Book I of III: The Swords of the Sultan (31 page)

Finally, the fourth morning came, a tribal
guard arrived, and after a prompting of his hand for Baltor to
follow, he then led the way into the throne room. This time, the
king and queen were there as well, in order to see him off before
his scheduled departure.

Once near the thrones, the prince beckoned
Baltor to approach closer with a hand gesture. Once he had drawn to
about five feet away, the prince stood up from his throne, walked
over to Baltor, and clasped his friend tightly. When he pulled back
from the hug, Baltor observed that a teardrop had formed at the
corner of his friend’s eye.

Instead of just simply wiping it away,
however, Prince Cheo extended his pinky out, swiped the teardrop
before it fell, and rather surprisingly, rubbed it in a little
circle right on Baltor’s forehead.

Baltor didn’t know or understand why the
prince had just performed this very unusual action—nor could he
even begin to ask with only the fractional bits of sign language
they had painstakingly co-developed.

A moment later, he found it even more unusual
that his mind’s eye suddenly began to relive these last few days
spent with all of the villagers, which included smiles, laughs, and
fun, of whom had become his newest collection of wonderful
friends.

Upon completion of all the happy
recollections, a few seconds later, Baltor sadly realized he was
going to miss everyone once he was gone, and he could feel his
heart begin to tighten up in his chest. A tear mysteriously formed
in his own eye, so he repeated Prince Cheo’s very unusual act.

A moment later, Baltor’s eyes held even more
curiosity and surprise after he had glanced up to the thrones and
observed that the king and queen were proudly smiling at the two,
though he had no clue why they seemed so proud and happy.

Meanwhile, the prince looked over to a
tribesman that was standing idly by, and then said something to the
man (68)—the tribesman cocked his head from side to side, bowed
down on his hands and knees, and then hurriedly exited the throne
room to carry out his orders.

Prince Cheo reassumed his throne, smiled yet
again at Baltor, and pointed one finger up in the air.

Baltor understood that he was to wait a
minute.

Exactly one minute later, that tribesman
reentered the throne room carrying two very recognizable objects in
one hand, 1) his saber and 2) the map. In his other hand he carried
a pear-shaped/sized bag made of black fur.

Baltor was quite surprised and delighted to
see that they had miraculously retrieved his prized objects, most
likely from the cannibals—he delivered both an elated smile and a
respectful nod of his head to the prince, queen and king.

The tribesman, just as carefully, placed all
objects onto the ground before him, bowed once again, and went back
to his former post.

Already had Baltor begun to pick everything
off the floor—in turn, stuffing the map into his shirt, sheathing
the saber onto his belt, and then picking up the bag.

While feeling on the bag that was very soft
on the outside, yet hard and shifty on the inside, Baltor’s mind’s
eye once again saw and thought of Valuspo. His camel, companion,
and friend.

He drew the picture of the camel into the
air, but as before, Prince Cheo rolled his head around in a circle,
indicating that no, his camel had not been found.

Out of curiosity as to the contents of the
bag, Baltor looked down and just about to open it up when Prince
Cheo unexpectedly whistled, which he had earlier taught the prince
how to do.

He looked up to see the prince gesture around
his throne room, and then at himself. He next pointed toward
Baltor, pointed around the throne room again, and then pointed at
the bag.

A moment later, Baltor shook his head from
side-to-side in understanding that the prince wanted him to open
the bag only after he had gotten home, and so out of respect, he
tied the end of the bag securely around his belt loop.

As he looked back up, he saw that Prince Cheo
was smiling as he for the very first time said his name right,
“Baltor.” He then pointed at the tribesman that had just brought
all his possessions to him, and then pointed out the door.

As Baltor looked over, that man prompted for
him to follow—he followed the man out of the throne room.

After he stopped and looked back one last
time into the throne room, toward the three thrones, he saw the
prince trace the outline of the tower into the air. He then pointed
eight fingers in the air.

Baltor cocked his head from side-to-side to
indicate he understood the prince’s message. He next dropped down
onto both hands and knees and bowed, as he had seen the villagers
do out of respect.

He stood back onto his feet nearly ten
seconds later, before casting one final smile and one final
farewell wave of the hand, and then making his way for the palace’s
main entrance.

