”If Prince Thrandel thinks he can come at me again, he is painfully mistaken,” Mundhir said with a smirk. He drained another cup of Westwind Brew, and savoured its sweet hoppy taste.
Before him, sprawled across a simple oaken table, was a badly worn map of the Eblistan Sultanate. The cloth that the image had been stitched onto was centuries older than he, and it stung his pride to see the vast expanses of territories that his people once controlled. Nillanor, Irongarde, Thraxton – all bended the knee to his forebears, and those nations that did not, ever shook with fear at the monstrous power the Prophet’s children held.
Picking up a small metal soldier, roughly an inch tall, Mundhir mused at it. On the aged map, it represented his “army”, and he quickly became embittered by the fact that it stood alone. Opposing it, ten centimetres east of Baalor, were five similar metal figures. These represented Nillanor’s recovering army; an army he had bludgeoned in the ruins of Eblistan’s ancestral capital city.
“Why wont father help me? We can make a difference here, we could end this war once and for all. Yet here I am, lauded for war crimes by going against his wishes, holding the very borders he and my brothers have forsaken. Don’t they see? If we don’t stop the Elves here, they will take more and more ground until the Citadel is an island of humanity in a sea of hostility. We’ll be cut off, besieged – forced to surrender before long, no doubt, and the Prophet will look upon us with shame,” he ranted to himself. Another cup of Westwind Brew followed his words.
“My Prince,” came an unfamiliar voice from behind him. Mundhir turned with the grace of a seasoned warrior, and narrowly removed himself from the arc of a sword swing. An assassin, masked in blackness, stood before him. Footsteps from his left and right confirmed that he was not facing just one adversary.
“Who sent you?” Mundhir demanded, drawing his sabre. “Tell me now, and I’ll ensure you are entreated to a warrior’s death.”
With a gasp, Mundhir awakened. Every single bone and joint in his body ached like fire, and his lungs felt as if someone had replaced them with iron kettles. Sweat poured down his brow, and felt icy cold upon his skin. His vision was blurry, and every time he attempted to focus on something, his vision exploded with a searing light.
He attempted to move, and it was then that he realised he was restrained to a wall. Looking down through shimmering visions, he made out dark stone, torches and a throng of people. He sniffed the air, and grimaced; he knew where he was, there was no mistaking that smell. A smell of death and decay, of waste and misery.
A swollen tongue and cracked lips, coupled with a throat as dry as a desert, hampered his ability to talk. If he wanted answers, he’d have to find another way of communicating. He tugged weakly at his restraints, and was surprised when one his hands came free. He figured that whomever had put him here, had thought him dead, and wanted his body to rot as a final insult to him; they must’ve paid little attention to the functionality of his restraints. A follower of Duranar, denied a decent and correct burial, could never find their way to the Undying Promised Land. The thought of being stuck in a black void for all eternity rattled him into action.
Using his free hand, he quickly unfastened the worn leather straps pinning his other limbs to the wall, until finally he fell with a thump onto the damp stone beneath him. The impact, though only light, sent shockwaves of pain rippling through his body; it was several minutes before he dared to rise.
The first thing he did, was press his face against the cold granite wall. With his swollen tongue, he jabbed at the tiny streams of moisture that had accumulated there, and did so for some time, until he finally felt well enough to at least hammer out a few words.
Turning, he looked at his fellow inmates. They were a colourful selection of varying nationalities, races and backgrounds. Murderers, thieves and conmen no doubt – ill company for a Prince of Eblistan, but it wasn’t as if he was in a position to complain. Besides, he had other things to worry about; namely, escaping his father’s dungeon and finding out who it was that tried to kill him. Their skull would decorate his house for a thousand years, this he promised himself.
A draft billowed past him from some hidden vent. He realised for the first time that he was naked as a babe, and as his vision returned to him in earnest, he was horrified to see a spider web of blackened veins spanning his torso; they emanated from a nasty looking wound down under his left breast.
“By Great Duranar, Lord of All, was I struck by Ice Venom?” He hissed aloud. He prodded a finger at his wound, and instantly regretted his childish curiosity as he doubled over in pain.
Ice Venom was the last of a dying, black art that had prospered in Eulona for centuries. Collected from the giant arachnids way up in the frozen north, it could be easily applied to blades, arrowheads – food and drink. It was guaranteed to kill anyone, by turning their blood into a thick blue jelly in a matter of minutes. A common tell-tale sign of its use was the ugly blue veins that would span the victim’s body, as his or her blood vessels became constricted with sludge. How he had survived, was nothing short of a Duranar given miracle.
Arranging for not just one assassin, but several, to murder him using one of the rarest of poisons in the known world, would have cost someone dearly. This left him with two possible conclusions: either Prince Thrandel of Nillanor had stooped to dishonest combat, and arranged it – or someone within his own Royal house had been responsible. The latter notion shook him to the bone.
A commotion erupted from beyond the wide iron bars that acted a wall for one side of the large cell. He could hear the guards, chuckling to themselves merrily, and the sound of their weapons rattling in their sheaths told Mundhir that they were prepared for trouble. He took comfort, however, in knowing himself as a beloved war hero – one of these men would recognise him - and likely set him free immediately. Then he’d be able to take revenge on those that had tried to murder him in the foulest way.
Barging his way through his fellow inmates, and paying them very little heed, he rested against the bars and waited for the guards. Already his tactical mind was deciding his next move, once he was beyond the depressing constraints of his father’s dungeon.
