Take Me Away

Chapter summary: Shandaar and Kieran spend a few nights in the desert, while trouble arise at Kadessa castle and between Kordell and Karali...

Author’s Notes: I tend to distance myself from what’s going on in Kadessa, as well as with Ethan… not that saying “Oops we missed him again” will do much to the story >_>’. This chapter is short, once again. There’s going to be more smut in the next one though… *grins*

Take Me Away
Chapter 13 – Reality Bites

And to Ystar Oasis they were headed for. It had been therefore agreed that Raya and Dagmar would stay together later on in the carriage, while Shandaar and Kieran were to slow down and relax for two or three hours before moving again. This way, if people were following them, they’d be spot and maybe dealt with right away.

The silver-haired man seemed rather numb about the recent events. Not only there had been the rape, which made him think over his relationship with Kieran even though he still loved him, but there had been changes… physical changes. He was aware of the scars he should have, yet didn’t. He had mysteriously healed over a few hours, and it stressed him. Why couldn’t he be normal, for once? Why wasn’t Kieran mad at him? He’d have all the reasons in the world to do so… and most importantly, why had he enjoyed part of it? That was the hardest question to reply to. Rape or not, it was sex with another male, and it turned him on. Maybe deep inside, he longed for domination and control. But he had wished he had been consenting to it.

Wait… that didn’t sound right. It would have meant cheating on Kieran! He couldn’t have done this, no! He couldn’t even THINK about it without feeling guilty. At the thought, he shuddered and his eyes watered, wondering why it was happening to him. He had tried being a good guy… he had tried being careful about not falling in love with other men than his lover. He loved him so much, yet this encounter had triggered so many things inside him. Yet he couldn’t bring himself to tell the raven-haired man about it all. No, he couldn’t, else he’d lose him. And that’s the last thing he’d needed. At worse, if Kieran didn’t like him anymore, maybe the two others wouldn’t, and would either leave him here or worse… send him back to Kadessa.

“Something wrong?”

No, he didn’t want to go back there. It would turn out to be hell if the whole population discovered about him being gay. The rape itself was a significant problem, and the fact he could lose it all because of it was very present in his mind. Plus he felt guilty for hiding things from Kieran. The fact he was down, unable to focus on anything. He felt weak, something he wasn’t used to, and something he would never get used to. “No Kieran… I’m fine. I’m just a bit tired. That’s all.”

Sitting on the horse, in his boyfriend’s arms, he leaned further, remaining quiet. He wished for all of this to end quickly. Not his life; although he’d maybe come to it if his whole world would fall. But he knew better. Despite what he thought, he knew Kieran wouldn’t leave him, and would help him recover instead. He could see the man worry for him, which was another thing he felt guilty about. He wasn’t used to people worry for him and constantly asking how he felt… sure he liked attention, being a rich prince, but he was a man himself, not some kind of China doll. He could fight. And he’d show that he could survive it all! Yes he would!

The time to separate came rather quickly. They’d meet at Ystar Oasis in about two days, if nothing happened during then. The giant axeman and the thief were somewhat reticent about leaving Shandaar behind, even if he was accompanied by Kieran, while the latter was clinging to his lover like there was no tomorrow. Apparently he’d be able to take care of him.

Raya was probably the most worried of the group. She looked up at the silver-haired heir and frowned. “What if everything goes wrong and you’re stuck there alone? It’s not like Shan is in a state to fight-“

“I’ll do fine” he replied calmly. “Don’t worry about me. Everything’s going to go fine.” Even Shandaar himself didn’t seem to believe what he just had said. If he was going to fight, that surely wouldn’t be going to be his best combat ever. The only thing he really felt like was sleeping. Sleeping, waking up and everything being a dream. But he knew that everything was very real, too real to his liking.

“Ok good. If we don’t see you at the oasis an hour after you should be there, we’re going to find you back. I seriously don’t want anything to happen.” Dagmar nodded and had the caravan moving again, with the pink-haired young woman waving in the back. This made the prince smile. She seemed so innocent, yet wasn’t at all.

