Into the West

Ah, another chapter! =^-^= It feels sooo nice to get this out of my system... I acually found myself drawing Othello in his armour the other day during class... ~.~""

To Prairiefire who reviewed this, i'd like to say - THANK YOU!!!!!! You really made my day!!! ((To be honest, i was beginning to wonder if it was really bad or something... Is it? Shall i go on?))

The next chapter shall be about our heroine, I promise! And things shall start to come together soon! Another promise ((@.@" Yikes, two promises in one day...))

Review? =^-^= Pretty please with suger on top!

~The Palace Courtyard, Sanc~


Eldest son to eldest son that was how it had been until they had come to this accursed land. Until the Lord Ska had allowed them to be polluted by Narsail and the Andine.

With their annihilation it should have ended. But it had not.

As with all old habits, this one would not simply lay aside and die.

It had burrowed itself deep into the king’s already troubled mind, poisoning him day by day, until it was all he thought about.

Who would be his heir?

Who had what it would take to hold the kingdom together when he was gone? Who had that balance of mind and soul needed to rule strongly as well as fairly?
Those were the questions that needed to be answered and the answer had to come soon.

He had been blessed or cursed, with five very different sons, but to him, none of them seemed to measure up to his expectations. Sometimes they acted nothing like him, but at other times he saw himself mirrored in their eyes.

They were of his blood but they had been born in Arisis, a country they could not truly call their own although they had paid for it in blood and battle.

They all had qualities that would be need, but it was those particular qualities which they did not share.

As each day passed he felt his strength fade.

He no longer recognised himself in the looking glass she had given him that day on Pandis’Veel. He often wondered if she had found out about her twin sister when she handed him the unbreakable silvered glass, sealing both her own fate and his.
She had smiled when she handed it to him, but her eyes, those sky blue orbs of hers, they had been as cold as a winter night.

Had she known?

-----

Othello sat silently watching his father out of the corner of his eye. The grooms had already strapped the aged king firmly into the saddle for fear he might fall. The first time they had done this, he had yelled at them, kicked them and finally pulled his sword from his sheath and promised to kill the next man who touched him.

He had still been king then.

What sat in the saddle now was not their king or his father, it was the dry husk of a man who had seen better days and had no time left to him.

The power plays now in full force were pulling the court apart and Ozoni had not even noticed it.

He suspected that both Pyriel and Lir were behind more then one assassination attempt on members of the council as well as on their own brothers. In the last two months, several food tasters had died from poisoning.

“You look ill brother.”

Turning in his saddle, Othello met Ariael’s grey eyes and gave him a melancholy smile.

He had decided when all this started up, that of them all, Ariael was best suited for the crown. Ariael was the only one really suited for the job and his weaknesses only made him a better choice. Already, he had told this to both his father and the entire council.

He had shown his colours and he did not regret his decision.

“Look at him baby brother, he’s dying before our eyes. I doubt he shall live until Midsummer…and if he does not proclaim his heir today, when he goes, the country shall likely erupt in civil war.” Othello cast his blue gaze towards the dark figure of their eldest brother as he finished.

Drawing his mount up beside Othello’s, Ariael followed his gaze and shook his head, “Do you think our father is so far gone that he would place Pyriel on the throne?”

Looking back to their father, the general frowned and said, “To be honest I do not know anymore. Before our people came here, the custom of the royal house was to crown the first-born child. It did not matter if they were a tyrant or a layabout, it was how it had always been done.”

“But that changed, Othello. When Ska took the throne after the last prince of Anvar was killed he changed those laws.”

Othello smiled but it was far from happy, “You do not sit upon the council, baby brother. You do not know what our father has been talking about behind locked doors.
He thinks that those laws, which were rewritten with the Ancients help, should go back to how they were originally. He thinks we have lost our cultural heritage because of them.
Both during the war and after, he thought that the new laws made us stronger as a people and I think that as well.
But now…now he longs for the past Ariael. He longs for his past youth, but he does not seem to realise that it is the past that could destroy us all.”

Ariael’s eyebrows drew together in confusion, “What do you mean Othello?”

“There are things I regret doing,” Othello whispered bitterly, while pushing his long hair back and pulled his elaborate helmet on. “Things that I wish daily I could change, but the past cannot be rewritten, no matter how much we may wish it.
We must live with the blood on our hands. With the mistakes that we made and the bonds of trust that we broke.”

-----

The day was not going as planned. But in the court of Arisis this was nothing new. Plans could be thrown to the wind in a matter of moments, just because of one tiny change.

The one change that had thrown this plan to the wind was the appearance of Ariael, an alive and breathing Ariael.

Luckily, as with most things, this slight irritation could be remedied.

Gazing out through his long dark fringe, Pyriel frowned and tightened his grip on his reins causing his horse to prance nervously. He had been so sure that it would work.

The scorpion had already removed a dozen obstacles for him and as cold-blooded as it sounded, he needed his youngest brother gone from the picture.

He knew that if Ariael made a bid for the crown, Othello would back him up, and if Othello backed him, so too would some of the council and the entire army.

The only good thing that had happen thus far was the fact that Othello himself had no desire to be king. If he had, it was very likely that he could easily take the throne. He had the power and resources to do it.

Sitting upright in the saddle, the prince shook back his hair and looked towards the king.

It had been a long time since he had thought of that man as his father. What he now saw was a puppet, something to be manipulated and controlled to his advantage. As a rule he saw most people like this, but as with most rules there were exceptions. His brothers for example.

Lir, he did not generally have to worry about, the spymaster had already shown his colours by backing him. Pyriel was still cautious of him though; you would have to be a fool not to be. Lir knew everything that happened, his vast network of spies reached to every corner of the continent and beyond.

It was thought that in the palace alone, he had every second person working in some degree for him.
Spies spying on spies, spying on spies, as he sometimes put it.

Pyriel’s caution towards Othello was for obvious reasons. As General Kailas, he commanded the respect and absolute loyalty of the army. While as the First Swordmaster of Arisis, he had been called ‘The Great Destroyer’ since the age of seventeen. Warlord and minister of the royal council, Othello held more power in his little finger then the king now held in his entire body.

And every thread of that power was ready to back and protect Ariael should he make a bid for the throne.

Which all by itself made the youngest prince a danger to any and all of Pyriel’s plans.

Kira, he was still unsure of, but the forth prince hardly mattered at the moment because he was not at court. Nobody had seen or heard from him in almost two months and considering that his general speciality was as an assassin, his disappearance did not vouch well for his personal safety.

To the north came the clear sound of the great bell, which rested in the highest point of the Tower of Remembrance.

He hated having to participate in these ridiculous processions, he did not care that similar rituals had been preformed back on Anvar all those years ago. The land was dead and gone, drowned almost six hundred years before by a great wave.

Anvar now sat on the bottom of the ocean, home to none but the ghosts of the far distant past. A past that should have been forgotten just like the last three hundred years had been.
Just like the Andine had been.

Moving his mount into the line behind the king and beside his brothers, Pyriel cast Lir a glance. The second prince was smiling pleasantly, but it was not real, it was habit and as real as his pleasure in participating.

“Smile brother, or at least do not frown, it spoils your good looks,” the spymaster whispered sweetly as the gates opened on to the cheering population of Sanc.

Biting back a sharp reply that would likely have resulted in an argument, Pyriel smiled tightly at his brother and gripped his mount’s reins tighter.