Soft and Hurt

All her life, the knowledge attached to certain items simply presented itself to her by virtue of physical contact. Even barely brushing against an object, especially one with the weight of history, was enough.

But what was happening to the knight was different. The knight wasn't an object; he was a person. The princess had never received visions from touching another person before.

She'd never tried, but why would she want to? It was bad enough learning things she didn't want to know about a jeweler by virtue of owning a tiara he had made. That day in the storm had been the first time she intentionally picked up something and desired information from it.

And the knight's sword, always by his side, serving him in many a duel and battle, protecting him and his liege for years, had been all too happy to oblige.

The knight was not an object, no.

But he was being used as one.

Perhaps the princess could use that.

The runes on the knight's wrists were the starting point. The part most directly affected by the sorcerer. The sorcerer who had forged a connection with the knight against the latter's will.

A bridge.

The princess pictured the sorcerer in their red robes, face hidden in the shadows beneath the hood.

It was dark in the vault, the lantern finally going out, but the princess saw---or perhaps imagined---a faint glow stemming from the runes on the knight's skin and in the frost on the floor.

It mattered not. She closed her eyes and envisioned a glowing thread between the knight and the sorcerer. It was white like the stars, one end clutched in the sorcerer's unseen hand, the other tied around the knight's throat.

In her mind's eye, the princess reached out and grasped the thread.

And suddenly the sorcerer was no longer imaginary.

"---so close!" They snapped, voice echoing strangely. "So close, and now you whimper on the ground like an insolent child throwing a tantrum."

The knight didn't answer, but the princess suspected they'd been having the same argument the entire time he'd been inside the vault.

"You're supposed to be honorable. You agreed to my proposition, and yet you cower when the end is in sight?"

The knight shuddered, the markings suddenly growing cold to the touch. "This is honor," he hissed through gritted teeth.

The sorcerer laughed. "Your loyalty truly runs deep. But they cannot save you. Only I can do that, and I require the relic---"

"That's enough," the princess said.

The sorcerer flinched, and the princess felt their attention shift from the knight to her, as if sensing her intrusion upon the connection for the first time.

"What are you doing here?" They demanded, and like that day in the storm, their voice quavered slightly. The princess had thought she imagined it, or that it was from fury at being interrupted.

But now, she realized, it wasn't anger.

It was fear.

"I am here," the princess said, "to take back what you have stolen."

The sorcerer scoffed. "You hope to undo what has been done? Even I cannot, and I was the one who cast the spell!"

"Perhaps, but you can dispel your connection, can you not?"

The sorcerer hesitated.

In that moment, the princess saw the truth in her theory, even if they refused to speak it.

The knight straightened. "Answer the lady's question!"

"I will answer how I see fit."

"They can't lie," the princess whispered, almost to herself. "They do not want us to know the truth. So why not lie? No, they must talk around it, hint with cryptic half-truths, or not speak at all. But never a lie."

"Reading about my order, have you?" The sorcerer chuckled softly, the sound devoid of true mirth. "Then know I speak the truth: I will not let him go. Not until I have what I desire."

An image popped into the princess's head, a memory that was not her own: a round object, small enough to fit in her palm, the exterior made of silver and encrusted with jewels.

The princess flinched and instinctively let go of the knight's wrist. Her perception of the connection vanished, and with it the sorcerer's presence.

But the image of the object remained. The princess slowly wiped her hands on her shawl, as if that would cleanse her of the intrusion. She should have expected something like that; she had opened herself up to another's mind, after all. But it didn't stop the memory from seeming tainted.

She opened her eyes. The vault was still shrouded in darkness, but the runes on the floor still glowed with an inner light, bathing her, the knight, and her brother in a soft, cold glow.

The prince watched her with wide eyes. "What happened?"

The princess gave him what she hoped was a reassuring smile and got to her feet. Her eyes fell on the broken mirror on the ground, the edge still crimson with the knight's blood.

Silver.

Silver in the mirror.

Silver in the object---the reliquary, it had to be---that the sorcerer sought.

A pure metal.

A valuable metal.

The princess' own tiara was silver, as were many pieces of jewelry passed down for generations in her family.

Many such pieces that now resided in the vault after the princess refused to wear them.

"Wait here," the princess whispered.