The Disinherited Prince

by Guy Antibes

  So how would Pol do it? He picked up his sword and closed his eyes, imagining an opponent. Grostin would do. He smiled and began to play out a fight with his brother. Pol remembered the wild swings, and then he found what he sought, a pattern in Grostin’s moves that he hadn’t noticed while fighting before. His memory had served him well. He dredged up about all of Grostin’s moves, except this time, Pol fought with a strong blade.

  He imagined the weight of the heavy blows, but none so heavy as what he actually deflected in his match. He saw opportunities, like his weak touches, but this time, in the tourney, his touches couldn’t be so weak. Two solid touches would win a match judged fairly.

  So how could he win quickly? He had thought about that dilemma before, but he realized that he could scout the competition and find their pattern. If he already knew their tendencies, then he could use his magic to anticipate their next move even better. Pol hadn’t intended to return to the practice field, but he put his sword away and walked to the armory.

  ~

  There were plenty of his possible competitors still practicing. Pol decided not to put on a padded jerkin and mix it up with anyone, but kept behind the railing and observed patterns. All ages were practicing, but most of the boys in his classification were at the far end of the field.

  Pol passed Kelso on the way. “Hello, Kelso,” Pol said. He felt uneasy around the man because of his actions the previous day.

  “Prince Poldon. How are you feeling?”

  Pol could see genuine concern in Kelso’s eyes, but he didn’t feel he could forgive him quite yet. He looked across the field. “I’m still a bit tired, but I’ll be fit enough by the time my part of the tourney starts.

  “You aren’t going to practice?”

  Pol shook his head. “I’m here to observe my competitor’s styles.” He was careful not to use the term patterns.

  Kelso looked at Pol with shrewd eyes. “You are quite a fellow, if you forgive me for saying so, My Prince.”

  “I’m just another fourteen-year-old,” Pol said.

  “No, you aren’t. I should know since I have talked to all your competitors. They would say they are picking up styles, but that’s something their fathers would tell them to say. I know you really can, and that will give you a competitive edge.”

  Pol returned Kelso’s gaze. “I need every edge I can find, so I need to observe my opponents more. You know I’ll run out of energy at some point.”

  “Yet you can find a way. You did with Grostin. I have my suspicions of how you defeated your brother. Your victory made my complicity in the match the lowest point of my life. I hope you can find it within yourself to forgive me.”

  “I wasn’t angry with you because I know your arm was twisted.” Pol knew he said words of placation, but it felt right to do so. He still felt hurt that Kelso had betrayed him.

  Kelso nodded. “When Val returns, know that no one has the strength to twist his.”

  “Thank you for your admission and for telling me about Val. Now I’ve got to observe my competitors before they leave the field.”

  “Of course,” Kelso said.

  Pol could feel the man’s eyes on him as he strolled to the far end of the field and took up a position looking at his competition. Pol turned his concentration to those practicing. He picked out the boys that had practiced at the same time he had and focused on memorizing their faces and their patterns.

  Since he had been practicing with these same competitors, Pol didn’t take too much time to identify how he could score quickly on most of them. A few were as wild as Grostin, and they just took a little longer. Wild swings, although unpredictable for deciphering a pattern, made for obvious openings.

  Kelso walked up behind Pol. “Are you finding the information that you need?”

  “I am. Are there any participants who haven’t been practicing here?”

  Kelso nodded. “There are undoubtedly some. Maybe not so much for the younger boys, but the competition is open to anyone at the highest level, and there will be those who come to make a name for themselves.”

  “Does Landon have a chance at winning?”

  Kelso pursed his lips. “Probably not, but you never know. The melee event requires a bit of luck to rise to the top, if your father relents and lets him participate. Grostin, if he recovers from getting his bell rung by a certain someone, has a better chance, but I think you have the best. The other two haven’t really applied themselves like you have.”

  “But I have to,” Pol said. “It will be difficult as it is with my condition.”

