[LitF] 21. We Three Do (Patreon)

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Arthur and Sophie eventually came back to themselves and realized they were making out in front of two old people.

They felt very awkward, untangled themselves, and stood side-by-side, holding each other's hands.

Tamara was still kneeling, and Graham had appeared and stood a few yards behind the head maid. The former still had her head lowered, and the latter was looking sideways.

Arthur opened his mouth to speak, but Graham beat him to it.

"This is what I was talking about, sire," the grand knight said. "Your willpower is strong, but that doesn't mean being incapable of change. Your beliefs and perspective slowly shifted over the years you spent isolated in this dungeon. Now, all your willpower is used to do things against your previous mindset."

Arthur frowned, his now-quelled anger returning in force. "I'm doing things, Graham? Yes, I suppose I am. And how terrible those things are! I dared to kiss a girl! You aren't even wrong about the mindset. Children don't crave romance. How horrible of me to dare to grow up!" he said sarcastically.

"You have one thousand vitality points, milord," the grand knight replied. "And already, you have given Brimstone a taste."

Sophie clenched Arthur's hand in fright. "I didn't hurt him! I swear!"

The prince's frown deepened. "I don't have a single injury, Graham. She didn't consume my blood. Stop spouting nonsense."

"White blood cells, Your Highness," Graham stated.

Arthur paled as he recalled his biology lessons. There were white blood cells in his saliva, in negligible quantity as it might be. Sophie also understood it. Her skin was naturally pale, so she did not change, but she clenched his hand harder.

"I..." the prince started weakly. "My father allowed it. There must be a way."

"Which way is that, my prince? Are you willing to part with Brimstone if you don't find it? Or were you so overwhelmed by emotion that you didn't consider the consequences of your actions?"

Arthur swallowed. He looked at Sophie, who looked back scaredly at him. No, terrified. She had been scarred for life by the episode on his tenth birthday.

And that was the greatest issue, as Graham pointed out as he kept speaking, "Four cups of your blood, Prince Boria, any kind of blood, red or white cells, and it'll rekindle Brimstone's vampire blood. That requires a lot of kissing, but I'm sure you two are anxious to reach that mark. And then what?

"Then, you'll see her turn into a bloodlust monster incapable of ever stopping. You'll see her throw away everything that makes her, her, and be willing to do whatever it takes for her next meal. You'll have to kill her, or she'll kill you first. Then, she'll kill everyone nearby because a vampire controlled by bloodlust can't see reason. They can only take control of themselves by consuming the blood of a higher vitality than the strongest they have ever tasted, but any blood gives them a fleeting moment of comfort from the craziness. Every single living being with blood around them is nothing but walking food. After you, she'll not stop until she tastes blood with at least 1,001 points of vitality. I assure you that she won't find it in her first victim.

"If she's not stopped but does find such strong blood in time, she'll become capable of rational thought again. Then, she'll conclude that the less terrible path is to start trafficking and hunting living beings to drink from. As you know, it's much easier to find strong beings of the Fated Races than monsters outside dungeons—and a vampire outside won't go into a dungeon. Even so, that is the best-case scenario. It'll give us all time until she can't find find suitable food any longer. Then, she'll become a walking calamity. She'll consume her neighbors, city, and country. She might consume the world. And all of that because you 'grew up.'" He spat Arthur's words back at the prince with absolute contempt.

Every sentence that came from Graham's mouth made the prince feel worse. Arthur didn't care about himself, but he did about subjecting Sophie to that. At the very least, they might need to part, which also sucked.

All because of his egocentrism.

All because he had become angry at his dad.

He had grown so much but still behaved like a damn child.

And Fate! Sophie comforted him despite how terrified he could see she was!

"Archie, I wanted it, too!" she urged. "We're both at fault. Don't blame yourself. Please!"

There was urgency in her voice. Whatever she saw in his eyes—the mortification, fear, anger, or whatever—made her deadly worried for him.

Suddenly, something fell on the floor beside his feet. Arthur looked to find a thin black cloth with white magic runes.

"A blood-repealing loop, sire," Graham explained, his voice still filled with contempt. "It repeals external blood that comes an inch away from the wearer. It won't stop a targeted effort, but even a randomly thrown bucket of blood can't pierce through the enchantment. Most use it as a headband, wristband, anklet, or choker."

A confused Arthur raised his eyes to the man.

Why did the knight need to limit his vitality if there was such a thing?

