Prequel One: Rise
“Some people have all the luck,” Kain lamented, one elbow on the polished surface of the counter, and his hand under his chin.
“If you can call that luck,” his friend Ama sniffed, looking unimpressed. Ama always looked unimpressed, though, so it was hard to tell if this particular situation had him more unimpressed than usual. “I say having to be at the beck and call of the Prince isn’t luck at all.”
Kain rolled his eyes. Everyone who knew Ama knew that he had some kind of problem with Prince Comman. Seeing as Ama was a whole five years older than the Prince and much less important, he didn’t know what the big deal was.
They were sitting in The Rock and Crater, a cantina just on the edge of town that catered to everyone from the mine workers to the Prince’s Guard. The latter had just walked into the cantina, all in their green and white uniforms, heads held high as they went to get a table and were immediately offered free drinks.
Ama’s lips curled, and he went back to his drink. “I think you’re fine as you are, Kain,” he said. “Although I know that doesn’t mean anything to you.”
Kain rolled his eyes again. Leave it to his best friend to turn saying something nice about him into an act of long suffering. Ama was so dramatic sometimes, and it was a wonder he’d made it through training at all.
“You know that isn’t true,” he said, knocking back his shot before signaling to the pretty woman behind the bar for another.
“I suppose.”
It wasn’t only Ama who wasn’t overly fond of the Prince. Most of the people of Jontira, and especially the capital city, had an issue with their young ruler. His age was one of the problems, but when Queen Odei had died, there wasn’t anyone else to take her place. Prince Comman had been a young thing, only sixteen movements old, but he was smart and clever, and he’d risen to the challenge, Kain thought.
Other people just saw his age and they saw the violence.
Enemies of Jontira, of which there were plenty, had seen the young prince as easy prey. They’d been sure that it would be no matter to pick off the Prince and take control of the kingdom. Of course, they hadn’t counted on the Stone Guard and all their power, and so each uprising of enemies had been summarily put back down.
Lives had been lost, though, and many saw the Prince as the reason for it. When their Queen had ruled, no one would have dared to even try to attack them, and that colored the people’s opinions of their ruler.
There was also the fact that the Prince wasn’t a warrior.
He didn’t have command over the ground beneath his feet, as even his mother had, and people saw that as a sign that he wasn’t worthy.
It wasn’t unheard of for a ruler to not be a warrior, but it had been a good hundred movements since their last ungifted king.
The Queen’s Guard had been there to protect her, but she’d been more than capable of protecting herself, as well, calling rocks to her bidding, building walls of the very ground to protect herself, wielding weapons that were forged right in her own hands. She had been a force to be reckoned with, and now in her place was her son, who couldn’t even defend himself at all.
From what Kain could tell, even his guard had a low opinion of him for his supposed weakness, and that bothered Kain. Whatever the Prince was or wasn’t, he was their charge, and they should be loyal to him.
He shook his head, letting his thoughts go as he watched two members of the guard laugh with a serving girl who had brought their drinks over.
“You could do much better, Kain,” Ama was saying in his arch way. “You could stay in the Stone Guard. Rise through the ranks. Become their leader, even. You’re good at what you do.”
Kain snorted into his drink. “Would you call me General?” he asked.
“Of course. I don’t hold with insubordination.”
“Maybe you should aim for General,” Kain pointed out. “You’ve the temperament for it.”
“Is that your way of calling me difficult, Kain?”
“Who me?” Kain laughed. “Never. You? Difficult? Never.”
“Alright, alright. I take your point.” Ama signaled for a fresh drink of his own. “All I’m saying, Kain, my dear friend, is that you have talent and skill and integrity. Which isn’t a combination often found in the Stone Guard or in anyone else, for that matter. You could do so much more than end up giving your life for Prince Comman.”
Kain sighed. He hated that. People were always taking wagers on how long it would take a member of the Prince’s Guard to lose their life for him. It had been two movements already, and no one had died so far, but everyone always said that it was only a matter of time.
He didn’t see the point of dwelling on that, honestly. Any of them could lose their lives at any time, for the Prince, for their people, for their planet. But things had been relatively peaceful of late.
Maybe the tide was turning.
WHAM! CRASH! BANG!
Kain jerked awake, startled out of sleep by a cacophony of noises from outside that shook his house down to the foundations.
