#cauterizing

Kallah, encircled by enemies, looked past the foreigners and found his mother staring at him, eyes bulging with fear. “Kallah, help,” she whimpered as the man, bearing the colors of a general in the Jotuun army, held a blade to her throat. 

“Stand down, princeling,” the general said, baring his teeth in a mockery of a smile. 

Kallah tightened his grip on his swords, staring at his mother who held his gaze like her life depended on it. She kept mouthing please, begging for her life silently as the general watched Kallah, delighted by the pain he had caused thus far. 

Kallah knew there were too many people. There were too many soldiers around him for him to reach his mother in time. It was an impossible decision and she could see what decision he was starting to come to. She shook her head as desperately as she could with a knife to her throat. 

“No, Kallah, don’t, they can be reasoned with, don’t do it-”

“They can’t, Maman,” he said heavily, feeling heat well in his throat and eyes as he spoke. “I’m so sorry. I promise to take care of the kingdom. I’m so sorry.”

The general laughed as, with tears rolling down his cheeks, Kallah hacked through man after man. He did not see his mother fall, but he heard her body hit the floor.

………………………..

Toruk was thrown to the floor in the throne room, slamming into servants that were already on their knees. Toruk struggled to sort himself out without any help as the people around him remained frozen with fear and confusion. He finally got himself sorted out and looked up at the throne where a strange man sat, looking very smug about his position as he did so. 

One of the Jutunites that stood by the throne called, “All hail your new king, Lord Isaac!”

The Jotuunites lined along the walls cheered fervently as the new king by way of conquer stood up, smiling and holding up his hand. 

“Not just yet, my warriors. We have some loose ends to deal with.”

Another loud cheer went up as a side door opened, usually used by servants, and in came warriors with two bound people. They shoved the two forward, and the younger of them caught himself on his knees while the older slammed into the ground without the strength to keep from hitting his head off the stone. 

Toruk’s nose throbbed in sympathy as whispers ran through the servants. 

“King?”

“Is that the king?” 

“What have they done to them?”

“Are they going to kill the prince?”

“Oh, I can’t look.”

Toruk, surprised, strained to see a bit better and, sure enough, the prince, bloodied and stripped of his rank, knelt on the stone, his father collapsed next to him. 

The prince looked up swiftly as the general stood up, axe in hand as he made his way over slowly, as though he was putting on a show. The Jotuunites seemed to appreciate it as they cheered for their general as he stopped in front of the two monarchs. 

“I’m guessing you’re wishing you’d accepted our proposal to give us aid now, hmm, old man?” Isaac asked, nudging the king’s face with his boot. 

The king didn’t move and suddenly the dull thud that rang out as he fell echoed over and over again in Toruk’s head. 

Isaac frowned, kicking the king, rolling the man over in one movement. He stared down at him and clicked his tongue. “Well, you’re no fun, are you? I had a whole speech prepared.”

He lifted his hand and let his axe fall. 

Toruk couldn’t look away, the horrible crunch already printed into his memory as blood seeped across the ground. 

The prince screamed, trying to throw himself forward, but Isaac kicked him back. 

The prince writhed on the ground, trying to get his breath back, coated in blood, a new layer of his father’s fresh on his skin. 

The prince was terrified. He stared up at Isaac with absolute fear and horror. It made the prince human in all of the servants' eyes. 

Toruk desperately wished the Prince wasn’t human. 

Someone, in a shaky and warbling voice, sang the death prayer and others whispered along. Toruk didn’t have the courage to even look somewhere else for the fear of drawing attention to himself as the general dragged his gaze over the group of servants. He smiled and looked back down at the prince. 

“You are certainly more entertaining than your parents…. Perhaps I shall wait to kill you. We could make a festival out of it, hmm? Distribute flayed strips of flesh to your people as a gift?”

The prince shuddered on the ground, bruises starting to show on his ribs from where he was kicked. “Please,” he whispered.

“Oh? Please what?”

The prince looked away from Isaac, shivering again as he stared at a wall rather than look towards his servants, none of whom did anything to stand up and help him. 

Toruk blinked. Should he? Should he stand up? He ought to stand up. He should get up and rally the other servants and protect the prince. There were a fair amount of servants. Could they?

But they were not warriors and the Jotuunites had blades of all shapes and sizes. They were watching and leering over them all daring them to. 

