The Princess and the Sword

         

11          - Samuel D. O. Ugowe

Her skin was flawless, a warm mocha, a tender hand stretched out towards me. The palm facing up, inviting me to take her hand. I hesitated for the briefest instant and her face fell, the dearest expression of disappointment making her beautiful face tinged with a hint of sadder beauty. The fingers of the hand, curled, beckoned me forward.
"Wake up, love," her voice had a musical lilt, each syllable like the singing of a crystal bell. "wake up."
My head rolled off my arm, thunking solidly against the wooden counter. I glanced up, groggily, the sands of sleep still clouding the corners of my eyes. The bartender sniffed audibly, avoiding my eyes as she cleaned a mug with a rag shorn from a corner of her apron.
The bar was much the same as when I'd last checked before I passed out on my stool. A cool fire smoldered in the hearth, casting a faintly warm glow that mixed with the early morning sun that filtered in from between the shuttered windows. I tucked my head back into my arms, studying the smooth grain of the oaken counter, tracing the lines with a fingertip. You need to stay out of my dreams, Bellaraum, I thought to her. A light hand lay on my shoulder. I didn't need to lift my head to know it was her. I could picture her perfectly, her warm skin, her chocolate hair, those bright eyes blue as the clearest summer's noon.
"Get up, love; it's time." Her voice was barely a whisper, caressing my ears as her hand caressed my shoulder.
I shrugged her off, though the motion was a waste, and rapped the counter twice.
The bartender sighed, "Rouke, the sun's not risen ten minutes."
I held up a hand, head still down, "Rum, please," I replied, rapping the counter with my knuckles again.
The bartender sighed again but still turned to fetch the rum, then paused. "How do you propose to pay for this? And last night? And the weeks before?" her voice was sly, I was trapped.
I reached slowly for the sheathed sword that lay on the floor by my feet. She kept her back to me, as she waited for an answer. I heard an annoyed yell as the door creaked closed behind me. She wasn't really angry; she'd have a cold mug of whiskey and sweet waiting for me at my spot in the corner. I'd have to deal with her eventually.
Even, the early light was too much for my drink-strained eyes. The floors slid on an axis, rolling like the deck of a ship. I was still drunk. I hid my sword underneath my cloak and let my feet carry me somewhere to loiter my drunkenness away. Bellaraum walked slightly in my wake, hands clasped on her back, We have work to finish, Belzat-
"I told you not to call me that!" It was meant to be a furious whisper
It was yet early in the morning but businesses were already setting up, a quiet bustle that lent the air a force and purpose that I didn't want any part of. I didn't feel like thinking with sweet still blanketing my mind. I just wandered through back-alleys and main thoroughfares. I eventually found myself at the canals with the distinct feeling that Bellaraum had led me here in my haze.
My mind cleared as I gazed up at the sun, peeking over the other half of the capital which sat on a parallel mountain range across the river. The east star cast the mountain's profile in its golden fire, warming the gray marble of the far palace near the mountain peak with a light that seemed to seep into the stone and emanate it back as a warm glow like the heat that flew with it.
The scene was exceedingly beauteous; I hated it. Spring was a damnable season.
I spit over the side of the canal into the gray, silty water below and was turning to head back to the tavern when I heard a soft titter and felt a knife nicking the small of my back.
The laugh was Bella's, mocking my misfortune.
The knife was a thief's, trying to make me his early morning mark.
I let my arms hang limply by my sides, looking as nonthreatening as possible, "I thought the thieves knew to leave Nalqel be." It wasn't a question; I tried to make it conversational, as normal as talk of overly high taxes and future weather.
He huffed, the gruff bark of laughter more like the sound of air rushing out of a winded man's lungs than a genuine reaction, "You? Nalqel the Elder? A kit young enough to be me son, the Clean Blade?" he asked, disbelief plain in his voice.
I turned to look at my captor but only got a quick glimpse of a bald pate, reflecting the sun, and a hastily constructed mask dotted with splotches of dried blood before his fist struck me across the side of the head. His fist told me even more, covered as it was in small scars.
"Don't turn! Don't even move!" His voice had a snarl to it that some might confuse for anger but one could learn to tell the difference in the sound of a man who harnessed true malice. That type held a darker feeling that this thief couldn't muster.
No, he was scared. The knife twitching across my lower back like a scrivener's quill attested to that.
"Just hand me yer coin. And that ring," he added when he saw my hand as I slowly reached my coin-string. "Tha's right, slow. I'll kill you and kick you into the river if you try anything. So don't," I thought I heard a whispered "please" follow it.