Kieran kissed him gently before climbing off the horse and walking to a rock and opened his arms to let the younger man close to him. “What are we going to do while we wait?” he asked, looking at the black eyes that were scanning him, making sure he was still alright, almost like a thief would do for a jewel, touching it and taking it out to be sure it was still there.

“I’d suggest we’d sleep, but with the sun and what we have to protect ourselves from it, I don’t think it’s a good idea. Maybe you’re in the mood to talk…”

What was there to tell beside the obvious? “Do you think you can wake me up if I choose to sleep? I’m tired already…”

The raven-haired man nodded and gave him another quick kiss. Shandaar crawled to the other man’s right side, wrapping himself up with his arm and let his head fall on the muscular chest beneath him. Reality was quickly catching up to him, and reality was known to bite quite hard sometimes. However, now that he was alone with Kieran, he was starting to feel a bit better. He could hear the man’s heart beat and breathing while fingers ran in his long silver hair. ‘I love you… Kieran…’

-

Kordell and Karali’s faction was ready to leave as well. Of course they’d have to go through Gurrensha -once again for Radwan- and then move on to the oasis. From there, they’d catch up with Shandaar and company, catch the prince and head back to Kadessa. All of that before they’d reach the border to Magdos in the best case. They had lost people earlier, but fortunately, they had gotten support of another small group that had decided to move to Nael a while ago.

The plan didn’t fit to everyone, although. Kordell simply wanted to get his hand on the prince as fast as possible, which would be as soon as he found them, but Karali wanted to wait until the other group would be less stressed, especially the prince himself, since he could be rather dangerous. And what had Radwan said about him only made them worry even more.

On his horse, the blue-haired spearman was holding Xylon close to him. The other was bandaged over his chest and arms, and seemed picking up on the vitality and sex drive. Still, his companion had insisted that he remained calm and try to rest instead than to fight. “I swear… it was freaky. And I’m not usually freaked easily. Plus look at what he did to him” he said as he referred to the smaller guy. “Kordell’s right, we can’t keep him on the loose too much. The next thing we know is that-“

“Then let him calm down. Radwan, I’m starting to think raping princey was the best idea. Now the gang’s gonna be after us-“

“Before us. They’re BEFORE us.”

The female leader rolled her eyes and balled her hands into fists. She wanted to hit her twin so much… “Kordell, shut up! That’s not the point. Now they’re fucking nervous. If we catch them now, we might not last. They’re going to count on their instincts.”

It was the red-headed male who started screaming right after. “Yeah but they’re weaker! Princey’s almost down. We take him and we head back to Kadessa and continue playing bad guys! We’d have an advantage!”

“You don’t get it, do you? We’re NOT taking them on right now. You can be such a prick sometimes…”

“Yeah but most of those times, you like my prick inside your pussy.”

“Whatever. Let’s go” she ordered, getting on her horse and speeding off. Along the way she mumbled to herself, annoyed by the brother/boyfriend/sex toy combo she had for co-leader. “Yeah, let’s see if he survives. Let’s see if WE survive. The problem with him is that he’s a stubborn asshole… okay I’m stubborn too, but my plan is better. MUCH better. We have better chances of capturing him when they’re not gonna be in defense mode. Because that’s probably all that they can think off; to protect that poor little rich pretty boy serving as a prince for Kadessa. He’s the next king! Oh please… get your senses together, Kordell!”

-

Meanwhile, at Kadessa castle, things were going as just wrong. After the Rekenian king’s departure, pressure hadn’t actually gotten down. On the opposite; everyone was agitated and even the queen was nervous. They hadn’t heard much of the other country after… yet it might have been safer like that.

Now and then, they’d have news of Ethan and the other groups that were gone searching for Shandaar and whoever had taken him away from the castle. Their traces had been found by the prince’s personal bodyguard, while other teams also claimed they had found him. One even had come back with a fake prince. Strangely the boy looked like the heir, but there had been something in his eyes… No, this couldn’t have been him. In the end they didn’t end up rich, but ended in the dungeon. Giving false hope to a mother missing her child, the Queen at that, wasn’t something that they should have been very proud of.

