Everything happened in the blink of an eye. Aliana plunged her blade towards the assassin, who, in turn, let his eyes go wide in momentary fear and began to try to move out the way. This caught Iora's attention and she immediately kicked her foot out, hitting Aliana's shin. The princess lost her balance and fell backwards. Her blade, still swinging viciously, missed the man's neck by mere inches; she toppled to the ground.

"Aliana!" Iora screeched, kicking the blade out of the fallen princess's hand. She snatched it off the ground and hurled it away from her, out the door. "What are you doing?" She reached down in a rage and gripped Aliana's collar, yanking her to her feet.

Aliana, still seeing red, attempted to rip herself from the guard's grip. "Let me go!" she hollered. She flung herself towards the assassin with her hands outstretched, but Iora kept a firm grip. "Let me kill him!"

"That wouldn't be a good idea," mused the assassin in a smug voice. The fear that had shown in his eyes had been quickly replaced with a certain haughtiness; he had the arrogant eyes of a man that possessed secrets and therefore could not be killed by anyone who wished to gain those secrets. "I know things."

"What?" Iora momentarily appeared confused, but it wasn't long before realization dawned on her face. She turned back to Aliana and said angrily, "You kill him and you never learn who wanted you and your father dead."

The princess briefly stopped struggling, as she too saw what the assassin meant. Although the rage inside didn't diminish in the least, her will to fight did. She let herself go limp.

Iora, seeing that the princess wasn't going to attack the assassin the second she let go, released her grip and shoved the princess onto the bed. Pointing to the tied up assassin, she growled, "Don't harm him. I don't care how pissed you are. You pull another stunt like that and I will not hesitate to tie you up also. You hear me?"

Aliana was taken aback by the uncharacteristic rage in Iora's voice. Even when they had just met and Aliana treated her horribly, the guard had never sounded this angry. The fear it instilled in Aliana was enough to suppress her murderous desires even more. The princess simply nodded weakly and sunk into the bed.

"Now," Iora muttered, rubbing her temples and turning towards the assassin, "tell me who you are and why the hell are you trying to kill us."

"I don't think I will." The man huffed and turned his head away, flicking his bangs.

Without a second of hesitation, Iora lifted her blade and leveled it with his throat, the sharpened tip barely touching his skin. "I think you will. You've been following us closely, so I have a feeling you know about those men I killed a few towns back. They gave me far less trouble than you have, and look how they ended up. You'll find that I am able to easily overlook my morals when the need arises."

The calm facade the assassin seemed to be hiding behind was once again slipping. He gulped, his eyes focused on the blade that was ready to pierce his esophagus. Seemingly mustering strength, he muttered, "I don't talk, and you kill me. I talk, and you kill me. Either way, I don't see this scenario ending with me the victor. I'd rather remain quiet."

"I won't kill you if you tell me why you want to kill me."

"No." He turned his head away from her, attempting to appear brave. Aliana noticed that his knees were trembling.

Seeing that Iora's patience was wearing thin, Aliana spoke up. "Out here, in the middle of nowhere, you are at our mercy. Your life is completely in our hands. Whoever hired you to kill my father and myself is not here to save you. As the true heir to the throne, I have every right to kill you. We'll get the information we seek in one way or another. Are you sure you want to die a slow and painful death when you could simply tell us what you know?"

Her words seemed to have an effect on the assassin. The gears in his head were turning as he began contemplating her offer. As he did so, Iora kept her blade at his throat, an incentive for him to make the right choice.

Finally, he sighed. The defiance that once kept him rigid seeped out of him and he let his proud shoulders slump. "Fine. I'll talk. Just get your sword away from me."

Iora sheathed herself and said to Aliana, "I really didn't think that would work." She shook her head in amazement. To the assassin, she commanded, "Talk. I want to know who you are and why you're here."

"Can I have some water first?"

Aliana, desperate to hear what he had to say, began to shake her head no. Iora ignored her and snatched the canteen from its spot on the bed. Unscrewing the lid, she lifted it up against the assassin's lips since his hands were tied.

He drank greedily from it and Iora had to pull it away before he could gulp it all down. She put the cap back on and tossed it aside. "Now talk."

The assassin took a deep breath and finally began to talk. "My name is Soren and-"

"I knew it!" Iora exclaimed, abruptly cutting him off. "Aliana, I told you he looked familiar. This is the guy that was kicked out of the military for stealing!"

The assassin gave her a piercing glare. "Yes," he said, agitated, "I was dishonorably discharged from the military for stealing. But do you know why I was stealing? Of course you don't. I will tell you why. I was stealing because the monthly military stipend that is given to the family members of soldiers is barely enough to buy a loaf of bread, let alone pay for housing, or a good meal, or even a warm blanket. Now, that may be manageable when your entire family has jobs and is able to have a normal, comfortable life and live in a nice, comfortable house. But after my parents and my aunt and my uncle were killed, guess who was left to care for my blind baby brother. I was!"

Soren's voice had been steadily rising throughout his entire monologue, but by the end he was on the verge of shouting and he had tears streaming down his filthy face. The blatant pain and sorrow that laced his words was almost, almost, enough to make Aliana pity him. A nerve had obviously been deeply struck, which had caused of torrent of emotion to overtake him.

