Meeting Nihena

by Ervin Agayan

  Arsy, of course, could refuse this offer. But he tried to take advantage of this. More precisely, he tried to forget Parelia with the help of Ulania so as to earn Elmunia's trust and, most importantly, to use Ulania to obtain information about Parelia. However, forgetting Parelia and obtaining information about her contradicted each other. Before, he usually got information about Parelia from Elmunia, but the latter started growing suspicious when he became too zealously interested in Parelia.

  After such a nightmare, Arsy could not fall asleep again. He got up, flung his cloak over his shoulders, and went out into the yard.

  The starry sky lit everything around, and it was not so dark. At first, all his thoughts were revolving only around Parelia. But then, Arsy felt an alarm deep down, remembering the latest news—Erathos' arrival at this part of the kingdom. Arsy found it curious why he came here. Could it be he was pursuing him? Arsy was well aware that their meeting would be a fatal one for him. Who would have thought that two inseparable friends would ever become sworn enemies? For Arsy, it was quite obvious that Agastan is too small for both of them, and only one of them could live there. But how is he going to defeat his opponent!?

  Arsy's heart started to beat hard again when he looked at the part of the wall through which Erathos came in during their childhood. Arsy reassured himself that the mercenaries would not allow him to enter. They would immediately notice him and raise an alarm. He saw the watchmen on the towers and breathed a sigh of relief. Then he thought again; what if they did not notice Erathos? What if he was already inside and searching for him?

  But he soon got rid of this exhausting fear and began to imagine the forthcoming battle. He knew he would not survive this time. Arsy was warned for the last time by Erathos. Before leaving, Erathos told Kars that next time, Arsy should dig his grave well in advance.

  Arsy seized many of Erathos' friends and kept them in confinement. He took away their property. Erathos wanted him to release them and return all that he had taken. He beat Arsy so much that he could not recover for several weeks. When Arsy recovered, he refused to comply with Erathos' orders. On the contrary, he unleashed the fury of his wrath on those few people who remained loyal to Erathos. In fact, he took over everything that Erathos and his friends had. And those who did not give up their property voluntarily were imprisoned.

  Arsy did his best to make things worse and uneasy for Erathos. The mercenaries began to look for Erathos with greater zeal. He was pursued not only by mercenaries, but also by the entire Agastan. Arsy hoped to get rid of Erathos with the help of mercenaries and policemen, but he played the wrong card. Despite everything, he did not spend such a large sum for nothing: Erathos was constantly on the run and never had time to stage a revenge.

  But Arsy never entertained the thought of fulfilling the conditions set by Erathos. Arsy needed money, a lot of money. If he had fulfilled Erathos' conditions, he would have almost nothing left. So, their next encounter would be fatal. But Arsy was no coward. In his ruthless life, he learned to overcome obstacles. And now, when he is so in love with Parelia, no obstacle could stop him.

  Arsy began to remember their childhood—two little robbers, who never argued among themselves. They finished each other’s sentences and were ready to sacrifice their own lives for each other. Erathos once came to him and said that he wanted to get into the fortress of mercenaries and learn some martial art. But this was an uphill task—no one had ever managed to get into the fortress without being noticed. After several unsuccessful attempts, Erathos was finally able to gain entrance to the fortress unnoticed. But the mercenaries caught Arsy and began to beat him to find out why he had come. He was kept for two days without bread and water, but he did not betray his friend. To divert the mercenaries' attention, Arsy set fire to several buildings in the neighbouring village. He was so severely tortured for this action. Then he managed to escape.

  Arsy's dream was finally gone. He knew it would be pointless even to try to take a nap. So he began to walk around the entire neighbourhood. Passing by one of the houses, he noticed a staircase near the wall. Without hesitation, he climbed to the roof. The rooftop had a beautiful view. He sat down on the roof and began to think about Parelia. The entire Mozakon plunged into a deep sleep under the milky light of the moon. There was dead silence all around, broken only by Arsy's heartbeats.