The man replied as if guessing his thoughts, "It's prohibitively expensive, milord. Beyond my and my wife's means in our youth, and her father wasn't willing to lend us the money. He also made sure no one did. After I became a grand knight and got enough money, we invested in finding ways to bear children instead. My entire life was shortened for being born too poor."

Graham left two words unsaid, but they still rang loudly in the ensuing silence: unlike you.

The man had sacrificed himself for love. Arthur had almost sacrificed the woman he cared for—or the world.

As his eyes returned to Sophie, he understood once and for all that wisdom did not mean maturity. He was willing to let everyone die for his first sweetheart.

He hated himself. Hated and felt so ashamed. He was repulsive, odious, egoistic, and unworthy of the very air he breathed. He couldn't stand the thought of being himself.

Arthur glanced at the room that led deeper into the dungeon.

It would be better for everyone if he just disappeared. His father would be able to stop hoping for a level 100 warrior as reinforcement that wouldn't come. The three people in the dungeon would be allowed to leave and return to their loved ones without waiting another year. Sophie would be free to find someone who cared for her instead of only himself.

The prince was done with being a failure.

He was done with being himself.

Tamara insisted in their talks that even a level 90-something mage would still be important for the war and that he was valued for more than his martial strength. For his mother, maybe. But only because she also hoped for his triumphant return instead of a prince willing to destroy the world so he could kiss a girl.

Tamara also said one's worth didn't matter at all. Everyone was entitled to keep living and seek happiness within the boundaries of the law. Well, he had disobeyed a Royal Decree. He had failed on that, too.

Arthur recalled the queen's words after he had returned from his training under Stinson.

"My boy is... gone?" she had asked with tears.

And his father's on the day of Arthur's awakening.

"You disappoint me," he had declared.

Both had made amendments, but nothing changed the fact that he had been disappointing them for a very long time. That's just who he was.

And now, he had hurt Sophie, too.

Arthur was done with that—and he even disappointed himself with his cowardice, pride, and egocentrism. For he had decided to die, but he wanted dragons to be the ones to do it.

He stepped towards the next room—

—

—

Sophie's two trembling hands held the sides of his head. She stood before him, crying. "Archie, look at me," she pleaded desperately. "Look at me. I'm here. Everything will be alright. You made a mistake, but it's alright. There's a way out." One of her hands left his head and touched the black choker on her neck. "See? I'm fine. Everything is fine. Everything will be fine. We can do this. You and me. We forgive you. We three do. It's alright. I'm alright. Stay with me, please. Please, don't abandon me. Not after you made me so happy. Please, I beg of you. Please."

The prince frowned. When had she put the choker on? She tried to turn to look at the floor, but she pulled his face back to her.

She was strong.

"Archie, please. Please! PLEASE!" she wallowed in misery. It was such a heart-wrenching, piercing cry that it brought Arthur's full attention to her. "Look at me," she pleaded, sobbing. "I'll be fine. You'll be fine. We can do this. Together, you and me. We can run if you want. But please, stay with me."

"Why—" he tried to speak but found his mouth dry. He frowned, wet his lips, and tried again. "Why are you crying?"

"Oh, thank Fate!" she rejoiced, briefly kissed his lips, and hugged him tightly. "I was scared I would lose you. So scared. Thank Fate. Thank Fate."

Still frowning in her arms, the prince looked around and saw a warzone.

Almost the entire building made of wooden plates had been destroyed, and some of it was still burning. All his disks, swords, spheres, and needles—a new stealthy addition—were deployed, many blooded. He wasn't where he recalled being a moment ago. Instead, he was a dozen yards from the next room.

Yet his weaponry was deployed against this room, which had scorch marks and bloodstains everywhere.

And limbs. There were cut-off limbs on the ground, too.

Armored ones.

An unconscious Graham had been thrown hard enough against a wall to form a crater in which his body had been embedded. Well, what remained of his body. He was missing a leg and an arm, and what remained of his armor was broken or twisted.

The kneeling, panting Tamara fared better—that is, if the other armored warrior in the room was Tamara. He guessed so. His Mana Sight let him know they were female by the format of the energy in her body and a biomancer by her mana's green color.

Her armor was silvery metal with black details. Most of it—breastplate, pauldrons, couters, vambraces, gauntlets, greaves, sabatons, and so on—had traditional forms if more eye-catching and beautifully crafted than most battle equipment had any right to be. However, instead of cuisses protecting her upper legs, metal plates had superimposed on her maid's uniform to create a wide protective dress. She wore a silver helmet that looked like a mix of a grand knight's with a royal guard's.

