crossfire || cardan greenbriar

thirteen

I woke up from my light slumber with just two knocks on the door of my bedroom.

Before I can even turn on the bedside lights, the door swings open, and a familiar-looking but hazy figure enters as I rapidly rub my eyes and sit up.

I saw the figure up close, and a sigh of relief tore through my lips, "Oh...just It's you." It's just Jude.

Although she usually doesn't look as gloomy in the mornings, she says, "Good morning," with a fairly serious tone.

"What brings you to my room at..." I pause, taking a glance at the clock beside me which read 7:05 A.M. "Seven in the morning."

She pulls out a folded piece of crisped paper from her pocket as she sits on my bed and says, "There is something I...have to show you."

I was, to put it mildly, startled when she smoothed out the piece of paper.

She peered at my baffled face then down at the paper, my brows interlaced together and my nose and forehead were all scrunched up, my face now as shriveled as dried-up clothes.

"What the hell?" I said, concerned and discombobulated.

The paper consisted of nothing other than my name, written over and over and over...again.

All over the paper was splattered ink and writing, Cardan's incensed and haughty writing. By the time he finished his brief artistic endeavor, his pen had visibly broken, as seen by the pools of partially dried ink all over the paper. Anastasia, it reads, each vile rendering of my name like a punch to the gut.

She hands me the paper and I take it reluctantly, she says, "I found it in his room."

She takes a big breath and adds, her eyebrows up and her eyes wide as pans, "He's either planning to kill you or is just very...disturbingly...obsessed with you."

"Stop it with your absurd speculations Jude," I sigh, chucking the paper into the bin and trying to get it off my mind. "Whatever this is, I want nothing to do with it."

It does lighten the atmosphere when she adds with a small chuckle, "Kinda ironic since, you're all over it."

"Also what were you even doing in his room?" I ask, one brow rising higher than the other, a smug expression taking place on my lips.

"Oh please, as if. Just another one of prince Dain's requests and tasks," she says and my expression comes up short into a confused one for a moment and then I remember she's part of the Court of Shadows.

"Oh," I falter, "Why d—

I stopped as I saw she wanted to say something else but held back from doing so,

I tried to talk but Jude spoke over me, "I have to go now, Ghost is giving me some extra training."

She gave me a brief peck on the cheek before leaving the room hurriedly, hardly giving me time to react.

