Step 4c: ...and he's being unfairly framed

"I have done as you decreed, my prince!"

"For God's sake, could you talk quieter?" Eirifold groaned. "My head's killing me."

A day had passed since Eirifold had asked Ivelle to spy on Princess Mariel. The last twenty-four hours hadn't done the prince any favors. He lay sprawled across the nearest chaise lounge, a damp cloth pressed against his forehead. His dark skin held greenish undertones, and his face was damp with sweat. He'd been too sick to meet with her in the garden today, so he had called her to meet in his private study.

Ivelle couldn't bring herself to care about his discomfort. She was sure it was nothing compared to the discomfort Eirifold's previous jester had experienced after his fall off the balcony. She sashayed across the room, beaming down at the prince with a savage smile.

"I am hurt," she declared. "I would've thought you'd be thrilled to see me. After all, don't you want to hear my news about Mariel? Riveting, thrilling, life-changing news from your one-and-only expert spy?"

Eirifold's eyes cracked open. They were even more bloodshot than before, a sure sign he was withdrawing from the mandragar. If he weren't such an awful person, Ivelle might have almost felt sorry for him.

"Okay," he rasped. "What did you find?"

Conspiratorially, Ivelle leaned closer, lowered her face until her mouth was beside the prince's ear. She hovered there a moment, drawing out the silence for dramatic effect.

"Mariel got a new dog yesterday."

Eirifold blinked up at her. "...A... dog?"

"Yes. He's a German shepherd puppy she adopted from the pound. He's adorable, and his name is Leopold."

"...I fail to see how this is life-changing."

She scoffed and crossed her arms. "Typical! Only a heartless bastard would fail to appreciate the news I've so painstakingly gathered. But I suppose I should expect someone who pushes people down staircases for fun to have no taste in animals."

He shot her a glare, then winced and closed his eyes. "Did you learn anything else spying on Mariel?"

"I sure did." Ivelle smirked. "She has a fantastic wardrobe, her hair is to die for, she's excellent at fencing, she has great taste in pastries, and she donated to a charity yesterday. She's basically a goddess in human form."

Unlike you, hung unspoken on the air.

Ivelle had not relied solely on Ash's report for the intel she was giving Prince Eirifold. Through pure luck, she'd happened to run into her crow on her way home from town after buying Eirifold's nasal spray. Together, they'd watched Mariel hit up a pastry shop and then a charity hospital, which the princess apparently frequented often to give donations. After that, she'd ducked into a martial arts dojo, then visited the pound, where she'd adopted the lucky pooch who now inhabited the royal chambers. In six hours of stalking, there had been nothing – absolutely nothing – that warranted suspicion.

Unless the lady was smuggling mandragar into the castle taped to her new pup's adorable belly.

Prince Eirifold scowled. He did not seem pleased with Ivelle's report on the princess. No doubt he'd been hoping she would dig up some incriminating dirt on Mariel that would land her in prison.

"Come closer," he said. "Closer - yes. I think I need to barf, and I might as well do so on your shoes to teach you a lesson, since you're clearly not taking your assignment seriously."

Ivelle leaped back in horror.

"Oh no you don't! I spent hours yesterday getting dog turds off my shoes. I am not letting a single drop of your vomit anywhere near my footwear."

Eirifold huffed an annoyed sigh, then let his head fall back against the gaudy pillow with a dissatisfied groan. "Ughhhhhh. I feel terrible."

"Suck it up. I'm sure Wilfred felt worse after you pushed him down the stairs."

"Who? – Oh, the butler. You just won't let that go. I didn't even touch the man."

"So how'd he end up at the bottom of the stairs with a head wound?"

Eirifold laughed weakly and waved a frail hand. "Ask Mariel."

"That'll be a fun conversation. 'Hi Mariel, I'm spying on you. Oh by the way can you tell me the truth about Wilfred's fall, so the person who's asking me to spy on you can prove a point?'" Ivelle flopped into the armchair opposite the chaise lounge and studied him through narrowed eyes. "What makes you so sure Mariel is guilty?"

"Obviously I don't have proof, or we wouldn't be having this conversation." The chaise lounge creaked as Eirifold fumbled around on the end table for a glass of water. "But who else benefits from making me look even crazier than I already do? We've been at odds our whole lives. She's always hated me for being next in line for the crown, when I never even wanted the throne in the first place."

He sneezed pathetically. The sunlight streaming through the lounge curtains highlighted the angles of his face, making the spaces beneath his eyes look even darker with exhaustion.

"I admit," he said, "the first couple years were my fault. I wanted to get out of doing work, and I didn't want to be king anymore, so I refused to apply myself. I did some research on my birth parents – I'm adopted, you know – and I decided to try acting crazy. Maybe the king would assume the insanity was genetic and decide to disinherit me. But it was one of those self-fulfilling prophecies. You know how you can act a certain way for a long time, and sometimes you start believing you are that person? I think I did lose it a little. I was going through a rough patch after one of my friends died, and... well, anyway."

