The moment the captain left the room, Robin went to the nearest window, grabbed some snow, and stuck it somewhat forcefully against the unconscious guard's cheeks.

It took about enough time for Robin to count to three, then the man's eyes opened. He looked over the prince, his gaze flickering back and forth until he finally focused on him.

The moment he did, what little color left in him drained. He started to try and move away, his feet slipping on the wooden floor in a scuffle to run, yet he found no grip through the bonds Andragoras secured.

Robin leaned forward. "If you fall backward, your head will strike the fire and I cannot promise I'll pull you out."

The guard stopped.

"Good." Robin gave the man no facial expression, kept his voice low and calm. "I will say this once and once only. You will answer my questions or I will take my sword and remove your fingers one by one, then your toes. This is not a threat. This is a statement."

The man's eyes widened. For a moment he looked almost like a boy. It made Robin wonder how old he really was, and how much of a monster he was for threatening a child. His sword was far from his grasp. Besides, he wasn't very keen on torture.

But there was no way he'd show that.

"Where are the others?" the guard squeaked out.

"Dead. I killed them. Captain Andragoras is much kinder than I am in sparing you." He frowned. The 'no expression' thing was broken fairly quickly. "Now, I'll make this simple to begin with. What is your name?"

"Tobias Lark."

"And how old are you, Tobias?"

There was no answer. Robin raised an eyebrow. "I wouldn't expect you to get stumped on a question like that, Tobias."

Tobias shrunk back. He squirmed in his seat, averted his eyes. "I am seventeen, sir."

Seventeen. Seventeen.

Dear God, he was younger than Robin's own brother. The guard was a child sent on a man's mission. How did he even get involved? Andragoras would take no one less than twenty, himself an exception, due to the tendency for battle.

Seventeen.

The shock that rumbled through Robin's body was too strong to be hidden, and for the briefest moment it replaced the mask he'd worn so well until then.

Tobias noticed, though it seemed he mistook it for violence. "I promise sir, I had no intention on deceiving anyone-- if it wasn't for the reward I'd never have agreed, and I didn't know--"

Robin held up a hand, shutting the boy up immediately. He clamped his hand around one of the nearby chairs and swung it close to him, then sat. He'd never admit it out loud, but the ache in the side of his head from where the guard struck him grew larger by the second. Eyes level with the boy, the prince tried to think though what he could do next, change his direction of questioning. An adult, he would frighten. Damage.

A child?

The king would have disapproved him not taking a finger off by that point. Andragoras would have frowned upon him being eye level with a prisoner.

His mother would have smiled.

So, he envisioned her. Took her approach. She'd be calm, but stern. Truthful to a fault.

Make him understand what he'd done.

"Tobias, are you aware of what your actions mean? You do know what you have gotten yourself into, do you not?"

He prayed to anything he'd answer 'no.' Then, it could be stated as child's innocence.

Tobias bowed his head. "Yes, sir. I just ask you make my death quick, sir."

Curse it.

Robin sighed. "No one here will kill you, so long as you answer me truthfully." He made eye contact with the boy again. Tobias clenched his fists to white balls. "I need to know why the Kallan is dead, and why the captain and I were next."

The guard was silent a moment, shifted as much as he could in his seat. Angry red welts formed against his wrist from squirming.

"The messenger was supposed to die because tensions need to rise. No war can happen without reason." He averted his gaze from the prince. "You, because you threaten that war. The man who hired us doesn't like you at all, and he also said that there is more reason to attack if the prince died as well."

"The captain was just collateral," Tobias whispered.

Andragoras stepped quietly back into the room. He nodded toward Robin. Everyone had gone but them. Good. No one to hear the secrets spilled like blood. No one to see the looming death.

"Why a war? Why more fighting?" Robin's blood cooled at the mere thought of a battlefield. He'd seen his years before and never wanted to face it again. "And why against Kallas?"

Tobias just shook his head. "I don't know, sir. It's only-- Krativ is more uneasy than ever, split between the two kingdoms. That may be why, or at least a part of it."

Speculation. It'd get them nowhere.

But always Krativ.

The prince began to speak again, but was stopped by a fast movement from Andragoras. The captain frowned at the boy, seemed to weight his thoughts, then spoke in a loud, rough voice not at all like the one Robin used.

"Krativ is peaceful. I have heard no other rebuke against this. How do you know?"

"I live there with my family. Or at least, I did." Tobias straightened. Then, he looked more like a guard than a child. "There are talks of fighting every day. Kallans and Erakis rarely get along, and any lengthy conversation turns to a fist fight."

Why was everything based off that? It was a riot. A fight. A peace.

Evidently not, if Tobias was to be believed.

Andragoras held none of Robin's thought. He scoffed at Tobias' answer. "Until I hear otherwise, your word amounts to dirt."

