The Noble Prince (The Empire of the North)

by Brendan DuBois

  She wanted to read this message in the privacy of her room aboard the airship, but Melinda couldn’t wait. She tore open the message sheet and saw the names of Dad and Mom, and the three lines of type:

  THRILLED BEYOND BELIEF AT THE NEWS OF YOUR DELIVERANCE//A MONTH OF CELEBRATIONS TO BEGIN UPON YOUR ARRIVAL//LOVE LOVE LOVE ALWAYS

  Melinda’s hands shook as she folded the message sheet back. Her interrogator had left her alone. Her cheeks were wet as the tears started streaming from her eyes.

  Thanks to that young noble Armand --- and she desperately hoped she would see him once again someday --- she was really and truly going home.

  The next night Armand was in his cabin, asleep, when a hammering wind and rain suddenly struck. The Mona Marie heeled over hard, tossing his belongings about and throwing him to the deck. Armand scrambled up, gathered what he could, and the howling of the wind grew stronger and stronger, and the boat heeled over harder. Shouts were coming from outside and Armand was on his hands and knees, still trying to get up. Wood started creaking, louder and louder, until the timbers themselves were screeching. Armand had been in storms before back on Lake Ontario, but nothing like this. He was shaking with fear and all he wanted to do was to get out of his cabin.

  Armand struggled up and got to the door handle, when the door blew open against him, and cold salt water cascaded over him like a flood.

  Armand coughed, choked, and struggled. He bounced against his bunk, and then against a bulkhead, and then Armand felt the edge of the open door. He struggled out, swimming up, and something tangled about his legs, and started to drag him away. Armand clenched his mouth tight and kicked his legs, kicked his legs and moved, fighting up against the storm.

  He broke free. It was dark, save for flashes of lightning. In the sudden flares of light, Armand saw horror all about him. Wooden boxes and containers floated in the water, and the Mona Marie was on its side, slowly going under. Armand swam away, his head hitting a piece of lumber, and another flash of light showed the stern of the Mona Marie, rising up, and sails and ropes flapping. Passengers and crew were flailing in the water, and he swam harder, his hand brushing up against a piece of timber. There was rope dragging from the timber, and as he was tying the rope to his wrist, something slammed against the back of his head.

  A cold voice, from a passenger or crew, Armand didn’t know, “That’s mine, boy, back off!” and he pushed Armand aside. Armand slapped him back, grabbed the timber, started kicking with his feet, moving away. The rains came down harder. More lightning flashes. Waves rose up and down, spray flying out, and there was a lifeboat, some distance away, and a crowd of passengers and crew were fighting to get aboard. Armand tried swimming towards the lifeboat, but the waves grew rougher and higher, and some piece of debris or cargo hit the back of his head, and saw nothing else for a while.

  Armand woke up, his face rubbed raw and hurting. He heard waves crashing and some voices. Armand’s right wrist hurt. He raised his head, saw rope tied off there, to a piece of the Mona Marie that had saved him. It was frayed and Armand was able to tug his hand free. A scream. Armand closed his eyes and opened them again, and things came into focus. Some meters away, Captain Jonah DeMint, was on his back, unmoving, mouth gaping open, as two other men tugged at his boots. Another man was a distance away from the captain’s body, holding a waterlogged book, and then he dropped his trousers and squatted down. He then sighed with pleasure and then tore off some pages and wiped his hairy bottom.

  The beach was cluttered with debris from the Mona Marie. Men with cudgels and short swords walked among the wreckage, picking objects up, examining them. Then the scream came back, weaker. Armand carefully turned his head and saw that young girl, the one that reminded him of Jeannette.

  Another man was over her, holding her left hand in his, and with a knife, he was sawing off one of her fingers, trying to get to a ring. Armand started to get up when someone grabbed his shirt collar.

  “Hey, Donnie,” the man holding him said, Armand understanding his patois pretty well. “When you’re done choppin’ over there, give me a hand with this one.”

