A Royal Rebellion Read online

  When he heard the engine turn over and headlights flooded the front, Edward relaxed. He moved forward, towing Percy behind him, just as Reynard returned. “In the back, please,” Reynard instructed, slipping past them and picking up half of their bags.

  Edward guided Percy out the door and down the front steps towards the driveway, his brother’s car dark and sleek in the shadows, the doors and rear hatch open. Edward gently pushed Percy ahead of him and in the spacious backseat, sliding in behind his mate and shutting the doors. Reynard put their bags in the rear and returned to the cottage, grabbing the last of their gear and shutting out the lights, making sure to lock the door behind him.

  Moments later they were pulling away from the cabin, the car gliding through the trees along the stone drive, heading back for the highway.

  They came to the exit ramps a few minutes later, and they sat at the intersection. The road headed off in into the darkness of the mountains, the other direction back to the capital. Along the road out into the far country lay the distant border of Elysian, one of the most powerful and technologically advanced countries on the planet. It was from that country that Edward’s late mother, the deceased Queen of Cassia came from, and nestled in idyllic forests along the River Styx was one of the many estates she left to Edward when she passed. Elysian came in close second to Cassia in terms of wealth and power, but the most important part about Elysian at that moment for Edward was that the neighboring country outlawed and eradicated all slavery practices and customs two decades prior.

  Percy would be considered a person, sentient, real, with rights and value as a man the second he stepped over that border. Once protected by Elysian law, no one, not even Edward, would be able to deny Percy his basic rights as a person, nor deny him rights to his unborn child.

  Edward’s rights to him would only be recognized if they were there with diplomatic status, under the auspices of Edward’s birthrights as a Blood Prince of Cassia. With the three of them marked as fugitives and potentially traitors for defying the King, the claims of ownership Edward held over Percy would be meaningless. Not even the rank of consort would mean anything without the endorsement of the Cassian throne if Edward was declared a traitor.

  Edward met Reynard’s eyes in the rearview mirror. There was no doubt the captain knew all of this as well. It was common knowledge that Elysian stopped engaging in the slave trade, and that no sales or trading of genetically modified humans with Cassia was allowed. It was taught in primary school as part of world history classes.

  Reynard’s eyes darted to Percy, where the young breeder was cuddled along Edward’s side, almost asleep, eyes heavy and breathing slow and relaxed. Reynard looked back to him, and Edward nodded.

  “Head east, Abe. Elysian and freedom.” Edward said, and the car took the ramp, aimed for the eastern horizon.

  Chapter Two

  Mason

  Pain was an ever-present reminder that just because he was royal, that didn’t mean he was impervious to harm. And yet, as each blow fell, each twist to resisting joints and every searing touch of hot metal to tender flesh, Mason was reminded of not all the times his father beat him as a child, but of the missions gone awry in the army, in years long past.

  Missions where he ended up held prisoner by the enemies of the Crown, tortured, beaten, assaulted, and eventually rescued, but not after days and weeks held in cells and dungeons infested with rats and roaches, mud and swampy water. Yet it was those days of misery that he yearned for, because it was in those distant times he had hope…hope of rescue, reprieve.

  There was no rescue for this prince of Cassia, not from this enemy. Not when the pain came from the hands of his own father.

  King Henry the Third, Monarch and Supreme Ruler of the Kingdom of Cassia had a mean left hook. He wielded that red-hot poker like he stoked fires all day long, and the silk ties he utilized to twist Mason into unbearable positions would have done a non-consensual practicing sadist proud.

  Mason was jolted from his memories of one particularly bad mission in the jungle of a southern shithole of a country when he hit the floor with a meaty slap. Stars clouded his eyes when his head hit the stone floor, but he still found relief as the silk ties around his wrists and ankles loosened and fell away. Blood returned to his extremities in a painful rush, but he lacked the strength to massage his arms and legs to ease the sensation.

  “Shall I send for the physician, my king?” a bland, even voice asked somewhere out of view of Mason’s bleary vision.