“What is that?” he mumbled, getting out of bed and stumbling to a window.
He couldn’t see anything through the darkness of night, but when the alarm signaled that they were under attack started blaring, Kain knew what was happening.
He swore under his breath and moved to get dressed, throwing clothes on and hopping around on one foot and then the other to get his boots on. There was no telling who was at their walls this time, but Kain knew he had to get out there.
Kain measured his breathing as he rushed out to the walls. There was no use tiring himself out before he even got to the fighting. He could feel the comfort of the ground beneath his feet, even and firm as he ran, one foot in front of the other. It was where his power came from, and it was also what gave him strength. The connection to the land under his feet was strong and deep, and he let the surety of it fill him. Their landscape was unchanging unless they changed it, they had the power, and they had the control. Deep breath in, hold, deep breath out. Slow and steady. With just the right amount of expedience.
He got close enough to hear the fighting, the high sound of metal clashing against metal and the deep, resonant bangs of stone shifting and crashing. There were screams of terror and anger, and Kain's lips curled into a smile.
Whoever was trying to attack them was not doing a very good job.
Kain closed his eyes to summon his power so he could join the fray when he heard someone shout "Guard the Prince!" and his eyes snapped open and his head whipped around.
What in the seven circles was the Prince doing out here? It was the middle of the night, on a remote corner of the wall, and it was no place or time for their ruler to be getting himself into trouble.
He couldn't see for a long moment, where the Prince was, but then a tall, thin figure slipped out of the crowd, and Kain swore under his breath. Prince Comman was easy to spot in this otherwise thick and bumbling patch of warriors. They were all built to be solid and firm, like mountains, and the Prince was tall and reed thin, more easily shifted by the winds. Just another thing that made him unsuitable, some would say, but they didn't have time to think about that now. The Prince was in danger.
While he wasn't a member of the Prince's Guard, Kain couldn't just leave the Prince unattended. It was his duty to serve his people, and surely that also meant the one who ruled them.
Centering himself again, he called on the power at his core and then let it flow through him, calling stones from the ground to form the large hammer he preferred to fight with. It was jagged and heavy, made from the literal ground beneath his feet, and he'd never lost a fight while wielding it.
"Your Highness!" Kain called. "To me!"
The Prince looked at him, brow furrowed for a moment, and then rushed over, darting this way and that around the fighting. If nothing else, at least he was nimble.
"Who are you?" the Prince asked, eying him.
"My name is Kain," Kain replied. "I'm in the Stone Guard. Which...is probably fairly obvious, considering." He smiled sheepishly and then shook his head. He needed to focus. "Where's your Guard?"
Comman shook his head. "I don't know. I was here with Maraath, but he is..."
Kain didn't need him to finish that sentence. For the Prince to have been with one guard and that guard to be absent now, could only mean he'd died protecting his Prince. It had finally happened.
"What were you doing out here anyway?" Kain asked, voice rising, both in agitation and to be heard over the growing battle.
He half expected a rebuke from Comman about speaking to the Prince in a way that was rude, but Comman hung his head, instead. "I was...I wanted to see the Conflux."
"The what?"
The Prince pointed to the sky where the moon and the largest stars were all in a line. It was beautiful, seeing how bright and strange the sight was, and Kain got the impression that this wasn't something that happened all that often.
"The Conflux," he said, sighing. "And Maraath accompanied you."
"Yes. And then we were ambushed."
That much was obvious. Kain took it all in and formed a quick plan of attack. "Alright," he said. "Stay with me, Your Highness. I'll get you out of here."
"But the battle," Comman said, gesturing around them.
"You're more important than that, Your Highness,” Kain said. “If you die, then all manner of bad stuff will happen. And since there aren’t any members of your guard nearby, you’re going to have to be stuck with me.”
The Prince looked startled, perhaps at being told what to do in such a way or perhaps that Kain was willing to stick his neck out like that to keep him safe. Either way, they didn’t have time to dwell on it. The longer they stood there, the more likely it would be that the Prince would come to some kind of danger.
Kain took his duties seriously.
