EnglandxReader~Finding Face~Ch 7

Finding Face~Ch 7~

Arthur was not in a good spot. He was hungry. His hair was a mess—it had traces of "kowalla" fur in it. He was tired. His wrists hurt. His parents were dead. His brothers thought he was a traitor. ___________ was somewhere else. Dotriba was plotting something awful. Above all else, the one person that could have been helping him at the moment was refusing to do as such.

"For the last time: could you please see if you can untie me?" he growled through his teeth that were clenched together from all of the frustration that was building up inside of him.

"It won't do you any good when they find out I helped someone like you," Tim said stubbornly.

"Really now?" Arthur snorted. Tim was testing his patience, and it was already growing thinner and thinner by the second. "In all seriousness, Tim, why are you here?"

"I told you already: I've got nothing to say to you," Tim replied simply.

Arthur let out a heavy sigh. He knew none of this was going to be easy, but now, it was anything but simple. What in the world could Dotriba want to do with that shambled province in the first place? Even his parents had taken little interest to it, but then again, he didn't hang around them too often after he took up the position of a common soldier.

Well, he thought. I'd better find a way out of this place, myself. If Tim doesn't want to do anything, that's his problem—not mine. With that, he began searching around for something—anything that particularily didn't belong. Perhaps it would be like that one time ____________ had escaped from the royal guards and found herself in the throne room though he hoped that if he should find such a passage, it wouldn't lead him to the throne room. Gilbert was clearly the last person he wanted to be seeing right now.

~~~~~

"Scottie, we've received a letter from Dotriba," Cailean said holding up a sealed letter to his older brother and almost-inaugurated king.

"Fuck," Allistor cursed. "Anything from Dotriba is bad news, ain't it?"

"Read it and find out," Cailean said with his arm still extended towards his brother.

Allistor took the letter and broke the seal to see what sort of ill contents it held:

"Let's see…" he mumbled and began to recite parts of the letter out loud or to himself. "Gilbert Beilschmidt….marriage…blah blah blah…the attendance of our parents…?"

"But Scottie," Cailean began, "our parents are—"

"I know that!" the short-tempered redhead snapped. "That's something ye don't need to remind me about." He continued to read the letter. "Invitation…Present to us the province of Chottsym?!"

Even Cailean was confused. "Chottsym?" he wondered. "Why on earth would anyone want that province? We're really not going to give it to them, are we?"

"Nay, of course not," Allistor replied with a frustrated expression. "But if we don't, Dotriba will invade us."

"Why are they acting so rashly?" Cailean asked horrified. "Don't they know that Thursaunia will back us up if they do?"

"There's another problem," Allistor said. "The reason they want our dead Ma an' Pa to go to their kingdom is so they can witness the marriage of Thursaunia's Elizabeta Héderváry an' Dotriba's one and only Gilbert Beilschmidt."

Cailean could not believe his ears. "Are you saying that Thursaunia and Dotriba are going to be unified?" he asked for clarification. "If that happens, then the only chances we have are with Crodinia, and those chances are more than slim."

"I know, I know," Allistor sighed. "What's worse is that the inauguration is going to be after the wedding."

Cailean groaned and brushed back his strawberry-blonde hair. "I am really not looking forward to this. It won't be long before the world finds out that Mum and Da are dead."

"Ye think?" Allistor snorted sarcastically. He wasn't looking forward to any of this shit either. Not only that, but Cailean was the only one with him: Arthur had left the nest, Logan was off finding the rascal, Peter was off in Crodinia and Dylan had left to Thursaunia just recently.

"Help me out here, Cail'," the stressed-out redhead said. "We're in a jam here. Ye know as much as I do, aye?"

"More than I'd like to, Scottie," Cailean sighed.

~~~~~

"…And so there I was: face-to-face with the most enormous dingo you ever did see!" Logan exclaimed spreading his arms out wide to emphasize the size of the beast he was describing. You had never seen a dingo before, and frankly, you didn't care if you ever did see one. But out of sheer boredom, you pressed him to continue.

"And then what happened?" you asked as if that was the password to unlocking the rest of Logan's story—which it practically was.

A smile spread across Logan's face. It must've been really lonely going off into the wilderness without so much as a soul save for a cynical "kowalla" latching onto your leg.

"So then," he continued, "I was stuck between choosing to face the dingo bare-handedly or jumping off the cliff down to the sharp rocks below."

"So which did you do?"  

Password unlocked. "Neither!" Logan beamed. "I waited for the dingo to charge at me, and then I hurled him over my head and tossed him down to the rocks below! Brilliant ain't it?"

"Clever," you replied. You were lacking in the imagination and vocabulary departments so you could only say so much.

"I'll be damned if it weren't," your travelling companion said proudly. He changed subjects. "So how about you? What's your story, _____________?"

"There's not much to tell," you admitted. Everything that was anything interesting had just recently happened within these few days—not even a week yet. But, like all good stories, they had to start somewhere, so you made the best of it starting from the very beginning:

"I met Artie a while ago when I was doing my daily rounds as a thief…"

You were starving. And when you were starving, you would resort to stealing—not that there was any other way of getting food when you were a thief on the streets. You never stole enough so that a piece of bread or a ripe fruit would be missed, but you never stole enough to get full, either.