I shake this odd feeling off and get out of bed, man I've gotta shower.

~~~~~⚔️~~~~~

JUDE'S POV ...

the day before

I close my eyes tightly, hoping that by doing so, whoever is entering the room won't be able to see me.

"I hope you've been practicing," Balekin says.

I let my eyes open wide. Cardan is standing beside the bookshelves, a formulaic male servant carrying a court sword with gold etching along the hilt and metal wings making the shape of the guard.

I have to chomp down on my tongue to avoid speaking.

"Must we?" Cardan asks. He sounds bored.

"Show me what you've learned." Balekin raises a single staff from a vessel beside his desk that holds an array of staves and canes. "All you have to do is get a single hit in. Just one, little brother."

Cardan remains still.

"Pick up the sword." Balekin's patience is worn thin already.

Cardan lifts the sword and sighs in discomfort. His posture is atrocious. I understand Balekin's frustration. Since he was old enough to grasp a stick in his hands, Cardan unquestionably had to receive instruction in combat.

The first thing I learned was where to put my feet because I was taught from the moment I arrived in Faerie, so he would have years on me.

Balekin stretches out his staff. "Now, strike."

They remain motionless and look at one another for a considerable time. Balekin successfully takes down Cardan's blade as he desultorily swings it.

He was struck forcefully in the side of the head by the staff. The sound of the wood rubbing against his skull makes me wince. With his teeth bared, Cardan stumbles forward.

He is completely red on one cheek and one of his ears.

"Swordplay isn't a game." Balekin swings again. Cardan tries to jump back, but the staff catches the edge of his thigh.

Cardan winces, bringing up his sword defensively. "Then why call it swordplay?"

Balekin's face darkens, and his grip on the staff rightens. This time he jabs Cardan in the stomach, striking suddenly and with enough force for Cardan to sprawl on the stone floor. "I have tried to improve you, but you insist on wasting your talents on revels, on being drunk under the moonlight, on your thoughtless rivalries and your pathetic romances—"

Cardan forces himself to stand up and charges his brother while violently swinging his sword. He wields it like a club. Balekin is forced to take a step backward by the attack's extreme ferocity.

Cardan's strategy finally comes through. He gets more methodical and launches a variety of assaults. He's never shown much interest in swordsmanship at school, and, although he knows the basics, I am not sure he practices.

Balekin ruthlessly and effectively disarms him. The blade Cardan is holding flies from his grasp and clatters across the ground toward me. I move back further into the chair's shadows. I quickly fear that I may be discovered, but the servant is the one to take up the sword, and his attention remains unwavering the entire time.

Balekin cracks his staff against the back of Cardan's legs, sending him to the ground.

I am delighted. There's a part of me that wishes I were the one wielding that staff.

"Don't bother to rise." Balekin unbuckles his belt and hands it over to the servant. The human man wraps it twice around his palm.

"You have failed the test. Again."

Cardan stays silent. He has a familiar look of rage in his eyes, but this time it isn't directed at me. Though he is on his knees, he doesn't seem in the least bit intimidated.

"Tell me." Balekin's voice has gone silly, and he paces around his younger brother.

"When will you cease being a disappointment?"

"Maybe when you stop pretending that you don't do this for your own pleasure," Cardan answers. "If you want to hurt me, it would save

us both a lot of time if you got right down to—"

"Father was old and his seed weak when he sired you. That's why you're weak." Balekin puts one hand on his brother's neck. It looks affectionate, until I see Cardan's flinch, the shifting of his balance.

That's when I realize Balekin is pressing down hard, pinning Cardan in place on the floor.

"Now, take off your shirt and receive your punishment." Cardan begins to strip off his shirt, showing an expanse of moon-pale skin and a back with a delicate tracery of faded scars.

My stomach lurches. They're going to beat him.

I should be glorying in seeing Cardan like this. Despite the fact that he is a prince of Faerie, a terrible jerk, and likely to live forever, I should be grateful that his existence is miserable, maybe worse than mine.

I would have believed that the only thing I would have to hold back would be applauding if someone had told me that I would have the chance to watch this.

But while I watch, I can't help but notice that his defiance masks fear. I know what it is to say the clever thing because you don't want anyone to know how scared you are.

It doesn't make me like him any better, but for the first time, he seems real. Not good, but real.

Balekin nods. The servant strikes twice, the slap of the leather echoing loudly in the still air of the room.

"I don't order this because I am angry with you, brother," Balekin tells Cardan, causing me to shudder. "I do it because I love you. I do it because I love our family."

When the servant lifts his arm to strike a third time, Cardan lunges for his blade, resting on Balein's desk where the servant put it.

For a moment, I think Cardan is going to run the human man straight through.

The servant does not cry out or raise his hands to shield himself. Maybe he is too ensorcelled for that. Maybe Cardan could impale him right through the heart and he wouldn't do a single thing to defend himself.

I am weak with horror.

"Go ahead," Balekin says, bored. He makes a vague gesture toward the servant.

"Kill him. Show me you don't mind making a mess. Show me that at least you know how to land a killing blow on such a pathetic

target as this."

"I am no murderer," says Cardan, surprising me.

I would not have thought that was something to be proud of.

Balekin moves ahead of his brother with just two steps. Close up, they resemble one another so much. identical inky hair, identical sneers, and menacing eyes. However, Balekin demonstrates his years of expertise by ripping the sword out of Cardan's grip and kicking him with the crossbar as he falls to the ground.

"Then take your punishment like the pathetic creature that you are." Balekin nods to the servant, who rouses from somnolence.

I keep my eye on every blow and flinch. There isn't much I can do. Even if I can close my eyes, the noises are terrible. And worst of all is Cardan's empty face, his eyes as dull as lead.

He certainly earned his cruelty honestly while under Balekin's care. He has grown up with it, been taught its nuances, and matured through its use.

However horrible Cardan might be, I now see what he might become and am truly afraid.