He continued, his voice steadily rising. "I was left to fend for my brother! I was fifteen and my entire family was dead! He was three and couldn't even feed himself! No one wanted to take care of the little blind orphan and I couldn't leave the military without being a deserter! I had to move him from family friend to family friend who would only watch him until money became tight! My small monthly stipend wasn't enough to even feed him! My brother was starving and I couldn't do anything! So yeah, I stole! I stole from a bunch of incompetent morons who don't know what hunger pains feel like! Am I really such a horrible person for loving my baby brother?!"

With that, Soren let out a high-pitched wail and collapsed on the ground. His bindings restricted his movement and caused him to fall into a tangled mess lying in filth. He continued wailing at the top of his lungs. The once proud, arrogant killer that had stood defiantly in front of them was now a sobbing mess on the cold, hard, heartless floor.

The women shared a concerned, baffled look. Neither knew what to do with the distraught assassin. They found themselves forgetting his sins and began instead pitying him greatly. He was just as damaged as both of them.

Finally, Aliana gathered the bravery to speak. "What..." she whispered hesitantly, "what does this have to do with you trying to kill me?"

Soren, his face tear-streaked, weakly lifted his head of the ground and stared at her through puffy red eyes. "I was without a job, a disgrace after being expelled from the military. I was reunited with my brother, but that did us no good. We were homeless and no one wanted to help us. At one point, I had to go almost an entire week without food so my brother wouldn't starve to death. I was on the verge of death when I was approached by a tall man wearing council robes. He said he would pay me a large sum of gold if I helped him kill the king. At first I laughed, thinking him joking or trying to secretly see if I was treasonous, but then, from his coat pocket, he pulled out a vial. He held it close to my face and showed me the contents, a swirling green concoction. He said it was poison and it was meant for the king. He said I was the perfect person for the job, as surely I must be angry at the government for firing me and abandoning me in my time of need. He would provide me an easy way to get access to the king's food and all I had to do was pour just one drop in. If I did it, I would be rewarded greatly.

"By this point, I began to realize the man was serious. I had asked why, if it would be so simple, didn't he just do it himself. I'll always remember what he said back to me: If I do it, then I am a traitor. If you do it, then I am one step closer to being king. And of course, I was really starting to be scared of this guy. Worrying that he would hurt my brother if I refused to help him, I said yes. Within a couple days, I was secretly smuggled into the castle. The councilman dressed me in servant clothes and brought me to the kitchen, where I was assigned to bring the king his supper that night. Slipping in the poison was almost too easy. And, as you know, the king was dead by morning."

Soren paused briefly to take a breath. "After the deed was done, the councilman kept his word and I was given a large sum of money. For a brief period, things were wonderful. My brother and I could actually afford to eat. And then, just when I thought life would get better, the councilman approached me again. He said I did so well with the king, he needed my services again. This time, I was to watch after you, princess. You had just been framed for the murder of your own father and would soon have a trail. The councilman said that it would break his heart to have to murder the princess himself, so he wanted me to do it. I was instructed to wait outside of your tower, while you were confined to it. If you made an attempt to escape, I was to kill you. If you didn't I wasn't to lay a hand on you and at trial you would hopefully be exiled.

"Now, when you escaped, that made things difficult. I didn't want to leave my brother behind to chase after you. I told the councilman that you were long gone, that you wouldn't be back. Of course, he didn't like that and insisted that he couldn't be sure you wouldn't return one day. I was told that if I didn't chase after you and kill you, my brother would suffer greatly. I was given the chance to either kill you, a royal, pampered princess who never did anything for me, or have my own brother killed. As you can see, I had no choice. It's nothing personal, but I must save my brother. He's all I have."

Aliana noticed that when Soren talked of killing her father, there was hardly any remorse or guilt in his voice. But, as soon as he mentioned his brother, tears instantly rose to eyes. Aliana found herself admiring his dedication to his family, but also filled with a rage at the careless way he spoke of her father, a man he had murdered.

Iora noticed Aliana's anger that was radiating off of her in waves and walked over to her. She gently took her in an attempt to both calm her down and keep her from jumping up and killing the assassin. To Soren, she warned, "You should show more respect to the dead king."

Soren was quickly returning back to his arrogant demeanor, though he still had tears on his cheeks. "The king never did anything for me."

At those words, Aliana squeezed Iora's hand tightly and leaned against her for support. She felt sick to her stomach and wanted to break down into tears. She had to force herself to remain standing. She was finally able to choke out, "Who was the councilman that hired you? I must know for when I return, I will slit his throat slowly, from ear to ear and watch him bleed out as he begs for my mercy." Her voice was barely more than a hoarse whisper, but that didn't mean that her promise wasn't real. Her mind knew the answer from his story, from the words of the person who had hired this man, but her heart was refusing her to believe it. She needed to hear the name and let either her heart or her mind win the battle. Hearing the name was essential.

It took almost no time for the name to come from Soren's lips, but nonetheless it was world shattering. "Councilman Mordeccai Alderexus."