  “You’ve learned that there is more to a match than utilizing sheer strength.”

  Pol didn’t care to respond. “I think I’ve seen enough, for now. With Emperor Hazett’s arrival delayed a week, I’ll have more time to practice and observe.”

  “Do that. The good fighters competing will be doing the same in their classifications.”

  Pol nodded to Kelso, who bowed back, and sought out the Royal Gardens and Paki. He needed a diversion.

  He entered the gardens and heard giggles. If a visitor entered the garden, Siggon and Paki generally found something else to do, so Pol wouldn’t find his friend here.

  Now that he had come this far, his route into the castle was closest through the gardens. Normally, Pol would find that a pleasant experience, but he spied Amonna and Bythia talking and giggling on the path he wanted to take.

  “Pol, come here,” Amonna said catching Pol’s eye before he could find a way around them. The request had the ring of a command to it.

  He looked at the two girls and did not see a friend. It didn’t seem that they were mad at him, but he could see a look of mockery in Amonna’s eyes that he hadn’t noticed before.

  He gave them both a little bow and just stood for whatever kind of question they would torment him with.

  “Have you been to Listya?” Bythia said. She narrowed her eyes a bit, for what reason Pol was unable to fathom.

  “Once, about four years ago. I was only eight. My mother and King Colvin wanted to check on how the king’s regent ruled. I remembered the country as hot and muggy. The countryside was lusher than North Salvan. Perhaps South Salvan is hotter than here.”

  Bythia giggled. “It is. Were there bugs?”

  “As large as my hand,” Pol said. He teased of course, but this wasn’t a formal inquisition. “The buildings all had moss or mold growing on them. As I think back, the people looked a little green as well. I think my mother has spent enough time in North Salvan for it to wear off. Of course, I was born here, so I am greenless.”

  “You’re joking!” Amonna said, laughing.

  Pol narrowed his eyes like his sister did moments before. “Am I?” He turned and walked away, wondering what to make of the girls and wondering what they made of his performance.

