The King's Gold: (The King's Gold Saga Book 1)

by Jenner, M

  “It’s just in me to help a fellow tradesman,” Ty grinned.

  “You mean a fellow thief. And here we are, locked up – again – because you just had to help a strange urchin swipe a couple of apples!”

  Ty shook his head, but didn’t reply. Instead, squatting down next to the door, he began to study the lock.

  “I suppose you’re going to pick the lock, fight your way out, and be in the Orc’s Armpit by nightfall, triumphantly drinking a pint of mead?” Kern said, folding his arms. “Is that your plan?”

  “At least I’m doing something, not just sitting around complaining,” Ty replied.

  Moving to the bed, Ty sat to remove his right boot. He poked his hand inside and pulled out a pouch of bound leather about half the size of his fist. After replacing his boot, he unrolled the leather pouch, revealing a bone set of thieves’ tools. “I’ll get us out of here in no time, trust me,” he said smugly. Kern rolled his eyes and made no reply.

  “No point bothering, you know,” said a voice from the opposite cell.

  “Oh? And why is that?” Ty replied, hoping he had masked his surprise. He squinted his eyes, trying to make out a face or form in the darkness of the opposite cell.

  “Only one way in and one way out – and that’s the way you came in, back up those stairs. And on the other side of the door are two armed guards. I know who my money’s on. Or would be on, if I had any,” the disembodied voice chuckled.

  “He’s got a point, Ty. They have weapons and armour; we haven’t even got a weapon between us. They took everything,” Kern said with a hint of despondency. He stood and peered into the darkness of the opposite cell.

  “I suppose you’re right,” agreed Ty, rolling up his tool-pouch. Facing the direction of the voice, he asked, “What’s your name, then, and why are you here?”

  “I am Galandrik Sabrehargen. I got into a bar fight and ended up injuring a town guard who was trying to break it up. That’s what they told me, anyway,” he added sheepishly. “I can’t really remember much; I was pretty drunk. Again.”

  Galandrik moved forward from the shadows of his darkened cell, a sturdy dwarf with a long ginger beard. Two braided ponytails hung halfway down his back, his face battle-scarred from years of combat and his red leather armour looking old and worn.

  “Pleased to meet you, Galandrik Sabrehargen. I am Ty ‘Quickpick,’ but most people call me ‘The Rat.’ This fellow is my old friend, Kern Ocarn, the ranger,” Ty said proudly.

  “Friend?” Kern said with a small snort, raising an eyebrow. “Friends usually don’t get friends locked up.” Ignoring Ty’s look, Kern turned back to the dwarf. “So how long have you been here?”

  “About a week,” he laughed. “I didn’t sober up for two days.”

  “But clearly this isn’t the town’s jail. What is this place, and why did they bring us here?” Kern asked, settling on the wooden bed.

  “You saw the tall guy dressed in black? That’s Conn, King Moriak’s personal wizard. I think we’re in his house,” the dwarf explained.

  “But why the hell did they stick us in his house?” Ty asked.

  “I don’t know; maybe he wants to try out some new spells on us, or practice turning people into toads,” the dwarf replied, smiling.

  “You’re… you’re… joking, right?” Ty spluttered.

  “Oh, sit down, Rat. No one’s going to turn us into toads, you fool,” Kern snapped.

  Galandrik looked at Kern and began to laugh.

  “Who are you laughing at, ginger-beard? Don’t make me open this door and come over there,” Ty said, squeezing his head as far through the bars as possible.

  “Anytime you want it, Rat-boy, I’m right here,” replied Galandrik. “I’ve pushed bigger people than you out of the way to get to a fight, lad!”

  “We shall see,” Ty said, retreating and sitting down on the bed.

  Undaunted by the sullen silence from Ty, Kern moved closer to the bars. “What brought you to Raith, Galandrik?”

  As the night grew slowly deeper, the three prisoners swapped their tales of bravery and lawbreaking until, one by one, their voices faded into soft snores. Long after the other two had fallen asleep, Ty continued mumbling improbably heroic stories of his past, but no one was listening.

