Kylar sat up on the cot, oriented on sound alone, and started the careful shuffle toward the hall. Three paces, then left; the floorboard that tattled; his palm dragging the wall like a rope. He was trying to reorient from where he was sleeping to the table to where the bathroom was. It was very quiet now in the main room. He paused listening and then decided they were entertaining themselves with his disability and continued his slow shuffle forward to the bathroom.
Then steps and a hand took his and lead him a couple steps and put his hand on the latch.
Jayce chuckling. "Tess, I wanted to see if he was going to make it or not."
Kylar huffed. "Thank you Tessa" He opened the door and said a little louder. " I would have made it."
“Uh-huh,” Jayce said. “Hero.”
“Would you like a spotter?” Rush added, exquisitely helpful. “Or, someone to guide you to the toilet?"
Kylar sighed like a saint. “No to both.”
He closed the door and Rush looked up from his reply to Ryder. "He surprises me" He said honestly to Jayce. Jayce glanced back to Rush. "He is a good man."
Rush nodded. "Just full of surprises" He said more to himself as he straighten the paper and slid them into the envelope.
Kairi came back with plates of egg, sausage, toast, jam and cups of tea. Tessa helping her carry more of the plates. When the bathroom door opened.
Tessa signed to Kairi.
Kairi caught most of it and went over and took Kylar's hand as he flinched only a little. "Thank you again Tessa." Kairi only smiled. "Of course" She said softly as he flinched again. Tessa was beside herself in her seat as Kairi guided Kylar to a chair.
Jayce cleared his throat. "Thank you Kairi for guiding our blind fool."
Kylar tensed. "..Sorry. Thank you Kairi" She only laughed and leaned over his shoulder a little and took both his hands and placed them on the table for the utensils and where the cup was. She spoke softly by his ear. "eggs at two, sausage at six, toast at ten" He nodded along with her voiced map of his breakfast plate.
Jayce took a sip and watched this all. "You are very subdued like this. You are quiet, listen, and are letting others touch you."
Kylar frowned in his general direction.
Rush and Jayce resumed “man talk,” which mostly meant bullying him with affection.
“So,” Jayce said around a bite, “we could just have her heal you enough to ditch the bandage. Then you can stop seducing doorframes.”
“I’m fine,” Kylar said, with the bravery of a man who wasn’t.
“You aren’t,” Rush and Jayce said together.
Kairi, gentler: “I can look after we eat. Soothe the burn and swelling, not undo the healer’s work. You’ll tell me when to stop.”
Kylar tapped the table once in agreement and busied his mouth with bread.
Talk turned to the road. Jayce sketched routes, tapping points only he could see. “We’ll stage at Miller’s Ford, then the orchard road. Escort proper runs bright. Damon and Dato will already be dividing your time because they’re men and will be demanding.”
Kairi snorted. “It’s up to Rush whether anyone spends time with me.”
Rush leaned back and theatrically regretted his life. “I am her father now. Scaring boys away is the job.”
“You’ve been doing that all my life,” she said flatly, pouring him more tea.
Rush lifted his cup in surrender. “Then I am an excellent brother-father.”
Jayce grinned into his mug. “Truly terrifying.”
They ate. They teased. Kylar listened, learned the rhythms, filed the useful parts. (Miller’s Ford. Orchard road. Damon’s mouth will get him killed, probably.)
“Jayce,” Kairi said a little softer, waiting until Rush was pretending not to listen and Kylar really was, “before you go—we should talk.”
Rush didn’t bother pretending long. “Talk about what? The question he avoided last time?”
Jayce choked on air and then on nothing. “I—what—Rush.”
Rush didn’t bother with a runway.
“So.” He set his cup down and fixed Jayce with the flat look he saved for men who should already know better. “What was your answer, Captain—and your intentions—and when were you going to ask me?”
Kairi made a strangled noise. “Rush.”
Jayce didn’t flinch. He folded his hands, elbows on the table, and met the crown that wasn’t on Rush’s head. “My answer last time was, I'm not suited for her..." He looked to Kairi. "I'm not suited for you." He said softer. "okay?"
