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The air warped around the escaping prisoners and Tenn swore loudly, roundly, and fully as Gaku’s dagger buried itself in a tree right where one of the escapees legs should have been.
“A teleporting ability!” said Gaku. “Why didn’t we know one of them had a teleporting ability!”
“Because,” Tenn said, through gritted teeth, “it wouldn’t have been relevant if my stupid brother hadn’t meddled and caused me to have to lift my mind control!”
“Some mind control,” Gaku snorted. “I’ll admit your brother’s is impressive, because that was the entire castle under his control, but yours is just...ridiculous, really.”
“Oh fuck off,” said Tenn. “As if you’re any better. All you do is make shiny rocks!”
“Shiny rocks that can kill people!”
“I can kill people too, and I’m less likely to get caught for it!”
“Can you two please stop arguing over whose power is better?” said Ryuu. “You’re both equally powerful, you know.”
“We absolutely are not,” said Tenn.
“Easy for you to say,” Gaku grumbled. “You’ve got the best power out of all of us.”
“Just because you need actual fuel to indulge your pyromaniac streak doesn’t mean you should take that out on Ryuu,” Tenn said snidely. “Look, we need to get those prisoners back in the cells, as soon as fucking possible--especially Yotsuba Tamaki. He’s Princess Aya’s biological brother, and Kujo convinced her that he fucked off and wants nothing more to do with her, and made sure the rumor was confirmed by locking him up, but if they reunite and she finds out that he’s been our prisoner all this time, we’re in trouble.”
“Wait, does that mean you’re locking up your brother again as well?” Gaku said, horrified.
“What?” Tenn said. “No, of course not. His lungs couldn’t take it. Why would I do that to him?”
“You’re doing it to your sister’s brother!”
“So? He isn’t my brother,” Tenn said, very reasonably in his opinion. “Why should I care?”
“He’s still a person!” Gaku said. “Plus, he’s your sister’s brother, so you’re practically family!”
“My standards for family are much higher than that, Gaku,” Tenn said loftily, as though he hadn’t accepted Aya as family just because Kujo had said she was now his sister. “Even you barely meet them.”
“Awww, you think of me as family!” Gaku cooed, ruffling Tenn’s hair as he squawked and then tried to throttle Gaku in return.
Ryuu separated them. “Enough, you two,” he said. “Don’t we have prisoners to chase down? If we even want to recapture them, that is.”
“Why wouldn’t we?” asked Tenn.
“Well, one’s your brother, one’s Aya’s, one can see the future, and two of them clearly came prepared to escape,” Ryuu said. “In the remaining five, one can blow things up and one can teleport himself and others. Without Tenn’s mind control, we wouldn’t be able to keep them locked up for a second.”
“Even with my mind control, it’s doubtful,” Tenn sighed. “It’s possible to push through if you’re aware it’s there--hard and painful, but possible, as both of you are aware--and Riku is capable of counteracting it, especially with his eight soulbonds. Honestly, doesn’t that idiot know better than to become soulmates with everyone who speaks to him nicely?”
“Eight?” said Gaku. “How do you know that? I only counted three.”
“Not all soulmarks are on visible skin, you idiot,” Tenn said. “And--we’re soulmates. We were each other’s first soulbond. We can sense how many the other has.”
“Huh,” said Gaku, who had soulbonded to Tenn and Ryuu at the same time and could not do this for either of them, because they both already had soulbonds of their own.
“Oh, yeah,” said Ryuu, “I can do the same for the oldest of my younger brothers. He’s only got the one other, though, his girlfriend’s. Tenn, why didn’t you worry about your brother gaining seven new soulbonds over the past five years?”
“I did worry,” Tenn said, “especially since they all happened over the span of two days. But I was also busy. It was right after Father fully commanded the people’s loyalty. I’d had to use a lot of power.”
“As if your mind control actually does anything,” said Gaku, looking deeply unsettled by this.
“It works perfectly fine,” Tenn snapped. “In fact, your stance on its uselessness means it works so much better on you.”
“Prove it,” said Gaku.
Tenn had proved it, many times. The main issue with proving it now was that his mind control was infectious, and while when he initially spoke it into being, he’d be able to shield Ryuu from its effects, as soon as Gaku opened his mouth about it or anything related to it, Ryuu would go under too, and so would anyone other than Tenn himself who heard Gaku.
“Do not prove it,” said Ryuu, who was vastly experienced with Tenn proving it, usually to embarrassing or disastrous results. “Right. We need to decide, before we get back to the castle, whether or not we’re going after the prisoners. I, personally, think we should let most of them go. We need to focus our efforts on the spare.”
Gaku shook his head. “All or none, I think. They’re a web of soulbonds, if what Tenn said is correct, and that’ll fortify the spare if they’re out and safe and the spare isn’t. If we really want to go down that path, we need all of them.”
“We are not locking Riku up there again,” Tenn snapped. “Whatever the cost. Father doesn’t have to know--”
“King Kujo definitely knows that he was there,” said Gaku. “I’d be willing to bet anything he was the one who put him there.”
Tenn huffed. Gaku was right, of course he was. That didn’t mean he had to admit it, though. “Well,” he said slowly, “he doesn’t have to know that I know.” Tenn smirked. “We can’t just let them go. I vote all; or, at least, we chase them all down. If we only come back with the spare, and maybe one or two others...it won’t be hard to make them think we’ve killed the rest.”
“Soulbonds,” Ryuu reminded him.
Tenn scoffed. “Please. I’ve had the spare unable to see King Takanashi’s intact soulbond for years. I can definitely convince them that their companions are dead.”
Gaku and Ryuu exchanged their ‘do we curb Tenn’s murderous impulses or run amok with them’ look for the third time that day, and Tenn huffed and tapped his foot, wondering what he could say to send Gaku into a blood frenzy that would make him side with him.
“I mean, assuming we can count on Tenn’s mind control--”
“Fuck you.”
“--You’re too young for me, babe. Assuming we can count on his mind control, I think Tenn’s plan is sound,” Gaku said. “We’re going for it.”
“Great,” said Ryuu. “Now, do any of us have any idea where they went?”
The three soulmates stared at each other for a couple minutes, entirely clueless.
“You see,” Gaku complained, “this is why Tenn’s mind control is useless! I wish he could just sniff out clues like a dog.”
“Oh, eat my ass,” Tenn said. “Clearly they’re going to one of the enemy kingdoms, right? All we have to do is figure out which one. ”