  The man rolled Armand over and he snapped down with one hand, found the knife he had gotten in Orleans, drew it out and shoved it hard in the man’s throat. His eyes bulged out and he gurgled, coughed, and Armand pushed him back. Like the other man, the clothes were a step above rags, and knife still in his throat, Armand pushed him back harder, onto the beach. He pulled the knife free out and got up and started running, as men on the beach shouted.

  What seemed to be hours later, his feet hurting --- covered only with socks that were torn and bloodied --- Armand found a paved road. He sat down and took some deep breaths. Once getting off the beach, he had fought his way through rough jungle and then some rice paddies and sugar cane fields. There were buildings he noted at the sugar cane fields ---- probably the same ones his father had visited, so long ago --- and from there, he walked along a dirt road that came out from the structures, where, as he hoped, it met with a paved road.

  Armand heard a low humming noise, and an electric coach passed by, followed by another. Then some horse-drawn wagons came by as well, and he started walking in their direction. It was hot, it was late in the day, and he tried not to think of what he had seen at the beach, the bodies being robbed, the books destroyed, that poor little girl having her fingers chopped off….

  Armand looked at his hands. Rust-stained with blood. He knelt at the side of the road, by a small drainage ditch, and washed them, again and again.

  When he got up, an older man and woman were staring at him, their horse-drawn wagon behind them. They asked Armand something and he couldn’t quite make it out. “I’m sorry, could you say that again? Just more slowly?”

  “Aye,” the man said, bearing a long beard and dressed in rough-hewn clothes and a straw hat. “Me wife and I, we be askin’, would you like a ride?”

  Armand bowed in thanks. “My sir, that would be wonderful. But can I ask you a question?”

  The woman had a long dark blue dress on, and some sort of cloth cap. “Go right ahead, boy. Ask away.”

  “Are we anywhere near Potomick?”

  The woman looked surprised but her husband burst out laughing. “My boy, we’re no where near Potomick.”

  The taste of disappointment bit hard at Armand, until the man laughed again. “My boy, we’re right in the middle of it.”

  The two were traveling south of Potomick, to a place called Mary’s Land where a grandson had been birthed last month. After a few minutes of talking with Armand, they started talking to each other, their patois fast and smooth, Armand finding it hard to keep up with their phrases. The road widened and damned if it didn’t look familiar. He felt like bursting into tears when they rounded a corner and a hotel came into view, a bit larger after some expansion, but the same place Armand had gone to with his now-dead father, such a very long time ago, when he was innocent and younger.

  Armand touched the man’s arm. “This is fine, thank you again.” The man made a cluck-cluck sound and the horses came to a halt, and he got off the front of the wagon, legs shaky, staring over at the Potomick Arms Hotel.

  He slowly walked across the paved road, to the curved driveway in front of the stone building, his feet burning with pain. There were carriages and electric and steam-driven carriages from various tour companies, but not the one he was looking for. Several meters away from the entrance a small crowd of barefoot child beggars waited, as they always had, for rich tourists to come out. Armand walked to the hotel’s glass doors and nodded at a doorman, wearing a white uniform, boots, peaked cap and short sword at his side.

  He held out an arm, blocking him. “No entry.”

  “I need to get in.”

  He laughed. “Dressed like that, you peasant?”

  Armand knew what he meant. Waterlogged, torn and stained clothes. Practically barefoot. He said, “Then I need to see someone here. A man named Micah. He operates a tour company called �
��Honest Tours, Honest Ways.’”

  The doorman shook his head. “Never heard of him. Never heard of the company.”

  “Look, just let me in and ---“

  The doorman frowned deeper and drew his sword out a bit. “Go. Or I’ll run you through.”

  Armand stepped back and nearly bumped into a woman, a couple of years older than him, wearing black trousers and a white jacket with gold trim. She said, “Ralph, are you tormenting our paying customers?”

  The doorman put his sword full back into his scabbard and smiled at her. “Celeste, if you want him, you can have him. He looks like he just came from the cane fields. And I’m not sure if he has any money.”

  She wrinkled her nose. Her skin was a light brown, as was her long hair. “Oh, I don’t know if I want him permanently. But maybe for a minute or two. If he’s amenable.”