“Very well,” Comman said, gesturing for Kain to lead the way. It was a nightmare, honestly. Ideally, there would be at least two guards on the Prince, one to watch the front and one to guard the Prince’s back. But now there was just him, and he wasn’t sure how to go about this. His job was usually just to defeat all the enemies he could find, not to have to guard one person.
But he managed. He and the Prince skirted the edge of the fighting, with Kain closest to the chaos. Every time one of their enemies broke away to try and engage the Prince in the conflict, Kain smashed them down with his hammer. They went on like that for a while until they had cleared the fighting and were heading back up towards the palace.
The rest of the Prince’s Guard met them halfway.
“What happened?” demanded one of them, and his dour expression made it seem like he was the one in charge. “Where’s Maraath? Who is this?”
The Prince drooped for a moment and then seemed to recover himself as he drew himself up to his full height. “Maraath has perished,” he said, and only his voice and the sadness in his eyes betrayed his emotions. “This is Kain. He escorted me here.”
“You’re in the Stone Guard?” the man asked, eying him doubtfully.
“Yes,” Kain said, drawing himself up as well. “I am.”
“Thank you for seeing our Prince here, then. You have our gratitude.” The man turned on his heel, and it was clear Kain was being dismissed. That was just as well.
He turned to leave, when a hand on his arm stopped him. Kain looked to see the Prince standing closer. “You have my gratitude as well,” Comman said. “I will not forget.”
“You’re welcome, Your Highness,” Kain said, bowing before he hurried off. He didn’t really believe that Comman was going to remember him, but it was nice to think about.
By the time they had stemmed the tide of creatures trying to get through to the city, the sun had risen in the sky and was high enough for it to be nearly midday. Kain was splattered with mud, dirt, and other people’s blood, and his body ached. He let the structure of his hammer fall to the ground with several heavy thuds, and stretched, wincing when his back cracked ominously.
All he really wanted was to soak in the natural hot spring in the warrior compound and then go get drinks or perhaps just go back to bed.
What happened instead was that as soon as he had stepped foot in the compound, he was summoned to the palace.
“But…” Kain objected. “I’m in no state to go there!” He gestured to his mud splattered uniform, eyes wide.
“You will come,” said the guard who was summoning him. “By order of the Prince.”
Kain sighed and closed his eyes, dreaming of the steaming water and his soft bed. But one didn’t disobey a direct order from the Prince of all people, so he let out a breath and followed the guard to the palace.
It wasn’t a place he’d been to very often. It rose up from the ground, taller than anything else in the city. It was a large natural structure, hewn from stone and glass, and studded with gems, with a walkway that led from the rest of the city to its massive doors.
Kain kept his mouth shut and just followed.
They walked down an otherwise deserted hallway and then down another and another before they reached an elaborately carved set of doors. The guard knocked.
“Enter,” said the Prince from within, and Kain swallowed hard.
They stepped inside, and Kain barely had time to take in the sparsely furnished room before the Prince was standing in front of him.
He had clearly had time to bathe and change, as he looked fresh and put together. He was dressed in simple clothes of fine make and material, his long, dark hair tied at the nape of his neck in a low tail. The Prince stood straight backed and clear eyed, though if he looked closely enough Kain thought he’d be able to see sorrow and fatigue in the lines of his face.
“Kain,” Comman said, a smile flickering over his lips. “Thank you for coming. I know you must be tired from the battle.”
Kain shot a glance at the guard who had brought him, and nodded. “Yes, Your Highness. Is there something I can do for you?”
“Yes,” the Prince said, nodding. “There is. With the death of Maraath, I find myself in need of a new member of my guard. I’m aware that it’s not a well sought after position to take, but I do only want the best.”
“Would you like me to recommend someone for you, Your Highness?” Kain asked. Because surely not. Surely he hadn’t been called so that one of his lifelong dreams could come true. Life didn’t work that way. He’d only escorted the Prince away from danger, that was all. That was not worth such a promotion, was it?
“No,” Comman said. “I would like for you to take the position yourself, if it is something you would be interested in. I will understand if it isn’t of course.” He lowered his eyes. “I know that I am not my mother and that I don’t inspire the loyalty that she did, but I believe that in order to be a good ruler, a good leader, I need to surround myself with good people. I think you are a good person, and perhaps more importantly in this case, a good warrior. Would you take the position?”
He wasn’t sure what to say, so he just bowed his head, composing himself for a moment.
