If there were any justice in this world, that creature - Orb - would have taken the life that he wanted and Taereme would have been able to grow old with some fool that she loved as deeply as anyone could love. It wasn't enough that Orb had followed him, tormented him... Koe's brow drew down in a heavy scowl. What had happened on that ride? How had he come from there to here? The frightening fact was that he could not remember. Koe's memory, so perfect, had never failed him. But now he could not recall the tang of the air as he rode for something like safety or freedom. He could not recall the how panicked the breath in his throat, or how awful the knowledge of her death had been. Those pieces of information were fleeting in his mind. Vanishing without a trace. She wanted to know what was wrong, and he would tell her, but ... he did not feel sadness.
A loss, perhaps.
Guilt.
Sadness was not in it. He wanted to know that if he ever faced her again, in this life or another, that he could tell her he was sorry. That he could express... what? The horror of life had been her only companion. She'd said as much to him, and then it was proved true. Orb... his mind slid away from the subject again. On to something happier, someone happier. The warmth nestled against his arm. All of his magic for nothing. All of his attempts to kill for nothing. Was that the simple end to the fight? That he would never be able to best his adversary? That he would live - and die - alone, as was meant to be?
Minaht could have saved him from this fate if she'd been... and what of Iluq? Would she try to save him if she knew? Were her talents more oriented toward death and destruction? Would she stare that hateful fate in the face and make what she wanted of it? Koe did not want to ask that of her. He shouldn't be here. But here he wa,s and he was not in any hurry to leave. He wanted that smooth skin against his. Or barring that smooth scale, welcome scale. He wanted to share this with her. How disgusting that, being willing to put Iluq in danger for the sake of his own comfort? He should go. She felt it. She knew it. That something was wrong. That their conversation was less pleasant now than it had been.
She could not trust her prince, she'd said. She could not rely on him to keep her secret. Yet if he was this king's son, this king who had saved her - to whom she'd owed her life - than perhaps they had something in common invisible to her. Because she cared for Ithacles? Because she feared the reaction that he would display if he knew what she was? That thought stung most of all. He could not forget Taereme, or the guilt he felt. Or the fact that Orb had mysterious disappeared. But his chest ached most at the thought that she would bind herself to a mortal prince, no matter how fair, and no matter how much like his father the fellow was.
A prince she seemed to hate and love in equal measure.
"Nothing, nothing," Koe told her with another gentle chuckle. "Raccoon does not sit as well as it 'ought, I'm afraid. That's all, my lovely. You were about to tell me what makes your prince so unbearable."
His head turned back to her, and his smile had returned. Another skill one learned as a bard. The skill of acting, totally and completely.