he wore a hood and cloak, which meant he was probably one of the assassins and just happened to be Yamani. Then she took off at a sprint once more, following the retreating voices she heard. There had been a fight outside her door, but they moved on before she had managed to free herself. Suddenly, Dove slipped on something liquid and managed to regain her balance a fraction of a second before her long skirts tripped her up again and she landed, sprawling, in a pool of warm blood. Disgusted, she tore off the long and now ruined outer dress, wearing only – quite inappropriately – a white under-dress of sorts. But it didn't matter. Leaving the fine fabric in the pool of blood, Dove advanced once more.

Finally she arrived at the second scene of the skirmish. There were more bodies here. Hooded and cloaked men she knew to be trained assassins, some of them even Copper Islanders, lay sprawled on the floor in a bloody mess. She found, with her keen eyes, three of her guards lying nearby, life quickly seeping away from them. And then, lastly, Dove's eyes – with the help of her ears, which heard the groan – found the still body of Aikido lying in a corner. It looked as though he had dragged himself into the corner, as there was a thin trail of blood starting from the middle of the room, and it looked as though he had collapsed. Dove gasped, eyes filling with tears again, and rushed over to the fallen comrade.

She found a deep wound on his chest made by a large metal sword lying nearby, and several small scratches on his face made from passing, poisoned arrows. They weren't deep enough to consider having to be treated in case the poison spread, but for one. It was right under his right eye and was quite deep, bleeding heavily. It was turning a frightening green from the poison on the arrow tip that had caused it, and it was this, more than the chest wound, that Dove fretted over. She ripped off a generous amount of her white skirt and wiped off all the poison she could. There was none on the edges or in sight, but there was clearly some that was rapidly sinking through the cut and into the Prince's bloodstream, out of her reach. Finally, Dove sternly told herself to stop crying as she pressed a new strip of cloth over the chest wound and tied it around his whole body so it stayed. Aikido stirred, which gave Dove some hope. "When I find out who locked my door, I will kill them," Dove murmured to herself, absently.

One of the Prince's eyelids cracked open a fraction and he grinned, weakly. "Actually," he rasped, "that would have been me. To keep you safe, you understand. But it looks like someone already dispatched of me quite successfully, so…"

"Stop talking nonsense!" Dove scolded him sharply, as she finished tying the makeshift bandage around his body. "No one 'dispatched of' you. You'll be fine. So stop talking nonsense," she repeated, through her anxiety for her newfound friend and someday-husband. If he made it through this alive, Dove told herself, she would marry him and never say or think a spiteful word about him.