  Chapter Two: The Offering

  The next morning, the three prisoners were awakened by what sounded like an army of blacksmiths each battering his anvil. When the cacophony erupted, Ty leapt upright and instinctively reached for his wrist blades. After fumbling sleepily for a few seconds, he vaguely remembered dropping them in the dirt the day before. He looked bleary-eyed down the hallway. The sight of six guards, each one running the blade of his sword along the cell bars, explained the din and prompted Ty’s memory of the previous day’s events.

  The red-haired guard, Devon, stopped outside Kern and Ty’s cell. Ty sat down at the foot of the bed as Kern began to get up, slowly stretching his aching limbs. The pair rubbed their eyes, the torchlight ravaging their eyes after so many hours of darkness.

  “Right then, thieves, Conn will see you now. We want no trouble,” the guard said with a twisted smile, “so give us any shit and you’ll be tied hands and feet and carried up like prize pigs. Got it?”

  “Yeah, yeah – whatever. You’ll get no trouble from us,” Kern replied, giving Ty a stern look. “Will they, Ty?”

  “No, I’m too hungry to try anything. It’s been three moons since I last ate,” Ty said, rubbing his aching stomach and yawning.

  “Open the cells and bring them up. The dwarf too,” Devon ordered before he stalked off down the hallway, leaving the other guards to handle the three prisoners.

  All three were led up the stairs and back through the corridor, past the giant statues and up the massive staircase. Servants went about their daily business, scurrying around like worker ants in a nest. At the top of the stairs the prisoners were led down another great corridor, where exquisite paintings of seas, mountains, and forests – landscapes from all over Bodisha – adorned the walls. At the end of the corridor, two large oak double doors barred their way; standing in front of the doors was yet another guard.

  Devon snapped to attention and announced, “The prisoners you requested, Captain Svorn.” Svorn ignored him, but rapped three times on the door, sending an echo down the great corridor.

  “It’s toad time,” said Galandrik, throwing Ty a smile, only to get a whack in the ribs from the guard and a snarled, “Shut it, dwarf.”

  The oaken double doors slowly creaked open to reveal a large square room lined with bookshelves and tables littered with parchments, bubbling potions, and stuffed animals. Strange birds and creatures that had once roamed the mountains and forests of Bodisha were mounted on wooden panels, glass eyes staring sightlessly at the clutter below. To one side of the room was a huge oak table furnished with lavish chairs.

  At the far end of the room was a massive desk, showing just as much disarray as the rest of the room. Seated behind it was Conn, in his black robe. His cloak and hat hung next to him on a tall stand carved to look like an old oak tree; his long gnarled staff leaned up against a marble fireplace behind him.

  “Bring them forward,” said Conn, in a commanding voice that echoed around the room. As the three approached the desk, they could see that the staff was topped by a crow’s skull. The crow’s eye sockets glowed red and seemed to follow them, as if alive. Closer inspection, however, showed that it appeared to be woven into the wood, perhaps by some magical arts, or engraved by a highly skilled woodcarver.

  Five paces from the desk, the guards stopped and stood, with one hand on the hilts of their swords, on either side of the prisoners.

  “That will be all, Svorn. You may wait outside,” Conn said to the larger guard.

  “But… surely you Lordship wouldn’t want to be left alone with these common cutthroats? It wouldn’t be safe,” the guard ventured.

  Conn rose from his seat and seemed to grow in every direction. The three pr
isoners looked in awe at him. His thin face seemed sunken, as if it had seen too many battles and yearned to rest; his eyes, as black as his cloak, looked as dead as the night. His clenched fists rested on the desk, and the oak creaked audibly under the stain.

  “If I need the Captain of the Guard to help me with three pathetic cutthroats, I will shout!” Conn thundered, barely restraining his anger.

  Ty’s mouth opened, ready to reply to the “pathetic cutthroat” remark, but he was hushed by a swift elbow to the ribs from Kern, who could foresee the probable outcome of such an outburst. Ty pressed his lips together and glared down at the floor.

  “Take your men and go wait outside, Svorn,” Conn said calmly.

  “Yes, my Lord.”

  Conn sat back down in his chair, shaking his head and mumbling something that sounded like, “We go through this every week!” The great double doors shut behind the departing guard, their creaking even more pronounced than when they had opened.