But wouldn’t it be better to die while trying? Would it be better to reach the other side and say that at least he tried? 

His father had a broken leg. His mother couldn’t take care of the whole family by herself. His siblings would have to help and they couldn’t keep getting education. They needed him. 

His family or his kingdom? What sort of choice was that?

Toruk couldn’t decide, his legs beginning to cramp as he tightened them to get up and then released them as the fear rose up in the depths of his stomach and then tightened them as he tried to rally just himself to get up and-

They were taking the prince, dragging him out alive. 

Toruk, now dizzy, stayed on the floor. 

“I do think we deserve to celebrate, hmm?” Isaac asked, delighted. “This has been a very successful take over if I do say so myself. Where can we find the wine in this place?”

His eyes swept over the servants, waiting for someone to speak up.

“Well? Who’s in charge of that?” he asked, a growl in his tone as his warriors grumbled, lifting their weapons. 

In a flurry of motion, Toruk was pushed out of the group and fell to his hands and knees at the front of the group. He froze there, his hair in disarray and in his bloodied face as he felt Isaac’s gaze on him. 

“Oi, are you in charge of the wine!?”

Toruk swallowed and slowly sat back on his knees, keeping his eyes on the floor as he said, “I am the storeroom manager. The, uh, the wine is in the 8th lower storeroom. The stairs are, um, by the kitchens, sir.”

“Perfect! Kata, go ahead and take some warriors to break some of that out.”

Toruk nearly cricked his neck looking up to find Kata moving among the warriors like she was one of them. She avoided his eyes as she left the room.

“Good. You will all be serving me and my men as we celebrate tonight. And do not disobey us. Wouldn’t want more blood staining our floors now, would we?”

The servants murmured assent and Toruk, now the head of the group, nodded along with them. Coward. 

……………………..

Toruk stood behind Isaac, almost numb at this point. His nose still throbbed, and it bled on and off. He was feeling light headed and shaky and there was a pain in his shoulder that said it must have been wrenched at some point during the day, though he had no idea when as he had been manhandled so many times. It could have been from his first fall, or being thrown into the crowd of servants, or being shoved to the front so quickly and having to catch himself, or from the many times that one of the rambunctious warriors had thrown him, just because they could. 

He held a bottle of wine in shaky hands, now in the relatively safe job of pouring wine for Isaac every time he ran low, staring into the middle distance and just waiting for it all to be over. How much did the city know? Would their own warriors be coming to save them? Was the prince still alive? 

He couldn’t think about the prince. He was an idiotic coward and it would be his fault if the man were dead. The guilt was a small creature living in his chest, though he knew for a surety that it would grow when the numbness faded. He had no idea if he would be able to live with himself. 

“Alright, alright, tha’s ‘nough,” Isaac called, tugging at his beard. “You all leave now. Leave ta wine.”

“Sire,” one of his more sober guards called, “Do we wanna keep them all in the palace.”

“Yeahhhhhh. Have them branded so we cn tell them apart from ours, kay? On the wrist or sommut.”

Toruk stirred from his numbness, horror shooting into his gut. “Sir, please. You can identify us by our belts.”

Isaac turned and growled, grabbing Toruk by the sleeve and jerking him towards him. “Is tha’s so? If you’re so scare of tha, how’s this for ya?”

Isaac pulled out a knife and slammed it it through Toruk’s wrist, driving the blade into the arm of the chair. Isaac laughed as Toruk sobbed, hand around the hilt of the knife but too shocked and dizzy to get it out. 

Isaac jerked it out and Toruk fell to the floor, cradling his wrist, pressing cloth to it to stop the bleeding. 

“Serves ya right,” Isaac laughed before taking another swig of wine. 

It wasn’t until every one of the palace servants were branded that Toruk was able to scrape himself from the floor. No one argued with the branding after that. 

They did not get to go home. They were left to sleep in an empty guest room, the bed reserved for the old and the floor having to do for everyone else. They barely fit in the room, having to sit up as the night dragged on, leaning on one another to sleep. 

And after his complaint about the branding, Toruk still had to have his wrist cauterized by the cook to stop the bleeding. Stupid cowardly complaint. Not brave enough to stand up and cowardly enough to try and wriggle out of pain. Toruk didn’t have much more time to berate himself after that before his exhaustion and numbness dragged him under. 

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