Although not as injured as Graham, she was far from healthy. Her right foot was missing, and she had a huge gush on the right side of her body, where her pauldrons had been torn apart, and her internal organs were visible. Her left hand was carrying a black and silver tower shield that was violently bent inwards. Its broken metal pierced her gauntlet, vambrace, and flesh, leaving her arm broken and bone exposed. Her right hand wielded what remained of a broken spear.

Arthur wasn't stupid; he could tell what had happened at a glance, even though he didn't recall it.

He had done that to them.

Immediately, his body was filled with terror as he looked back at Sophie and checked on her.

Thank Fate, her white and golden maid's uniform was spotless.

Sophie hadn't stopped crying as she looked afraid at him—not afraid of him, but for him.

"What have I done?" the prince asked, shocked.

Sophie pursed her lips and shook her head as she approached again. She didn't want to answer. She just wanted to hold him tightly.

Arthur let her and returned it tightly this time. He had never felt so loved. He had been responsible for all that, yet Sophie only wanted to stay by his side because she feared he might leave otherwise. Which also made him feel guilty for giving her reason to believe so.

Looking at his still rotating disks and floating weapons—which he now let go of, and they fell on the ground with loud clangs—it was obvious that he had been keeping everyone away. Graham and Tamara had tried to approach or stop him but failed miserably. Yet, Sophie had braved all dangers to get to him.

She had risked her life for him.

That was all he needed to know about her loyalty and the threat she represented to the world. If that woman one day decided to betray him, he deserved it.

Tamara stood up using her remaining foot. The noise called the prince's attention to her. He didn't let go of Sophie but held her in the air as he turned his body to look.

The head maid let go of her damaged spear and shield, and took her helmet off. Her face was not as he recalled. She was thin, looked a little younger than middle-aged, blond, blue-eyed, and had pointy ears. She was an elf, and her face had been a fake, except for the angry scar that marred her left cheek from eye to chin.

She stared at him, and Arthur saw overwhelming terror in her eyes.

"Are you back to yourself, Your Highness?" she asked. Her voice confirmed that she was Tamara.

"Yes," he replied, full of shame. "What happened? Why don't I remember it?"

"You decided to die, Your Highness," she said.

The prince shivered at the revelation.

After around fifteen hundred points of mind stats, one's willpower became strong enough that if they decided to commit suicide with their entire beings, they did just that right then—or close enough. They shut their minds down and unconsciously pursued the physical completion of their idealized way to die. They would see it through to the end, no matter who or what stood in their way.

While he considered the implications of her words, a nearby, bloody sabaton floated to Tamara. The metal was torn and cut through, like the foot inside. Indeed, a moment later, a floating foot came from the inside, and the sabaton fell. The limb moved until it reconnected with Tmara's leg stump, then green mana started reattaching it. Green mana was also acting on her torso injury and broken arm.

"I..." he started but didn't know what to say.

Tamara gave him the clarity he desired without his need to ask. "I noticed the signs on our sessions, Your Highness. We treated your early worries, but they didn't just disappear. That's not how mental health works. You are surrounded by death almost all day, every day—death brought to monsters from your own hands. Grand Knight Graham wasn't lying when he said it changes the killer, even if monsters deserve to die. For twelve years, you have known nothing but training and killing, pursuing a goal that feels so far from you. You can't stand this place or lifestyle any longer. I deemed it safe for you to keep going for another two to three years; the grand knight and I even made our lessons longer to give you a longer resting time. But when you added that to the emotional turmoil from reading the Royal Decree and the self-loathing from finding out you could've caused Sophie's downfall, you saw no way out. What was already bad would only get much worse, maybe for life. It triggered a chain reaction." She shook her head and looked at the fallen Graham. "He should've known better. I have cause to believe he did this on purpose, Your Highness. I urge you to investigate it."

Arthur was astonished. "Are you serious?"

She nodded. "I'm almost certain, Your Highness. Grand Knight Graham had no chance against you, but I'm level 50 and tried to stop you as much as he did. He fought as if he was injured. He must've broken a soul vow, the one about protecting you."

The mention of her level made Arthur instinctively inspect her. Indeed, instead of a level 20 human, he saw something else altogether.

| Elf — Level 50

However, the prince focused on her words about Graham. "He betrayed me?" He didn't know how to feel about it, much less what to think.