He broke off, looking mildly embarrassed.

"My point is, I may have brought this on myself by trying to act crazy. But all the loopiness from the mandragar, and especially all this violence I'm being blamed for... That's not me."

"Sure doesn't seem that way from where I'm sitting." Ivelle crossed her arms. "If you didn't push Wilfred down the stairs, who did?"

He rubbed his eyes. "You won't believe me."

"Probably not, but I still want to know your version of what happened." Even if it's just so I can mock you for it.

Eirifold shook his head. "My memory of that day is pretty foggy, which doesn't help my case, but... I remember the butler standing at the top of the stairs, staring at me. I went up to him to ask if I had something on my face. He didn't respond, so I assumed he was hard of hearing and got closer to yell in his ear. When I got within arm's length of him, he clapped his hands once and just... toppled. I think I reached for him, but he was already gone."

Ivelle digested this, chewing her lower lip. It sounded pretty unbelievable to her. Certainly not a convincing plea for innocence.

"And the previous jester?" she scoffed. "Let me guess: he jumped off the balcony himself?"

Eirifold sighed. "I knew you wouldn't believe me."

"What about the hot tea you spilled on that servant?"

"An accident. I get clumsy when I'm drunk. I tried to set her up with paid time off and better health insurance after I sobered up, but no one would even tell me her name. They all seemed convinced I wanted to dump another pot of tea on her."

"And the baby tigers?"

"Now that..." His shoulders shook, and Ivelle realized with surprise that he was laughing. "That one was definitely my fault. My friend dared me to sic some baby tigers on this racist butler no one liked. We were maybe twelve at the time. The baby tigers spent most of their time trying to cuddle and nuzzling the butler for food, and he would have been fine, except the bastard panicked and tried to kick one of them and lost... bits. Not those bits!" he added hastily, seeing Ivelle's horrified expression. "But the doctor did have to amputate one of his toes after he failed to seek medical attention and it got septic."

Ivelle studied him across the narrow rug that separated them. Despite the lingering greenish undertones to his skin, his brown eyes still sparkled with mischief. He looked almost handsome like this, the soft morning sunlight catching his touseled hair, his lips curved in a reminiscent smile, as though remembering better days.

Suppressing a sudden uncomfortable swoop in her stomach, Ivelle drummed her fingers against the arm of her chair. He was a noble, she reminded herself. An untrustworthy bastard, just like Lord Saffron. "You do realize how unbelievable these excuses sound to an impartial third party?" she said sourly. "Not the tigers, but... everything else? Particularly the part about jesters voluntarily throwing themselves off of balconies."

"Oh, I'm aware. I don't expect you to believe me. In fact, half the time I'm not even sure I believe myself."

"Did the jester die?"

"We were visiting the palace lake house, and he fell into the lake. I was too drunk to hear if they ever found a body." Some of the laughter went out of his eyes. He buried his face in his hands. "I... don't really know what happened that day, I'll be honest. The pollen was horrible, I'm pretty sure I used the nasal spray like seven times, and everything was very... spinny. I remember the jester tapping me on the shoulder, and then he started shouting at me not to hurt him while I watched in confusion, and that's when he jumped. But I don't remember getting mad or pushing him off the balcony. I should remember something like that, right?

"It keeps me up at night, you know. I can't stop worrying. Wondering if I really did push him, and I was just too out of it to remember. I don't like hurting people." He heaved a sigh. "My father wishes I did. It's one of his biggest complaints. The most embarrassing day of his life was when he told me to execute some guards, and I refused and started crying."

"While you sit here feeling sorry for yourself, the banks aren't robbing themselves," Ivelle murmured, without thinking.

"What was that?"

"Just something my mum used to say."

He huffed a laugh. "What is your family, some sort of crime syndicate?"

"Something like that." Ivelle shook her head. "My mum was embarrassed that we were related. I was never evil enough for her, never enthusiastic enough about stealing, I never drugged the bank tellers properly, and I always would let slip that a heist was afoot so the little old men who relied on the bank for their retirement would have a chance to withdraw their money before the banks went under... Mum hated it. She never let me hear the end of it." She sighed. "It's impossible living up to your parents' expectations. Sometimes it's not worth it to try."

"Did your mum ever force you to kill people?" Eirifold sounded genuinely interested. He was studying her, with an odd kind of intensity that for some reason sent that funny sensation swooping down through Ivelle's stomach again.

Ivelle looked away, finding it somehow difficult to keep his gaze.

"She never went that far. But indirectly, the things she was doing were killing people. You can't rob a bank and cause it to go under without causing all the citizens whose money is in that bank to suffer. What if they relied on that money for food?"

"Is that why you're robbing the royal treasury?" Eirifold said keenly. "Because it's not really hurting anyone, just punishing royals for hoarding so much gold?"

Ivelle fell silent.