A soft clink floated away on a salty breeze as I dropped my coin onto the slick stone underfoot. Unfortunately, as I worked the ring from my finger, I knocked my scabbard loose from its hidden bindings. The thief saw what it was quick and grabbed for it before I could stop him.
We both froze. I could sense what he was experiencing, almost smell the cold sweat on his brow as Bella held a sword across his throat. She whispered words, threats, so low even I could not hear them but the malice could be felt in the shaking of the man's hand on the sword's hilt and a drop in the temperature of the surrounding air.
"Enough, Bella!" I tore the thief's hand from the sword and turned around. Seizing his other wrist and I gave it a quick twist and kicked the falling knife over the side of the canal wall. The thief's face was pallid, wild brown eyes unnaturally wide. He was sputtering, fear mangling the words before they could even rise from the throat.
I held his gaze while I played with my ring, making the symbol embossed on it, a sword piercing the sun, easy to see. "Paring meat from bone is so much harder than it looks, isn't it? So easy to slip and cut the fingers. But those scars are on the mend, so you must have been apprenticed ages ago, butcher." His eyes, if possible, widened further.
I turned and looked over his shoulder at Bellaraum, who watched the entire scene with an amused half-smile. "I knew things were bad when the Drunken Queen was near empty. But so bad as to move butchers to banditry?" I spoke the words to her but I knew the butcher-thief couldn't see or hear her any longer. I addressed the next to him, "The profession doesn't suit you.
"Take this, sell what housing you have here and leave this city," I told him, slipping a single fat, golden fivegold off of my coin-string, "Use the money to buy some livestock, should be good for at least 3 pigs."
The butcher stared blankly at me, a mixture of fear and distrust in his eyes. I slapped him, "Do you have children, man?" he nodded quickly, a bright red hand print starting to shine on his left cheek.
"Then leave and get them used to the idea of living on the countryside!" I said, a bit of annoyance climbing into the words.
He scurried away without a backwards glance, clutching the thick coin to his chest like a life preserver. In moments, he was lost in the growing shadows between buildings. A bell rang somewhere in the distance as one of the canal walls lowered, letting a rush of seawater and a few small skiffs into the adjacent chamber. As the dynamic sea met its more sluggish cousin, the spray reached up even these high walls, peppering my lips with salt. They reminded me almost of tears, almost. Tears had something else mixed in with the salt, though.
I knew the taste of tears, my own, of women I had consoled as they lay dying.
Bella draped her arms over my shoulders, her right cheek pressed against my left, but I felt nothing.
I lifted my arm and gazed at the steel wire that was now a fivegold barer, leaving a few measly onecoppers and a single fivesteel. "I remember a time when I couldn't see the cord for the coin," I said wistfully to no one in particular, "That coin was to pay for this week's sweet and rum."
Bella laughed, "I thought it was for last week's drink and the week before and the two-week past?"
I growled at her but didn't answer; instead, gazing back up at the sun again, resembling so much the fivegold I had just given away to charity.
Bellaraum's thin fingers grasped my chin and tugged it lower, "You're looking too high, love."
I could sense where she was focusing but I was tired of the games, tired of the fights.
Tired of living.
Despite myself, I looked at some scaffolding that jutted out just above the surface of the water on the opposite canal wall. My eyesight was keen and I picked out ten men glancing around furtively as an eleventh pulled at a thick slab of stone that concealed what looked to be a secret tunnel that led further into the mountain.
"Some enterprising bandits found the King's River?" I asked, as I watched a group of them lift the slab away and enter the system of tunnels that snaked its way from the palace to various other places throughout both halves of the capital. "Good for them. But what concern is it of mine if a few thieves make use of a path perfectly suited for the tas--" Bella's finger on my lips seized the words. She said nothing, merely gazing intently at the men. As I continued to look and I noticed a quick flash of light. A split-second reflection of light off of chain mail and, as I looked closer, I recognized the look of blackened plate mail, grimy smoke disguising the metal. A few of the men, I had labeled as thieves, fingered maces and axes, others shortswords similarly smoked.
I set off at a run for the nearest opening to the King's River. Bandits didn't sneak into underground tunnel systems, and certainly not in Seraafyyn, the capital of the nation of Umestra.
And thieves had no purpose for the weapons of war.

























The room sat in shadow, a downy softness underneath as if I lay on clouds. I'd been awake for an hour, anxiety gnawing at the fringes of my mind.
