Chapter 3: 2. The Prince

I am Speki Brodi, son of Tendra Brodi, king of Lumima.

Power. That is the only lesson my father has ever taught me.

“Listen, son. All that matters in this world is power! If there’s something you want, go and take it,” he would always say, followed by his obnoxious laughter.

What was it that I wanted? …I was happy to merely exist as a young boy in my mother’s embrace. Could power really procure a mother’s love?

“Prince Speki,” mother would say to me, placing me on her lap. “Always remember to be kind.” Her eyes were full of grace and wisdom. “You will be king one day, so take care your sisters. A king is nothing without his people.”

“Mommy,” I asked her. “Why is your stomach so round?”

“This is going to be your younger sister,” she said.

“Oh, but I want a brother! I already have twelve sisters!”

“I’m sorry, Speki,” she said. “But I think I’m unable to give you a brother.”

By some miracle, Flon was born. He was a sickly baby boy, so mother had to give him all her care and attention. I was not allowed to see her until it would be certain that the boy would survive. But I didn’t mind. I was happy to know that I was going to get a baby brother.

Then, seven years ago, on that fateful day…

“Hi! Who’re you?” a little boy, about five years my junior, asked me with a wide grin.

“I’m Speki,” I said. “Who are you?”

“Wow, you’re big!” the boy said without answering my question. “Will you play with me?”

I don’t know why—maybe I was lonely—but I played with the boy for the entire afternoon, entertaining his every whim. Climb this tree, jump off this wall, throw this rock—I did everything his own frail body could not handle.

“Speki!” the boy said as the sun was getting ready to set. “When I grow up, I want to be strong, just like you!”

This feeling that I felt—what was it? A profound affection for a child I had just met? Is power truly capable of securing such a love?

Without thinking I picked up the boy and placed him atop a branch on a small tree. I wanted him to see the world through my eyes.

“Flon!” a familiar voice cried out in the distance. “Get down and come here this instant!”

It was mother. It had been five years since I last saw her. She possessed a natural vigor and beauty, but I could tell she looked tired, even from this distance.

I picked up the boy and set him gently on the ground. He proceeded to sprint to his mother, stumbling a few times on the way. His mother went back into the door out of which she came, not even acknowledging my presence.

The boy turned around as he ran, and waved at me.

“Speki! Thanks for playing with me! My name is Flon! I’ll see you tomorrow!”

“Flon!” I yelled back. “Yeah, I’ll see you tomorrow!”

That night I had a dream that I was drowning.

I woke up, feeling the sweet and warm embrace of my mother’s hands wrapped snugly around my neck, her wet tears showering me with the warmth I was so long a stranger to. I heard a scream.

The next thing I remember was waking up in the throne room to the sound of my parents arguing in an adjacent room. As I lay on the small couch at the side of the room, I saw the flickering silhouettes of my parents animating the wide castle walls.

“Tendra, please!” I heard my mother plead. “You must get rid of him!”

“No,” my father said. “The boy will be kept alive.”

“Flon is a healthy boy! He’s the rightful heir! It’s too risky to keep any potential rivals alive!”

“The rightful heir,” I heard as the two silhouettes merged, “shall be whoever is the strongest.”

“But Tendra! He will be a worthless king without any magi—”

The silhouette was consumed by a bright light that shone from the adjacent room amidst the muffled screams of my mother.

Turns out, I’m the son of a concubine, and the queen mother was not my own. My birth mother had died shortly after I was born, and the queen mother decided to raise me as her own because—after having birthed only girls for years—she gave up on having a son. But after giving birth to Flon, she gave up on me.

From that day on, I traveled with my father on all his excursions. On days that he would return home to the castle, I stayed at the camp and trained.

“Power!” I would yell at myself. “With more power!”

I put my body through a gruesome training regiment. In the mornings I trained in hand-to-hand combat. The afternoons were devoted to weaponry. After sunset I would partake in strength training until my body gave out. I did this every day for seven years.

As someone who lived in a world filled with powerful magic users yet possessed no magical affinity, the only way for me to compete was to push my body to its utmost limit. I immersed myself in suffering. My only companion was pain.

But why? For what end did I subject myself to this torture? Was it merely to survive?

Then one day, the answer came to me clearly, as if I were being directly rewarded for my efforts by the Phoenix himself.

“Father, look!” I cried as I extended my arms and my weapon flew back to me.

I had learned “Retrieval,” a common but useful magical ability known by a many of the judges of Renascentia.

“Gahahaha!” my father laughed. “I guess you had it in you all along!”

“Maybe I really can be king one day!”

My father struck me on the head, knocking me over and launching me several feet away.

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“Fool!” he said. “You can decide that once you become the strongest!”

“Father…” I said, facing the ground. “Please send me to the capital. I wish to train as a judge like you did.”

“You aren’t ready.”

A few days ago, I heard rumors in the camp about an incident that occurred at Lumima Prison. A boy about my age, nicknamed “the Red-Eyed Demon,” went on a rampage and incapacitated over thirty guards before the warden came to stop him.