Tamara opened her mouth to speak, then paused, closed it, breathed, and said, "Your Highness, as you now know my true identity and I have been given clearance from His Royal Majesty, I should report to you as a battle maid, not a maid. I should've done it earlier, but habit and circumstance saw me put my persona on. I beg your forgiveness."

Arthur frowned again. What did her persona have to do with anything?

The battle maid's next words explained it.

"I have spied on the orders Grand Knight Graham received today, Your Highness. Among them were excerpts from multiple prophecies His Royal Majesty purchased. They were about your future in this dungeon and after you left. The vast majority agreed that you would inevitably despair and seek death. Grand Knight Graham was instructed to push you towards despair if you decided to pursue your relationship with Sophie within a week of receiving your Royal Decree and hadn't reached level 100 yet.

"Supposedly, it would happen anyway, sooner or later, and now is the safest it can get. You and Sophie's feelings are much stronger now due to the stimulation you both received and the novelty of your relationship, which is how you regained your reason. There was only a tiny chance of it failing. His Royal Majesty meant it as a preventive measure. As I already taught you, with enough mind stats, those who step into the abyss but find their way back seldom ever let themselves go there again."

His father had bought prophecies about Arthur!

Awakeners who picked the time element were called chronomancers in the League dialect. Only rarely did anyone have an affinity with it. It was tricky to use and required prohibitive amounts of mana to affect the physical world. The few who ever went to the battlefield only cast a few spells—admittedly powerful ones that could change the tide of war—before leaving.

Most chronomancers chose the seer career instead. They spied on the future and wrote prophecies about what they had seen. Such predictions were seldom precise, as the future was ever-changing, and different seers saw different things; after all, magic was affected by one's knowledge of the laws of nature.

However, if you asked the same seer to look into someone's future enough times, then compared it with divinations from multiple seers, you could eventually unveil the most likely events. The issue was finding enough seers, time affinity being rare as it was. Many possible futures would always go unnoticed.

So, it was a probabilities game, not something set in stone. Anyone who wanted to pursue knowledge of the future needed to spend a lot of money, and even if they prepared for everything that had been foreseen, they might still fail in the end.

Many did it regardless. Some matters were too important. And in hindsight, the king seeking prophecies made sense. The prince reaching level 100 was too important for the war.

It still made him a little depressed; only Charlotte had truly trusted him blindly, it seemed.

On the other hand, if there were prophecies and the king still sent Arthur in...

There was a chance. Even if it was a small one, he could reach level 100. He felt more certain of it than ever before.

The manipulation irked him, though. He had severely injured Graham and Tamara! What if he had killed them? What if he had killed Sophie?!

His father had no right to do that to them...

Except he had. He was king, and they were his subjects. He used them as he saw fit for the benefit of the entire country.

Regardless, it left a terrible taste in the prince's mouth.

Tamara wasn't done. She hesitated but decided to move on with her report. "Your Highness, that was the main reason you needed a beautiful woman of your age who passed loyalty tests by your side in this dungeon. Don't take it wrong; Grand Knight Graham and I were ordered not to interfere unless you tried to consummate your relationship before the right time. From what I read in the letter the grand knight received, only a few prophecies suggested you would fall for anyone while in this dungeon, and even fewer that she would fall for you. When we think of Annie, it makes sense. There was only a tiny chance of it happening, yet it did, and His Royal Majesty was ready for that. By forcing you to despair in a mostly controlled environment, His Royal Majesty might've saved many people. If you reach level 100, decide to end yourself, and someone objects... Some of the prophecies mentioned it. No one wants that to happen."

The prince, once more, frowned. As usual, that made sense. As usual, he still hated it.

"Sophie," he said softly, "I should help Graham heal." She hugged him tightly, and he caressed her hair. "I'm alright. Thanks to you, I'm alright. But I'll need to stop hugging you now, okay?"

She said or did nothing for a while. Then, she nodded and slowly let go of him.

He meant to keep her in a half-hug as they walked, but she hugged his left arm with despair instead, as if letting go would mean losing him forever.

Arthur froze. He was still wearing a first-class sorcerer's robe, which felt like he was naked. As the situation's confusion, shock, and tension dissipated, he couldn't help but notice that Sophie's curves were firmly pressing his "bare" arm.

He swallowed and started walking.