  He sighed once he entered the castle. Where had Amonna gone? His one-time confidante seemed to have transformed into Bythia’s best friend. Pol knew that Amonna had already ceased to support him, but now that he had sure knowledge of that, he felt more alone than he ever had.

  ~~~

  Chapter Thirteen

  ~

  POL SHOWED UP FOR GARDENING, since the Emperor had put off his visit. Siggon taught Pol and Paki snare-making for the morning’s instruction. Since he had been taught this before, Pol made short work of making one from the bundle of materials that Siggon threw at the two boys’ feet. Paki took a bit longer.

  Pol’s friend spit on the ground. “I hate doing that.” Paki shivered with distaste.

  “Your life might depend on finding food in the woods,” Siggon said. He rose and walked off into the garden.

  Paki snorted and pointed at Pol. “You’ll always have a servant close by to find stuff.”

  “I haven’t lived my life yet, so I can’t agree,” Pol said.

  “You know the booths for the Emperor’s festival are open. Let’s go sneak to the grounds and find something good to eat. Anything is better than a gamey
old rabbit.”

  Pol hadn’t done anything fun for so long that he eagerly agreed.

  “I’ll need different clothes. I don’t want to be recognized.”

  Paki nodded. “I already thought of that. I brought some of my old clothes and one of Dad’s hats with me.” He grinned and beckoned Pol to follow him behind a garden shed hidden by greenery.

  Pol changed and both boys left by a secret door at the back of the woods, and sauntered to the large field just outside of Borstall’s walls where the festival and tourney had been set up. Flags flew above the tourney field, which had already been plowed, dragged and raked for the competition. The festival booths were to one side of the tourney grounds.

  The boys walked along the rows of booths. During the tourney, Pol could picture the place crowded with people, but he was surprised at the numbers that had evaded work to walk between the booths with the tourney a week away.

  They stopped at a puppeteers’ booth and stood behind much younger children. Pol vaguely recognized the setting. The puppeteer talked about the god Demeron and how he slept, alive, yet not alive, under a crystal dome in the city of Fassin. Priests were plotting to kill the god and make off with the golden statues that adorned the inside of the god’s temple. The story had a hero that saved the priest’s beautiful daughter at the last minute and saved the day.

  Pol rather enjoyed the show, but on a different level than the children who cried, laughed, and clapped together with Paki as the events in the story unfolded.

  “I know the real story,” Pol said.

  “Real? That wasn’t real,” Paki said. “I enjoyed it too much for it to be real.”

  “There is a real sleeping god, but he sleeps under a crystal dome in a cathedral, not a temple, in the city of Fassin in the northern part of Volia.”

  “You’re kidding!” Paki said, guffawing in a most unsophisticated way. That was part of Paki’s charm.

  “No. Maybe I’ll go there someday.” Pol smiled, since he likely wouldn’t last long enough to chance a trip to the Volian continent.

  “On your Processional, after you’ve expanded the Baccusol Empire?”

  Pol hit Paki in the shoulder. “I’m not delusional.”

  “Yes, you are!” Paki’s eyes lit up as they passed a vendor selling candied apples on a stick. “I want one of those.”

  After not finding any money in the pockets Paki had given him to wear, Pol shook his head. “No money. Do you have any?”

  “Why do we need money?” Paki stood close to the vendor’s booth and when the man looked in the other direction, he stole two apples and thrust one into Pol’s hands. “Here, now we run!”

  “I can’t run,” Pol said, but he followed Paki as best as he could down the lane between the booths amidst calls for guards.

  Paki turned a corner and four guards stood to block their way. Paki reversed course and took off. Pol knew the men would catch him once he tired, so he just stood, looking stupid, he thought, still clutching a candied apple. Two of the guards took off after Paki. Pol just gave up the booty to one of the guards.

  It wasn’t long before Paki returned between the two guards, with his hands tied.

  “Stealing from a vendor is a misdemeanor, you know. It’s a good thing the Emperor isn’t here, or we’d have to cut off your hands.”

  Pol knew bluster when he heard it. “What happens next?” he said. His adventurous spirit had left him.

  “We have a detention shack on the grounds. You can cool off there and reflect on your evil deeds while we scare up a magistrate. Perhaps the king will come and adjudicate; then you’ll be in real trouble.”

  Pol had no doubt about that. He followed the guards without making the same kind of fuss that Paki did. Once inside, guards locked the door, and the two boys sat alone in the dark roughly-made jail.

  “I’m sorry, Pol. I was caught up in the moment.”

  “And now we are caught up by the guards,” Pol said. “I don’t know what my father will do.”

  “Laugh it off? That’s what Dad does when I have my little run-ins.”

  Pol’s eyebrows shot up. “You’ve done this before?”

  Paki nodded and grinned. “I generally get away with it, but my luck isn’t always alive when I try.”

  “Did you stop to think about me? This is an embarrassment to my father. The people will laugh at him for having such a stupid son that would steal treats at the festival.”

  Paki shrugged his shoulders. “Give them a different name. Say Malden is your father or Kelso Beastwell.”