“Yes,” Kain said finally, when he could force words out of his mouth. “I will.”
Prequel Two: Plateau
“Some people have all the luck,” Silvia sighed, slumping down in her bed. Part of her was yelling at the rest of her to turn the television off for crying out loud, but she was stubborn, even when she was arguing with herself, so she kept her eyes glued to the screen. On it, the news was doing some feature on prom season, and they had done interviews with various high school juniors and seniors about their outfits, their dates, their choice of transportation, and whether or not they were attending after parties.
Silvia stared at the screen as smiling teenager after smiling teenager showed off their frilly dresses or pressed suits and talked about the hotel suites their parents had booked for them.
“My uncle owns a limo service,” one breathless girl was saying into the camera. “So he’s hooking up me and my friends with a car for free as like, an early graduation present!”
“We’re riding our bikes to prom,” said a boy with a seemingly permanent scowl. “We just wanna get there, not spend a whole buncha money on one night, you know?”
“No, I don’t know,” Silvia muttered, scowling at the television. “Please tell me more.”
“Oh, honey.” She looked up to see her mother coming in, holding a tray that contained what she could only assume was her dinner. “Why don’t you turn that off?”
Silvia rolled her eyes. “Just seeing how the other half lives, Mom. Living vicariously, and all that.”
“You’re just making yourself upset, and you know it,” her mother countered. “Anyway, I brought your dinner.”
“Goody. More pudding.” Silvia sighed and turned the TV off with a vicious jab at the remote control. She laid perfectly still while her mother pulled the legs of the tray down, setting her meal before her. Lukewarm Salisbury steak and rubbery green beans, for the third time this month. And of course, the perpetual cup of pudding, strawberry cheesecake this time.
She closed her eyes and tried not to hate her life.
But she knew her mother would be watching her anxiously, waiting for her to eat something. She knew that if she turned her nose up at this meal, her mother would fret and then offer to go home and make her something else (as if stopping at the McDonald’s down the street was out of the question), and then Silvia would feel worse than she already did.
So she let out a breath, opened her eyes, and picked up the plastic fork and knife to start sawing through the hockey puck masquerading as steak on her plate.
Her mother relaxed and eased herself into the chair on the other side of the room.
Silvia was fifteen years old, and she had spent the majority of the last four years in the hospital. A weak immune system and a habit of catching anything and everything that was possible to be caught had her sick every other day it seemed like, and her parents were paranoid and had too much money, so she got checked into the hospital every time she was sick for more than a couple of days.
Sometimes it was worth it, sometimes she needed to be there, and sometimes she definitely did not.
Unfortunately, this wasn’t one of the times she needed to be hospitalized. The doctor had been concerned about her white count and some kind of rash she’d had, so she had already been here for three days with no sign of being discharged yet.
Everyone else was out there living their lives, and she was trapped in here. Her best friend tried to keep her up on what was going on, but she missed so many days of school that it wasn’t like she could go to public school anyway.
All Silvia wanted was to be normal. All she wanted was to feel like she was just like any other fifteen year old girl. But instead she got this. It made her angry and frustrated, but she tried not to show that to her parents. They had enough to worry about.
Two years later, and she was staring down the barrel of a gun shaped cigarette lighter. Silvia held up a hand and pushed it out of her face.
"No, thanks."
"Aww, come on," her friend Katya was saying. "Are you afraid of a little smoke?"
"Considering it might put me back in the hospital with lung issues, yeah," Silvia deadpanned. She wasn't intimidated by Katya and her friends, no matter how cool they tried to pretend like they were. They were the same age as she was, and she wasn't impressed by their whole 'we're bad and dangerous' vibe.
Katya just rolled her eyes. "Whatever. Anyway, are you coming with us tonight?"
Sil hadn't decided yet. She did desperately want to go to this party. It seemed like one of those things that people would talk about for years, a kegger thrown at some rich kid's house while his parents were out of town. She'd seen it in countless movies, and it was one of those experiences that she would have missed out on if she was in the hospital.
Her parents had eased up a bit when it came to the worrying about her health, but not enough that they wouldn't put her right back in an uncomfortable bed and a hospital gown if anything happened to her at this party. So it would probably be safer to bow out and tell them that she couldn't make it.