Your meals were just enough to keep you alive. That's all you did: keep yourself alive. Perhaps it was human instinct, or perhaps it was just the built-in desire to keep going, to see the next sunrise. You had never bothered to ask yourself why you chose to survive. You were nobody. People could have gone by and missed you—save for the people you stole from and actually knew a thing or two about facial recognition—since you were so insignificant, a loose thread on the tapestry of society. Actually, scratch that. To call yourself a loose thread was overdoing it; a loose thread stood out. Then, maybe you were that one speck of dust that lay of the tapestry that wouldn't get blown away or dusted off no matter how hard one would try. Yes, that was more like it.

But still, you lived. You hadn't realized it until recently, but perhaps Arthur was right: all you needed was that opportunity to see what you were capable of. And that moment happened when you decided that one particularly unnormal day, you wanted some meat.

-----

"…I really don't see why you're over here, Arthur," the young prince's comrade said shaking his head. "You should be back inside the castle with your brothers, learning through books, getting fat on ale and meat. Anyone with a brain would want that."

"And anyone with that sort of brain would die a boring and early death," Arthur snorted and continued to patrol the streets. He had told his captains time and time again to not give him a higher ranking based on his status as a prince. Even when he had actually earned the privilege of becoming a royal guard or a captain, he had refused the offers for he knew that the higher he went, the less work that had to be done.

Why exactly does the bloody system work that way? he wondered as he turned a corner separating from his comrade as he scanned the other side of the block. None of it really made sense: those who were considered to be at the top should have had to work much harder to maintain their positions, but instead, it was the lesser ranks, the people who were fair and easy game to the fat cats of the army and royal guard that had somehow earned those privileges. Had Arthur not turned down those very things, he would have turned into one of those fat cats, himself, and that was not what he wanted.

Well, today, he was going to really see what sorts of "exciting" things were in store for him being an underdog because from the moment he turned the corner into the alley that sold freshly smoked meats and spiced sausages, he heard the sound of something that required his upmost attention:

"Stop, thief!"

-----

Okay, so you had successfully gotten the meat, but now there were two men on your trail.

"It's just a piece of meat!" you cried as you ran for cover. Things weren't exactly looking up. At least you got some meat out of it. Now all you had to do was run away and wait until the heat died down. If you were lucky, the meat vendors wouldn't recognize your face in a month or two when your meat craving had kicked in again. But, as your rotten luck would have it—the type of luck that would make moldy apples look fresh—some ungrateful bugger stuck his foot out and tripped you. Your face hurt, but that was the least of your concerns. You had dropped your meat. You had dropped your bloody (cooked) meat.

"Alright, who did that?!" you shouted and looked behind you to see who was responsible for making you lose the meat that you had carefully tried to snag. Well, the meat wasn't exactly lost—it was more like, "passed on" to another person—make that the person who had tripped you. It wasn't the type of person you had been expecting, either.

"You're the one who stole this, love?" the soldier asked holding out your perfectly fine piece of still-steaming meat. You could smell it from the ground, and your stomach was beginning to grumble.

"Yes, and I deserve it," you said with a sharp, cutting tone that revealed your frustration. "So give it back."

The soldier raised one of his enormously bushy eyebrows; they looked good on him for whatever reason.

"I'm afraid I can't do that, love," he said and began to toss the hunk of meat from one hand to the other mocking you.

"What sort of sane person would toss around a perfectly good piece of meat?!" you cried angrily and began to jump up and down trying to snag your stolen good back; it also looked like the vendors had lost you.

"What sort of sane person thinks that a soldier will even try to give back something that a civilian stole?" the soldier asked with a smug grin on his face.

"You—!" You lunged forward and knocked down the unsuspecting soldier and made a grab at the piece of meat. The soldier had his other hand on his sword, but he didn't draw it. In fact, he looked rather amused that you were trying so hard to get something so simple as a piece of meat.

"Give it back!" you demanded.

"How far are you willing to go for this, thief?" the soldier smirked.

"Far enough to know that I will get it back!" you snarled. "For your information, I've been looking for a decent piece of meat all day! You can't just come in and grab it from me!"

"I sure as hell can," the soldier chuckled and ripped a good chunk of the meat off with his teeth and began to chew much to your horror.

"Now you've done it!" you shouted and began to beat your fists down at the soldier whose mouth was still full of meat. All the while, he was staring at you with his glowing green eyes in an amused expression on his face. He was actually enjoying this, and it wasn't fun—for you, anyway.

When he had successfully finished the meat and gotten away with a few bruises, the soldier just laughed the whole incident off and offered to buy you a piece of [favorite fruit] to make up for eating your stolen good. It wasn't meat, but you were willing to suck up your pride for a day and take what you had to survive. While you were eating your new and honestly purchased piece of fruit, the soldier took some time to chat with you. It was all rather strange.

"So what's your name?" he first asked.