“And what is his history?” my father asked one of his advisors.

“It’s unknown,” the advisor said. “But it seems he’s a simple peasant with no military training.”

“Wonderful!” my father said. “Now that is potential! He must swear allegiance to me, and we must send him to the capital at once!”

“Father!” I shouted. “If I can kill this boy… would you send me instead?”

My father stood there in silence. He was a man who would kill even his most trusted advisors when rudely interrupted.

“Gahahaha! I like your guts!” he said. “OK! But I can’t guarantee you’ll stay alive.”

As a prince, I should have been born into this world with everything. Yet somehow, I’ve only had a small taste before it was violently snatched away. I will get stronger—I must get stronger—so I can take back everything that is rightfully mine!

[Ability Acquired: Retrieval]

***

The battleaxe hung motionless in the frosty air, its sharpened blade inches away from Mattias’s face.

“Aaaaaahhhh!” Speki cried with tears in his eyes. “It’s all mine!”

The battleaxe zoomed toward Speki, who was standing under the clear blue sky in the open snow, looking up with arms stretched wide. Before Speki could notice, the battleaxe cut clean through his right arm.

“Gah!” he yelled, his blood dripping from where his arm was severed. He was in too much pain to notice the second battleaxe that was hurling toward his hunched body. The second battleaxe sliced straight through his neck and sent his head twirling in the air. Speki’s decapitated body fell lifeless to the ground; his disembodied head soon followed, landing in the bloody snow.

All within one moment Mattias had experienced Speki’s recollection of his life—his joyful moments, his struggles, his pain. And all within the next, that life had ceased to exist. Mattias remained kneeling in the snow, trembling at what he had witnessed.

“Gahahaha!” King Tendra belted from above the slope, his army joining in on the laughter. “You have done well, boy! Join my army!”

“He was your son… how could you…” Mattias muttered, looking down with teary eyes.

“What is your answer, boy!” the king yelled. “Say it loud and clear so I can hear you!”

“You’re a monster!” Mattias said with all the rage he could muster. “I’ll never fight for a piece of trash like you!”

“You… insolent child!” the king said, raising his right arm into the air. A large ball of bright red and orange light formed in his palm, and he threw it at Mattias.

Mattias, as if by instinct, stretched out his left arm to the round metal shield that lay on the snowy ground several yards away. It flew straight to him and strapped itself onto his arm. He placed the shield in front him, held it up with both hands, put his head down, and braced for impact.

Mattias could feel the heat of the torrent of fire that engulfed him. He noticed that in front of him the fire was being deflected, which left a cone of safety behind his shield as the fire scorched the unprotected ground and turned the snow into vapor.

As the fiery blast ended, Mattias was surrounded by a foggy mist. For a few seconds, all he could see were the tiny specks of vapor that pervaded the fog, but soon the light of the morning sun pierced through the dissipating mist.

Standing in front of him was the man in dark-blue armor, wielding a spear in his right arm and extending his left arm toward the king.

“Frederick!” the king yelled. “What is the meaning of this!”

Mattias focused his eyes to the top of the slope where stood the king, his army, the prison guard, and the man in silver armor.

“Judges have no right to interfere in Lumima politics!” the king continued. “This is a breach of treaty!”

Suddenly the silver-armored man blinked to the outer edges of the army of men. He held a running stance with his broadsword in his right hand trailing behind him.

“Agh!” came a scream from the group of men as the body of a large man, spurting blood into the sky, was knocked up from within the group. Less than a second later came another scream. Then another. And then another and another as the entirety of the king’s army joined in on the deathly crescendo.

Immediately, the blue-armored man launched himself straight toward the king who stood at the top of the slope. Asmund Vordur, the kind prison guard who had taken care of Mattias for the past week, positioned himself at the edge of the slope between blue-armored man and the king, taking a defensive stance.

Flying in the air, the blue-armored man waved his arm to the side, and the prison guard was thrust onto the snowy slope and began to tumble down. The blue-armored man pointed his spear directly at the throat of the king who, with angry eyes, had balls of fire forming in his palms.

Mattias saw a huge explosion of ice and fire. The resulting mist covered the scene, and Mattias was no longer able to see the tall prison walls that stood at the top of the slope.

Mattias looked over to his side and saw Speki’s body lying on the ground in a pool of blood. The fire had not burnt his body, but his severed right arm had landed close enough to Mattias that it was severely burned.

Frantically, Mattias crawled over to Speki’s disembodied head. His bushy eyebrows were burnt to a crisp, but the skin was unharmed. With trembling hands and tears running down his face, Mattias knelt in the pool of bloody slush and placed Speki’s head onto his decapitated, twitching body, as if vainly attempting to bring him back to life.

Perhaps it was because the scene was too much to take in, or maybe he was just exhausted, but Mattias Richter began to feel lightheaded.

He fainted.

***

 

 

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