When a royal guard entered the throne room, saying that he had message from the Reken king, everything stopped. He carried the sealed message to the queen, his head bowed in respect, and handed it to her. “They have said that it is very important.”

She took it and opened it right away. This surely didn’t mean any good… maybe they had cancelled the wedding.

Judging by her silence and the look on her face, however, it was worse. She seemed rather surprised by what was written on the piece of paper. She knew that King Rasham was a direct man and his attitude had proven her right a few times already, just like for the wedding announcement.

Following the recent events, we have no choice but to impose an ultimatum. Either you find the missing prince, or we will be forced to act… in this case, prepare for a war.

Couldn’t be more direct than that indeed. And what if they found Shandaar dead? It wouldn’t be better… it’d get King Rasham furious, seeing that the Kadessa empire’s army couldn’t even be able to find their own prince, and the marriage would be officially cancelled. As if the relations weren’t even bad for the start, it’d be a war. And a bloody one. But the queen couldn’t dispatch the whole army right now, else they couldn’t withstand an attack from the next kingdom. And yet, “surrendering” had never been a word in their vocabulary. If they got in war, they’d fight.

-

Hours passed slowly under the heat in the desert. Kieran thought he was going to do mad, with Shandaar’s body over him. He had tried to sleep, and had removed a part of his clothes to cool himself, but that wasn’t effective. The silver-haired man, however, was so deeply asleep that he had wondered if he wasn’t unconscious. He poked the prince and about twenty seconds after, he stirred and opened his eyes before closing them again, apparently still sleepy. But when he realized that the sun had moved, anyways according to the shadows created by the stones here and there, he poked him harder. “Come on… wake up. We’ve gotta move back again.”

“Ugh… already? It’s been what… fifteen minutes?” the youth asked, rubbing the sleep off his eyes as he sat in the sand.

“About tree or four hours… I think I finally had dozed off. Better make sure no one stole anything.”

Shandaar looked around himself; everything seemed to be alright. The horse had lied in the sand as well and seemed to be waiting for the lovers to get up. “Something tells me we should find a water spot for the horse” he said as he walked toward the animal, gently petting it. “It might dehydrated and if he does, we’re next. It’s a week walk. Our water supplies won’t stand.”

“Oh don’t worry. It’s going to take a few days max for Dagmar and Raya to find us. Plus horses are rather resistant… of course camels would have been better, but you gotta do with what you have.” The raven-haired swordsman was right.; they wouldn’t have to wait a very long time if they got lost, and following a straight line to the west was probably one of the easiest things.

The prince was the first one on the horse and helped his mate up. “Anyways I doubt we’d have both fit on a camel…” This time he sat behind him, his arms wrapped around his torso and leaning on his right shoulder. “I’d have had to sit on you. Not that it’s a bad thing when you look at it.” In answer Kieran chuckled, tugging on the reins so the brown animal would start moving for another while.

“Hey, why don’t you sleep some more? In a hours I’ll let you up front and you’ll command, while I sleep. This way we’re going to get to Ystar faster, it’s gonna save us about eight hours or so.”

“Good idea. Might as well do that.” The problem is that sleeping on a horse was a different thing than sleeping in a bed or in the sand. They were constantly moved around as the animal made it’s way around or sped up on long distances, so Shandaar had gotten less sleep than usual. Still, he let his boyfriend try to sleep as well. The latter found it less hard to sleep though, being used to travel around in this fashion. It would have been a cute sight, but the prince knew that he had to keep an eye in the direction they were headed.

They came to a halt at what they could guess was around eleven at night. It was a small oasis; nothing like Ystar was according to Kieran. A few animals ran around, but no fish; the bigger mammals must have had those ages ago… if there ever was some. Their supper consisted of some meat that the silver-haired swordsman couldn’t identify and barely dared to ask it to his lover. His gaze got to a snake, and he prayed that what he was eating wasn’t a reptile. It was only when he was done with his plate that he asked. “What was it anyways?”

“Snake meat. Pretty nourishing and filling. Why?” When he looked at him, he almost laughed out loud from the face. Nope, royalty wasn’t used to such meals.