Moments later, his worry about that intimacy was proven misplaced. He felt stimulated, but it was nowhere near how much his high vitality had made him feel. He could easily deal with it.

Although it sometimes didn't look like it, he had a lot of willpower.

His issue was steering it in the right direction.

"Wait until I'm done with my injuries, Your Highness," Tamara said. "Your Life Share skill will help Grand Knight Graham, but reattaching a limb requires specialized spells or skills. He also needs blood. I know a spell to help his body produce more, and Sophie can help, too."

Arthur nodded but didn't stop walking. As he approached, he prehended a few dozen metal spheres from the floor and pulled them behind Graham. He pulled the knight out of the wall and balanced him on the orbs to gently lay him on the ground.

He then started removing the man's armor—with his hands since the metal was enchanted.

The black plate was bent almost everywhere. Removing it wasn't easy, but patience got Arthur there. Soon, it was revealed that Graham wore his civic duties clothes below his armor, unlike the casual attire he had worn when he sat by the bonfire. He had multiple bruises and broken bones.

The prince sought the man's limbs next. He found the arm nearby, but the leg was close to one of the entrances to another room. The upper half was three, but the lower half was missing.

"Do you have a spell to regrow limbs?" the prince asked his head maid.

Tamara shook her head as she approached the fallen knight. Her torso injury wasn't fully healed, but it had stopped bleeding, and the still-visible internal organs were no longer damaged. Her foot was also reattached, though she was limping. Her arm wasn't twisted at an impossible angle any longer, but flesh and blood were still visible through her torn skin. She had only done first-aid healing for now.

Fortunately, while she had shaken her head to his question about limp-regrowing spells, her words were brighter.

"Grand Knight Graham should have a potion, Your Highness. They are rare and expensive, but I doubt His Royal Majesty would've sent you into this dungeon without a single potion. You might not convince the grand knight to drink it, however."

Arthur shook his head as he grabbed the man's upper leg and brought it to Tamara. She put it and the arm in their places. Then, she touched Graham, and green energy started healing him.

She didn't need to touch the knight to use her magic, but while an intent string cost negligible amounts of mana, biomancers learned to only heal from a distance if needed. That little mana they wasted to treat a patient from afar might be the difference between life and death.

"You can help me heal him now, Your Highness," Tamara said.

The prince complied.

Whether skills required touching the target was literally up to Fate. No scholar had managed to guess what factors were involved.

Life Share required him to touch his target. So, he crouched—which was weird while Sophie was holding him and crouching together—touched the man, and activated the skill.

Five body points per second started disappearing from his stats. Graham instantly gained a boost of over 700 points of vitality that would continue for as long as Arthur kept the skill going.

Soon enough, the limbs had been reattached. Tamara went further with the knight than she had with herself. Bruises and broken bones also healed, and except for the missing lower leg, the man became good as new.

"You can stop now, Your Highness," she said. "Sophie, help me replenish his blood."

The prince stopped his skill and pulled his hand back while Sophie touch Graham's arm. Her crimson mana entered the knight's body.

"This should be enough," Tamara said after a while. "I could wake him up, but resting will be better for him. Sophie, help me now, please."

Sophie nodded, and soon enough, Tamara's injuries were also gone.

Then, she removed her armor piece by piece, put them into her spatial storage, went back to also store the dropped sabaton, shield, and spear away, walked to Arthur, and knelt.

She had returned to the position she had been in when Arthur left the building.

"Huh?" the prince asked.

The head maid said humbly, "Your Highness, urgent matters took me away from this duty, but I'm still supposed to explain a battle maid's purpose and rules to you."

Arthur looked back at Graham, then to the destroyed building. Nothing remained of four beds. "Before that, do you have a spare bed for us to place Graham on?"

"Yes, Your Highness," the head maid said.

Moments later, the grand knight was resting on a bed, and she revealed what battle maids were.

= - = - =

In a single word, battle maids were counter-spies.

That was their primary function, not fighting. They still trained as defensive knights, though. At level 50 and aided by outstanding equipment, they could withstand heavy hits. They also packed a punch.

Level 50 was a significant mark. That was the pinnacle and end of a battle maid's awakener life. They were meant to reach that far for the extra element but were forbidden from going a single level further.

The skill they used to hide their level lowered their true level by 30 at the S-tier, and palace rules prohibited any servant from going beyond 20 to avoid issues—including spies using that skill. Skills that direct interfered with Fate were unique in that their strength exclusively depended on their tier, not stats.

