But doze was all he could seem to do. Kay was still aware of Nik's presence, the warm air, the now obvious hole in his stomach. That was probably what was keeping him half-awake, he had not eaten and was beginning to feel the first pangs of hunger. It made him shiver, slightly. He would be able to restore more of his energy if he could just eat something, but it was clear that was not going to happen.
The tent door opened, and then the scrape of a key in the lock. Nik's eyes fastened to the man opening it. "Seren." He greeted, pushing himself to his feet and forcing himself to stay standing. He was a prince, and he was not going to allow Seren to cow him, even if he could barely stand. "What do you want?"
Seren flashed a smile, all white teeth and threatening. "Nikolas. Kaylum." His eyes fell on the dragon shifter.
Kaylum raised his head at the sound of the door opening. He just stayed in dragon form, mostly because he felt safest that way, and moved to a sitting position since there wasn’t a lot of room to fully stand.
“Oh look, it’s the human bastard,” he said dryly. Despite his tone, his claws were out and his feathers in his mane were standing up.
Seren narrowed his eyes at Kaylum. "Enjoyed your night?" he asked the two princes, voice dry and sarcastic.
Nik snorted. "You know we didn't. What the fuck do you want, Seren?"
Seren gave him a wounded look. "What do you think I want, Nikolas?" he replied, taking a step closer.
It was at that moment that Kaylum’s stomach decided to growl. Laughing a little, he said, “Food, maybe.”
He laughed it off mostly for the sake of his dignity and not appearing pathetic, but he probably failed that the moment he was captured.
Seren frowned at Kaylum. "We'll see." was the response to the request for food. Then he looked at Nik again, crossing his arms.
"You aren't getting my crown, Seren. My father would never have let that happen, and neither will I."
Kaylum promptly fell silent. This was between them. If Nikolas needed encouragement, Kay would do his best to give it, but right now he just wanted to see how this would play out. Who knows, maybe it would end with Seren dragging him away to be tortured or something.
Seren shrugged his shoulders. "See, I was afraid you would say that." he replied. "I knew it would come to this." he sighed. "See, if it were solely up to me, I would just leave you be, Nikolas."
Nik spat at him. "No you wouldn't. You're a fucking liar, Seren."
He tilted his head, but kept quiet. Wasn’t this already solely up to him? Kay then heard his stomach grumbling again, and he cringed inwardly. Now this was just getting awkward for him.
Seren sighed again. "I did love your father, Nik. I know you probably won't believe that, but I did." he crouched to look Nik in the eye, though he somehow made the movement look mocking. "And I loved the kid I thought you were, right up until you did this." he touched the scar on his face, expression twisting. "That crown no more belongs on your head than it would belong on an animal's. If you were anyone else, would you allow the crown of the country to remain on the head of an animal? Of a destructive, malignant thing incapable of control?" he stared at Nik through narrowed eyes.
Nik took a few deep breaths, face hardly twitching at Seren's words, save for a few blinks at the comparisons made between himself and an animal.
(Kinda wanna scene where he transforms and Kay has to fight him off in the cell as a dragon)
Nik was good at this. Kaylum would have probably lost his temper by now. Actually, even now he was resisting the urge to bite Seren or shove him out of cell. Here he was, in dragon form, a prince, and this man was talking of animals ruling countries. His tail began swaying side to side, but he tried to steel himself. Nikolas didn’t need him to intervene, or at least didn’t seem to. From what he had told Kay of the Kevran crown, he figured it was better if Nik could resist this on his own.
(definitely will happen at some point)
"Answer me, Nikolas." Seren snapped, when Nik didn't respond.
Nik raised an eyebrow. "What is there to answer? You've given me a false choice; no matter what I answer, you will use it was an excuse to further your narrative."
Seren shrugged a shoulder. "I had forgotten you were capable of intelligence. My mistake, it shall not happen again." he paused for a moment. "Now, Nikolas, you can make a choice: either you give me the crown now, without any unpleasantness, or…things get more unpleasant." his gaze flicked to Kaylum for a moment, then back to Nik. "For both of you."
Kaylum’s tail swayed faster, a manifestation of his quickly rising anger. He reminded himself to breathe; the sound of the blood rushing in his ears made it difficult. At least Nik was keeping a cool head. Though he could easily guess what the human prince’s answer would be, he tried to give him a subtle shake of the head. It did not matter to Kay what unpleasantness lied ahead. For the sake of both of their kingdoms, Nikolas must not give in.
Nikolas shook his head. "I'm not giving you my crown, Seren. You had the chance to become consort if you had married my father, but you left instead." he replied.
Seren sneered, shaking his head a little bit. "I thought you might say that." the man replied. "I'll be back for you in a moment, then. Unless you can walk?" his gaze flicked to Nik's injured leg, then up to his face again.
Nik grimaced. He wished he could walk; not being able to was like an admission of weakness.
His tail went still. Kaylum shook out his feathery mane, silent as ever. Time for the unpleasantness, he supposed.
Catching Nik’s grimace, he held out a foreleg. “He can lean on me,” he offered.
Seren frowned. "You are not walking around my camp in that form." he said, studying Kaylum. "You will either be a human, or you will remain in your cell." either way, Kaylum likely wouldn't be kept around the whole time; Seren wanted to work on the two separately.
Kaylum honestly did not understand the point of being in human form. It wasn’t like he could fly away if he stayed as a dragon. But hey, walking around and seeing the camp in his own body was better than sitting around doing nothing. He glared at Seren, using most of his willpower to keep from throwing curses at the man. He used the rest to shift to human form.
Seren watched Kaylum. "If you're going to have him lean on you, do that." he said, frowning at the two. Nik reached out, pulling himself up by the bars of the cell so that he was standing on his feet.
As he went over to Nik, Kaylum ran his fingers through his dreads, still feeling vaguely tired at this point. He held out his arm for him, his other arm eventually dropping to his side.
Nik took Kaylum's arm, leaning on him a little bit so that he wouldn't fall over. He looked at Seren, taking a deep breath. "Well? Let's go." he said, meeting the older man's eyes.
Seren sneered at him, and turned away to lead them out.
After making sure the other man was situated, Kayum followed Seren out of the cell and the tent. A few times he had to stretch out his legs to get his muscles working again. He kept his expression clear of emotion.
Nik held onto Kaylum, limping as he did his best to follow after Seren with Kaylum by his side. Seren was silent as he led them through the camp. Once they had come out of the cell, the two guards by the cell had fallen in behind Kaylum and Nik, following closely.
Kaylum felt his heartbeat rise steadily. Being actually out of the cell inside his body was nerve wracking, especially with the humans following behind them.
Nik was silent, gaze moving around the camp silently as he tried to take stock of how many men there were, and how experienced they seemed. The more he and Kaylum knew about the camp and the men within, the better off they would all be.
Kaylum quickly realized he was not in a good mental space. For him, looking around at everything in their surroundings was making him overwhelmed and unstable. He was tired, and hungry. For the sake of being of sound mind for whatever was ahead, he stopped focusing on everything else and turned his attention to Seren ahead of them. His heartbeat gradually slowed as he took more controlled breaths.