"Why would you want to know?" you countered back with a question.

"So I can recognize you when I see you again," the soldier said.

You frowned. "You're just saying that so you'll call out my name and share it with your buddies so they'll all know I'm a thief."

This only made the soldier chuckle. "Then how's about I give you my name so you can tell your thief friends that I'm a good soldier?"

You frowned again. "That's stupid. Everyone can tell you're a soldier—and not a very good one since you haven't arrested me yet. Besides, I don't have any friends."

"Ah, so you're a lone thief then?" the soldier guessed.

"Most of us are," you said. "It makes stealing easier."

"I'm Artie," the soldier said.

"I never asked for your name!" you spat.

"I gave it to you, anyway," Artie laughed.

You grumbled under your breath and continued to eat the remaining pulp of your [favorite fruit]. When you finished, you couldn't find yourself leaving. There was something interesting about this soldier that was different than the rest. He appeared honest and clean unlike the ones who would arrest a man just for getting an old vegetable peel on his tunic or something trivial like that.

"So why don't you arrest me?" you asked.

"Because I don't feel like it," Artie answered simply.

"I don't understand."

"Simple," Artie said casually. "I just don't feel like it."

Back to square one. You tried a different approach. "What would it take for you to arrest me?"

"What would you be willing to do?" Artie asked.

"I'm the one asking the questions here!" you snapped.

"I'm just giving you the answers I see best," the messy-headed blonde soldier chuckled.

You let out a heavy sigh and answered in defeat. "The most I'd be willing to do was to steal a good piece of meat like the one you stole from me only a few minutes ago."

"Well, if you feel so strongly about that, then perhaps I should arrest you for committing your highest rank of intended crimes," Artie suggested.

"No!" you said quickly. "If it means arresting me, then I'd be willing to punch a soldier in the face before stealing."

"Alright, then I won't arrest you until you punch a soldier in the face," Artie smiled. He was a strange fellow.

"You're a strange fellow."

"I've gotten worse compliments," Artie admitted.

You frowned. "That wasn't a compliment."

"Are you going to tell me your name?" the soldier asked.

"Where did that come from?"

"Me," Artie answered. "Weren't you listening?"

You tossed your hands up in the air in complete defeat. "That wasn't what I meant!" For crying out loud! You couldn't keep up with this guy!

Artie laughed. "You know something, thief, you're a very interesting girl."

You only grumbled.

"Tell me something: why do you steal?"

"To survive," you answered.

"That's it?"

"What else is there to say?"

"I don't know."

You rolled your eyes.

"Have you ever thought that perhaps your place just wasn't really fit for you? Like you were made for something better?"

"I don't have the time to be thinking like that," you said in a low voice. Artie was just as interesting—interesting in a confusing way.

"Then, you are not really alive, are you?"

"What?"

"You heard me the first time, I'm sure," Artie insisted.

"Yeah, but I don't understand what you mean."

"If you have not found a purpose to live, then shouldn't you be better off dying? You're not doing society any good, are you?"

"I'm still here."

Artie arched his eyebrows with fascination. "That you are, thief."

"Stop calling me that," you growled. "I have a name, you know."

"You never told me it," Artie reminded you.

You swore. "It's ___________."

Artie laughed again. "See? Was that really all that hard?"

"I guess not…" you admitted.

"I enjoyed having this conversation with you, ___________," the soldier said getting up.

"You're leaving? Just like that?"

"The amount of work I'd have to deal with when arresting you is too much," Artie yawned stretching his arms above his head.

Oh, you thought. So he's just lazy.

"I'll be seeing you around then, _________." With that, Artie just up and left.

"Don't be too sure about that!" you yelled after him.

"Oh, I'm sure, alright," Artie laughed. He dissolved into the crowd a few seconds later. You dissolved, too.

-----

The people passed by him as if he were a phantom. He was Arthur Kirkland: fourth in line to the Kirkland Throne that ruled over the grand kingdom of Brysogwig. These people couldn't give a damn about him. They didn't even recognize him.

It's going to be impossible to work my way up to the top, Arthur thought. He had given up that goal a long time ago. But even so, there were personal reasons for keeping him completely tied to his family unlike Logan who had disappeared one day without so much as a letter bidding everyone farewell to the kiss-my-arse world.

Arthur wasn't on great terms with his brothers, but he had the side that cared for them, too. In fact, perhaps all of his brothers were like that in some form or another. Logan just wanted to be free; he cared, too.

But the life of a prince was suffocating. He was no more than extra baggage, an insurance policy that only came into play when an accident happened. Well guess what? Not one, not two, not even three accidents had to happen before he was called into the picture. Four accidents had to happen. Three insurance policies would have had to fail. That wasn't going to happen. He'd be damned if it ever did, though.

"Well, then, Artie, what are you doing here?" the conflicted prince asked himself. "Why aren't you off wandering the world like Logan or playing with the Crodinians like Peter? Why are you still alive?"

No, he wasn't on the brink of suicide. He was just lost. He didn't really know himself or his role. He didn't like being insurance. No way. But he was still here.