  It is difficult to describe in words how beautiful Mozakon was. You needed to see it with your own eyes.

  But Arsy did not notice this beauty; he could see only Parelia's silhouette... and remember how she warned, asked him not to fall in love. Arsy thought it was a joke, but it later turned out that she was dead serious. It was already too late when he realized this—Arsy was head over heels in love.

  Having discovered whom the empress of his heart really was, Arsy realized that a difficult fate awaited him—a criminal like him could not marry a princess. But that's not all—the trouble was that Erathos wanted to marry Parelia.

  When Erathos finally decided to seize power through a revolution, Arsy was overwhelmingly happy. He understood that Parelia would be his. They would have managed to stage a coup if Erathos had not betrayed Arsy at the eleventh hour and fled with Erania.

  When they were discussing this plan before, Erathos assured that he would go all the way to the end. He told Arsy to kill him should he withdraw from the revolution because of Erania. And Arsy was ready to do just that—their swords crossed, but Parelia stood between them and did not allow them to shed blood. Arsy could not forgive such a betrayal, and he turned Erathos' life into hell.

  When Erathos and Erania left, Arsy stood confused and wondered what to do next. Almost the entire kingdom was under their authority before they left. But could Arsy retain power without Erathos? Siyeron also needed to be conquered and captured.

  There was an obvious answer to this question: He could not. The only reasonable solution was his escape. But in that case, he would forever lose Parelia, who stood near him and did not take a stern look. Then she shouted, “Get away from here!” Hatred could be perceived in her voice...

  Remembering this, Arsy shed tears. He knew that if he left, he would forever lose her. But there was no other way out; if he had not fled, he would have been caught and hanged. So, Arsy stood in confusion. He looked at Parelia and did not know what to do.

  “Leave!” Parelia ordered him again. “I hope I never see you again.”

  “No... we'll meet one day,” Arsy said confidently.

  “Agastan has never had such a nonentity like you before. I hate you with all my heart...” Parelia muttered between her teeth.

  Arsy did not even say goodbye. He only turned away and left with his gang of robbers. Since then, he had not seen Parelia nor spoken to her.

  He again and again recalled her last words and cried... Yes! The godfather of the underworld cried... Before, Arsy did not know that he could be emotionally touched. It was only after falling in love with Parelia that he realized that he had tears.

  “I hate you.” Arsy recalled these cruel words that stuck into his soul like arrows, and tears flowed down his cheeks like streams…

  He initially thought of hiding for a while in one of the hidden corners of Agastan until he was forgotten. However, he fell under Elmunia's net and decided it was all over with him. But this was his rescue—they began to cooperate and Arsy eventually regained his feet again. Needless to say how much Elmunia hated Erathos and Erania. Everything was just obvious. With great pleasure, she helped Arsy take revenge on them.

  Ay! He had really missed her—very, very much... He would really like to see her even from a distance... But he knew that Elmunia's men kept their eyes on him from morning till night, and he could not get close to Parelia. Elmunia wanted Parelia and Tiedos to marry, so she would not let Arsy take away Parelia.

  Arsy tried in every possible way to hide his interest in Parelia. Parelia did not tell Elmunia anything about her knowing Arsy. Elmunia thought that they had met during the coup, and it was from
that time on that Parelia began to hate Arsy. It was amazing to Arsy as to why Parelia hid this information from her close friend.

  The tears poured continuously... and endlessly... and did not stop even when pleasant memories came up his mind... the tears flowed and flowed...

  Arsy began to remember how he took Parelia's hands and they looked each other in the eyes…

  Memories from the Past: How Arsy Lost the Bet

  Arsy and Erathos agreed to go on night vigil. Since Erathos had many enemies, additional vigilance wouldn’t go amiss. Most danger came from Elmunia; Arsy had caught many of her people. The questioning revealed what traps Erania had set for Erathos. These Agayans were ready to stop Erathos by all means to prevent him from becoming a Tiedos. It was quite possible they would resort to murder! This time, Arsy was supposed to be the first to keep vigil. In barely an hour, he fell asleep near the fire.