"If my word amounts to dirt, why question me?"

"Because people with their lives on the line tend to betray their employers," Robin said quickly, before Andragoras did as he looked and took another strike at the guard. Information gathered would be much more successful with the informant having a slightly clear head. "Now, I need to know who wants a war and me dead."

Tobias just stared at him. His face contorted, twisted as if he was going to vomit. It was as if his brain whirled, whistled to answer, yet his mouth could do nothing of the sort.

The slightest twinge of annoyance hit Robin. He'd been nicer than he should to the boy, considering the circumstances. Now, the one answer that would make his life much simpler, wasn't being told.

He let the kindness his mother would have shown fall, replaced by his own sneer.

"I need the answer, Tobias."

The guard's mouth opened. Closed.

"I... can't tell you."

"I believe you're perfectly capable of speaking, as you just proved. Give me the name."

Tobias looked to Andragoras, Robin, the window. Anywhere. His already swollen eyes turned a darker red, bloodshot and watery.

"He'll kill my family."

The annoyance turned to an incessant gnawing. "I am a prince. I can fix that."

"No you can't. He'll know." Tobias shook his head. "I'm sorry," he whispered.

Sorry wouldn't cut it.

Robin stood so quickly his chair fell over backward. Gone was the kind man who patiently waited. In his place was the one who killed three guards and barely held damage to prove it.

He didn't what he was going to do. He had to sword or knife. He didn't want to punch Tobias either.

Whatever it was, the captain stopped him with a firm hand on his shoulder. Robin whipped around, the fire in his eyes petering out the long he glared at the stern face of Andragoras.

"Highness, a moment. Alone," the captain said.

He didn't move, still locked in an icy stare with the guard.

"Prince Robin. Now."

Prince.

The title and his name made Robin jolt. Very rarely was that combination of words used, and even rarer in a manner of addressing him. Usually, it held comments of his parentage and mixed blood.

He didn't bother checking the ropes that tied Tobias to the chair. Andragoras had done them, and he held no record of a prisoner escaping the bonds.

When the left the room, and were well out of earshot, the captain shook his head, arms crossed over his chest.

"He has told you all he will. There is no use in fear," Andragoras hissed. "Besides, you have more information than either of you are aware."

All Robin wanted to do was argue. The adrenaline from his fight still swirled through his veins, and the realization of a difficult prisoner only made it flash more so. He opened his mouth to comeback at Andragoras, to tell him he had no need to take him away from an interrogation--

"What do you mean?"

The tiniest grin of amusement flickered over Andragoras' mouth, made his beard twitch. "Highness, if you were listening instead of being so keen on a fight, you'd have heard." Quickly, he pressed his fingers against the bruise on the side of Robin's cheek, near his jaw. Pain shot through the place for a moment, and the older man removed his fingers.

"Or you wish to be hammered again. I'll not hold you back."

Robin snatched himself away. "Andragoras, I am not in the mood," he warned.

"Whoever hired him outranks you, highness." Andragoras took a deep breath. "For him to not tell you the name, but all the other information, and be worried of his family's safety even though he has the word of a prince-- it is likely someone at the castle."

Robin's breaths caught. "How are you sure?"

"He's more afraid of them than he is of you. Likely, he was ordered to stay silent and takes that word more than yours."

It still didn't make sense.

"Do you remember a time any of the prisoners have given the reason for their crimes, but not wanted retribution against the one who hired them?"

That was a good point. They'd taken in hundreds of people over the years, questioned them, most with far more... persuasive means than what Robin did to Tobias. It never failed, as the threat arose they gave them more information than they needed. The only was Robin's word would be null was if Tobias was sworn to someone at a higher station than him. King. Council. Prince. Queen.

He nodded, slowly. "Would it be Kallas?"

As soon as the words left his mouth, he knew the answer. No. Kallas would never kill one of their own. They held no reason to want a war.

No one did.

Though, someone wanted it.

He turned back to the prisoner. The pit in his gut widened, filled with mixing questions, fear, anticipation. If what Andragoras said was true, how many in his home were aware of the plan? How many put on a smile, only to wish him dead? He couldn't let anyone know he knew about the plan-- or it would throw it off enough he could catch the plotter.

Or everything was a lie.

Then, a sickening though churned his stomach. His mother. The queen was less prone to fighting than he. If there truly was a conspiracy, and he was to be eliminated for his lack of support to wars, she was also a target.

While the prince said nothing, the sudden realization was enough to tip the captain off about something being very wrong. He bowed his head and began to move away.

"We leave as soon as the sun lights the sky, highness."

Robin just nodded, turned to face the prisoner. The snow storm he'd faced hours before died before it began, though it's winds brought along a new challenge.