He is too late to save Kamet. By the time he returns, the town is overrun, and the face he is looking for is set up on a spike as an example to others.
He is too late to save his queen. Or her heirs. By the time he returns, the ambush is complete, and Sounis, Eddis, and Attolia have been felled at one blow.
He is not too late to save his king.
That's what he keeps telling himself at least.
With every day that passes, Costis is less sure.
(They could have won, he hears. The wounded he finds as he scours the battlefield for his king croak out stories of the path his king had carved through the Mede officers, through their camp, through their army. They had been winning.)
(But the Medes' reinforcements had slid right past their supposed allies' ships, and the pass fell, and suddenly the retreat was a trap, and the small guard the king had with him became their last stand.)
He finds the king all but dead at the bottom of the trail that his guard died to a man to defend.
He washes his king with water from the spring and bandages him with rags he cuts from the dead.
It's hopeless, and he knows it's hopeless. He doesn't cry. There is a hollow place inside him that he thinks all tears have been scraped from.
They used to say their queen was made of stone. He wishes he was now.
He doesn't beg for his king's life in his prayers. He begs to die with him.
He doesn't offer anything to go with the prayer. He doesn't think he needs to. Not for this.
But he must have been wrong because he doesn't die with his king.
His king wakes up the next morning, every wound vanished.
Costis cries then, cries with every tear he'd thought he'd lost.
He thinks it's a miracle then.
He's less sure, later.
("My king," he says, and he weeps as he says it.)
("Costis." His king blinks, and just for a moment, Costis thinks - )
(And then his king says, "There is no king of Attolia now," and his voice is as cold as the mountains of Eddis in winter.)
(There is nothing of the king left in him.)
(Nothing but the Thief.)
("My king," Costis says, helpless.)
(He keeps saying it.)
Costis thinks that the king might still rally whatever troops are left and retreat to Eddis. If they do -
But the king will not even consider it.
"I'm not your king," he says again.
"Yes, my king," Costis says, and for just a moment there's a flash of something that is not blood or cold in his king's eyes.
(He's not even sure the king wants him there. He certainly hasn't asked Costis to follow him. He hasn't even told him where they're going.)
(But Costis has nowhere else to go, no one else to turn to, and he swore to his king that he would follow him and his patron all the days of his life, and so that is what he does.)
(His king only ever steals enough food for one, but he never eats any of it. He just hands it all to Costis, no matter what tricks Costis tries to force him to eat too.)
(That's answer enough, he supposes. And to more than one question.)
(No matter how little he eats, his king looks just the same.)
When they reach the Continent, his king takes to leaving him behind in the evenings.
He always returns just before the warning bells of the palace, or castle, or town, or wherever else they are, begin to chime..
There is usually still blood on his hands.
(Costis cannot make him wash his hands, but he washes his king's coat, over and over again, and he begs him to eat.)
("I'm not hungry," he says, and he almost sounds amused.)
("You will be," Costis says, stubbornly, with one last desperate hope. "When this is done.")
(He has nothing else left. His king must still stand when the feyness leaves his eyes and lightning no longer strikes when he speaks of it.)
("Costis," his king says, so terribly gentle. "This will never be done.")
He insists on going with his king in Brael. He says it's because of the guards. There are more here, so many more, and it's not just because of his king. The Continent has erupted into endless bloody feuds, as their kings and their heirs tumble from their blood soaked thrones.
The whole world, it feels, is at war. A funeral pyre for Attolia, and Eddis, and Sounis. An endless libation of blood poured out onto the thirsty soil.
He says he must join his king because his king will need another sword.
The truth is that he thinks he must be here because Brael is the last, and if it is the last, then when it is done - When it is done, no matter what his king says, for it must be done, then what will become of his king?
He has lost everything else. He will not lose this, he will not fail now, he will not, will not -
And if he cannot save him, he can at least stand at his side.
But the hook sinks in, and blood spills across the runes by the Brael king's bed, and his king does not fall to the floor as the power leaves him. The power does not leave him at all.
He is still just as he was, staring with interest at the blood on his hands while Costis stands in mute grief and tries to convince himself that he has not lost his king.
"Are we done now?" he pleads, but he already knows the answer, and he is not in the least surprised when his king finds them a ship headed for the emperor of the Medes.
("I could release you from your vows," his king's voice whispers, barely a breath in the dead of night as their ship rocks in the storm. "You don't have to follow me any longer. You've done more than I could dare to ask.")
(Costis closes his eyes and pushes back every dream of blood and flame and only says, "So where do we go next, my king?")