  “Malden’s not married, and don’t you think the guards would know Kelso?” Pol put his head in his hands and shook it. How could he get talked into this, but Paki had gotten him into trouble. Pol tried to feel guilty, but all he had done was catch the candied apple and run from the vendor.

  Should he have given the apple back to the vendor after Paki took off? Pol didn’t know, and the situation had confused him at a time when he dreaded being confused about anything. He had to find a way out of this prison and get back into his regular clothes and into the castle. He looked at the solid lock on the door. “Maybe there is another way.”

  He stood up and looked closely at the lock. After concentrating and not coming up with any inspiration, he shut his eyes and tried to probe in the lock for a pattern. He had to succeed, he just had to. He shut his eyes again and concentrated. Suddenly, like the time he pushed Grostin, Pol felt something click inside of him, and he could perceive the works of the lock. It was a stationary pattern that he could tweak a bit here and a bit there. He did so and opened his eyes.

  Pol took a deep breath and pushed the door. It opened! This time he couldn’t feel any loss of strength, but after the run and the shock of being arrested, Pol might not be a good judge of his physical condition.

  “What have you done?” Paki said.

  Pol looked back at him. “I opened the lock.”

  “How did you do that?”

  “Magic,” Pol reluctantly admitted. “Malden has taught me a few tricks.”

  Paki’s eyes grew a bit, and then his practical nature took over. “Then let’s get out of here.”

  If Pol wanted to punish Paki for his misdeed, he would have left him alone, but he untied Paki’s hands, and they sneaked out of the detention shack. No one was around, so they both took off for the castle.

  Pol ran out of breath halfway to the city, but they found no evidence of a pursuit. The guards had probably enjoyed the candied apples, anyway. They slowed to a walk.

  As they got closer to the castle, Pol gave Siggon’s hat to Paki. “Now I want to be recognized, so we can get back in if the door we used is locked.”

  To their delight, the door was still open, so they slid inside and locked it. Pol quickly changed his clothes. They turned a corner and found Siggon tossing pruned branches into a cart.

  “Where have you gotten off to? I’ve been looking for you all morning. I was about ready to comb the drinking establishments and the jails.” Siggon laughed and commanded Paki to help him with the branches. Pol just waved and hurried into the castle.

  Once he reached the sanctuary of his rooms, he sighed and lay down on the couch. No sooner had he closed his eyes, than Kelso knocked on his door.

  “Grostin has asked your father for a rematch, and he has agreed with conditions, My Prince.”

  “Conditions?”

  “Wooden swords are the same for each, and the match ends at two touches.”

  Pol gnashed his teeth. “Is there no way out of this?”

  “Your father, the King…”

  The walk down to the training grounds took forever. Pol wasn’t mentally or physically prepared for another match. The ‘trick’ that he had performed in the detention shack had taken more out of him than he had realized.

  He hadn’t seen Grostin since his previous match. Pol wouldn’t prevail this time, but he had no reason to. He didn’t feel guilty for what he had done to Grostin. The end of that match was a matt
er of life or death, of that Pol was certain. He wouldn’t let his brother win too easily, either. If Pol could get a touch, he felt he would retain his honor, at least to himself.

  There seemed to be as many people in attendance as the last match. Grostin had already donned a quilted jerkin and evidently wanted to show off in front of the crowds warming up. Pol paused and watched him perform. Someone had taught him a few new moves. He had been coached, but that might mean Pol could pick up his patterns more easily.

  He found a jerkin his size and soon practiced with a real sword, so the wooden sword wouldn’t seem so heavy. Pol limited his warm-up so he could preserve what little reserves of strength he had.

  Kelso called both of them together. Pol looked over the audience and saw the two kings conferring while he continued to survey those who would watch his defeat. The Captain of the Guard stepped into the center of the field.

  “This is a princely rematch of the two younger brothers of our King Colvin. This time, the king has graciously offered to judge the match.”

  Pol heard the buzz from the crowd intensify. At least Grostin wouldn’t be threatening the judge this time. He watched his father have a few good-natured last words with King Astor. It appeared they had become fast friends in the short period of time the South Salvans had been at Borstall. Pol knew it wasn’t always so, and he wondered why.

  His father raised his hands to silence the crowd. “I want to make sure that this match is conducted to match the rules of the tourney.” He raised two fingers. “Two touches and the match is over. I will personally provide swords to each of my sons.”

  Kelso delivered the two new wooden swords.

  “You get to choose, Poldon. That is my rule.” King Colvin looked at Grostin who looked disappointed.

  Pol took each and swung them. The balance of one of the swords seemed to suit him better than the other, but they were much the same.

  “When I drop my arm, the match begins.” The king took a few steps back from the boys and raised his arm. In a moment the match was on.