Book I of III: The Swords of the Sultan (18 page)

From a distance, Baltor watched in silent
amusement, and recollection, as the hardcore drill instructor
screamed insults in the young girl’s face, while egging her on to
do more pushups or sit-ups!

Baltor held back a laugh of remembrance as he
watched her struggle, seconds before he made his way to the
bunkhouse for some much-needed dinner. It was while he ate that he
first wondered to himself if Humonus ever took a vacation.

Five nights later, which was exactly two
weeks after Baltor had first received the stitches, Racine paid his
fourth visit to the bunkhouse in the middle of the night and saw
that Baltor was sleeping.

After cautiously waking him up by wiggling a
couple of his toes, Racine said, “Hey buddy…let’s check on your
stitches.”

Baltor sleepily sat up in bed and extended
his bandaged arm out, whereupon Racine used a pair of scissors to
cut off all the exterior and interior wrappings.

After taking a professional look at the
stitches and seeing that everything had healed up, the medic
informed with an elated smile, “Yup…good to go.” He immediately
began the process of cutting them off.

During this painless medical procedure,
Baltor said after a deep yawn, “Awesome, Doc! By the way, how much
longer should I wait before I can start taking archery?”

Racine’s answer was, “Two weeks.” At the same
moment, he had finished cutting off the last stitch.

While looking at his arm, Baltor replied,
“Perfect…and thanks!”

“No problem, Baltor. Sorry I can’t stay and
chat but I’ve got another patient to check on right away before I
can call it ‘a day,’ and trust me, it’s been a long day!”

“Thanks again so much, Doc. Bye.”

“Bye.”

Only seconds after Racine had departed,
Baltor lay back down in his bunk, closed his eyes, and quickly fell
asleep.

The next morning, after having awoken and
eaten a hearty breakfast of warm porridge with a mug of milk, he
was at his first class of the day—reading and writing.

After his final class of arithmetic had
concluded that evening, Baltor painlessly trained through several
of the obstacles courses before calling it “a day.”

The following morning, Baltor visited the
Hall of Education. There, Sharice granted Baltor the basic archery
course in two weeks hence, as he was excelling in most of his
classes.

And two weeks later, precisely at 3:00 p.m.,
Baltor began his first class of archery—quickly he found that he
was getting the hang of it!

Several months passed and Baltor’s level of
education steadily increased. Not only had he just finished
graduating the basic arithmetic and archery courses, yet he had
just begun taking advanced arithmetic, archery, and the Mauritian
language course.

As for unlocking door and safes course, this
was another matter, as Baltor didn’t have a whole lot of patience
for the very complicated locks that Instructor Thaven would make
Baltor unlock—after all, the student couldn’t unlock any of them
within Thaven’s tight timeframes! It took him two semesters to
graduate this course instead of one.

Those months turned into years, and Baltor
had finally become a sixteen-year-old who stood at
five-feet-nine-inches tall with a weight of one hundred and seventy
pounds, had a peach-fuzz goatee, and possessed a slightly manly,
crackly voice. He even had earned a week’s worth of decent clothes,
socks and underwear, which allowed him a hundred percent
maneuverability—thanks to Humonus’s kind generosities whenever
Baltor received an “A”.

Already, Baltor had graduated seven
thieving-related courses so far. Moreover, he could now speak,
write, and understand four languages—Pavelian, Mauritian,
Thoriumite and Savekian. Just as impressive was the fact that he
had graduated advanced algebra and geometry, and had just begun to
take basic biology and chemistry, only one semester earlier.

As for where he lived, because he always put
higher priority on his education over a job, he continued residing
in the bunkhouse, though he now had his own private corner to
himself, as well a large wall locker with a steel lock and key—also
gifts from Humonus. The handle of the key looped around the silver
necklace, which was always around Baltor’s neck.

The evening after Baltor’s seventeenth
birthday, another two inches taller and ten pounds heavier, just
after he had exited his basic-etiquette class and was heading down
the hallway that led to the fountain room, he saw Lydia approaching
from the other direction in the hallway.