  “Give me your grade book immediately, so I can give you a failing grade! Whoever heard of sleeping on duty?” It was a familiar angry female voice. Arsy opened his eyes and saw Parelia, who was bending over him, like a strict teacher would be looking down on a school bully.

  “I wasn’t sleeping!” Arsy immediately started justifying himself, and as ill luck would have it, he yawned. “I… just winked for a bit.”

  “Of course, you just winked and snored so loudly that even a dead man would rise again.” Despite Parelia’s angry intonation, her face reflected a gracious smile. “I think you deserve a most severe punishment.”

  “Okay, I just took a nap. Big deal!” Arsy was desperately trying to overcome the fits of yawning but with little success. “I hope you won’t tell Erik, will you?”

  “I won’t if you are a good boy!” answered Parelia with the same smile.

  “Have I been misbehaving recently?” Arsy frowned.

  “You could hardly behave worse!” The smile quickly disappeared from Parelia’s lips, and she pursed her mouth.

  Arsy’s eyebrows crawled up in surprise. Erathos had warned him multiple times to keep away from Arpy, and for the last two days, he was doing his best to avoid meeting her, though it wasn’t easy; every fraction of his body dreamed to be close to her.

  “You are ignoring me.” Overtones of grievance appeared in Parelia’s voice.

  During their first meeting, Arsy made an unpleasant impression on her. However, being a dignified young lady, Parelia was used to being the center of men’s attention, so she couldn’t put up with such attitude towards her. Besides, Arsy had ignored her on more than one occasion. Back then, Parelia didn’t know his name, but later, she easily recognized that very “mysterious stranger” who was discussed by absolutely all the ladies during the reception that night.

  That happened a few months ago. Arsy was a regular at parties and tumultuous receptions. During one such night, Parelia, just like other girls at the reception, took a fancy to him, mostly because Arsy was the so-called “dark horse” whom no one knew anything about. This very mysterious aura around his personality became the main attractor of women’s attention at the party, where people knew practically everything about each other. The mysterious stranger quickly found himself in the focus of discussions.

  Something should be clarified here; in fact, Arsy was mysterious only for Parelia, while all the others knew perfectly well that, on top of being a criminal, he was Erathos’s friend. They surely didn’t tell Parelia about it, since in that case, they would have to explain the sources of their awareness. But we shouldn’t also forget about Arsy’s notoriety; after all, no one was eager to have such an enemy like him.

  Parelia was used to men’s attention, and by her nature, she wasn’t too bashful. Unlike her peers, she wasn’t afraid to be the first to approach a man. That’s exactly what she did during that party.

  Imagine her surprise when the mysterious young man not only ignored her but also avoided further encounters. He didn’t do that too openly, but Parelia noticed his coldness and reluctance to come face to face with her. Every time she walked toward him, he found an excuse to get away. This baffled her and frankly made her angry. How dare he avoid the princess in the first place?

  Parelia continuously repeated her attempts during other parties, and he kept avoiding her like before. She was unspeakably boiling over; he was the only person who didn’t want to get acquainted with the princess and avoided her in a downright rude manner. At some point, however, the princess made up her mind to catch him, no matter what it took, but we’ll get to that later…

  “You know, I promised Erik not to bother you,” Arsy said quietly.

  “Such a weak-willed man!” exclaimed Parelia.

  “What?”

  “You heard me! You are weak-willed!” repeated the girl. “By the way, those are your own words. This is how you referred to people, who reconciled with their fate, whereas you are personally giving way without struggling.”

  She took a seat at the fire in front of Arsy, scanning him with her eyes. Arsy didn’t answer her and only shrugged his shoulders.

  “Why don’t you answer me? Justify yourself!” ordered Parelia. “Or do you have nothing to say in your defense?”

  “Well, in that case, I am also weak-willed,” he uttered each word slowly.

  He wasn't going to walk away from Parelia, but he wanted to irritate Erathos even less.

