Chapter 1: The Tavern's Back Room
The ale was warm and tasted faintly of metal, but Prince Silas drank it anyway. The tankard’s handle was sticky. Everything in The Rusty Nail was sticky—the floor, the tables, the air itself, thick with the smell of roasted meat and unwashed bodies. He kept his hood up, the coarse wool scratching his neck, a far cry from the silk he’d once taken for granted. From his booth in the shadow of a singed tapestry, he watched the room. He saw the fear in men’s eyes, the quick, savage laughter, the way hands never strayed far from belt knives. This was the world now. The exile. The ruin.
He’d chosen this table for its sightlines and its single, guttering brazier that painted the wall behind him in shuddering orange. It was a strategic position. A prince’s habit, even here. Even now.
The tavern door swung inward with a crash that cut through the din.
Two figures filled the doorway, blocking the muddy evening light. The room’s chatter died to a murmur, then a strained, watchful silence.
The first was an orc, a mountain of moss-green muscle beneath worn leathers. His cropped red hair and thick beard were like fire in the gloom, and a lattice of pale scars crossed his knuckles and forearms. He didn’t have the jutting tusks of the northern clans; these were filed, civilized. It made his grimace more human, and somehow more dangerous. His eyes, a chips-of-flint gray, swept the room with open contempt.
The second was Dragonborn, taller, broader, a wall of deep gray scales and quiet power. Curved horns swept back from his skull. The low light caught the ridges of them, and the amber of his slitted pupils as they adjusted to the gloom. He moved with a stillness that was the opposite of his companion’s looming threat. He just was, an immovable fact, and the air around him seemed cooler, drier.
Hostility rolled off the human patrons in a palpable wave. A man at the bar spat into his mug. Another deliberately turned his back, presenting the hilt of his sword.
The orc’s lip curled. “Charming,” he rumbled, his voice like stones grinding together. He didn’t bother to lower it.
The Dragonborn placed a single, claw-tipped hand on the orc’s arm. A silent check. His gaze was already moving, assessing exits, threats, the layout of the room.
And it landed on Silas.
Silas didn’t look away. He held that amber stare, feeling a jolt go through him—part fear, part wild, electric recognition. Here was power, raw and unapologetic. Here was exile, same as his. He saw the same quiet fury he carried in his own heart, reflected back in two very different forms.
Slowly, deliberately, Silas lowered his hood.
His fair skin and careful posture marked him as noble, even in rags. His brown hair was longer now, falling across his forehead. He saw the moment they placed him, the slight tightening around the Dragonborn’s eyes, the orc’s slow, incredulous blink.
Silas lifted his tankard in a slight, ironic toast. Then he nodded to the empty bench opposite him in the booth.
A challenge. An invitation.
The orc snorted, a short, sharp sound. He leaned toward his companion. “You seein’ this, Kazan? The pretty princeling’s asking for a playdate.”
The Dragonborn—Kazan—studied Silas. His voice, when it came, was a low, resonant rumble that seemed to vibrate in the wood of the table. “He’s either a fool, or he has a death wish. Or both.”
“My money’s on both,” the orc grumbled. But he was already moving, cutting through the parted sea of the tavern’s crowd with a swagger that dared anyone to touch him. Kazan followed, a silent, scaled shadow.
They dwarfed the booth. Drac slid in first, the old wood groaning in protest under his weight. Kazan sat beside him, the difference in their forms stark—one a battering ram, the other a fortress wall. They left Silas feeling oddly exposed, his slender, human frame suddenly inconsequential.
Silas took another sip of his bad ale. “I assume you know who I am.”
“Aye,” Drac said, grabbing a passing barmaid by the apron and barking an order for a jug of their strongest, without taking his eyes off Silas. “The king’s cast-off. The disappointing son. Heard the stories. Bit flowery for my taste.”
The words were meant to sting. Silas just smiled, a thin, practiced thing. “The stories omit the important parts. They always do.”
They always do.”
The orc, Drac, grunted as a clay jug of something murky and potent thumped onto the table. He filled three tankards to the brim, sloshing liquid over the side. “So enlighten us, princeling. What’d they omit?”
Silas took the offered drink, his fingers brushing against Drac’s scarred knuckles. A deliberate touch. He watched their reactions. “They say I was cast out for political insubordination. For weak judgment. That’s not untrue.” He took a long swallow, the liquor burning a clean path down his throat. It steadied him. “But the core of it was simpler. My father found my personal tastes… blasphemous. My promiscuity. My inclination towards men. And his doctrine couldn’t stomach my belief that a kingdom could be more than just a human kingdom. That all races could build something together. Not just survive each other, but coexist.”
The silence at the table deepened, becoming something else. The tavern noise faded to a distant buzz.
Kazan’s amber eyes glinted in the brazier light. He had gone very still. “You believe that?” His rumble was softer, almost wary. “That such a world could ever be?”
“I have to,” Silas said, meeting his gaze. “Otherwise, what’s the point of any of this?”
“A pretty dream,” Drac muttered, but he was listening, his head cocked. “Dreams get clans exiled. They get people killed. My clan believed in keeping to our mountains. We weren’t building anything with anyone. Your father’s knights still came. Still burned. Still drove us out.” He drank deeply. “But me? They kept me. A trophy. A weapon. My ‘battle prowess’ earned me a chain, not a home. Forced to be a crown warrior. Clean up their human messes.” He spat the last word like a piece of rotten meat.