As Lydia passed by Baltor, she did not
recognize him because he had his hair pulled back into a ponytail,
he had facial hair, and he kept his body washed and clean. As for
him, however, he had never forgotten her image.

After all the years that he had known Lydia,
he was still very much in love with her. Even though she was
fifteen years his senior, he dreamt of her quite often.

He turned around and exclaimed with his manly
voice, “Mistress Lydia—how are you?”

She turned around until she faced Baltor, and
as she threw a puzzled look at him, she asked, “Do I know you?”

As his eyes squinted just a bit, a look of
remembrance suddenly crossed her face, and she exclaimed,
“Baltor—how on earth are you?” She then threw him a tight hug, but
as she loosened her hold so she could look at him yet again, she
added excitedly, “Woooow. You look spectacular!”

Even though his cheeks had been turning red
from the compliment, he managed to answer, “Good, very good, my
Mistress.”

She gave him yet another tight hug, before
saying, “That’s soooo great to hear!” She pulled herself away for
the third time to get an even better look at the young man, and
said, “My oh my, what a man you have turned out to be!”

Suddenly gaining courage, perhaps from all
her nice compliments, he spoke aloud his heart and mind, “My
Mistress, there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you for some
time now, but I’ve never really had the nerve to do it before—until
now. May I ask you that question?”

“Of course you may, Baltor.”

Baltor was just about to pop the question,
but unexpectedly, his throat had clogged itself up with phlegm, the
nerves throughout his entire body felt on fire, and his head began
to swirl!

Lydia’s face instantly turned from happiness
to concern, and so she asked, “Are you okay?”

He cleared his throat a few times, took a
deep breath and slowly released it. After taking another deep
breath, and feeling “calm, cool & collected,” he asked, “Would
you like to go out with me sometime….like on a date?”

She immediately looked away from him and
toward the ground—only a second later, she completely released her
hug, answering, “I can’t, Baltor.”

His eyes and face instantly betrayed shock
and hurt, but he still managed to ask, “Why not?”

“Baltor…” she confessed with a pause, “I’m
with someone else and am deeply in love with him.”

With disappointment and sadness now clear in
his voice, he asked, “What? Who?”

As soon as she saw the crushed look, she
added sympathetically, “I have been for three years now.”

With exasperation growing in his voice every
single second, he asked, “Did you know what it really was that
helped me through all my training and tests? It was you! Even
though my mind didn’t know it at the time, my heart has always
known. I’m in love with you, Lydia! Who cares about our little age
difference?”

She tried to console, “Baltor, you are so
young and so obviously very handsome. There is no doubt in my mind
that you can have your pick of any number of beautiful women your
age. As for you and me, this can never be. Can’t we just keep being
great friends?”

With tears that had unexpectedly begun to
pour out of his eyes and down his face, he said, “I… I’ve got to
go.”

“Wait, Baltor!” she called out, but it was
too late, for he had already booked down the hallway toward the
exit.

She was about to chase him down, but only
after having taken a couple steps, she changed her mind. She
decided that it was best if Baltor remained alone.

Two more very fruitful years passed as he
continued to reside at the bunkhouse—Baltor was now nineteen,
six-feet tall with a weight of one hundred and eighty-five pounds,
and sporting a goatee that he kept braided and was six inches long.
Typically but not always, he shaved off the mustache and
three-quarters of the sideburns.

Diligently he pursued further into his
education, especially his thieving-related courses—rare were the
times he ever left the Guild, instead studying from a book, or two,
or three before falling to sleep late at night.

Thus, he had already mastered eight different
languages from all of the neighboring countries, as well learned
their histories and customs. All of his teachers were highly
impressed by the uncanny amount of intelligence Baltor
possessed.

One particular subject that he had really
enjoyed learning was world history, especially about Mauritia’s
history, the only city of the Vaspan Empire. And the surprising
fact that the legendary Emperor-Sedious Vaspan, ruler of the Vaspan
Empire, was actually the younger brother of Sultan Brishavo Helenus
XI, ruler of the Sharia Empire.