  Conn sized up the three prisoners. Taking his time, he looked each of them up and down. They all kept quiet, their heads bowed like naughty schoolboys awaiting punishment from a head teacher. Kern wanted to speak up, but his tongue was frozen in fear. He glanced at Ty for reassurance, but Ty just raised one shoulder, and seemed as lost for words as Kern. Galandrik was affected the same – head bowed and silent – when suddenly Conn spoke.

  “Kern Ocarn. Human ranger from the north, expelled from your hometown four years ago after you refused to fight for your father’s army against the orcs. You’ve been traveling ever since, living day-to-day and hand-to-mouth, like a common vagrant,” he said, staring directly at Kern. Kern struggled to make a reply but his mouth just wouldn’t open.

  With a cold chuckle, Conn turned to the thief. “Ty ‘The Rat’ Quickpick; halfling. You never knew your parents. You were raised by thieves in the town of Phebon, and were apprehended while trying to steal a jewelled dagger from another thief – a grave betrayal of the thieves’ code of honour. Banished by your own kind, you have been hated by them ever since.”

  At this speech, Kern looked at Ty with his eyebrows lifted in surprise; Kern had been told quite a different story. Ty merely shrugged his shoulders in return and returned his gaze to the floor. He stood meekly, as if he had just been caught red-handed stealing from the local shopkeeper.

  Finally Conn turned his attention to the dwarf. “And Galandrik Sabrehargen. Dwarf warrior from under the great mountain of Grimnoss, you fought on numerous campaigns against the orc armies of the east. You led a platoon of dwarves into an orc ambush and over one hundred dwarves were subsequently slaughtered. Only you and a few others survived. You were stripped of all your honours, and sentenced to work in the mines under Grimnoss. You fled, of course, and have been an outcast ever since.”

  Kern and Ty could see the truth of each word in the pain etched upon Galandrik’s face. Conn stared at all three for a few moments, then steepled his hands to his chin, elbows resting on the table. His brow furrowed, and his face bore the expression of a man wondering if he was making the right decision.

  “Now let me tell you a little about me,” Conn said, rising and walking around the table, grabbing his staff as he went. Kern could see that even though his size projected a younger man, his gait was far from young; he shuffled more than he walked, and leaned heavily on his staff whilst doing so.

  “I am Conn, advisor to King Moriak, and I have a problem. Two weeks ago today, a shipment of the King’s gold was stolen by orcs just to the south.” At the word “orc,” Galandrik’s head swivelled, like a dog alerting to a knock at the door.

  “What I need… is a group of thieves to retrieve it,” Conn said, now standing behind the group.

  “What if we don’t want to help?” Kern said, still facing the desk where the wizard had been.

  “That’s perfectly fine. Should that be the case, I will simply hand the halfling and dwarf over to their respective towns, and you can rot in jail for a few years,” Conn said placidly.

  “But that’s certain death for Ty, and a life of slavery or worse for Galandrik,” Kern said, raising his voice slightly.

  “What do we get for doing it, and how do we know you won’t just hand us in afterwards?” Ty questioned.

  “You have my word that you will walk free after the task is completed. I will speak to the dwarf warlord, Grumlo, and to the grandmaster thief, Cronos of Phebon. You will both receive pardons, in addition to one thousand gold coins each.” Upon hearing the words “one thousand gold,” Ty swiftly raised his head.

  “When do we leave?” he asked, turning to Kern and grinning.

  “What’s to stop us just taking the King’s gold after we find it, or just giving you our promise, then leaving here and walking off into the sunset?” Kern asked.

  Conn’s staff came down on Kern’s shoulder with a thud. The flesh was still aching from the guard’s blow the day before, and Conn had struck the exact same spot – as if he knew exactly what would cause Kern the most discomfort. Kern gritted his teeth, inhaling a deep breath to distract himself from the pain.

  “That would be very foolish, my friend. It is very unwise to steal from the King. You are already running out of places to hide; where would you run to, exactly?” Conn sneered.

  Conn walked back and sat in his chair. “In addition to the pardons and the gold, I will kit you out with weapons, armour, provisions, horses, and even a guide,” he said, leaning back in his chair and watching the three prisoners.

  Kern, Ty, and Galandrik all looked at each other; it was clear they had no other choice but to do the wizard’s bidding.