That battle maids had at least one S-tier skill to hide their race and level showed their importance.

Sophie had learned the same skill. Previously, whenever Arthur inspected her, he saw an almost level 15 vampire that had been progressing steadily. Now that she had deactivated it, just like Tamara, he could see she was level 33.

Arthur had leveled almost three times as her, but he had spent years pursuing achievements to become stronger before attacking his first monster. He was also built for war, while battle maids were spies first, doctors second—they needed to be biomancers or bloodsingers—and only then, defensive warriors. Moreover, he spent a lot of time killing while she had been forced to fight monsters only when he wasn't looking.

So, her level 33 was astonishing. Graham had said he also hadn't known the truth. Even he hadn't detected the two women's escapades to level up.

As if afraid that Arthur wouldn't find her level impressive enough, Sophie said apologetically, "I mostly leveled up before you reached level 30 yourself. After that, it took forever to sneak past thousands of level 35-plus monsters and get to a room where Lauquenbur could take the brunt of their attacks. I also take much longer to kill monsters than you do. Then, we had to come back before Graham found anything wrong. There were too many close calls. I stopped leveling altogether after you reached level 43."

As a battle maid, Tamara had a single goal: protection. She didn't care about anything else as long as it didn't affect that goal, so Arthur could use her skills however he wanted.

"I almost always stay by your side," she explained. "When the palace was attacked, I was investigating House Alfair under His Royal Majesty's command. We never expected the palace to be so unsafe, Your Highness."

In general, a battle maid would also refuse to leave the city charge was in. They also wouldn't leave their side for more than half a day.

"Almost always? You traveled with me, Stinson, and Charlotte?" Arthur asked, surprised.

Tamara smiled proudly, "The hardest part was passing through the return portal unnoticed, Your Highness."

After explaining her job, she explained why her race had to be hidden.

"Elves live three times as long as humans, Your Highness. We train a lot before awakening to ensure we'll reach at least level 50 by the time we can no longer use extension stones. No one would believe a level 20 elf was by your side. It would either mean I'm too young—and thus wouldn't be allowed to leave my enclave—or that I wasn't what I looked."

"How old are you?" Arthur asked.

"One hundred and seventy-five, Your Highness."

The prince was surprised. She looked around thirty. Elves aged well.

"How about your husband?" he continued his inquiry.

"A spy like me, Your Highness. I would visit sometimes. We had a complicated relationship for a while, but it was dead and buried much before I came into this dungeon."

"I think I got everything," the prince said at last. "Can you stand up now?" She had refused to while she explained things.

"Do you forgive me for my lies, master?" Tamara asked in return.

That was the first time she called him master, and she also did it seductively. There were multiple hidden meanings behind that. Not only was she accepting him as her master once and for all, but their relationship was also transforming. She was behaving like a poorly trained new servant who would test boundaries until he firmly set them all down.

Sophie tensed and hugged his arm more tightly.

Tamara chuckled. "Sorry, master. Sorry, Sophie. I wanted to do it at least once." Then, she smiled widely. "But I approve of it! Protect your man from all threats, girl! Everyone can be a rival, no matter how much you like them or they like you! Prince Boria is too great a catch for you not to feel threatened!"

Arthur frowned. "Stop this at once," he commanded. "I won't have you or anyone fueling Sophie's or my insecurities."

Tamara's smile softened but didn't die down. She bowed her head again. "I apologize, master."

The prince shook his head. "I forgive your lies, but not what you just did. Not yet. You knew what you were doing. Behave well in the next days, and I'll consider it."

"As you should, master," she said softly.

From her words, he guessed she had also been testing him and his relationship with Sophie. "And stop any tests related to Sophie and me, too," he added.

"Your will is my command, master." She was much more serious now.

Arthur nodded. "Alright. Go wake Graham up. I have something important to say. Sophie, let me go for just a moment, please. I need to do something."

Sophie compiled unwillingly.

Tamara didn't hesitate. She stood up and waved her hand.

Graham opened his eyes.

He looked confused for a moment. Then, his eyes widened as Arthur immediately knelt down. The prince could no longer see the man's reactions after that. Arthur prostrated himself on the ground, his forehead touching the floor and his open palms turned up.

Like a supplicant.

"I beg your forgiveness," he said, finally letting his tears of fear, shame, frustration, and gratitude—so much gratitude!—come and fall freely. "All three of you. I'm so, so sorry."

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