The powerful family feud started
approximately twenty-five years ago, when Prince Vaspan Helenus had
become so enraged when his elder brother had refused to share any
of his empire. Therefore, he dropped his last name, promoted
himself to “Emperor-Sedious,” stole one-third of the Sultan’s
troops while the Sultan was away, and without a drop of blood
spilt, conquered another of the three cities of the Sharia
Empire—the city of Mauritia. Of course, none of this information
was listed in
any
of Pavelus’s library books, but it was
clearly mentioned in three neighboring countries world-history
books.

Finally, regarding the feud, because of the
lost wars and years that the Sultan spent trying to recapture his
stolen city and one-third of his land, which always ended in
failure, he continued to have only two thriving cities—Pavelus and
Lasparus. After all, Emperor Vaspan had quickly fortified his own
beloved city with huge labyrinth walls that surrounds her to
date—very effective defense for stopping massive armies!

Oh yeah, Baltor loved learning anything and
everything in school! So perhaps because of this, the times were
very, very rare when he saw Lydia, only twice, but that was okay by
him, for knowledge had become his new passion and love.

Inevitably, Baltor and Humonus had become
great friends. Once or twice every week they would spar against
each other in the training area, in order to improve their fighting
skills. And on a rare occasion, perhaps once every other month,
they would even go out to a bar for a few drinks of ale, for
fun….

Finally, the day came when Baltor graduated
ninety-nine percent of the courses he was allowed to take as an
advanced student, which timeframe occurred days before his
twentieth birthday. He pretty much looked the same as he did
before, except that he had gained five more pounds of muscles.

Of course there were at least a hundred more
courses he could take…upon achieving higher ranks in the Guild.
This made him forty-seven percent of the way done. His two final
courses had been equestrian combat, and its prerequisite course,
equestrian riding. He had learned very well how to ride a horse,
and to fight while riding at a full gallop.

The only course that he could have taken yet
purposefully never selected was “picking pockets”—he felt this
skill would undermine his purpose, especially as “an honorable
adventurer.”

In fact, he now felt so ready to undertake
any quest that the Guild could ever ask, that he finally submitted
the written petition for Phase Four.

Only one week did he have to wait until he
was summoned before the High Council at nine in the morning. He
stood before them, all of who were comfortably sitting on their
thrones, and whose cast included Bayema, Lydia and Salmot, though
not in attendance was the old woman that had silenced the group
during Baltor’s trial nine years ago, nor Master Lupan.

Sitting in that old woman’s place instead was
a middle-aged woman, whose brown hair dropped halfway down her back
before braiding itself back up into a bun on the back of her
head.

She was the one who pleasantly greeted Baltor
with “Good morning to you, Baltor. My name is Mistress Tricia.”

He extended his arms out until the entire
High Council was within the reach of his arms, and as he bowed a
moment later, he said, “Good morning to you all, Masters and
Mistresses. Mistress Tricia.”

A second later, Tricia went straight to the
point, as she asked, “So, you are ready for Phase Four?”

“Yes, my Mistress,” he answered
confidently.

“In most cases, we do not give our candidates
a choice to accept or deny the mission we select—however, in this
particular and very unique case, we shall give you that option,
Baltor.”

He looked a bit surprised for a second at
that piece of news. In the next second, he looked just as confident
as the reply he gave, “No matter the mission, or missions, that the
High Council wishes for me to accomplish, now or in the future, I
shall succeed.”

“Excellent,” Tricia said. After a short
pause, she added, “But please make your final decision only after
I’ve concluded with my rather lengthy briefing, okay?”

This time, the look of curiosity filled his
face for a second. In the next second that look once again became
poker-faced as he silently nodded his head twice in
affirmation.

Tricia first cleared her throat, before
asking Baltor a question, “Were you in Pavelus four months back
when we experienced the major earthquake?”