Aureus 1 Chapter 1

Chapter 1

“Another round.  Again!”  the golden-haired boy snarled and brandished his dulled blade.  His back ached and the bruises on his arms formed purple sleeves that rode along his body to kiss the nape of his neck.  Sweat dripped from his brow and down his pale torso, pooling in the dust beneath his feet.

Kaeso Portus eyed Ser Caspar warily.  The graying knight met his gaze and gave him a curt nod.  “The warrior prince aspires to be a tiger, then.  I will be honored to give him his stripes.”  He smiled tersely at the breathless boy before him, standing a head shorter and with only half his own years.

The prince replied with steel, recklessly charging his opponent.  Though still young, the man-at-arms had served House Domitian for nearly a decade.  His gray eyes locked on to his opponent with dangerous intent.  A predator sizing up the movement of his prey.  He allowed the prince to sate his rage by meeting his blows with his own blade rather than avoid the clumsy strikes outright.  When he had had his fill, he sidestepped the sweeping arc of an overhead swing and responded with a swift kick to the boy’s ankles, a maneuver that sent him tumbling to the floor.

The young prince bounded to his feet and cast his sword on the ground, spouting curses and threats to nobody in particular.  Ser Caspar nodded to Kaeso, who bowed in return before leaving the training pit.

“If you fight like a rabid dog, you will be put down like one.”  The knight stooped down to pick up the discarded training sword.

“He’s too quick.  Nothing I try can get past his guard.”  The boy muttered darkly.  “I only wanted to see how that boorish grin of his would hold up against steel.  If I could have just gotten close enough to wipe it off his face…”  His green eyes gleamed with murderous intent.

Caspar failed to stifle a chuckle.  “At the very least you have ferocity.  That’s not something so easily trained in a man as the ways in which to wave a stick.”  He walked toward the edge of the pit, a slight limp apparent in his stride.  “Come boy, we’ll get you cleaned up.  Your father will be wroth to learn you are late to your studies once more in favor of bruising your body.”

Aureus shifted in his saddle.  The Hayak Wastes stretched for miles on end, separating Satria from The Cerean Empire with an ocean of bleached sand.  The smooth gait of his gray palfrey Whistle made it easy for his mind to drift off into the past.  In those days the greatest of his worries came in textbooks and at the end of a quill; his battles ended at the edge of the training pits.  Now he drifted about in a foreign land pursued by enemies both at home and abroad, a specter flitting across the barren wastes.

“I was worried you’d lost your mind to the sands, the way you’ve been gazing into them all morning.”  Ser Caspar pulled up his own horse, a brown pack horse more fit for pulling a wagon than carrying a man across the desert.

“I’m worried of losing much more than that amidst these unending dunes.”  Aureus looked into the hardened face of his old mentor.  The southern sun had not treated him kindly.  His now leathery skin, once fair and ruddy, stretched taut over his gaunt cheekbones.  A thick beard more gray than black spilled out of the bottom of his light gray cowl.  The thin red scars that decorated his face in a crisscross pattern had long since blanched under the constant assault of the sun.  His eyes still retained their vitality, despite it all, burning fiercely beneath a weary face.

“Safar Hammida is the greatest smuggler this side of The Black Peaks, or so he claims.”  Caspar shrugged.  “If this is the safest way into the Empire, I’d walk barefoot over a thousand dunes.  Who knows how many ambitious lords, unsavory brigands, and derelict hedge knights are itching to lay their hands on that golden head of yours.”

“Such a warm welcome awaits me.  It often makes me wonder why I ever left.”  the prince replied dryly.  “It also raises the question of how much our noble guide knows of the nature of our journey.  If he even suspects my identity, he may turn us over the moment we cross the border in exchange for a mountain of wealth.”

“He has about as much an interest in dealing with the Cerean law as you do.  If he brought you in he’d be serving up a two course meal for the first lord to trap him in the walls of his keep.  That’s assuming he even knows who you are.”  The knight replied in a low tone.

Aureus sighed, leaning back into the scalding leather of his saddle.  They had struck a bargain with the smuggler count, as he is called, to deliver them safely across the Satrian border with The Cerean Empire.  He assured them he had made the journey countless times with parties ten times the size and with wagons loaded with illegal armaments, substances, and ill-gotten coin.  They had spent nearly all of their remaining funds on the man to both acquire his services and discretion.  Although it had been many years since his flight, Aureus’ informants had kept him up to date with the ever increasing bounty on his head.  He wondered how many straw haired men had lost their lives to an executioners blade, falsely accused of being the estranged prince for the poor misfortune of bearing his likeness.