But she didn't want to do that. For once, she wanted to be a normal teenager, and that meant keggers and proms staying out past her curfew. Her parents thought she was spending the night at Katya's house, anyway, which wasn't technically a lie. Technically. They would be together, just...not at Kat's house.
"Yeah," she said, making a snap decision. "Yeah, I'm going."
The music was blaring when they pulled up to Bobby Henderson's house. 'Rich' didn't quite seem to cover it when it came to how much money his parents had. The sprawling lawns were well manicured, and there was a fountain in the middle of them, where several people were already gathered, leaning against the stone and smoking.
The noise was incredible, and as they got out of the car, Sil could feel the bass from the music inside the house thumping through her shoes. It was chaos, and she could see people she'd never met before all over the place, dancing, touching, groping, smoking, drinking, laughing, living.
It was amazing.
She smoothed down her leather jacket (genuine leather, a hand me down from her father who had decided he was too old for such things), and hoped her hair was still in the messy ponytail she'd spent an hour constructing that afternoon.
Silvia knew she'd never be able to pull off the glamorous look that some of the other girls were going for. With their short skirts and low cut blouses, make up on their faces drawing attention to their eyes. She wasn't pretty like that, even if she did have a nice figure and an okay face.
Her hair was long and dark, a muddy brown that she wanted to dye as soon as she could. She was average height, with above average boobs and decent hips. Katya had told her all of this, of course. Silvia wasn't vain enough to spend that much time staring at her reflection and trying to come up with some kind of description for her body.
"You look fine," Kat said, smiling at someone who whizzed by them on a skateboard. "Stop fidgeting."
"I'm not fidgeting," Sil hissed back. "I just don't know any of these people." She probably would have known them if she'd gone to school with them, but since she didn't, she was the stranger in the midst.
"That's for the best, trust me," Katya said. "No one knows you. You're like a blank slate. You can be whoever you want to them. This is your night to make yourself, Sil."
It was surprisingly inspirational from Kat, and Silvia sighed. Still sounded easier said than done, but she was willing to try.
"Okay," she said, letting out a breath. "Let's do this."
They made their way up the ridiculously long driveway and got a better view of the house.
Mansion was a better word for it, honestly. It was all white stone and glass, and shining lights from the inside spilling out onto the lawn. The sight of it took her breath away for a moment, and she wondered what Bobby’s parents had to do to make this much money.
“Kat!” someone cried, and Kat laughed and waved at a tall boy with wavy hair.
“Come meet everyone,” Kat said to her, tugging on her arm before she could argue. “Hey, losers,” Kat said as they joined a circle of people in the kitchen. There were six of them in all, four guys and two girls, both blonde and tall. Silvia fought the urge to hunch into her jacket.
“Hey, Kat,” said one of the girls, smiling thinly. She glanced over at Silvia and arched an eyebrow. “Who’s this?”
“This is my friend Sil,” Katya said. “Sil, this is Darren, Kris with a K, Chris with a C, Eve, Charlie, and Alan.” She pointed to each of them in turn. Kris with a K was one of the blondes, and she smirked at Silvia when she was introduced.
“Silvia,” Sil said. “Nice to meet you.”
“Where’re you from, then?” Darren, the one who had called them over, asked. “Haven’t seen you before.”
“I’m home schooled, technically,” Silvia replied, shrugging a shoulder. “And I don’t get out much.”
“Juvenile detention?” Kris with a K asked, smiling innocently.
“Nothing that exciting,” Silvia fired back.
“Behave, Kris,” Charlie said. “Any friend of Kat’s is a friend of ours. Can I get you a drink, Sil?”
She could hear her mother’s voice in her head, warning her of the dangers of accepting drinks from strangers. Roofies for one thing, and think of the germs! She sighed internally and smiled. “Yeah, sure. Whatever’s fine.”
Smooth. Definitely best to pretend like she did this all the time and knew what people drank at keggers. Beer, she was assuming. She could handle that.
She could not handle that.
Beer was disgusting. It tasted like medicine and grass mixed together into some horrible, fizzy drink that she was supposed to like. Charlie had brought her a red plastic cup filled to the brim with the frothy liquid, and she’d downed half of it like she saw everyone else doing, before the taste caught up to her.