  A well-dressed lady emerged from the hotel and the doorman went to open the door, and Celeste stepped back and looked him up and down. Armand said to her, “I appreciate your help, m’lady.”

  “Oh, I’m not much of lady. But I thought you need assistance.”

  “Do you always assist young boys dressed like this?”

  “Not hardly,” she said. “But even in your rags, your bloody feet, your scratched face. You had a presence when you were talking to Ralph. Like you were someone used to giving commands and having them followed. May I see your hands?”

  Slightly surprised, Armand held them out. She examined each one carefully and sighed. “How odd. You have the voice and accent of someone foreign, someone educated. Yet your hands are that of a field hand and you look like you’ve spent a week in the jungles. What’s your story?”

  His story. Armand didn’t think there was enough time in the world to tell her his story, so instead Armand said, “I’m looking for a man named Micah. He used to run a tour business out of this hotel called ‘Honest Tours, Honest Ways.’ Do you know him?”

  Her eyes seemed to sparkle with delight. “Micah… yes, Micah Kennedy. But he’s no longer a tour operator. I mean, he runs a number of businesses, but no, you no longer see him pedaling his little tour cart.”

  Armand’s hunger, thirst, aching feet and scraped hands and face seemed to fade right away. “Can you take me to him?”

  “Of course,” she said. “For a price. Always a price.”

  Money. He reached deep into his left pocket, pulled out a small plastic bag. From the bag Armand removed his old Father Abram coin. She looked at it. “Impressive, for someone from so far away to have that coin.”

  “I know, but I can’t pay you with this.”

  “So why show it to me?”

  “Micah gave this to me, a long time ago. And I ---“

  She interrupted him. “Ah, that only means dreams and politics. I don’t care for either. So if you want to see him, you need to pay me. That old coin won’t do.”

  Armand put the coin back into his pocket. “If you bring me to Micah, I’m sure he’ll pay the fare.”

  “Certain, or just sure?”

  Armand lied. “Certain.”

  Celeste gave him a slight bow. “Then let’s go.”

  The side of her coach had a well-painted sign on the side saying “Old Ways Tours” and she opened the rear door, then held a hand up. “Just you wait.” She reached in and pulled out a dark blue cotton blanket, which she draped across the rear seat. “No offense, but that leather is new and polished.”

  Armand said, “No offense taken.”

  He got in and sat on the blanket-covered seat, and she closed the door with a satisfying thump.

  The drive took them along a well-paved road that rose up and offered a view of the jungle-covered ruins, and seeing them again, he ached inside at remembering the young and arrogant boy who had first seen them, in the company of his proud and influential father. Armand always knew he would come back to this special place. But not as a poor, nearly drowned fugitive, an escapee from one of the Emperor’s labor camps. The circle had closed and had come about, but Armand was damned if he knew what it all meant. But Armand knew with a cold and hard certainty that his future didn’t belong here; it belonged in a city further north.

  Up ahead were some old cement and stone buildings, covered with ivy and other growths. Celeste pulled her coach up in front of the largest building, with a painted wooden sign outside announcing “Honest Ways Mercantile Limited.” When she switched off the engine she beat Armand to opening the rear door. She bowed again, with exaggerated politeness, and when he came out on the crushed stone, wincing as his bloody feet stood on the sharp rocks, she said, “Ah, I must warn you, young sir, of one thing.”

  “Go right ahead.”

  Her smile was chilly. “If Micah Kennedy does not know you, then we’ll have a problem. I am a businesswomen first and foremost, and I do not give out free rides. If no payment is forthcoming, you will have to deal with my husband and make proper arrangements for payment.”

  What else could he say? “That sounds fair, m’lady.”

  She slammed the rear door to the coach. “Fair or not, I’m still not much of a lady.”

  She led the way into the building, past a male receptionist who maintained some sort of telegraph and telephone switchboard, and who had a bulky revolver on his cluttered desk. He waved Celeste ahead and they went down a hallway and past a series of closed doors. At one door marked Chairman, she knocked on the door and opened it. “Micah? A visitor to see you, if you’re available.”