I had wormed out the information from my brother's councilors that he had a major decision to make today. One that would fundamentally change the state of relations with Emeth to the north and, indirectly whether Umestra would go to war with the Khelga Clans to the far northeast. The shadow of war hung more thickly over the nation than the gloom over this mountainside.
Too poetic, I thought laughing softly, the sound of it shifting the silence for a few seconds and allowing it back when I stopped.
Mother had always said 'Aera, you have the soul of a poet.' Not a very useful soul for a noble. I reminisced warmly, And brother would always try and look serious, saying that nothing is more important than anything.
My brother had always been so serious as a child, and nothing had changed since Mother died and he'd become, the ruler by necessity, imperte-em-adjunus. Though it was another two years before he became fully king, lack of another had forced my brother to take up a king's duties.
Including issues of war, I remembered, stowing away the warm memories for later. I lay quiet again and watched time pass as an almost unnoticeable shift in the light, the night clinging tightly to the lee-side of the mountain.
Ghosts of dust floated by on whatever errands they ran from day to day. Today, like many of the other days when I happened to see one, I considered calling out to one of them to ask if they knew my father. I parted my lips to whisper when a scuffling of feet pattered from outside my door.
Seconds later, a single, light knock shook the door timber and I froze, startled. The sound of the knock could have been overshadowed by a whisper but it seemed to echo in the quiet.
I burrowed under the covers a touch fearfully, as a second, more insistent knock alighted on the door. I couldn't say why I was afraid; no one except my personal maid knew I was here in the royal canal-side manor. We had left just after dusk, opting for further secrecy and taking the underground King's River to avoid being recognized by the guards at the checkpoints set into each ring of the walls that separated the districts of the city.
"Come in," I said aloud, cutting off a third knock, "The door isn't locked." There was a pause and I keenly wished that I had remembered to keep a dagger under my pillow like I had been taught.
There was a click as the handle turned and a hiss of air as the door swung open on well-maintained hinges. My maid wasn't at the door but neither was it anyone to fear. In the door frame stood my manservant, Ahmus Preant, an immigrant from the theocratic nation to the east who has served my family since he was a boy as a page to my grandfather. I felt guilty admitting it but, in my heart, I had always considered Preant to be as much a father to me as my real father, the late king, never had the chance to be.
Preant still had not moved further then the door frame, standing stiffly, his face carefully blankly. I noticed he carried a change of clothes over his left arm. He noticed my inquiring eye brow, I could tell, but chose to ignore it. Instead, placing the clothes, a sea-green frock, white blouse, and brown pants, on the bed by my feet, then pulled the room divider closed.
There was an awkward silence, or so I felt, as I dressed, "How did you know we were here? And, for that matter, where is my maid?" I called, quietly, as laced up the front of the frock. Some quality in the air made me want to whisper, though there was definitely no one else in the house.
A noticeable pause marked one of his rare less-than-truths. "This manor has not been stocked with supplies in months, Aera. The pantry is quite empty."
It seemed like a non-sequitur but I could guess what had happened. My maid had gotten hungry during the night and gone to the kitchens where she had been caught by Preant. It had taken me years to understand his roundabout way of being politely truthful. I continued dressing in a pleasant silence.
As soon as I was fully dressed and pushed back the divider, Preant snapped into motion, shifting and rearranging until it was no longer apparent that anyone had just occupied the room. I could almost believe that he had replaced a layer of dust on the surface of everything that I had touched the night before. He ushered me out of the now fusty room and locked it behind us. I lead the way past room after room of memories; hazy memories of a jovial, clean-faced man others have told me was my father and clear memories of summers with my brother and my mother. Looking back, it was clear that in all the years after my father succumbed to his soulrot and died. Every smile was tinged by sadness, every sun moment clouded by her regrets. Both my brother and I had decided to leave this building unmanned when she'd passed away as well but I couldn't shake the feeling that I needed to be here. As if it were my last chance to do so.
We entered the cellar and the cool morning airs shifted to the emptier chill of cold, dark earth that crept throughout the space. Strands of garlic and dried caipaic spice bundles hung from the ceiling, the sweet scents of the caipaic mixtures twined with the equally strong smells of garlic and damp stone. Casks of varying sized tucked themselves into the corners with cobwebs or dominated entire side paths of the branching basement.
At first, I wasn't certain of where it was in the mazes of oak and dust but after a series of befuddling turns and some subtle hints from Preant, we came to a round, wooden trapdoor recessed into the ground at the end of another sideway that was little more than a crack in the wall.
