Chapter I: Rashness and Revenge
“Apprentice Alhawat! Apprentice Alhawat!"
’Thump’ ’Thump’
The knocking and harsh voice from a terrified crewman startled Alhawat from his light sleep with with a jerk. He still felt weary from what couldn’t have been more than a few minutes of sleep. Alhawat rolled from the bed to his feet. His apprentice robes were stiff with the salt air.
Alhawat opened the door. The crewman before him was a giant bear of a man, and was unknown to him.
"The Prince?" Alhawat breathed an exhausted sigh.
The bear nodded. Alhawat did not wait for the man to move. He all but ran, barefoot, down the hall to the Prince’s cabin, the crewman taking long strides to keep up with him.
Alhawat looked like a shaman from ancient times as he burst into the cabin without so much as a knock. His hair was down from his braid and billowed around him. Naturally fluffy, it was made positively wild from the salt air and the hot Pyrinian sun. Alhawat’s robes had come loose and hung low on his chest, exposing his collarbone and part of one shoulder. Heavy earrings dangled and tangled his hair and loud bangles clanked noisily around his wrists and ankles. On one wrist,hung a glass bangle with a tiny bottle charm amid the copper bangles.Shaman and their apprentices wore all manner of loud jewelry, they claimed it was to keep evil spirits at bay by scaring them with sharp noises. Perhaps, once when the world was fiercer, it was true. Now, shaman used them to make themselves seem bigger and more intimidating by making noise, like the rattle on the tip of a snakes tail.
Alhawat looked around the room. He recognized only three people: the ambassador, the captain of the ship, and the captain of the Royal Guard. The cabin wasn’t small for a cabin, but it was still cramped, made only more so by the dozen or more unnecessary crew members present. Alhawat pushed his way to the bed. The bedside chair was conspicuously empty.
"How long?" Alhawat’s voice was demanding, though he addressed no one in particular as he checked the prince’s temperature, breathing and heartbeat with his hands.
"We found him like this not ten minutes ago, we do not know how long he has been this way," Lin-Sari was the captain of the royal guard and he had a firm, calm voice.
Alhawat’s fury burned hot, his skin pricking and his mismatched eyes flashing darkly. They passed over everyone in the roomy cabin. “Where is the first mate?” His voice was flat, calm and even a bit soft. Everyone seemed to shrink beneath his gaze. Even the captain looked properly nervous.
Ambassador Loyein tried to reign in Alhawat’s fury by giving him a withering look. "You were sent with us to ensure his health. Why did you not come to check sooner?"
Alhawat was immune to the ambassador’s accusations.
"Keeping your son alive for two weeks with no capable help would be a task even for my father,” Alhawat would not be cowed. “When I left, he was stable and I left explicit orders to be called for if anything changed," Alhawat narrowed his eyes. "I left him with the first mate, a man I presumed competent enough to follow simple instructions.”
A glare from both ambassador Loyein and Alhawat sent the ship’s captain to a state of sickly pale.
"Dobrat is on deck... He has been for the last two hours..." The captain’s voice grew softer with each word.
Ambassador Loyein’s glare went from withering to murderous as he closed the gap between himself and the captain.
"If my son dies, so shall Dobrat,” Ambassador Loyein fair towered over the captain. The ambassador turned to Alhawat. “Do what you can. I must think on how best to handle renegotiation with Vesuvineae,” he turned and stalked towards the door.
Alhawat covered the prince up to his neck with his blanket then turned, unsheathed a dagger from his hip, and offered it to the captain.
"Even my father could not save Prince Loyein in his current state. I can ease his pain, but he will be dead by morning."
The captain looked spitefully at the dagger. "I will not murder my first mate," He nearly spat the words as he turned to leave.
"The ambassador will do it for you,” Alhawat’s voice chased the retreating man “Your first mate has murdered one of his sons," Alhawat watched the captain leave. Alhawat then chased out all the remaining crew, he allowed only Lin-Sari to stay. Alhawat feared that if he were left alone with the Prince, his last friend, Alhawat would shatter and be unable to perform his duties as a shaman.
"Will Prince Loyein be dead by morning?" Lin-Sari pulled the chair from the bedside away and sat in it.
"Yes," Alhawat put his hand to the prince’s cheek. "My father told the king Loyein was too weak to survive. He sent me only to ensure his comfort as much as possible."
