Prince Nord surveyed the two score soldiers assembled before him. Raggedy and still smelling of smoke, most of the men had survived the sacking of Duke Gallow’s keep. The survivors had a grim, hard edge to them. The remaining half dozen looked like boys taken straight from the fields. They held their war axes on their shoulders like they planned to go chop firewood.
Still, all of them cowered as Nord looked down at them. At six foot eight, Nord weighed over three hundred pounds—all of it muscle—without his armor. By far the largest of the three brothers that had vied for the crown of the High Kingdom, Nord still believed he should have won. Now he’d been reduced to a mere mercenary captain.
How the mighty had fallen.
The men assembled before him represented the latest recruits to the White Tigers mercenary band. The White Tigers numbered four thousand strong and many counted them among the most skilled mercenary bands in the Broken Kingdom.
This had not always been the case. When Nord had fled north after the Crown War, the White Tigers had amounted to little more than a miserable band of outlaws numbering perhaps twenty.
Nord encountered them first in the forest near their camp. He’d approached in peace, not wanting to fight an entire camp of armed men. The White Tigers had drawn steel and prepared to attack. He’d been forced to kill three of them before their leader, Dragen, had called them off.
Nord and Dragen spent the rest of the day talking and taking the measure of each other. He took a liking to the bandit leader almost at once and they’d struck a bargain whereby Nord would use the wealth he’d secreted out of the High Kingdom to buy better equipment for the White Tigers and to entice new recruits. In exchange Nord would get the rank of second-in-command.
Six months later the Tigers numbered over a hundred, including a sorcerer of middling power. Nord and Dragen decided the time had come to make their name.
A messenger had gone to the castle of Duke Cassius. Cassius was engaged in a fierce battle with his neighbor, Duke Ballin. Ballin had managed to construct a fort between two rivers. This fort overlooked the only ford for many miles in either direction. Ballin used the fort to halt all merchant travel heading toward Cassius’s land. The White Tigers offered to sack the fort in exchange for whatever plunder they found.
Cassius had agreed with the understanding that if they failed, he wouldn’t acknowledge them. The Tigers had accepted and managed to complete the mission. Well pleased, Cassius had hired them for several other missions. The wealth and fame gained from these efforts brought the White Tigers to prominence.
For eighteen years now Nord had fought with the White Tigers. He’d more than doubled the wealth he escaped with and now controlled half the Broken Kingdom through puppet dukes.
Dragen died in battle four years ago and Nord now ruled alone. In another year or two he’d control all the Broken Kingdom and then he’d turn his sights south to his brothers and the High Kingdom.
Assuming he could turn these plow boys into soldiers.
Prince Kent sat unperturbed as his new business associate ranted about the unfair price Kent had offered him for his pearls. The eastern merchant, he called himself Yin, paced from side to side tossing his hands in the air. Kent’s beautiful office had a spell of silence surrounding it, so Yin’s ranting went no further.
“They’re worth three times what you offered me!” Yin shouted for the fourth time. “Twenty-five gold pieces each is an insult.”
Kent leaned forward and rested his elbows on the large mahogany desk that dominated the room. “You’ll do no better elsewhere. Accept my offer or get out.”
Kent’s blunt ultimatum seemed to jar the merchant. He sat down in one of the small leather chairs in front of the desk. “It’s just that my expenses ran a little higher than I anticipated. Couldn’t you make it a little more?”
Kent smiled. He had his fish hooked now. “I’m not without sympathy, Yin. I’ll make it thirty gold pieces each.”
“I accept,” Yin said. “Thank you, sir.”
Kent rose from his high-backed chair. At just under six feet, Kent wasn’t the most physically impressive figure, certainly not when compared to his brothers, Nord and Vilos. The runt of the litter, they always called him. That had rankled at the time, but he soon learned that his brain could often get him what his lack of size couldn’t.
That was a lesson that served him well over the years.
He patted his belly and swallowed a sigh. The good life had taken its toll.
“My pleasure,” he said. “We merchant men have to stick together.”
“Indeed we do, sir.” Yin bowed to his host.
Kent walked around his desk and escorted Yin out the door that led to his main warehouse. “Just tell the clerk what price we agreed on when you bring the pearls.”
“I will, and thank you again.”
Kent closed the door behind him and began thinking of a number of jewelers he knew that would be glad to offer one hundred gold pieces for each of those pearls. Kent had no sooner sat down than someone knocked on his door.
Kent touched a rune that had been engraved on his desk. Whenever he touched it the silence spell ended until he removed his finger. “Come in.”
His beautiful assistant, Yaway, entered the office. Her flawless features were highlighted by a hint of rouge on her lips and a bit of sparkling crystal at the corners of her eyes. A loose, swirling robe covered her from neck to ankle, yet the thin silk clung just enough to give a hint of the perfection that hid underneath.
Not that her looks were the only reason Kent hired her. Yaway had a mind nearly as keen as his own. On those rare occasions when his business took him out of the city, he trusted her to handle matters in his absence. Given how few people he trusted, that was a rare honor.
“We received a sending from one of your ships, The Happy Mermaid,” she said. “They’ll arrive about a week late due to a storm. They’ve sustained some minor damage, but nothing that threatens the ship’s safety.”
“The Happy Mermaid…” Kent tried in vain to remember what cargo it carried.
“A variety of copper tableware,” Yaway said as if reading his mind.
That’s what he loved about the woman: besides a jaw-dropping figure she always seemed to know just what he needed. “No big deal. Anything else?”
“Your niece’s birthday is approaching. Do you wish to send a gift?”
Kent thought about it. He hadn’t spoken to either of his brothers since the Crown War ended. He didn’t like Vilos, though more because they had little in common than due to any particular offense. Despite several magical conversations with his niece over the past few months, he hadn’t yet decided if visiting the palace again was a good idea.
But perhaps the time had come to reach out to the Crown. “Pick out something nice and extravagant. I trust your judgement.”
“Very good, shall I send it directly to the palace?”
“No,” Kent said. I'll take it myself.