Kairi sat there and nodded slowly. "...You made that clear last time...I wanted to talk about something else. Before you left." She barely got out with the awkwardness in the room now. Her internal thoughts wondering if he thought she was a love sick girl now.
Rush tipped his chin once. “okay,” he said, and then, as if they were discussing forage, pointed at the papers spread by his hand. “Two princes who might steal her heart,” he counted, tapping Damon and Dato, “and the possibility of the other.”
“Other?” Kylar asked before he could stop himself.
Tessa was listening to the exchange and watched Jayce's face. She took a moment to really take it all in and signed with bright precision,
Jayce nodded slowly and looked to Rush. "She asked us to tell them about the other."
Kylar stared at the dark behind his bandage and wished to the saints he could see the signs. He heard a chair push back and quick steps away. This must be a subject she doesn't like.
Rush sighed like a man beset by children. “Kairi. Speak with Jayce before he rides so I don’t have to watch you pout and mourn him leaving again.”
Jayce blinked. “She does that?”
“Sometimes,” Rush said, amused despite himself.
Silence settled, steadier this time.
Kylar risked it. “Who is the ‘other’?” he asked, careful.
Rush’s gaze flicked to him, measured, his gaze drifting toward the kitchen where his sister went and then back to the table. “Dream boy,” he said simply.
Kylar’s pulse climbed and he forced it down. He kept his body quiet. Don't move Dato. Stay calm.
Rush's gaze swept over Kylar to Jayce and continued. "We think that she established a bond of some type when she was younger to another person. Ryder and I have been researching for years trying to pin down who this man is and if he would be a threat."
Kairi returned with too much focus on wiping the same dry spot. “He’s kind,” she said softly, answering the air and the question beneath it. “He listens. He makes the world make sense when it doesn’t.” She looked at Rush. “And he isn't a threat." She said sternly.
Rush’s mouth went stern. His eyes cut to Jayce, then back to his sister. The fear underneath his love made a small, honest sound. “If your stalker shows up and is real,” he said, not unkindly, “We would do a lot of questioning to determine ourselves if he is a threat. See if he has been telling you pretty little lies all these years."
“If you talk about him that way, if he shows up, she'll never tell you.” Jayce said, quiet, not looking away from Rush.
Kairi stood in the weather between them and stayed upright, hands folded. Before the argument could find teeth, Tessa rapped the table with two knuckles. she signed, eyes moving between them.
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Jayce blew out a breath and took half a step back so he could see all of them at once. “Like Rush said, he and Ryder have been researching the bond,” he said. “We don’t know how it works—only that it does. From what the dragon implied, the Phoenix is protecting her chosen. It gave her someone who… fixes what’s breaking.” He glanced to Kairi to make sure he wasn’t betraying something she hadn’t offered. “That’s the best language we have. But when our Princess here goes to sleep, she goes to a dream world where this dream boy also goes to and they can talk."
Kairi blinked at Rush. “You never told me that. What the dragon said"
“You were depressed,” Rush said, the admission costing him. “Then you started to get better. The dragon grew suspicious of everything. More than usual. It started checking"
The room held still around that truth. Tessa’s expression softened. Jayce’s shoulders eased like a bow unstrung.
Kylar heard his own heartbeat in the bandage’s hush. Protecting her chosen. Fixes what’s breaking. He sat very straight and stewed in the mix of guilt and relief, fear and want, while every part of him waited for Kairi to point across the table and say it plain. This is my dream boy, his name is Kylar, he is one of your Shadowguard Jayce. He listened carefully, waiting for the first intake of breath.
She didn’t.
Tessa’s fingers rapped once on the table, then shaped a question sharp as a blade-tip.
Rush didn’t look at Kairi when he answered. “We don’t know,” he said. “That’s the concern.”
Tessa’s hands moved again.
“Almost six years,” Kairi said, her eyes then fell on the grain of the tabletop.
Rush and Jayce traded off without glancing to cue each other.
“He is calm and steady most of the time." Rush offered.
“He fights like a trained guard,” Jayce added. “Sword work’s good. Teaches well. He’s taught her swordwork and some sign”
“He knows the capital’s quarters,” Rush said. “Lantern-view points, food stalls, where to avoid drunks—specifics.”
"Her age-range" Jayce said. “give or take.”
