Exiled Prince and Hi Chapter 54: Deep tissue massage

Chapter 54: Deep tissue massage

Renji stood before the chief and said nothing for a long mont.

The old man waited. The room waited. Even Vaelric, still nursing the side of his face, had gone quiet in the way people go quiet when they’re watching sothing interesting unfold.

Renji’s mind was moving fast beneath the stillness.

Attack the chief. He considered it the way you consider a door that might be unlocked — quickly, practically, without sentint. One decisive move, seize control of the situation before it could get worse. Except the mont the thought ford, the chief’s aura pressed back against it like a wall. Not aggressive. Just present. The weight of a man who had spent decades becoming very difficult to kill, and who no longer needed to prove it to anyone. And even if Renji sohow managed it, there were guards, and villagers, and absolutely no reason to assu anyone in this building would simply accept a change in leadership because a strange young man had made his case with his fists.

He discarded it.

Run. Take the girls and move before anyone could organize a proper pursuit. Except they were exhausted — genuinely, bone-deep tired in the way that ca from days of hard travel and harder fighting. They didn’t know the terrain. The forest beyond the village was full of Gravefangs they’d only just barely co through, and that was when they’d been fresh.

He discarded that too.

Which left the third option, sitting there at the end of his reasoning like an unwanted conclusion.

Accept the mission.

He turned it over once more, looking for the flaw in it. Couldn’t find one. A roof, food, rest, and a clear objective that his group was — annoying as the timing was — actually qualified to handle. Compared to the alternatives, it was almost insultingly sensible.

Renji exhaled through his nose.

"Fine," he said. "We’ll kill it."

Rei made a sound like she’d been lightly struck. Aya’s eyes went wide, soft shock moving across her face. Kaede didn’t make a sound, but Renji felt the specific quality of her silence beside him and chose not to look at it directly.

Vaelric’s smile spread slowly, satisfied and smug, the expression of a man watching sothing go exactly the way he wanted.

The chief studied Renji for another mont, then nodded once — the asured nod of soone who had already accounted for this outco and found it acceptable.

"You will rest tonight. Food will be provided. Tomorrow, we discuss the details of the hunt."

He gestured to the guards.

They were being escorted toward the hall when Vaelric’s voice followed them, light and leisurely.

"Sleep well. You’ll need it."

Renji stopped walking.

He turned around, unhurried, and looked at Vaelric directly. He didn’t say anything. He just smiled — slow, easy, the particular smile of soone who was not remotely concerned — and held the man’s gaze until sothing behind Vaelric’s eyes shifted. Just slightly. Just enough.

The noble’s smile stayed on his face but lost its footing.

Renji turned back around and kept walking.

The room was modest and clean, two low beds and a table and a window that looked out onto the quiet village street below. Lanterns on the wall. Solid floor. After the forest, it felt extravagant.

The guard set them inside and moved to leave. Renji glanced back at him.

"Food," he said. "Quickly, if you don’t mind. Starving hunters can’t kill beasts, and I’d hate for that to beco the chief’s problem."

The guard’s frown was imdiate and thorough.

He left without responding.

Renji turned around.

Kaede was already looking at him. She had been looking at him, he suspected, since approximately the mont he’d opened his mouth in front of the chief.

"Are you trying to get us killed?"

"Dramatic," Renji said, and moved to the chair in the corner, lowering himself into it with the careful slowness of soone whose body had opinions about the recent past. He stretched his legs out and tipped his head back. "Relax. Nothing’s happening to us while I’m here."

"You accepted a mission," Kaede said, "against a beast you know nothing about, in a region you’ve never been to, on behalf of a village chief who will execute us if we fail. Which part of that is relaxing?"

"The part where we had no other real choice." He looked at her evenly. "What were you going to do, Kaede? Attack the chief? Run? We’re exhausted and we don’t know the terrain. The forest on the way in nearly killed us when we were fresh." He spread his hands slightly. "At least this way we have a bed, a al, and sothing to aim at."

Kaede held his gaze. Her expression said she had already processed all of this and arrived at the sa conclusion and was annoyed about it.

Rei sat carefully on the edge of one of the beds. She had been quiet since the hall, the particular quiet that ant she was gathering herself toward sothing.

"You did have a choice earlier," she said. Her voice was soft, the way it always was, but there was sothing steady underneath it this ti. "You didn’t have to provoke him."

Renji was quiet for a mont.

"No," he said. "I didn’t."

He looked at the floor, then back up.

"But I’m not going to stand there and let soone talk about any of you that way and just walk off without consequence. That’s not sothing I’m willing to do." A beat. "So I didn’t."

The room was quiet.

Aya crossed it in three steps and threw her arms around him.

"Renji," she said warmly, her face pressed into his shoulder, squeezing with the focused dedication of soone who had decided this was happening regardless of any obstacle.

"—ow—"

"You’re so dependable." Kiss. "So reliable." Kiss. "We’re so lucky—"

"Aya. I have bruises."

"I know, I’ll be gentle." She was not being gentle. "You’re wonderful."

"I’m in pain—"

Rei, smiling now despite herself, moved to his other side and tucked herself against his arm with considerably more care, resting her head lightly on his shoulder.

"Thank you," she said quietly.

Renji opened his mouth, found nothing suitably deflecting, and closed it again.

"Right," he said after a mont. "Soone get off my ribs."

Aya released him approximately halfway. "Better?"

"Marginally."

"I could massage it," she offered, pulling back to look at him with genuine helpfulness. "Your shoulders especially. You’ve been carrying everything crooked since yesterday."

Rei sat up. "I can help too."

Renji looked between them. He considered making a dismissive remark and then assessed the genuine, throbbing state of his back and decided against it.

"...Fine," he said. "But carefully." He pushed out of the chair and moved to the bed, settling face down across it with a long exhale. "If either of you touches the left shoulder wrong I will—"

He glanced sideways at Kaede.

"You joining?"

Kaede, who had been leaning against the wall with her arms crossed, watching all of this with an expression she wasn’t quite managing to keep neutral, was quiet for a beat too long.

"I suppose," she said, and pushed off the wall.

Renji smiled into the blanket.

That satisfaction lasted approximately four seconds.

Kaede’s hands found his upper back and went to work with the systematic, rciless efficiency of soone who had trained extensively and retained zero sympathy for sore muscles on principle.

Renji’s whole body seized.

"Arghhh—what are you—that is not a massage—"

"It’s deep tissue," she said pleasantly, and continued.

"Deep tissue implies there’s tissue left—Kaede—"

"Hold still."

Aya giggled. Rei covered her mouth. Kaede did not stop, did not slow, and did not acknowledge his protests in any way that suggested she intended to.

Renji pressed his face into the blanket and yelled again.