  “All right, we accept the assignment. What is it exactly that we are looking for?” Kern asked.

  “All in good time, my friend, all in good time,” Conn said. “First we must get you cleaned up and fed. Svorn!”

  Within seconds, Svorn entered the room, followed by Devon. “Yes, my lord,” Svorn said, bowing slightly.

  “Take these men to the bath house and give them the clothes from the cupboard we prepared yesterday. Remember: They are no longer prisoners; they are my guests,” Conn said. “I know how some guards can be a bit overeager to lash out with the flats of their swords at prisoners.” Kern’s eyes narrowed at this, but if the wizard noticed the suspicious expression, he did not acknowledge it.

  The trio was led back through the enormous house to a large bathing room. Inside were four wooden baths in a row. Filled with hot water and bubbles, each tub boasted a thin cloud of steam; chambermaids flittered about, some scooping buckets of cooling water out of the tubs, while others poured jugs of near-boiling water in. The smell from this room was like a field of roses, Kern thought, as he stripped and slipped into the first bath. He quickly relaxed into the warm water, closing his eyes and rubbing his aching shoulder. Ty and Galandrik followed suit; Ty immediately dunked his head under the surface of the water to wash his face, which felt like it was covered in a lifetime’s worth of dirt.

  “Kicked out for stealing from one of your own, then, was it?” Kern said after several minutes of silence. “What happened to the escape from prison, picking the locks on your hand- and leg-irons with a sliver of wood you found on the cell floor, and killing five guards on your way out? Not to mention the reason you were there in the first place: Pick-pocketing five mithril pieces from the Prince, who happened to be visiting the week before? And to think I believed you!” Kern shouted at Ty, throwing a bar of rose-petal soap in his direction.

  “That Conn is a fool; he doesn’t know the real story! They made up that scandalous lie because they were embarrassed by my escape,” Ty retorted, raising an arm to throw the soap back.

  Just then the red-headed guard appeared, carrying three piles of clothes. As he placed them on the table opposite, Ty thought back to the scene on the street the day before. Devon had just reached the door when Ty threw the bar of soap in the guard’s direction. The soap whizzed past the red hair, missing Devon’s head by inches – only to hit the
door and rebound directly into his forehead.

  “Oi! More hot water and more towels, you. And don’t be slow about it,” Ty commanded. The young serving girls giggled behind their hands, and Devon gave Ty a sinister look. He knew he had to resist the urge to put the annoying little halfling in his place; after all, these were Conn’s guests now. Devon had just gotten his irritation under control when Ty added, “And make sure you wash off all the horse shit you’ve been rolling around in!”

  The serving girls’ giggles broke into outright laughter, and the guard’s face turned as red as his hair. Staring at Ty with a cold smile, Devon slowly backed out of the door, alert for any other missiles that might come his way. When the door closed behind him, all three companions erupted in laughter.

  “One day you’ll get us into serious trouble, Ty the Rat,” Kern joked.

  “And one day you’ll stop moaning!” Ty answered.

  “Here we go again. Don’t you two ever stop?” Galandrik laughed as he rubbed the dirt out of his ginger beard.

  After an hour in the bathhouse, the three got dressed in the clothes the guard had left on the table. None of them could believe the fit; the garments seemed made to measure, as if their sizes had been known even before they’d arrived. The beautiful green and brown silks had been stitched with a perfect hand; these were good quality clothes, Ty mused. Even the trousers were of fine cloth and fit him to absolute perfection, as did the shoes. He wondered why three thieves should be lavished with silks, but said nothing.

  A guard led them back up to Conn’s study, where the first meeting had taken place. In the centre of the room was the massive oak table that had previously sat off to one side. Eight lavish chairs surrounded it, three down either side and one at each end. The table held the most luxurious spread of food Ty had ever seen. Kern and Galandrik had seen feasts like this, but only on very special occasions. A suckling pig, complete with the traditional apple in its mouth, lay in the middle of the table, surrounded by every sort of vegetable and bread imaginable, fish such as the red-bellied river cobblers, and large pots laced with baked shrimp and filled with seafood dressings. Fine wine and jugs of ale were placed around the edge of the table, completing the sumptuous array.