He hesitated, then went on. “If Kairi would be willing to say more, we could pin the circle tighter—especially now that everyone slated for the escort is… a suspect.”
Across the table, Kylar sat very still. The bandages turned the room into sound; his name, unspoken but present in the list, made the air feel closer. A suspect...Jayce already has a concern it might be me. This escort was a trap for her dream boy. Clever Jayce.
Tessa studied him, then Rush, then Jayce. Her gaze slid to Kairi and stayed, steady, kind, assessing.
Kairi’s mouth pressed thin. She didn’t answer. “This escort,” she said instead, voice quiet and sure, “now feels like a trap.”
Rush exhaled. “Please don’t think of it that way.”
“You were going to watch me react to everyone on it,” Kairi snapped, finally looking up, “and what then—restrain and question him? What if it’s Prince Damon?”
A beat of hot silence.
“Kairi,” Rush said, keeping his voice level by force, “I don’t want to fight.”
They fought anyway—old habits, sharp worry, love with its elbows out. Kairi pushed back from the table and went for the back door; it tapped the stop hard and swung on its hinge. The little courtyard took her like a breath released.
Jayce rose slowly. “I’ll talk to her,” he said, and went after, soft-booted, leaving the door to fold itself quiet behind him.
The room settled to three: Rush, Tessa, Kylar.
Kylar spoke into the quiet. “Honestly,” he said, measured, “as my name is on that list… the escort does feel like a trap now.”
Rush looked at him properly, weighing the man under the bandage. The decision moved across his face like weather. “Dato,” he said.
Kylar flinched a fraction. “Kylar,” he corrected, turning his head toward Rush’s voice.
“What would your brother do,” Rush asked, “if it were you—bound to a person who promised the world, and would never say their name?”
Kylar sat with it. The answer was obvious and ugly and right. He heard Tessa knock once more. Rush slid paper and charcoal to her without looking; she wrote in quick strokes and pushed it back.
Rush read aloud so Kylar had it. “‘Ryder would do what you’re already doing… because that is what he is doing now. Correct?’”
A smile ghosted, brief and tired. “He is doing that,” Rush admitted. “Right now.”
Kylar’s mouth tipped. “Ryder is doing what he thinks is right,” he said as he tried to listen to the sounds outside, but couldn't hear anything. "Who are your top suspects?"
Rush and Tessa both watched him. Something in Rush eased a degree; something else sharpened. "Top suspects are Prince Damon, Darius and you."
Kylar waited in the silence as he waited for Rush to continue. I'm a top suspect. She told enough about me for Jayce to guess.
"I don't know if it's you. You're injured and she is treating you like any other injured person she happens upon." Rush watched as Kylar was sitting alert, cautious. Kylar let it sink in slowly as he was grateful for the excuse of injury for her attention. He would have to warn her later.
“I’ll make sure Kairi heals you,” Rush said, dry as flint, “so you can do whatever you volunteered to be here to do. Get to know her before your brother?”
Kylar didn’t bite. He sat in his darkness and let honesty be a small shield. “Darius and Zen couldn’t be pulled,” he said. “I arrived at the barracks at the wrong time.”
Tessa’s mouth tugged; she bent to the page again and wrote: that is how he got voluntold. He had nothing better to do besides be impatient.
Rush read it and actually laughed, the sound surprising them all. “Please tell me,” he said, leaning back, “the saga of your conscription to two weeks of domestic guard duty.”
Kylar huffed. “I brought a letter to Jayce,” he said. “Then got sat in a chair and interrogated by half the barracks about my intentions. I… did want a head start,” he admitted. “I’m not as charming as my brother. I wanted to meet her as someone normal before she had to be anything else. I expect you understand. You’re a prince. I’m sure women have thrown themselves at you.”
Rush made a face like he’d bitten a lemon. “I do not miss those days.”
Tessa’s hands lifted, wicked again. she signed, sweet as a knife in silk.
Rush stared. “I don’t know what you just said.”
She smiled, saintly. Rush shoved the paper toward her; she shook her head, zipped her lips with two fingers, and leaned her cheek into her palm like innocence itself.
Rush grumbled. “I need your eyes healed, Kylar, so you can tell me what she signs.”