The wooden trapdoor which still held the hint of lacquer from when it was first created more than a century ago was warped and stained dark by the pervasive, cool damp. Eight grooves were carved regularly into the wood arranged around a metal disk with an engraving of the three wavy lines that vaguely resembled a river; conspicuous for how well-kept it was in spite of the generally aged surroundings. The iron gleamed dully in the light of that lantern Preant carried.
The King's River, I thought as I traced the three lines that formed the Umestran coat of arms with a finger. Truth be told it frightens me. I had nearly crushed Maide's hand on the way here.
I realized I had been staring blankly at the symbol, lost in thought and mesmerized by the swirling reflection that shifted in time with the light that rocked in Preant's hand. I knelt by the door and felt around the ridge of the inner, metal circle until I found a good grip, pulling up and hearing a soft click as something caught inside the door. Planting a hand on the door, I tried to spin the metal disk, struggling against resistance as the ancient mechanisms strove to remember their functions. Suddenly the resistance disappeared with a soft hiss and scratchy grinding as whatever had been holding the trapdoor in place retracted. I gave a muffled yelp as I barely managed to avoid falling in, the noises sounding loud in my ears as if the darkness below was as tangibly solid as it looked. A low, polite cough, again loud, pulled my attention back up to Preant. He held the lantern out towards me, beckoning me to take hold of the brass hoop it hung from and I once again understood his politely circular communication. I shook my head and gingerly lowered myself in, making use of the incised handholds in the trapdoor when it became more convenient to do so. It was only because I could just scrape the floor below with the toe of my boot that I managed to convince myself to loosen my fingers' iron-grip on the handholds.
As soon as both my feet were on the ground, I regretted my brave decision to go first. Ever since childhood, since I'd gotten lost in the gloomy back-alleys of the seamy Canalside quarter of the city, I have been afraid of the dark. And the desolate heaviness of the air in the King's River did me no favors; the combination was oppressive, simulating being both dead and forgotten. My breath started coming in short bursts and my head felt airily light, white spots dancing over the shadows.
I closed my eyes and began counting slowly as Preant had taught me, inhaling on the odds and exhaling on the evens. Soon the white spots vanished and the darkness behind my eyelids was at least more personal than the distant gloom. I had no idea how long the events had taken but the touch of something about my shoulders made me shriek.
My eyes snapped open and showed me in the warm circle of light from the lantern but more comforting was Preant's presence. I hugged him quickly, swallowing back bile I hadn't even noticed had risen up.
As with every other time that I travelled by this road, I quickly lost my sense of time. Trying to mark it by my pulsing heart as I fought and lost the battle to control the wildly racing thing was worse than useless. Even the glowing foeltite lanterns didn't help, the pockets of bluish-white light emitted by the small chips of metal not nearly regularly enough to use.
The oil lantern stood out amongst the soft, velvet darkness and the softer foeltite light, the hard orange-yellow flame overpowering both light and shadow. My ears perked up as the scuttle of light feet echoed up the tunnel from behind us.
Are there rats down here as well? I wrinkled my nose at the thought. Fantastic.
Preant froze for a second, shutting all but one side of his lantern and turned it back the way we had just come from. It shone back some thirty feet but nothing had changed. Another scuffle bounced up to our ears and Preant opened the lantern as if something had been decided. He turned, a knife in hand where there had not been one when he had looked back.
My heart started to race again and it had nothing to do with the gloom that lurked at the edges of the light. Was there something worse than rats here?
He pressed the knife into my sweating palm, closing my fingers around the hilt. Just pressing his palm against my forehand like he hadn't since I was a child, still fresh in my night terrors. The hand was a comforting reminder of his presence; there when I finally drifted to sleep and the first thing I noticed when I awoke
But this hand felt more like a goodbye kiss, "Go on ahead, Aera-maiura," He whispered, using a pet name I hadn't heard since I was eleven. "I've errands but I will return by the time you greet your brother."

~~~

I'd wasted too much time. The nearest King's River entrance was in the middle of what had become a moderately thriving marketplace and, thus, not the best place to reveal a royal escape tunnel. I stood staring at the spot where the invaders entered. I felt each second pass as if it were a grain of sand being blasted against my skin.
I didn't have to look at Bella to feel her amusement. It was different for her, this was sport but, if I didn't hurry something would change. Whether for good or for ill, I wouldn't be able to tell. And that was the problem.
"Bella, can you get me across the canal?" I was resorting to my tried-and-tested insanity. "Float me across, perhaps?"
She frowned, a small crinkle knitting her brow as she thought. "Mayhaps," she spit over the side "My sister hasn't meddled on these lands in years but she always knows when someone tries to fiddle with her things."
That was good enough for me.