“Well… don’t count on me to eat more of that… anyways for now.”

For the rest of the travel, he didn’t eat much except from a meat sandwich – not snake – and preferred to drink instead. After all, he had almost gotten sick after his last meal and didn’t want to repeat the experience he had. Shandaar felt like he had taken enough risk in this country… while Kieran ate all the way, keeping fruits and nuts for his younger lover.

“You’re not dead yet… so it can’t be that bad. And we’ll be there soon, about an hour…”

With a sigh of relief, the prince hugged his lover once again.

-

It had taken some time for the two remaining members of the team to find an inn that wasn’t full. Ystar Oasis was probably the most populated city of the Nael Kingdom. To most of the travelers, it was some kind of tourist attraction: an oasis in the very middle of nowhere. Nomadic tribes often stopped there to replenish their supplies and to trade with strangers. The area had also a reputation established for religious affair. Many councils met there annually and discussed important points, as if to avoid war.

The moment they got inside, they started to worry. Where they doing fine? Could they have been attacked by bandits or monsters? Maybe they were lost by now… well they had no idea. Although, with two strong men like Shandaar and Kieran, they doubted that the attackers would have stuck around for too long.

Raya sat on one of the bed, twiddling with her fingers. She didn’t like not knowing what was going on with her friends, and that made her nervous. “Let’s go back…” she trailed to the bearded man, who stood at the window, waiting for their arrival.

“Don’t worry, pipsqueak. They’re gonna be safe… I hope. Well they better be, else I’m killing whoever came back without the other one” he mumbled, annoyed. Maybe in the end they shouldn’t have had separated. On the other hand, they needed to be sure that they weren’t been followed from too close, to prevent another ambush attack with more disastrous upcoming events. The first one had bad repercussions already.

After two hours and a half of waiting, Dagmar finally got up and left the inn. The streets were empty already; the sun at set a short while before they got in the city. The inn they had chosen faced the oasis itself. Green was now everywhere around, and yet they could see the tall sand dunes from there. It was quite a change from the desert… and from Kadessa too. Maybe when the trip would be over he’d bring his wife and kids there; it was definitively a place where they could live. Sure it was far from his home country, and there probably were other areas he would say the same.

The bearded man continued on the street, taking deep breaths as he walked, sometimes lifting his head at the stars. His family was probably watching it at the same time. Yes, he missed them and couldn’t wait to get back home to tell them what had happened. He could always write a letter, but that would ruin the surprise! The thought of his children laughing and smiling at the idea that their daddy had travelled that far makes him smile as well. All his worries were gone whenever he though of them.

Once he reached the outskirt of the town, he scanned the area, as the moonshine was helping his vision… and made him think he should be getting glasses. It was blurry from afar, but he still managed to figure something out. And that something was moving toward them. Could it have been Shandaar and Kieran? The thing sped up an in a few minutes, they were meters away from the axeman, who let a sigh of relief. Both men were safe. “Well guys, congrats. Glad you’re alright.”

The prince smiled and let go of his lover for the first time in hours so that he could get off. “Thanks, Dagmar. We were forced to stop at some point else we’d have been caught up with you. And we were really tired.”

“Well that’s good. You still made it faster than I’d have thought. Anyways. Did you see other people around?”

Kieran shook his head from the animal, and made it move a few steps forward. “Nah. I suspect they’re taken another road, or left after us. I’m gonna get the horse at a stable and I’ll join you at the inn. Which one is it?”

“The one right there” the blonde declared as he pointed to a big white building. “There’s still light in our room, as you can see. Raya’s waiting for us there. I think she ordered food.”

With a light chuckle, the silver-haired swordsman started to walk in the right direction, thinking about his last meal. “I’m going to go over there and get something to eat. And not a sandwich or snake meat… Are you coming, Dagmar?”

“Yep. And what’s wrong with snake meat?” he asked, shrugging. It wasn’t his favourite, but he rarely missed an occasion of eating it.

“You know, it’s called royalty.” Kieran chuckled too and led the horse to the nearest stable. “At least tonight we’re gonna sleep in decent beds.”

~ TBC ~