Pynch Secret Santa gift for @dollopheadsandclotpoles. So, uh, you may read this and wonder, “This is a pynch fic?” Me too, friend. Honestly, this may read more like the exposition part of a pynch fic, but I ran out of time because I'm a terrible procrastinator and also I write too much exposition. Anyways, maybe it’s enjoyable? I'm just going to post it now, and then maybe tomorrow I’ll think about proofreading and titles and all that.
Adam Parrish had never planned to rule his father’s kingdom. Beginning at fifteen, he’d been sent on mission after mission to increase the wealth of the kingdom by whatever means necessary, more like an errand boy than a prince. At seventeen, he’d taken the meager collection of coins he’d managed to stow beneath his bed and the larger collection of bruises he carried on his body, and he’d disappeared. At nineteen, he was being dragged back.
“I don’t have much, but I will give you anything to release me,” Adam said to the knight who’d found him on the first day of his capture. The knight did not reply.
“I will leave again as soon I’ve been returned,” Adam said to the knight who’d found him on the second day of his capture. The knight did not reply.
“Surely my father has not gone to this much trouble over a handful of coins,” Adam said to the knight who’d found him on the third day of his capture. That was when he learned of his father’s death.
Adam Parrish had faced many difficult things in his life, and each time, he’d tried hard and eventually gotten to what he’d wanted. But even as he tried, Adam Parrish could not make himself mourn his father. All he could do was think that, now more than ever, he wanted to be nothing like him. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to be up to him.
Ten days and halfway through the journey, Adam was beginning to lose hope. The knight never let Adam out of his sight, and from what little information he’d shared, and what little Adam had kept up on over the years, it sounded like he was returning to an angry kingdom. While Adam had been gone, his parents had slowly exhausted the wealth of their people through poor investments and useless displays of extravagance. With some doctored books and bleeding bribes, the citizens were under the impression that their poverty lay in root with Adam’s departure. Even the knight didn’t seem to know whether Adam was being brought back to rule, or to hang.
Lost in despair, an emotion that he usually only allowed himself in the slightest doses in the direst of moments, Adam almost didn’t see the opportunity when the knight chose to stop at an inn for rest. Until now, they’d been too far from towns when darkness fell, and had camped in the forests and the plains. Neither of them had minded – Adam because he felt he had slept in worse places, and the knight because his brand of silence was well-suited to a place far from other people.
But it would have seemed too strange had they returned to the outskirts of town to set up camp, particularly since the knight hadn’t been shy about replenishing his supplies at the market. Adam knew that the knight was avoiding attention, which was why he was not tied up, but kept captive with his lack of money, the unfamiliarity of the land, and promises of what the man’s blades would do to him if he tried to escape. It was also why, after they had set down their things, the knight brought them down to the tavern. After all, when did two traveling gentlemen pass up the opportunity to drink in a town they would never see again?
It was hours into the evening before Adam realized that this was his chance. The knight was preoccupied with his mug of beer, and the tavern was growing crowded. To avoid suspicion, he had been given permission not to hover beside the knight. If he timed it right, it could be hours before the knight realized he’d vanished. But the more time ticked by, the closer that chance was to slipping away.
Adam took one, two, three deep breaths. He found a nearby table where someone wasn’t watching his beer and quietly slid it to the edge of the table. He took a few quick steps away before – crash. The mug fell to the floor, causing a swell of noise as the man’s friends made fun of his spilt drink and the nearby tables joined in for the fun of it. The knight had looked over at the sound, and now Adam caught his eye, a manufactured proof that he was still here. This way it would be longer, hopefully, before the knight thought to check for him again.
The knight turned back to the bar, and Adam melted into the crowd. Cautiously, anxiously, slowly, he made his way to the exit. One last glance at the knight – looking away – and Adam was outside.
More deep breaths. This was possibly the stupidest thing Adam had ever done. It was also possibly the bravest. Two years ago, he’d run away from his family, and he’d framed that escape to himself as a matter of survival. Two years ago, Adam Parrish had been certain that he could not live if he stayed in that castle. Today, even with the looming threat of his people’s anger, Adam Parrish did not see his return as a death. In fact, Adam was quite certain that, with some quick thinking and discussions with village leaders, he could easily manage to live out his life in the confines of the kingship. This decision was not about his mortality; it was about himself.
Adam could be a king, sure, but Adam didn’t want to be a king. Adam wanted to spend his life learning the secrets of the world. He wanted to keep working at blacksmithing to feed himself until a time when he could do that with something that made his heart and his brain run fast. He didn’t want to rule a kingdom; he wanted to rule his own life.
So, Adam let himself make the selfish choice and walked fast through the town streets. He didn’t dare return to the room for any supplies. He had a few spare coins in his boot, a hunk of bread in his pocket, and enough determination to make up for the rest. Too hopeful to be deterred by the stories of bandits and murderers ruling the roads at night, Adam chose a direction that was neither where they’d come from nor where they were heading and started running.
Ronan Lynch had never imagined that he would have the opportunity to avenge his father. Once, a psychic had told him that the man who’d killed his father was a knight without armor who served no crown. That was the only hint he’d had over the last three years, and Ronan didn’t even strictly believe in psychics. He did believe his own eyes.
When Ronan’s father had been killed, Ronan had seen on the murderer a pin of a strange dragon, faded green but turning back from the tail, a slow rot overtaking its twisting body. As the breath left his father’s body, the blackness crept further up the dragon’s. It was the one thing Ronan remembered clearly from that day.
Ronan didn’t think that the man he’d caught had killed his father, of course. This young man was about his age, and the murderer had long been comfortable with being an adult when he’d ended Niall Lynch’s life. But there was the pin – nearly swallowed up by its rotting soul now – on the coat of a young man who’d rushed through Ronan’s own village. He could hardly be blamed for overtaking him in the woods.
The man, when he took a break from yelling and attempting to free himself in order to examine Ronan, stopped moving. He said, “You weren’t who I was expecting.”
Ronan crossed his arms. “You either,” he said.
“So, you’ll be letting me go, then,” the man said decisively. It wasn’t a question, but it wasn’t exactly an order. It was, if anything, an observation. A flawed observation, but it was sure of itself.
“Where did you get that pin?” Ronan asked him. “Did you kill the man you took it from?” The man stared until Ronan begrudgingly pointed to the offending pin.
“Oh,” said the man. “I suppose it was on the coat.” Ronan gestured for him to continue, quickly. His prisoner pressed his lips together in silence, in thought. “It was given to me. I didn’t have one with me.”
“Who gave it to you?” Ronan pressed desperately. “How do you know him?”
Ronan saw the moment that the man realized that he had the advantage here, in spite of the rope on his legs. He said, “Let me go and I’ll tell you.”
Ronan glared. “Or you’ll run away and leave me with nothing more than I came with.”
“It was a knight,” the man said carefully. “But I don’t think he is who you want to kill.”
“I’ll make that determination, thanks,” Ronan replied icily.
“Knights don’t work on their own orders,” the man noted. “This one works for a wealthy merchant. Whatever this knight has done to you, I’m sure it was the merchant’s idea.”
Ronan considered this. He also considered the man’s freckles, his earnest and beautiful eyes. Finally, the man said, “He had me captive, the knight. If you let me go, I’ll help you find him.” A crooked smile, and he added, “I’m Adam, by the way.”