“At any rate, we are in his hands now, and the hands of the gods above.”  Caspar added.  He lightly kicked the sides of his mount, riding ahead to converse with their guide.

The ground beneath the party gradually blended from the white of the sands to the rocky brown of the peaks as the crimson sun began to set on yet another day.  They had travelled for seven moons, sneaking out of the gates of Malabeh on the first night to avoid unwanted attention.  Aureus brought all of his retainers, twelve loyal men remaining of the thirty who had first ridden with him fearlessly into his desert exile.  Over time the desert had stolen away his ardent defenders, laying upon them plagues, misfortunes, and violent banditry.  Safar had brought four of his own men all clad in black robes that reached the straps of their leather sandals.  Each was armed with a heavy riding saber that snaked down their left side, along with a glossy recurved bow and a leather quiver bristling with barbed arrows.  White masks decorated with swirling red glyphs never left their hooded faces.  Aureus wondered how they could stand it under the sweltering heat, but he never got a chance to ask them.  They rode in pairs, one ahead and one behind the convoy to alert the group of a patrol, or so he assumed.  When camp was made, they always set to guarding the perimeter without a word to any save for Safar himself.  In fact, the prince had never once seen them take time to eat or sleep.  Despite the heat still emanating from the baked earth beneath his feet, he felt a chill as one of the dark sentinels passed by.  From behind the black of his eye slits he could feel its gaze upon him, calculating and cold.

That night Aureus slept fitfully.  In his dreams he felt a looming presence watching his journey through the wastes.  The panic in his heart mounted and he spurred on his steed.  It stumbled and fell in the shifting sands, tumbling down the slope of a dune to be swallowed whole by the white tides.

When he awoke, he could not remember the particulars of his nightmare, save for the feeling of dread it left in the pit of his stomach.  He could not saddle Whistle soon enough and ride on into the stony embrace of the mountains, which rose like a black curtain to obscure him from the vision of his ethereal watcher.

“This path will soon be unpassable, the horses are bound to break a leg on these slopes.”  Kaeso complained aloud.  Their route had narrowed considerably as the hours dragged on.  The convoy had been forced to thin with it, each rider pressed behind the man in front.

“I trust the good lord smuggler knows his way round these peaks.”  Mathus replied.  The mouse-eared rider had been younger than Aureus when they fled the Empire.  At the time he had been a mere stable hand, but brutal necessity had forced him into the role of a warrior.  “Says he been doin’ it afore I crawled out of my mother’s womb.  If it weren’t passable, we wouldn’t be here.”

“A lot of stock you put into a man who makes his living swindling officials and smuggling street filth into our lands.”  Kaeso muttered.

Mathus snorted with laughter.  His ears twitched as he smiled, a yellow mess with as many gaps as teeth.  “Don’t let the good prince hear that.  To be called traitor’s one thing, street filth I don’t believe he’s ready for.”

“You know damn well what I meant you bloody fool.”  Kaeso shot back, his cheeks reddening.

The sign came down from the front to halt the line.  Aureus dismounted and passed the two, who quickly ceased their argument at the sight of the prince.  “I’d rather be street filth than a corpse.”  He patted Kaeso’s leg before continuing to the head of the convoy.

Safir’s dark face broke into a smile as Aureus drew near.  “Ah, a thousand blessings to you and to the gods above my noble lord.”  He leaned into a gracious bow, the bottom of his red silk robe sweeping in an arc in front of him.  “We have reached the pass undetected and with great haste.  From here, I recommend you lead your horses on foot.  The treacherous path does not suit the hooves of the horse I fear.  Once you begin your descent on the other side, the path should widen to accommodate riding once more.”

Aureus looked out over the crags that lie ahead.  The path all but disappeared as it winded upwards through a steep trail of loose, gravelly rocks.  As he scanned the terrain, Aureus noticed a dark figure on the side of the mountain to the left of the trail.  He watched as several more black robes stepped out from their hiding places among the rocks above.  In total, he counted two dozen of Safir’s mercenaries watching like a murder of crows from their stony perch.

“I suspect you wish for the second half of your payment now.”  Aureus spoke with steel in his voice.  He reached for the purse on his belt, not taking his eyes off of the amassing group of masked men.

“You suspect correctly.  However, there is something else I require of you, I am afraid.”  The smuggler placed a gloved hand on Aureus’ shoulder and offered him a faint smile.  “Let us walk, my prince.  My business with you does not end here.”