  “I doubt I injured anything vital. Leave him there, he can drag himself to bed once he comes around,” his father replied, and Mason could see his booted feet pass in front of his line of sight, heading for the door. “If he wishes to cooperate after this lesson, do let me know.”

  “Yes, Sire,” the servant replied, following King Henry from the room, leaving Mason alone on the cold stone floor in the cell passing for his new room in the palace. The door shut and the lock turned over with a final snick, and silence descended in the small room.

  He was in the petitioner’s quarters inside the Old Palace, the structure once called home by the great King Airric at the birth of the Cassian Dynasty two thousand years ago. The modern palace seen by the world surrounded and protected the ancient castle at its core, keeping the original seat of their power safe from the erosions of time and prying eyes.

  Mason and his brothers used to play in the vaulted halls and stone walled rooms as children, imagining they were stalwart knights battling scores of savages and monsters, saving their kingdom over and over again, returning conquering heroes. It was a weird twist to Fate that Mason now found himself locked away in a room he used to retreat to as a young man, seeking asylum from the increasing demands of his duties as a blood prince and the second born son of the king.

  Here, in the Old Palace, no one would hear him scream when the pain got too much too bear.

  Mason cautiously pushed himself upright, the room spinning before his brain settled, and he spit out grit and blood to the floor. He leaned back against the wall, eyeing the distant pitcher of water on the nightstand, wondering if today would be the day he lacked the strength to get up and drink some of the cool fluid.

  Maybe he should just give up. There was no point in continuing to bait his father with his refusal to speak. Not that he knew anything for certain to tell his father about where Edward and his shy mate were hiding or where they were heading. Though there was one person Mason knew better than anyone other than his brothers in this world, and that person was Abelard Toussaint Reynard, minor baron and once honored captain in the Royal Guard. Mason knew the way Reynard thought, the way he would prepare and act, and if Mason were to make an educated guess, Reynard and Edward would be taking Percy over the nearest border with Elysian.

  Percy was a slave, a breeder, and once he asked for asylum in Elysian, he would be safe.

  The King and his men were focusing the search on Hartgrove, Edward’s massive country estate, and the routes through the mountains between Cassia City and the estate. Edward’s fondness for his country home was well-known, and if Mason hadn’t known Eddie and Reynard so well, he would think the trio would retreat to that place of safety and power as well. It was defensible and Edward knew the area better than the locals.

  Mason understood one thing that the King didn’t.

  Edward, and Reynard, both loved the young breeder. Maybe not in the same way or for the same reasons, but that love was real. And that love meant they would do anything to keep Percy safe. Even if safety meant sacrificing any claims they had over the beautiful and exceptional breeder.

  It was that thought that made Mason push aside any inclinations of giving up. He would survive his father’s fury, escape, and do what he should have done years ago. Expose the king for the monster he was, rip apart the secrets of the Cassian Dynasty, and maybe find some measure of peace in his otherwise joyless existence. It was love that kept him going all these years as his father, with casual cruelty and vind
ictive precision, stripped Mason of all he held dear and forced him into a stilted half-life, a façade of perfection that grew into a torture and prison with each passing day. Love kept him alive, and kept him from falling apart as he pretended to be the rapscallion second son and loyal prince.

  His penchant for surviving was both gift and curse, ever since that fateful day he loitered at his dying mother’s bedside and learned a truth that could shatter the greatest royal dynasty to ever rule on this world.

  Those he loved were already past the king’s reach. His silence could no longer be guaranteed by the threat to their lives. His sisters, those spoiled and hollow creatures sold in marriage to wealthy men, were beyond harm at their husbands’ sides. Edward was safe, Malcolm was a lost cause, and the other …

  King Henry could no longer force Mason’s cooperation by threatening the life of the man he loved.

  Abe Reynard was in the wind, and far more dangerous than the young innocent he once was, vulnerable to a king’s wrath. Now all Mason had to do was set free the truth, even if that meant he died trying.

