The firelight flickered, casting wavering shadows across the camp. Soldiers murmured in low voices, laughter occasionally breaking through the quiet hum of the night. Horses shifted in their tethers, their hooves stamping idly against the damp earth.
Eric sat hunched by the fire, his wrists bound, his shoulders trembling with exhaustion. His body ached from the bruising ride, but that wasn't what made his chest feel tight. The chains, the hunger, the way no one looked at him as a person—just a captured prince, a thing to be transported and used—it was suffocating.
And Ryan.
He sat a few feet away, sharpening his blade, his expression unreadable. The same hands that had once held Eric in warmth now wielded steel, cold and distant. Eric had spent the entire ride clinging to the hope that something—anything—would break through that indifference.
But the moment Ryan had caught him—caught him effortlessly—that hope had shattered.
