The Prince, surprised, looked over at the big man, who appeared to be lost in thought.
“How long ago was that?”
The giant looked about to respond, but then caught himself and turned to the Prince with a smile.
“Long enough. It’s not my story to tell.”
And with that the conversation did end, and they remained silent for the rest of the day’s journey, even though the Prince tried to come up with something to say multiple times. It was infuriating—he had grown up a natural at court politics, and yet he couldn’t hold a conversation with a simple Baseborn Exile. It was baffling.
The next few days continued much the same, with barely any conversation on any of their parts. Tomaz taught the Prince a few more impromptu names of trees and plants, and though the Prince tried to appear interested, Tomaz soon realized he wasn’t, and so the lessons ended. The girl was gone most of the day, apparently having taken it upon herself to do most of the scouting. She returned only for brief intervals to speak quietly to Tomaz, and then at night when they made camp.
A few times the Prince caught her looking at him across the fire at night. As soon as his eyes met hers, though, she looked away, and either engaged Tomaz in conversation or else made an excuse to walk away from the fire. The looks varied—some were oddly subdued and thoughtful, as if she were waiting for something, while others were angry and uneasy, as if she were impatient for that something to happen. The Prince wasn’t sure what to make of this, but as he remained unbound, he told himself it was none of his concern. Neither ofthem were his concern after they reached Banelyn and he made his way into the city without them.
And finally, that day came.
Close to noon, they emerged from a dense thicket of trees to find themselves on a ridgeline that overlooked a city. It was still miles distant, and it would take them the rest of the day to arrive there, but the Prince felt anticipation rush through him and suddenly his nerves were on edge.
Even from a distance he could tell that the city must be Banelyn. It was located at the center of an enormous fork made of three well-paved stone roads, each wide enough, it was said, for half a dozen carts to travel abreast. One road curved off to the east eventually, once it crossed the river lands, and led to the city of Formaux, the seat of his brother Tiffenal, the Prince of Foxes. The road that led north went to the city of Lerne, nestled in the rolling hills that spread through central Lucia, the seat of his sister Symanta. And finally, and perhaps most importantly, the road that led south eventually ended in Roarke, the seat of Ramael, the Prince of Oxen, and also the end of the Empire.
The city of Banelyn itself could more properly be called a city within a city. Or better yet, a city within a city within a town. The middle city had been built when his Mother, with Rikard and Geofred by Her side as Her right and left Hands, had begun to solidify Her rule of Lucia, and began Her second great conquest of the southern realms. The original wall of Banelyn, known as the Black Wall, had been built to withstand both time and attack, and as such had never fallen to any enemy. From where he sat his horse, the Prince could see the top of it, rising out of the city like an enormous black stone curtain, forming a large parallelogram around Banelyn City, which was a city devoted almost entirely to commerce. It was unparalleled in the rest of the known world, and was the source of various expressions along the lines of: “I bet I couldn’t even find it in Banelyn,” or “Well, we could always move to Banelyn and try our luck.” Inside this wall was Banelyn City proper, where lived the Elevated, the HighBlood, and the Most High Blood, who owned the city and the lands surrounding it. Toward the center of the city proper was another wall, inside which only the Children and the Most High could go. This Inner City was made of towering stone structures that stretched high into the air, spearing the heavens with their spires. Unlike the Black Wall, these buildings had never felt the touch of the Empress, and as such had been worn down and rebuilt over time. The Prince had heard that they came nowhere close to rivaling the majesty of the Black Wall, but were still tall and powerful, and some, the Cathedral of the Empress among them, breathtaking in their own right.
The Outer City, the town spread out around the walls of what was historically Banelyn City proper, was actually three very large towns that had sprung up outside the walls. No one was allowed to pass beyond Banelyn’s Black Wall who was not an Elevated merchant, tradesman, or one of the High Blood, and so, over the years, the lower classes who lived outside the wall had built second-hand shops, teetering inns, and rickety wooden houses that had melded into a haphazard city of its own that was like a wooden maze. This Outer City was broken into three large sections, each of which was centered on one of the Black Wall’s three Gates: the Lerne Gate, the Formaux Gate, and the Roarke Gate, named after the primary trade objective toward and from which goods flowed. For first and foremost, Banelyn was a trading city, and important because it was located almost squarely at the center of the Empire, and as such served as the Empire’s central trading hub. If Lucien was the head of the Empire, Banelyn could very well be called its heart, and the roads that led from it the arteries that fed the Empire’s life blood—trade—to all corners of Lucia.
And somewhere in that mess, thought the Prince,is the Path of Light that will lead me to the Seeker.
“Shadows and fire, it always takes my breath away to see that sight. It’s a beautiful city.”
“If by ‘beautiful city’ you mean a cesspool of corruption, thenyes, it is.”
The Prince, by now used to the way that the Exiles came and went with barely any sound, managed not to jump when the girl spoke from right behind him, but only just.
He looked at Tomaz and saw the Exile staring at him, still atop his charger. It took him a split second to realize the giant expected him to be surprised.
“Banelyn,” he said, trying to play it off as though the sight had struck him momentarily dumb. “You… you’ve brought us to Banelyn.”
“Yes, we did,” the girl said.
“Why?” he asked, keeping his demeanor calm and collected. Inside, however, he was filled with a sudden mix of conflicting emotions.
Banelyn, it’s there, right there! I need to go to it, I need to.…
But he would wait. He had waited this long, and he could wait a little longer. He needed to make a clean escape, needed to make sure Tomaz and the girl couldn’t follow him, or at least couldn’t catch up to him until he was safe inside the city, and preferably safe inside the Seeker’s lair. And then, once he was there… once he was there, things would be worked out. They had to be. There was nowhere else for him to go.
“We need supplies,” Tomaz said, dismounting. With a sudden thrill that jolted through his body to the tips of his fingers and toes, the Prince realized that this would be his chance. They were making camp here for the day.
“We aren’t going closer?” he asked.
“Why would we?” the girl replied, looking at him suspiciously.
“I’m… not sure. I suppose I’m just so used to traveling until dusk that stopping to camp at noon is… strange to me.”
Tomaz grunted in what the Prince felt was agreement and began to unburden his horse of the heavier saddlebags. The answer seemed to please the girl, who grimaced and began to unpack the food.
“If there was anywhere else to go, we’d keep going. But any closer and we run the risk of being found by a patrol and any farther away we’d be too far to make the journey in half a day.”
“Speaking of which,” Tomaz said, “I could make it there and back by sunset.”
“You?” she asked. “I thought I was going; I always go.”