There was a long silence before Alhawat spoke again, and his voice was only a bare whisper. “He should be dying at home...”
Lin-Sari watched Alhawat as he went through his shamanic motions. It was clear Alhawat did not have enough experience to do more than ease Prince Loyein’s suffering. Lin-Sari could not decide if Alhawat’s father had been kind or cruel to send Alhawat with his only friend to watch over Loyein as he died.
By midnight, Prince Loyein was dead and Alhawat woke the ambassador to perform immediate death rites on the prince.
Ambassador Loyein anointed his son’s head with perfumed oil and painted his lips with a poison meant to guard him against dangerous spirits in the afterlife.
"Alhawat," The ambassador’s voice was low and soft. He had loved Loyein, but had not spent as much time with him as the ambassador might have liked. Ambassador Loyein had many sons and a few daughters. He had been blessed by the gods indeed to only lose one.
"Your majesty?" Alhawat’s voice was tight and restrained. After his own sister had died, Prince Loyein had become his close friend and confidant. Loyein’s marriage would have taken him across the sea, but that was not so far away as death. There was an empty place in his chest that hurt two-fold, throbbing with each beat of his heart. A pain that lanced from his chest to his throat.
"You were always quite close to my son," Ambassador Loyein’s voice was quiet, almost reverent He looked up, the dark, nearly black eyes of his line were not harsh or cruel but they were the eyes of a strong man, a man of war and politics who could not afford to chose his family over his duties. "I thank you for that. I made a mistake by pushing for the wedding to take place so soon. The Empresses always speaks last, but I pushed for it. I thought Loyein would recover." The ambassador took the crown that had lain on the prince’s bedside table and slid it carefully around his forehead.
Alhawat shook an incense burner to disturb the embers and keep them burning.
"It was an honor for me when Prince Loyein became my friend,” Alhawat did not look directly at Ambassador Loyein. “I did not think I would ever be close to anyone after my sister died." He almost whispered the word sister. Even now, nearly ten years after her death, the strong fear of pulling her soul off its path was terrifying to him. “He saved me.” Alhawat’s vision blurred, but he blinked it clear with a force of will.
Alhawat and the ambassador were both silent for a long time.
“Perhaps,” the ambassador’s words were carefully measured. “You could save Pyrine in return.”
Alhawat tore his gaze away from the prince’s body, still and growing colder by the minute. “Your Majesty?”
“You are clever, Alhawat, and secretive, neither of which are undesirable traits. All things considered,” the ambassador turned to face Alhawat. “Pyrine and Vesuvineae have had several trade treaties over the past hundred years, but little of our politics have crossed our great ocean. I could not name one king that was not involved in trade with Pyrine. I doubt the anyone in Vesuvineae is any more knowledgeable on the politics of Pyrine.”
Alhawat remained silent, but there was a cold growing inside him it sat hard as iron and cold as winter in his stomach. It was a familiar pain.
“There would be no one to dispute who my sons were, how many I had, customs of travel,” The Ambassador met Alhawat’s eyes.
Alhawat swallowed, those black eyes dug hard into his own. He felt dizzy, waves of burning heat and bone-chilling cold rose from his chest to crash over his face. “Sire?”
“I will make a bargain with you Xuetahir Alhawat,” The Ambassador’s face was carefully neutral. “I know your temper. I will allow you revenge on Dobrat, in exchange for not arriving in Vesuvineae empty-handed.”
Alhawat’s head cleared suddenly, the ambassador’s face came into sharp relief and the world went silent. For a breath, nothing moved. “I accept.”
The ambassador nodded. “Good. Rest now, say your final farewells. Any letters you wish to write, do so now. When the sun rises, you will become a Son of Pyrine.”
The ambassador turned and left.
The room creaked against the waves and wind, the sound of water splashing against the ship creating a rhythmic drum beat, slow as a breaking heart. All the sound, all the weight of failure, the dizziness and the numbest crashed down upon him, sending Alhawat to the floor. There was a great shattering inside him. His heart like a thrice dropped glass. He clutched his chest and heaved silent, choked sobs. Alhawat buried his face against the white silk sheet covering the corpse. He wanted to scream, to wail and wretch and thrash, but he could not move and his voice would not come. So he bled the pain through his tears and purged the poison of his despair while he clutched at the pieces of his heart. The gods had turned their backs on him a second time, Alhawat wondered if they ever actually cared.