Actually, she was kicking herself for not thinking of what Eirifold was suggesting sooner. Stealing from the king's treasuries was more harmless than trying to poison someone. Government assistance programs weren't really a thing in Estrella. The only thing the government spent money on was their military. Military they probably used to conquer countries like Lillian's. She definitely could have figured out a way to orchestrate a treasury heist with no one the wiser.

Instead, she had decided to advertise her skills at murder.

She'd tried to rationalize to herself that killing one rich asshole was better than her mother's strategy of robbing a bank and leaving a whole bunch of people to starve.

But was she any better?

Abruptly, she stood up, scattering several armchair pillows in the process. "I should go."

"Wait." Alarm filled Eirifold's voice. "What? Don't go." He struggled to sit up. "I want to keep talking. This is the least nauseous I've felt all day!"

"Get one of your guards to chat with you."

"They're all afraid of me. ...Why aren't you afraid of me, by the way? It's something I've been wondering. Is it because your mum was a hardened criminal? Don't worry, I won't tell anyone."

Why wasn't she afraid of him? Perhaps it was because he'd seemed so ridiculous during their first encounter that it was impossible to be afraid. Or maybe it was because, in some weird way, he reminded her a little bit of Ash. Not that he was a crow, but... there was something about his sense of humor.

She settled for saying, "When your mum's a fan of murder, everything seems relative."

He seemed to mull over this, staring down at his fingernails. "Huh," he said, glancing up at her again. "Perhaps that's why I'm not afraid of you either, even though you did attempt to smother me. We both have equally villainous parents. Probably equally tragic backstories as well."

"I didn't smother – Oy." Ivelle glowered at him. "If you're trying to distract me from leaving, it's not going to work!"

"But I want to know more about you. You and that delightful crow, which you never bother to bring when you visit."

"What is your obsession with Ash – I mean, Soot?"

Curses, she hoped he hadn't noticed the slip-up. Another reason why she had to get out of here, now. She needed to go, before he managed to somehow convince her that he was a nice – even likeable – person, and that she was the shitty McShitFace for contemplating murdering him in cold blood.

Unbidden, Lillian's warning from yesterday rose to the top of her mind. Don't trust anything the prince says.

Had he just been manipulating her this whole time? Was he just a stellar actor? A pro at dispelling blame?

And yet... surely if he were such a pro, he could've thought up a better excuse than, "I don't remember who pushed the jester off the balcony, and I'm terrified it was me."

Ivelle shook herself.

With businesslike efficiency, she dug into her bag.

"Almost forgot. I brought your nasal spray. Do you want me to spray it in my nose and risk getting my nose germs all over it, or are you content with trusting that I'm not... some sort of... evil person... who poisons princes for fun?"

Ivelle tried to ignore the guilt crawling up her spine. Eirifold glanced at her, his face furrowed into a frown. For a moment, she had the oddest sense, as though he was seeing right through her, as though he realized how ironic her words had been.

"I don't mind your nose germs," he said after a moment. (Ivelle's stomach flipped again. She was starting to feel like a gymnast had permanently taken up residence in her intestines.) "Can't be worse than you kissing me out of the blue the other day. What was up with that, anyway?"

Ivelle flushed. "I told you, I panicked."

"You have an unusual panic response. Do you do that to every person who surprises you?"

"What? No!"

"Ah, so just the good-looking ones?"

Ivelle grabbed a cushion off the chair and hucked it at his face. "Stop fishing for compliments, you bastard!"

"Ow," said his voice from behind the cushion.

Ivelle let out an annoyed huff and shoved the spray bottle in her nose, scrutinizing him out of the corner of her eye as she spritzed. He really was quite good-looking. She'd thought as much when she'd first met him. He had a build that was naturally tall and lean and looked like it should acquire muscle easily.

He would be even better looking if he wasn't sick and if his face wasn't covered by cushions... and if he ever bothered to work out, which it didn't look like he did.

"When was the last time you exercised?" she asked abruptly.

"I don't believe in exercise."

"Well, you should do it more regardless. It's better for you than chugging vodka."

He laughed sharply and shook his head. "Whenever I've tried to exercise, my dear dad's taken that as a cue to teach me swordplay and either beaten me to a pulp or tried to make me hurt people. It's better to pretend to be weak and feeble. Trust me."

Ivelle passed him the nasal spray, frowning down at his (rather deconditioned-looking) biceps through the thin fabric of his shirt. As she scrutinized his chest, a lightbulb went off in her mind.

Aw, hell.

This was a bad idea.

This was a really bad idea.

"Tomorrow night, midnight," her traitorous mouth declared.

"What?"

"Find some way to give your guards the slip. We're going for a jog."

~*~

Word count: 19,817

Today's ONC recommendation is bigfivedonaldduckfan's delightful novella, "Baguette Rhymes With Dead." This brilliantly-executed romp through an alternate version of Paris (which might or might not be full of dead people) is hilarious, moving, and definitely not one to miss!