  ***

  He was sleeping. Or trying. Pain made it hard to relax. If not for the lateness of the hour he wouldn’t dare attempt to sleep. His father was too busy being entertained by his ministers and the Court to come and beat him at this hour, so he was guaranteed some peace until morning.

  “Mason?”

  He frowned at the harsh whisper, almost too loud to be counted as such, as if the speaker had little experience with such foolish things. Only one person he knew of who was so atrocious at being quiet. And who liked to wander at midnight to places she had no business being, even for the queen-in-waiting.

  “Come to gloat at my downfall, Arianna?” he called to the door, the oak panel solid but for a small hole filled with iron bars near the top. He rolled over on the thin pallet that counted as a bed, and squinted through the shadows. The light in the hall was bright enough for him to see the top of his sister-in-law’s head, her typically tamed curls fuzzy and piled high, bouncing as she tried to see through the window in the door.

  He laughed, the motion hurting his ribs and shoulders, but it felt good to make a sound that wasn’t wholly pain-filled. If only the rest of the world could see the future Queen of Cassia as she was now, bored and alone at night, dressed in her nightgown and wandering through the palace like a recalcitrant preteen anxious to avoid going to bed.

  “Oomph! Oh, bloody hell, why are these blasted chairs so damn heavy?” Mason heard her swear through the door, and he thought it likely that the guard was either dead, knocked unconscious, or absent to miss the racket Arianna was making in the hall. A clang, then the door shuddered, and suddenly Ari’s makeup smudged and tired face appeared in the window.

  “Oh! So it’s true then, King Henry has finally done it. He always said he was going to lock you up and throw away the key one of these days, but I never thought I’d actually see him do it,” she quipped, the light bright enough for him to see her white smile, her hands clutching the bars.

  “Such a stellar wit for so exalted a personage,” Mason growled, painfully sitting up. He blinked against the light that came through from the hall, shielding his eyes until he adjusted. He heard Ari gasp, and he was about to laugh, expecting her to fall on her butt in the hallway, but all he got was the sound of sniffling.

  “Are you crying?” he asked, wary even though they were separated by the door. Crying females always made him want to run away. There wasn’t much that scared him, but a female and tears did it every time. And he couldn’t escape right now, he was locked up in a medieval cell.

  He was again thankful that his psychotic bitch of a wife wasn’t the type to cry, staying disturbingly dry-eyed even when faced with the most devastating of news. Nothing made that woman flinch, and sentimental she was not. For instance, she had yet to come visit him in his comfy prison cell, and he had no doubt she knew he was here. She just didn’t care. She was most likely hanging on his father’s arm, the bitch.

  “Why, for Saint’s sake, are you crying?”

  And she was. Big tears ran down her cheeks, a hand over her mouth, and she stared at him, eyes tracing over his bare shoulders and chest, obviously seeing the scores across his flesh from fist and scorching hot poker. He’d had worse, truly, but to the relatively sheltered eyes of Princess Arianna, he must be horrendous looking indeed.

  “Mason, tell me what is going on! This instant!” she demanded, furiously wiping away her tears, her angry response coming out to play when confronted by unpleasant news. “You’ve been hurt! WHY? King Henry said you were merely in here for a few days as punishment for letting Eddie sneak out, and he’d let you out once you told him where Eddie and his little pet were! What the hell is going on?!”

  He could continue to cover for this bastard of a father as he had for the last several years, or should he reveal the truth? It was the spoiled, erratic, and temperamental princess on the other side of the door who’d been misled the most by the King and his machinations, and she had no clue. Perhaps the truth would out, after all. Their family and kingdom were about to shatter, and Mason was so tired of carrying the lies that hid the truth around with him every-damn-day.

  The only member of their family right now who was stain-free was Edward, and he was blissfully unaware. His life was about to change, for better or worse, and he felt a twinge of regret. Perhaps Eddie would be better off if he stayed silent. But the dishonor of their father’s actions left them all marred, and those actions drove every decision made by the King since that fateful day the late Queen passed. With Eddie gone and Abe out of the king’s reach, it was now or never.