Without daring to give it a second thought, I leaped over the wall. A stiff breeze caught me like a wave, tossing me higher and carrying me farther than even my legs could take. I waded through it like water and it carried a scent of the sea that pervaded everything about this city.
I crashed against the opposite wall, fingers scrabbling at the rimy stone trying to keep from bouncing back in the roiling water below. I hooked a finger into the lip of the hidden door, pulling it open and myself through it in one movement.
I felt a familiar thrill run up my arm and down my back as I stepped into the darkness that had nothing to do with the damp chill of the Kings' River. Drawing my sword, I closed the door behind me; the shadows were thick but I'd spent a few years learning to fight without sight.

I sat in the dark, fear crushing me into the fetal position.
For the longest time, there was nothing.
My eyes might as well have been sewn shut for all I could see until, suddenly, faces swam forward through the gloom. Twisted faces, horrible faces. Faces that shouldn't exist; malformed eyes that were at once too small and too large; mouths made cruel with jutting fangs that pierced through their snarls like spears.
These were the faces of demons. The darkness was truly full of terrors.
I screamed and threw the barely-lit lantern at the faces, stumbling back in the now-darkness over whatever lay on the ground. The tunnel burst into light for a split second as the foeltite lantern shattered and two human forms could be made out, one slumped on the other wearily.
All sounds faded as the light disappeared except the hammering on my heart. I sat there, waiting and wondering. Wondering when those monsters would come for me, wondering what exactly it felt like to die. After an eternity, one of the monsters acted. It wasn't a knife or fang thrust at me, but a word.
"Aera-maiura" drifted out lightly as another lantern was lit. Preant was being supported by another man, scruffy, world-weary and smelling strongly of spirits. He had two of the horrifying masks twined around his neck.
"Preant, what happened? Who is this man?" I fussed nervously over my guardian, noting the darkening bruise on forehead and what looked like a snippet sliced off his ear.
He straightened himself, for my benefit I'm sure, and bowed to me. "I do not have the pleasure of knowing this man's name but he provided a great service to you."
I glanced at the man in time to see him cock his head as if listening to a question, and then nod. "So, you're the princess?" He asked, out of the blue. "Excellent because I'm looking for work."
"W-wor..?"
"Yes, work." He cut me off, he seemed to ooze irritants, "Y'see, I'm a particular type of hunter. I hunt 'hunters' as t'were. And the prey all the greatest hunters want is nobles."
I could barely follow along with this nonsensical tirade. It seemed so off-the-cuff that I thought perhaps Preant was trying to play a joke on me. Something about "essentially being a bodyguard for the wee noble" drifted through my cloud of confusion.
His hand roughly grabbed my shoulder, shaking me out of my reverie. "The men that are lying dead further back are sending a message back by their absence, 'send more; the princess ain't dead yet'." His eyes were cold and dark, eyes that had liken seen many things die. I feared for a moment that I might be one of them.
"Ya will need me, lass. Do you accept?" I glanced at Preant before answering, he stood stiff-backed. I could tell he was bristling at the way this man seemed to handling me but I saw him give a terse bob of the head.
"Alright, sir, I'll have you. Though, your pay will have to be outlined later." I reached for a mask hanging around his neck, the mask of my would-be attackers apparently. "What are these?"
He shrugged his shoulders and subtly rolled away from me in one smooth movement. "A cult from far north, that've had the misfortune of meeting before. But they're dead, so fine's fine."
"What you need to consider is your future. Because some person wants to make sure it doesn't come to pass."
The words chilled me in a way the darkness had yet to manage. It was a slight tension; a nagging fear from the knowledge that my every moment was know a threat.

~~~

I looked at the child as I tried to remember how the persona I was using acted. Rouke wouldn't suffice as too many people in the lower town knew him. The thoughts made me I wanted to spit.
This was almost as much a game to me as it was to Bella. A game where I put on a face and beguiled some noble or politician into hiring me, a game where I had to appeal to what they wanted to see. And it was a game that was made all the more unfair by this princess's youth. She would never know that some ageless devil had made her a puppet, only that she was in danger.
I wondered what would have been more distressing for the girl to bear: the lie or the truth.
No, I shuffled that familiar thought away, this girl is in peril. And, until we decide what her fate is, it is my duty to make sure she sees tomorrow.
Bella laughed, "That is your duty as my sword. I know you won't fail."
I almost wanted to prove her wrong. In all my years, I had yet to fail a mission, but I was curious as to what could occur if I did.
Then, I actually did spit. These were lives I thought of playing with and I made myself sick by entertaining any such notions. I had made a promise to remain human.
"I am more than just a sword."