“How did you get free?” Silas asked, leaning in.
Drac’s smile was all sharp edges. “The chain broke. So did the man holding it.”
Kazan was staring into his tankard. When he spoke, it was so low Silas had to strain to hear. “I was left in a ditch. As an egg, maybe. A human couple found me. Raised me on their farm. Loved me, I think. I had to hide in the barn whenever anyone came.” A slow breath hissed through his nostrils. “The town found out. They came with torches and scythes. Calling for the monster.” His clawed hand tightened on the tankard. “My parents… they barred the door. Told me to run out the back. I heard them… I heard the door give way.” He didn’t finish. He didn’t need to. The old pain sat on him like a physical weight.
Silas didn’t offer empty pity. He simply nodded, his own isolation reflecting theirs. “They gave you a life, and then they gave you your life. That’s a debt that haunts. It’s also a strength they’d never understand.” He raised his tankard. “To the disappointing sons. The kept weapons. The hidden monsters.”
After a beat, Drac clanked his mug against Silas’s. A hard, solid sound. Kazan followed, more slowly, the touch of clay to clay a gentle knock.
The jug emptied. Another appeared. The talk meandered through shared bitterness and surprising, jagged laughter. Silas watched them unfold, these two walls of muscle and scar-tissue. He saw the protective weight of Drac’s arm near Kazan, the way Kazan’s calm presence seemed to ground Drac’s simmering rage. A partnership forged in the same fires that had scorched him.
And as the alcohol warmed his blood, a different heat stirred. It had been so long since he’d touched anyone without calculation. These two were alive, vibrating with power and pain. He let his gaze linger. Let his knee brush against Drac’s under the table. Let a slow smile spread when he caught Kazan’s eye.
“All this talk of past and future,” Silas said, his voice dropping, turning intimate. “It’s heavy. I was thinking of something more… present.”
Drac’s gray eyes sharpened. He leaned back, a slow, knowing grin spreading across his broad face. He glanced at Kazan, a silent question passing between them. Kazan’s nostrils flared, his pupils widening slightly. A nervous flick of his tongue over his lower lip. After a moment, he gave an almost imperceptible nod.
“Alright, prince,” Drac rumbled, slamming his tankard down. “Enough sitting. Let’s see if you can move as pretty as you talk.”
He stood, the bench screeching, and offered a massive hand to Silas. The gesture was a challenge. Every human eye in the tavern followed them as Drac led the way to the small, clear space by the fire, Kazan a looming shadow behind them. Murmurs of disgust rippled through the room. Someone muttered “abomination.”
Drac turned and glared, and the muttering died.
The music was a simple, thumping reel from a grizzled dwarf with a pipe. Drac started moving, a surprisingly graceful shift of weight for a creature his size, all controlled power. He pulled Silas in, not close, but into his orbit. It was a show. A defiance.
Silas laughed, a real sound that surprised even him, and let the rhythm take him. He was all lean grace, his movements fluid where Drac’s were solid. He danced around Drac, teasing, before turning his attention to Kazan.
The Dragonborn was standing stiffly, watching. Nervous.
Silas closed the distance. He moved in front of Kazan, his back to the Dragonborn’s chest, and began to sway. He rolled his hips, a slow, dirty grind against the air, then pressed back, feeling the solid, unyielding wall of scaled muscle. He felt Kazan’s sharp intake of breath. Reaching back, Silas let his hand trail over Kazan’s thigh, up, and cupped the thick, firm bulge straining against his trousers. Kazan shuddered, a low rumble escaping his chest.
Drac moved in then, a wall on Silas’s other side. He crowded in, his big hand sliding around Silas’s waist, pulling him from Kazan just enough to claim his mouth. The kiss was rough, all teeth and heat and the taste of strong ale. Silas met it with equal hunger, his fingers tangling in Drac’s short, fiery hair.
When Drac released him, Silas was breathless. He turned immediately back to Kazan, whose amber eyes were wide, hot with a mix of terror and wanting. Silas rose on his toes, curled a hand behind Kazan’s horn, and pulled him down. He kissed him softly, a contrast to Drac’s assault—a press of lips, a soothing sweep of his tongue against the seam of Kazan’s mouth. Kazan remained frozen for a heartbeat, then a groan vibrated through him and he kissed back, clumsily, desperately.
The tavern was a riot of disapproving shouts and thrown curses, but to Silas, it was just noise. There was only the heat of them, the smell of leather, musk, and scales, the pounding of his own heart.
He broke the kiss, panting, looking from Drac’s fierce grin to Kazan’s dazed, heated gaze. “My room,” Silas said, the words raw. “It’s not a palace. But it’s private. And it has a very large bed.”
Drac laughed, a short, victorious sound. He clapped a massive hand on Kazan’s shoulder. “What d’you say, brother? Fancy defiling a royal?”
Kazan looked down at Silas, at the prince’s kiss-swollen lips and fever-bright eyes. The last of his hesitation burned away in that amber gaze. He nodded once, decisively.
“Lead the way,” Drac said.