Then she’d coughed and spluttered and asked where the bathroom was while Kat’s friends had laughed.
“She must be new,” Kris with a K said as she walked off in the direction she’d been pointed in.
“Must be,” Silvia mumbled under her breath. The bathroom was blessedly empty and she locked herself in and dumped the rest of her beer down the sink before filling the plastic cup with water from the tap and chugging it. The horrible taste still lingered, though and she shuddered and then sighed, plopping down on the closed toilet lid.
Maybe she wasn’t cut out for this. It had been less than half an hour, and already she was tired. Her head hurt from the music, beer was vile, and the only thing she’d seen by way of food was bowl after bowl of chips and cheesy snacks.
“I would kill for some pizza,” she mumbled under her breath.
“Um,” said a voice from behind the shower curtain. “I can help with that.”
Silvia screeched and was on her feet in a second, wrenching back the tastefully floral patterned shower curtain to find a boy sitting in the otherwise empty tub, fully dressed.
“What are you doing?” she demanded. “Trying to spy on people in the bathroom?”
“No, no!” the boy said, holding his hands up. “I was just hiding in here. I was going to say something but I couldn’t decide if it was creepier to say something while you were already in here or just wait for you to finish. I was going to keep the curtain closed.”
That didn’t really sound better to Sil, and she huffed, stepping back. “Why are you hiding in the bathroom?” she asked. “Why come to a party at all if you’re just going to hide?”
“It’s my party.”
Oh. Well, then. Silvia hadn’t realized she was shouting at Bobby Henderson himself.
“Oh,” she said out loud. “Well, then why throw a party if you’re just going to hide?”
Bobby sighed. “It wasn’t my idea. You know how it is. One of your friends hears your parents are going to be gone and mentions it to someone else, and then all of a sudden you’ve got four football players in your face talking about how rad it would be if you threw a kegger because keggers are rad. And then before you know it the whole school is on your front lawn and probably some other people besides, because I don’t think I’ve ever seen you before, and I’d remember.”
Silvia blinked, trying to catch up with that tirade. “So you got peer pressured into having party.”
He nodded. “Is it rad? The party?”
She shrugged. “I wouldn’t know. This is the first one I’ve ever been to.”
“Oh.” Bobby frowned and then looked up at her again. “So...pizza?”
And that was how she found herself sitting in the bathtub eating an extra large ham and pineapple pizza with Bobby Henderson of recent house party fame. He was nice enough, and they talked for hours while the party went on around them.
Once the pizza was gone, Silvia sighed. “I should probably go find my friend. We came here together, and I don’t think she’d leave without me, but knowing her, she’s probably passed out drunk somewhere.”
Bobby groaned. “I need to figure out how to get all these people out of my house.”
“Should have thought about that before you threw a house party,” Silvia teased.
He rolled his eyes and got up to help her out of the tub. “Yeah, yeah. Next time they’re doing this at someone else’s house. I don’t care how rad it would be.”
“What does that even mean?” Sil had to ask.
Bobby shrugged a shoulder. “I don’t even know.”
They looked at each other for a long moment and then dissolved into laughter. “Well, I had a pretty good time,” Silvia said. “So that has to count for something, right?”
“Right. So uh. This might be a really dumb idea considering you apparently don’t even go to our school, but would you wanna do this again sometime?”
“What, eat pizza in a bathtub?”
“Well, the pizza part. Maybe without the bathtub.”
Silvia smiled. “I dunno, that part seems pretty important.” She shrugged a shoulder, going for nonchalance. “Sure. Sounds like fun, though.”
When they emerged from the bathroom it was to find Katya slumped in the hallway. “Silvia!” she cried, slurring the word and trying to stand up. “‘Found you!”
“You definitely did,” Sil said, shaking her head. “And you’re in no state to drive, of course. Where are your keys?”
“Bowl.”
“What?”
“Bowl,” Kat said. “Downstairs. Chris took them and put ‘em in a bowl.”
“With a C or with a K?”
“With a B,” Kat said, looking confused. “For bowl.”
Silvia rolled her eyes. “Never mind, Kat. Let’s just get you home.”
It hadn’t been the wild night she’d been expecting, but as she listened to Bobby try to convince people to leave his parents’ bedroom, she had to admit that it had been fun.
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