  “Damn it woman, the Prez’s bursars are coming due this afternoon and ---“

  Armand walked in and Micah was sitting behind a wide desk. He looked up and Armand realized Micah had aged some as well. My word, what would Micah think of Armand? Micah’s skin was still olive-colored and his black hair was still cut short, but his face had filled out. He had on a white cotton tunic with colored embroidery over both chest pockets, and he slowly stood up.

  “Do I know you?” he asked, his voice almost a whisper.

  The office was clean and neat, with wooden filing cabinets and bookshelves, and a window behind Micah had a view of the jungle and some of the old ruins.

  Armand bowed to him. “Micah, Monsieur Armand de la Cloutier, from Toronto, the Empire of the Nunavut, at your service.”

  His jaw dropped and it was like his skin had lightened at least two shades.

  Somehow, Armand found it all so amusing. “You look surprised. Didn’t you invite me to return, the last time we spoke at the Potomick Arms Hotel?”

  His hand went to a box intercom system on his desk, and he depressed a switch. His voice, more firm, said, “Gregory. In here at once.”

  Celeste had a slight intake of breath and the door opened up. Gregory --- the man at the front desk with the switchboard and large pistol, now in his hands --- came in.

  Micah pointed to Armand and said firmly, “Take this man away.”

  He then grinned widely. “And treat his every need.”

  Chapter Eleven

  The rest of the day strolled by in a pleasant blur. Armand was taken to the rear of the building, where Gregory explained there were suites and hospitality areas for the benefit of traders visiting his boss, Mister Kennedy. Armand was shown to a WC that was almost as luxurious as the one back at the Starmen’s military base. He showered and cleaned himself off and treated the scratches and cuts with bandages and ointments that had been left out.

  Outside of the WC, on a wide bed, clean clothes were displayed. He got dressed and then went through the rags that he had earlier worn, and retrieved his old coin, and another, larger pouch that he had kept hidden under his shirt. Armand looked longingly at the bed, thinking a long sleep would be wonderful, but there was a knock on the door. “Come in,” Armand said, and Gregory opened the door. “My mister’s good wishes, sir, and a meal is waiting for you.”

  Armand followed him out, down another hallway that opened up to a small room with a light pink tile floor and tall windows that had the same view of the jungle and
ruins. Bright colored birds flew overhead, diving in and out of the leaves and branches. In the room were five round tables, and Micah stood up from one of the tables and came over and embraced him. Armand thought of the young man who had met Micah so long ago, and how offended he would have been by this familiarity, but Armand now slapped him on the back and embraced him in return.

  He stepped back, hands on his shoulders and said, “So much to ask you. I know you have so much to tell, but let’s dine first. You look like you could faint.” Then he playfully tugged at Armand’s small ponytail. “What’s with the long hair? Spend too much time with the barbarians?”

  Armand said, “Decided looking civilized wasn’t all that it was cracked up to be.”

  They both sat down at the nearest table and Gregory served them fruits, coffee, juice, and then ham steak and scrambled eggs and hotcakes with jam, and more coffee. When Armand was finally full and the dishes had been cleared away, the faraway sun was setting, giving the stones and jungle growth a pinkish tinge. Micah turned about. “I never tire of this view. This is where I like to entertain my guest traders when they visit. It helps, sometimes, they seeing the place of the old capitol.”

  Armand looked around at the fine furniture and the room and tall windows. “You’ve done well, Micah, very well since I last saw you, running a one-man tour from a pedicab.”

  Micah’s face was suddenly like stone as he stared at Armand, and then he laughed. “All right. My, the guilt I’ve carried all this time… all right, not that much guilt. After all, to a boy like me, you were outrageously rich.”

  Armand laughed right back at him. “You’re some kind of cheat, Micah, and I admire that of you. When I saw the sign outside for your business, I knew you had done quite well. I remembered the silver and gold coins I had paid you, so long ago when you gave me the coin of Father Abram. So I guess I overpaid you. By a lot.”