Kylar couldn’t help it; he laughed, then winced when the motion tugged bruises. “As soon as your sister is calm,” he said. “I’m not sure I want angry healing done right now.”
Tessa’s eyebrow climbed; she tapped the table twice paused as Rush looked to her. Kylar glanced in her general direction. RIght. He can't see my hands She grabbed the paper and wrote Tearian magic then? I would like to watch how it is done. Rush read her note and nodded. "When she isn't angry and wants to heal our broken shadowguard."
Kylar grimaced a little. "I'm just a little banged up, not broken."
Out back, a door hinge sang. Jayce’s voice came low and patient; Kairi’s, tight and frayed, answering, then unspooling on a breath. Inside, Rush folded the paper once and then held it in his palm as flame took the paper, licked it to black, and crumbled it to ash in his palm. He dusted his hands, turned back to Kylar, and spoke like a commander who’d remembered how to be a brother.
“Once you can see, we can layout the rotation for now and then on the escort." Rush spoke softly, his attention half on the courtyard outside.
Kylar relaxed in the chair. "I look forward to seeing."
The courtyard kept their voices close. Kairi’s palms were still flat to the stone; Jayce stood a few paces off, hands open, jaw set.
“You stacked the escort with suspects,” she said, anger clipped clean. “You turned my life into a hunt.”
“And you handed me a trail and told me not to follow it?” It came out sharper than he meant. He saw it land, winced, and shook his head. “I’m—sorry. That wasn’t fair.”
She swallowed. The apology took some air out of the heat, but not all. “It felt like a trap.”
“It felt like a way not to fail you,” he said, quieter. “Even if it looks ugly from your side.”
She almost reached for him—almost—then caught herself, fingers closing on her skirt instead. “You probably hate that my dream boy exists out there somewhere. An unknown potential threat."
He didn’t varnish it. “I do,” he said. “I hate it.”
Her eyes went to her hands. He stepped in one breath closer, slow, and tipped her chin up with two fingers until she had to meet him.
“I’ve known that for four years,” he said, and the admission looked like it hurt to carry. “I’ve known that if he ever showed up, he could either be everything you know him to be. Or shatter everything about you."
She held his gaze. “Jayce, he wouldn't hurt me. Not on purpose. Of everyone on the escort, would any of those men you think it may be hurt me?"
He shallowed looking into her eyes. She was close and the faint smell of her soap hit as the wind tussled her hair. "No...I don't think any of them would."
She lifted her hand and wrapped his, easing it from her face but not letting go, thumb moving small circles over his knuckles watching his eyes as they briefly went down to their hands and then back to her face. "Let me find him first. Let me check he is the same. Then, I will tell you who it is. I know his name. His real name."
He glanced toward the door like he could already hear the future walking through it; then he turned back and pulled her in, not fierce, not claiming, just gathering. His mouth was by her ear when he whispered, raw and soft, “Who?”
She closed her eyes. It would be so easy to tell him and break two promises at once. “Please wait,” she breathed.
His hands tightened once, then eased. “All right,” he said against her hair. “I’ll wait.”
He didn’t move. “...is he on the escort?”
Her breathing steadied against him. She didn’t answer at first; her arms tightened, small and sure, like she was bracing both of them. “Yes.”
Jayce let the word settle. A single nod against her temple. “Then I’ll do my job,” he said quietly. “I’ll keep you safe. And I’ll keep my mouth shut until you’re ready.” He eased back just enough to see her face, thumb brushing once along her jawline. She flushed and he pulled away from her and looked over to the stalls.
"Alright, let's go back in so your brother doesn't assume we are plotting against him." He murmured.
Kairi gave a small smile. "But...we are, kinda."
He sighed and rolled his eyes and let his head tilt to the side. "Last chance to come clean then and tell me who your stalker is."
She paused at that and glanced to the door and then back to Jayce. "Who do you wish it is? Or who would you trust me in their care the most?"
Jayce watched her eyes and subtle movements there. "If I name someone, will you tell me if I'm right?"
She thought about it for a while and closed her eyes. "...Not yet."
Jayce took her hand and tugged her back to the house. "Then...tell me when I can guess or tell me when you are ready."