Adri felt raw panic as Vrath released his hand and began speaking with the other adults who had joined them from the hermitage.
He had heard and smelled the jungle, and the overwhelming sensations he felt now were despair and terror. The past few days had been tolerable, even enjoyable at times, because of his uncle’s and brother’s presences. But though Shvate would remain with him at the hermitage for the duration, he already sensed that his brother did not share his fear and loathing of the wilderness; if anything, he heard and sensed joy in his brother’s voice and words when he spoke of it. Shvate loved the forest. Adri very much did not.
On their journey to the hermitage, Uncle had said he would not intervene to help if he and his brother encountered trouble, yet on at least two occasions, Vrath had either aided Adri or prevented him from harming himself. And, now, in a few moments, Adri would be left here in this desolate, forsaken wilderness, and the last adult protector in his life would leave him. Leave him and go back to the city, to the palace, where he would reside in comfort and security. While Adri stayed here, in the stark, savage clutches of the jungle, this living, breathing thing that pressed in on all sides around him, like a herd of wild fanged beasts wanting a closer sniff to gauge the weaknesses of this blind two-legged prey.
A moment of utter despair washed over him.
He turned to Vrath, sensing his uncle preparing himself for departure, and said in a voice half-choked with desperation, “Please, Uncle, please, take me home to the palace. Don’t leave me here. I want to go home with you. Please take me.”
He heard the startled silence that followed his pleas, the sharp intake of breath from his side, and knew that everyone, including Shvate, was surprised and disappointed at this outburst. Most of all Vrath, who had repeatedly urged them to always show restraint of emotions and reactions, as a warrior and a king always kept his true feelings to himself lest they be used as weapons against him. But Adri couldn’t help it. He couldn’t bear the thought of staying here for days, nights, months . . . maybe even years? Impossible.
“Adri . . .” He heard the patient tone in his uncle’s voice and knew that he was supposed to understand from that single syllable that this was no way for a prince to behave, that he was a Krushan, heir to the great dynasty of Hastinaga, inheritor of a great legacy and responsibility, ruler of the civilized world—an emblem of Krushan law. The world looked to him for guidance and governance. He could not burst out begging and crying thus.
And yet, for the next several moments, that was all he could do. He was, after all, barely nine years of age, suddenly removed from all the comforts and luxuries to which he was accustomed, sent far away from home, and was now being forced to live the life of a warrior hermit.
He begged, he cried, he screamed, he howled, and finally, when Vrath reluctantly but firmly tore him loose from the leg he had latched onto, he heard the pain and sorrow in his uncle’s voice as he said, not without sympathy, “Be strong, child. All things are hard in the beginning. Give it time. You will adapt.”
And then, with a strong stride and without a backward glance (Adri sensed, for he could sense such things without the benefit of sight), his uncle was gone. Back to the pathway several miles away where they had left the chariot to negotiate the densest part of the forest on foot, and thence back to Hastinaga, a good three full days’ and nights’ ride from here. Five hundred miles? A thousand? Two thousand? He did not know. It did not matter. He was far enough from home that he may as well have been in the netherworld, among the Nagas, or in the lower realms, where urrkh roamed like mad demons eternally. His family had left him here.
He was forsaken.
“Adri,” said his brother’s voice in his ear as he stood, desolate and bitter of heart. “Adri, do not fear. I am with you, brother.”
But in that moment of black despair, bitter-hearted at being abandoned in this desolate forest against his will, Adri felt a sudden surge of anger at his beloved brother.
Without thinking about it, he shoved Shvate away with a fierce push.
“I don’t want you! I want to go home!”
He regretted the action and the words as soon as they were committed. But he knew that there was truth in them too—his heart’s pure naked truth. He did not want a brother’s help. He wanted his home, his family, his protection and security.
He wanted his mother.
But she had abandoned him long ago.
She had let go of his little hand even before he could walk on his own.
She no more cared what happened to him than she cared about what happened to a deer roaming these jungles.
She was the first to forsake him. Uncle Vrath was the next. Soon, Shvate would forsake him too.
In time, everyone would.
It was what people did. They made you want them, need them. Made you trust them, love them. And then, when you needed them most, they turned and walked away, shaking off your hand.
In that moment, Adri’s handsome face coiled and twisted, his tears stopped, his sobbing ceased, his heart drank its own bitter juices, and he vowed that if the world could be this cruel to you, if even those whom you loved most, the woman who had birthed you herself, could forsake you, then he would learn to be cruel as well.
He would show them.
He would show them all someday.
And he let the hermits lead him into the hermitage without another word of protest.