  He stood, pausing until he could trust his feet to remain steady under him, and he slowly made it to the door. He gripped the bars, face mere inches from hers, and he met her confused gaze.

  “Shall I tell you a story, dear sister? It is no fairy tale, there are no heroes….” Arianna’s eyes went round, and she nodded, captivated by the intensity in his voice. “It begins with a young princess from the faraway land of Elysian, sent to marry the young crown prince of Cassia, many long years ago. She brought with her a curse, and there was no true love to break it….”

  ***

  Percy

  Edward’s arm around his waist was heavy, and his bladder was complaining. Percy squirmed, and wiggled his way out from under his master’s arm, sliding from the bed, bare feet finding the chill floor. He gasped, but dared the rest of the expanse between bed and bathroom, darting in and shutting the door. He flicked on the light, glad that the light in here worked, if nothing else. Even when he lived at Heritage in his windowless cell, his space was clean and the commodities worked reliably. Here in this run down shack Reynard led them to, Percy was afraid one of his toes was going to be gnawed on by a rat or a cockroach.

  Percy lost track of how long they’d been on the road. The comfortable car Mason gave them was left in a place Reynard called a “chop shop”, and in return they were given the keys to an older vehicle, something Edward called an SUV. It was big and bulky, and the last row of seats was missing, but Edward filled it with blankets and told him to rest. The hours spent on the road was made bearable by the grocery bag of books Edward gave him one morning, titles Percy had never even heard of before by unknown authors, and he spent a good portion of the trip oblivious to the passage of time. He would look up on occasion, and watch the scenery as Reynard drove.

  The area closest to Cassia City was an odd mix of large palatial estates belonging to nobles, interspersed with densely populated towns Edward told him were “micro-cities”, places where the general populace settled on land not owned by the crown or a noble. Once outside the city limits, every spare patch of earth available was snatched up, and commoners were left with the undesirable bits. Percy asked question after question, Edward patiently explaining the history of Cassia as they went further and further away from the City.

  Centuries ago, the only people allowed to own land had been the ro
yals and those of noble blood, and the land around Cassia City in all directions for several days’ worth of travel via horseback was claimed, leaving nothing for the commoners. They were allowed to lease and rent land from the nobility and crown, and whole villages and towns were settled, but everything was still owned by a select few. No one owned the roofs over their heads or the land beneath their feet, and if the owners of the land wanted to evict the tenants, they needed no cause or justification.

  Percy listened, shocked on some deep level by what Edward was describing to him, and it was only in the last hundred years that things gradually changed. Individual, non-titled citizens were given the right to own land directly, and while the balance of power never shifted away from the upper classes, a strong middle class of merchants, traders, and entrepreneurs grew rapidly. Edward told him that is was at about the same time genetic engineering and manipulation became viable, and technology as a whole expanded by leaps and bounds, that the laws and systems of the Cassian government and culture began to change.

  Percy shook his head, clearing out his busy thoughts. He was weary still, but he made himself use the toilet. He checked the floor around the toilet for creep-crawlies before urinating, and he sighed in relief at the lessening of pressure on his bladder.

  Percy leaned on the wall in the small bathroom, wondering if he was brave enough to wander down the hall to the tiny kitchen and get himself some water. He would need to go to the bathroom sooner if he drank now, but he was thirsty, and his brain too busy to sleep. He looked back at the bed, and saw his master still sleeping.

  Edward had been tense and on edge the last several days. Percy lost track of time, but with each passing day Edward was tenser, warier, and the words exchanged between Reynard and his master were terse and clipped. Neither man lost his temper, nor did they speak to Percy with anything but care and affection, but the stress they were all under was wearing them down. Reynard was coping best, the former captain obviously accustomed to difficulty. Edward, while no stranger to hard work, was still very used to having servants and a staff take care of his needs, and Percy could see the subtle shifts in how Edward reacted to situations. Paying for things directly, having to ration resources and go out in disguise daily left Edward cranky, for lack of a better word.