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making his elaborate clothes look too big for him. Manning wanted to sink into the ground.
    “Do you know where we are?” he asked.
    “Where are we?” asked Albert, his voice small and cold.
    “About eight miles from the Moranian Forest. We have been traveling due east at a good pace ever since we left the castle.”
    “Are you abducting me?”
    “No,” said Manning, although he supposed, from a certain point of view, he was. He didn’t understand why Albert was so calm. He seemed defeated. Manning wished he would yell at him or scold him as he had done after Manning had first touched him.
    “Did my father tell you to kill me?” asked Albert.
    “No!” said Manning, “and I wouldn’t ever, even if he did give me such an order. I won’t let anybody hurt you. I will stand between you and your father, or anything else that means you harm.” Manning surprised himself with the vehemence of his response. It came from somewhere deep inside him, and he had said it without thinking. It was a silly thing to say when he had spent the past three days leading Albert into danger. Albert watched Manning’s passionate display impassively.
    “Why are we almost in Morania?” he asked. The coldness in his voice was worse than the chill in the night air.
    Manning watched the embers of their fire glow, casting a paltry light. The diminished circle of firelight seemed to be pulling them closer together as they shrank from the encroaching darkness.
    “My instructions from your father were to bring you, unwitting, to Morania, to the forest that Edward and Charles both claim as theirs. It is there that you are meant to bring down a deer. ‘The most magnificent stag you can find,’ were your father’s words. If you aren’t able to kill it then I am to do it for you. And once it is done, when you blow your hunting horn hoping to bring your father’s servants, it will be Charles’ men who will find you, the king’s son, the crown prince, poaching on his land. At this point I am to leave you to your own devices, or, if I am captured, to be a docile prisoner and let what may happen, happen. Either Charles will imprison you, or worse, in which case your father has an excuse for the war he craves; or he will be forced to ignore this transgression, and your father may start using the land as he pleases. Either way, you see, your father wins, Charles loses, and you are like chaff in the wind, left to whatever ending fate may have for you.”
    When he was finished speaking, Manning forced his eyes to look towards Albert, whose continued silence worried him. The prince sat still, hugging his knees to his chest, staring blankly ahead. Manning began to reach out a hand to touch his shoulder, the back of his head, his cheek, but he stopped.
    “I…,” Manning began. But what could he say?
    Suddenly Albert spoke. “My father clearly chose well for this task,” he said. “Congratulations. A prince is quite a prize for a three-day hunting trip. You’ve won. You may do whatever you like with me.”
    “Your Highness,” protested Manning, not quite sure what Albert meant. Albert lay down, still curled in a tight ball, with his back to Manning. A charred log fell apart in the fire, its embers settling. Manning didn’t know what to do.
    “What I would like is to take you safely home,” he tried. Albert made no response.
    “I am very sorry I brought you this far,” he tried again. “I should have told you sooner.” Again, Albert showed no indication of having heard him.
    “In the morning I will take you home,” he said. God knew what he was going to say to the king.
    When Albert gave no answer to this declaration, Manning sat with the prince in silence. After a while Manning assumed that Albert had fallen asleep, but then he spoke.
    “We’ll go to Morania tomorrow,” he said.
    “I won’t take you there,” said Manning.
    “Of course you will,” said Albert, “it’s your duty.”
    “My duty, as I see it, is to protect