Cas listened, eating bites of his food while Erix spoke. Again, food. His parents had been good people, good rulers, but yet…had they not done much to help the poorer people? He couldn't imagine his mother, kind and lovely, letting people starve. Especially children. But yet, here was Erix. Who had never had enough food growing up. Could his parents really have failed their people so badly?
"Well, the palace is the place for lavish food." he replied softly, pushing away his memories of his parents. Thinking about them for too long always made things worse. The images of their bodies was burned into his brain, and if he tried to think of them, it was always their deaths that eventually flickered to life in his mind. He exhaled, studying Erix for a moment. "How old were you, when you joined the army?" It had been three years since his parents' deaths. Had Erix been in the military at that time? Or had he been doing something else?
He looked down at his plate, at his hands, at the missing fingers. He reached and idly rubbed his fingers over the stumps on his hand, then shook himself faintly and went back to his food. Dwelling on the past would do him no good. Not anymore. Nothing really did. THInking just went in circles, and he could hardly even leave this room to try and distract himself. How many days had he paced this room like a caged animal?
Erix tried to keep his opinions about the royal family to himself. After all, this was the second job he had had in his life where he was employed by one of them, but he had never been overly fond of them, that had always been obvious. At least, that had been Cassio's parents. They had seemed like good people, really, and he had no doubt they would have been at heart, but after living in poverty, seeing people who he had been friends with die from starvation or dehydration, sickness from having not enough medical supplies, Erix was more inclined than most to have less than a positive view on them. He didn't know what Marcus was doing, either, for those who needed help, but it would never be enough in his mind. They deserved more. They needed more. He pushed around the food on his plate, taking another mouthful despite losing his appetite thinking about it.
"I was sixteen," He replied, feeling the prince's gaze on him and refusing to look at the man, instead focusing on his food as he thought about the day he joined, "My brother had passed away not long beforehand. I worried that my sister would succumb to the same illness that took him. I had no other choice, there are not many places that are keen to hire a teenage boy who is known for getting into trouble. My… mentor, saw past that, though."
Rowan had been more of a father to him than his own had ever been. At least Rowan had been there, which was something to say considering his real father had never done so. After his death, too, Erix had decided that that had been enough for making friends or connections. Not that he had had many to begin with. There had been minimal in the army and yet they had died, too, or left for something better. He was cursed, he was starting to believe, that he would never truly have someone in his life permanently. As much as he tried not to think about it or be phased, his heart ached at the thought.
Cassio listened, watching Erix, but he did notice how the other man seemed reluctant to talk about this, reluctant to even look at him. He leaned back in his chair, looking down at his own plate for a moment. "You do not have to answer my questions." he said, lifting his gaze back to his guard after a long moment, studying Erix again. "If you do not truly wish to, then I shall not force answers from you." he knew that as a prince, even a mad one, sometimes people felt that they owed him something.
"I know you said that I could ask questions, and I have, but if you do not want to talk about something, you do not have to." he took a few more bites of food, then pushed his plate slightly back from himself, done eating. He didn't eat as much as he used to, didn't need to eat as much as he used to. His lifestyle was more sedentary now than it had been, and he didn't need to eat as much. he could have gorged himself if he wanted. COuld have let himself eat to the point of illness, and let himself gain weight. But he had not. He had, a few times, attempted the opposite. TO starve himself, and see how far they would let it go. The answer was that after abour four or five days of him refusing to eat, they usually forced it into him somehow.
He had long ago learned that acting out only brought in more heavy handed control, and even more tight fisted grasps on the already very short reins of his freedom. If he complied and rolled over like a submissive dog, things were a little better.
It was hard to ignore the ingrained training that he had been given for the last few years of his life. Erix had been trained and told to obey those who were above him, whether that was his general or commanding leader, the man above him that controlled his actions and moves, the one who could end his career if he so much as acted out. That was even more so ingrained in him when it came to royalty. As much as his feelings towards the family were… strained, difficult to decipher at times when the man before him had struggled so much and didn't deserve the pain that he had been put through, it made it far more difficult to ignore what he had been taught. Don't act out, don't ask questions, be nothing but a good solider. It was already difficult when Cassio was telling him to ask questions about himself, even more so to deny answering the questions he was asked in return.
It was wasn't that he felt he owed the mad prince an answer, more that he couldn't refute what had been hammered into his brain a thousand times over. Erix was no longer hungry. For a man who was so large, muscular and built - a soldier, warrior, through and through, it always surprised others when they learnt how little he tended to eat. But, much like Cassio, he had been raised in a lifestyle that had followed him through to his adulthood. there was little he could do now to ignore it or change it, not after so long.
"I know," Erix replied after a moment, looking up from his plate to the prince on the other side of the table, "But, if we are to be together for most, if not all, hours of the day, topics such as these are bound to arise. I have… no qualms with speaking about them, it has just been a while since I have done so. Forgive me for my hesitancy."
"There is nothing to forgive you for." Cassio responded. "We have only just met, and i have practically interrogated you about potentially sensitive matters. We will, ah, learn about each other as we spend our days together. I should not have rushed finding things out about you." even if he was a touch worried about it. Even if he was concerned about what Erix wanted, concerned about his own safety around a man who could easily overpower him… interrogating Erix about his past wouldn't help anything.
He exhaled, and finished up his own dinner, then pushed his chair back and got up from the table. "Maura will be back to collect the dishes in a bit, so don't worry about that." he said, pausing in place for a long moment, and then giving his head a quick shake and making his way over to the window, looking out of it as dusk crawled over the palace gardens. "I…must admit that holding my mind together is very tiring, and I am nearing my limit for today." he glanced back over at Erix. "My capacity for intelligable conversation may be, ah… strained. But, I have cards, and we could play a card game."
Playing cards would be less of a strain, and, well, if he lost… it didn't matter that much. It would be pretty easy to do it with little to no conversation, and with the gameplay to distract his mind, it might be easier to talk anyways. Or maybe it wouldn't. He… wasn't really sure, honestly.
