Soldier, Brother, Sorcerer. Morgan Rice

anything to stop it.

      “You need to be able to prove the truth of it. The whole truth.”

      It had taken so much of his father’s strength to say those words. It had been so important to him, in that moment, that Thanos be able to prove that he was the king’s son. Perhaps he had seen a way to undo some of the damage he had done in his life. Perhaps he had just seen the damage that Lucious might wreak given real power.

      Thanos groaned at the thought of it all, sunlight streaming in through his dreams, while pain pushed them back more physically. Even so, his father’s voice lingered.

      “Felldust. You’ll find the answers you need in Felldust. That’s where she went after I…”

      Even in his dreams, there was no conclusion to those words except the blank staring of his father’s eyes. There was only the name of a place, a hint of a journey that might tell him everything.

      If he lived long enough to make it.

      Consciousness came back to him, and the full weight of the pain came with it. Thanos felt as though every part of him was bruised bone deep. He could barely lift his head, because it felt as though it might fall to pieces just with the effort of it. He knew from experience what broken ribs felt like, and far too many other places felt nearly the same.

      The guards who had beaten him hadn’t held back because of who he was. If anything, it felt as though they had hit him harder for it, either stung by the scale of his supposed betrayal or wanting to show that they weren’t on the side of their rebel prince.

      Thanos managed to sit up and look around. The world near him seemed to shift while he did it. For a moment, he thought it was some trick of the pain, vertigo caused by the blows to his head. Then he realized that he really was moving, vertical bars of iron providing a constant reference point as his movement made him set the rest of the world swinging.

      “A gibbet,” Thanos murmured, the words feeling thick in his throat. “They’ve hung me in a gibbet.”

      Looking again confirmed it. He was in a cage shaped like the ones some dainty noblewoman might have kept a bird inside, but this one was large enough for a man. Barely. Thanos’s legs dangled down between the bars, although still well above the ground, thanks to the short chain attaching the cage to a post.

      Beyond, there was a small, enclosed courtyard. The kind of place that might have been used by nobles about their sports, or where servants might have gathered for the kinds of tasks that were likely to be unpleasant. Drains in the cobbles showed where blood or worse could be washed away.

      In one corner, guards were erecting a gallows platform, not even bothering to look over at Thanos. They weren’t putting together a simple block for a beheading, either.

      Thanos gripped at the bars in sudden anger. He wouldn’t be caged like some beast waiting for slaughter. Wouldn’t sit there while men prepared to execute him for something he hadn’t even done.

      He shook the bars, testing them, but they were strong. There was a door with a lock held in place with a chain, each link as thick around as Thanos’s thumb. He tried it, looking for any weakness, any way of escaping from the confines of the gibbet that held him.

      “Hey! Hands away from that!” one of the guards yelled, lashing out with a stick that cracked across Thanos’s knuckles, bringing a gasp of pain as he tried to hold back the urge to cry out.

      “Be as tough as you like,” the guard said, looking at Thanos with obvious hatred. “When we get done with you, you’ll scream.”

      “I’m still a noble,” Thanos said. “I have the right to a trial before the nobles of the Empire, and to choose the manner of my execution if it comes to that.”

      This time, the stick cracked against the bars, just a handbreadth from his face.

      “King killers get whatever’s decided for them,” the guard snapped back. “No quick axe stroke for you, traitor!”

      Thanos could see the anger there. Real anger and what seemed like a sense of personal betrayal. Thanos could understand that. Maybe it even meant that this man had started off as a good man.

      “You believed things could change, didn’t you?” Thanos guessed. This was a huge risk to take, but he had to, if he was going to find a way to prove his innocence.

      “I thought you could help make things better,” the other man admitted. “Then it turned out you were working with the rebellion to kill the king!”

      “I didn’t kill him,” Thanos said. “But I know who did. Help me to get out of here, and – ”

      This jab of the stick struck him hard in his injured ribs, and as the guard drew it back for another blow, Thanos tried to find a way to protect himself. But there was nowhere for him to go.

      Even so, the blow didn’t land. Thanos saw the guard stop short, lowering his stick and then dropping into a deep bow. Thanos tried to twist around to see what was happening, and that set his gibbet spinning.

      By the time it finished, Queen Athena was already standing in front of him, dressed in mourning black that made her seem as though she could have been his executioner. Guards crowded around her, as though afraid that Thanos would somehow find a way to kill her the same way they believed he’d killed the king, in spite of the bars of the cage.

      “Why is he hanging there?” Queen Athena demanded. “I thought I told you to simply execute him.”

      “Begging your majesty’s pardon,” one of the guards said, “but he wasn’t awake, and it takes time to build an execution fit for a traitor like this.”

      “What do you have planned?” the queen asked.

      “We were going to half-hang him, draw out his entrails, and then break him on the wheel to finish him. We couldn’t just kill him quick, after all he’d done.”

      Thanos saw the queen consider it for a moment, and then nod. “Perhaps you’re right. Has he even confessed his crimes yet?”

      “No, your majesty. He even claims he didn’t do it.”

      Thanos saw the queen shake her head. “Foolishness. He was found over my husband’s body. I wish to speak with him, alone.”

      “Your majesty, is that entirely – ”

      “Alone, I said.” Queen Athena’s glare was enough that even Thanos felt a moment of pity for the man. “He’s secure enough in this cage. Hurry your work on the gallows. I want the man who killed my husband dead!”

      Thanos watched as the guards moved back, well away from him and the queen. Certainly well out of hearing distance. Thanos had no doubt that was deliberate.

      “I didn’t kill the king,” Thanos insisted, even if he guessed that it wouldn’t make any difference to his situation. Without proof, why would anyone believe him, let alone the queen, who had always disliked him?

      For a moment, Queen Athena’s expression was set. Thanos saw her glance around, almost furtively, as if worried about the prospect of being overheard. In that moment, Thanos understood.

      “You already know, don’t you?” Thanos said. “You know I didn’t do this.”

      “How would I know a thing like that?” Queen Athena asked, but there was an edge to her voice as she said it. “You were caught with my beloved husband’s blood on your hands, standing over his body.”

      “Beloved,” Thanos echoed. “You only married the king because of a political alliance.”

      Thanos saw the queen clutch her hands to her heart. “And we couldn’t come to love one another?”

      Thanos shook his head. “You never loved my father. You just loved the power that being a king’s wife brought you.”

      “Your father?” Queen Athena said. “It seems you found out a lot more than you should, Thanos. Claudius went to a lot of trouble to hide it. It’s probably just as well you’re going to die for this.”

      “For