  Perhaps, he’d better keep a distance from Parelia. He could start seeking her love once he returned to the city.

  “But you liked me, didn’t you?” asked Parelia at a loss.

  “Big deal!” sneered Arsy, but his expression when he looked at her immediately made her realize that whatever he said was total farce and pretense. “There’re far too many girls in Agastan—I’ll find someone else.”

  Parelia’s smile showed she didn’t mind playing that game with him.

  “Far too many, but no one like me!” She smiled in a coquettish way, after which she added haughtily, “Seriously though, it’s in your interest, since you will face disappointment. It’s not as easy to win my sympathy, as you might think. For you specifically, it’s almost impossible.”

  “You don’t know me well,” Arsy pronounced arrogantly. “No one has ever slid through my fingers.”

  “What if she already has an admirer?”

  Arsy’s smile became bigger, but his eyes beamed somewhat spitefully, which Parelia attributed to the flashes of the fire.

  “A single encounter with me, and this admirer will realize he isn’t actually so badly in love with her.”

  “Still joking?” Parelia grinned without a shade of suspicion that her interlocutor was speaking seriously. “I think you are not as bad as you want to seem.”

  “Aren’t you going to bed?” asked Arsy after a pause.

  “Are you sending me off?” Parelia took offence.

  “No, I just don’t want Erik to see us together.” Arsy looked back behind his shoulder, as though he expected to see his friend’s raging face. “He will come to replace me shortly.”

  “Are you really so scared of him?” Parelia asked, showing surprise. “It seems like he is your commander, rather than your friend.”

  Even though Arsy and Erik called each other friends, Parelia was astonished at how eagerly one fulfilled the orders of the other.

  “It’s not about fear.” Arsy raked up the wood in the fire. “I’ve made a promise to him, and I intend to keep it.”

  “Don’t worry. If he turns up, I will tell him you were not bothering me. What is this night vigil for?” Parelia looked around and added with uncertainty, “Is it unsafe here?”

  Arsy sensed her unfaltering royal stare, which demanded that he revealed some hard-hitting secret. There was indeed a secret he kept under wraps and had no intention of revealing.

  “It’s better to keep eyes open when there are such treasures around,” he joked.

  “May I know what treasures you are referring to?” Parelia asked with a smile.

  “For some, it’s Erania; for someone else, i
t’s you…” Arsy pronounced the last phrase with ultimate tenderness.

  “Hmmm, I’d like to ask you a serious question, Arsy,” Parelia said, biting on her lip. Suddenly, she looked at him with a cunning gleam in her eyes and asked, “Would you like to be the king?”

  “No,” Arsy answered instantly.

  “No?” Parelia showed surprise. She expected a positive answer. “Take your time to think about it. I can help you.”

  “Help me? How?” inquired Arsy.

  “Well, I know Parelia, and I can help you win her heart,” Parelia answered, winking at him.

  “My heart is bleeding, and you offer me god knows who?!” Arsy pronounced with a grieving voice.

  “God knows who? You are referring to the princess of Agastan!” the princess exclaimed in surprise.

  “Thank you very much, but I don’t need it.” Arsy shook his head. “A king’s life is too boring for me. I’m sure I will hardly hold out for a few days, after which I will flee.”

  For a second, Arsy fell into reflections. Becoming a king? Money and power were certainly good. He could be ruling, reigning, and giving orders. He’d have a great many people under his command; the nationals would look at him with admiration, bow down to him, and show him respect. Arsy sneered. But they’d also speak with forked tongues, lie, and feel envious of him. Everyone wants to be the king; thus, kings can’t trust anyone. However, lack of freedom is the main downside of such a superior position. Hundreds of eyes are fixed on the king, whose every word and action are analyzed meticulously, whereas he can’t do what common laymen are free to do. No, such a life was definitely not for him. In addition, he’d have to live with the princess, who didn’t stand out for her brilliant intellect, judging by the laws recently adopted by her.

  “So, you are the only fool in the entire kingdom,” joked Parelia.

  “You know, I attend various kinds of events…”