Once outside, he discovered that there was a
caravan of twenty tribesmen waiting around in loose formation, all
armed with feathered spears and blowguns. Shockingly, the
tribeswoman who stood in the very middle held onto the reins of a
giant, grey, saddled animal with long ivory tusks that had just
knelt down onto it knees, so Baltor could climb up. This animal, as
his memory reminded him, was called an “elephant.”

And the reason it was
so shocking
for
Baltor to see an elephant was because he had seen them only once
before in his life yet never forgot, when he was
six-years-old—thanks to his mother who had taken him to the bazaar.
Along the way, they had been stopped by a short parade of visiting
royal dignitaries; their guards rode either on horseback or on
elephants. While waiting, his mother had told him the name of this
animal. Never, ever, ever had he conceived he would get to ride one
… until now!

He climbed up into the elephant’s
comfortable, multi-pillowed saddle and relaxed. After all, per
Prince Cheo’s message, the journey to get from the village of
Chao-chu-sha-maen to the tower would take approximately eight
days….

About thirty minutes-or-so before the sun was
about to set, eight days later, and surprisingly without so much as
a single encounter through this trip through the vast jungle,
Baltor’s eyes finally gazed upon a tower far to the east. Hanging
just above it in the skies was the full, gray moon, as well a dozen
twinkling stars.

This tall, black and lonely tower rested at
the top of a great, grassy hill without any trees. Even from this
distance of two miles, he could tell that parts of this ancient
structure had collapsed, and were in severe ruin due to the harsh
elements. He could also tell that his tribal escorts had been quite
nervous, especially after these last few days as they drew nearer
to this taboo area.

So after climbing down off his elephant, he
pointed them back to their village, although he knew they knew the
way better than he.

After the tribeswoman had given him a lit
torch and a quick smile, they quickly departed back for home.

Only once they were completely out of sight,
about five minutes later, lost behind a thick cover of jungle
trees, did Baltor turn around to face the tower that had just begun
to blend into the ever-darkening sky.

He simultaneously observed that, amongst this
prairie containing mostly two-foot tall patches of grassy rolling
hills, there were quite a few clusters of grouped trees here and
there, for possible predatory animals, robbers, or even cannibals
to hide.

As his mind considered his options of whether
to stay or head to the tower, he mused aloud, “Well, how much safer
am I here?”

At a good pace, he began jogging toward the
tower. As he drew nearer, his eyes could clearly see, even with the
darkness that was quickly consuming the skies, that this tower was
definitely in a very serious stage of decay—more than half of the
tower’s extended rectangular-shaped building had long ago
collapsed.

Perhaps three minutes after the sun had set,
he finally reached his destination. While throwing another quick
glance westbound into the last of the furious colors of dusk, it
was only then that he noticed for the first time that the red moon
was also in the western skies, also full.

After cautiously circling around the
perimeters, which took about an hour, while examining everything
carefully with his torch, he soon realized that the only real
entrance to the tower was a lopsided door that hung solely by its
bottom hinge. Inside, he saw that the wooden floors had been
exposed to the elements, as there were large gaping holes in the
floor, the walls and the ceiling.

The next problem that he had to solve was
where the rod could be, but only one option surfaced on where to
start—the front door. By this time, a luminescent night consumed
the lands, thanks to all the reflected light shed from both
moons.

After entering into the tower, his right foot
accidentally kicked a very small rock that flew down into one of
the dark holes in the floor, which in turn caused a whole lot of
echoing noises below.

Subsequently, he heard loud, screeching and
echoing sounds as hundreds of small bats flew their way around him
and out the front door.

He quietly mused to himself, “So much for the
quiet way.” He drew his saber and then scanned a wooden staircase
with lots of gaping holes that led both up and down—he first
decided to check downstairs before the upstairs.

After walking over to the staircase, he
mentally prepared to jump over a very large and gaping hole between
ten missing wooden steps. After all, he knew that if he didn’t make
it to the steps on the other side, he would most likely plummet
deep into the base of the tower, and die—he, now prepared, jumped,
and made it.

Three more gaping holes right below the first
did he has to jump across, before finally reaching the bottom of
the stairwell, which took nearly ten minutes.

At the base of the stairwell, he observed
three doors, one to the right, one to the middle, and one to the
left—he sheathed his saber.

In the next moment, he chose the one directly
in front of him, opened the door, and was about to walk through.
However, he stopped the very second his “warning senses” had begun
to ring.

He scanned down the dark hallway that ended
with another door at its far end, which was about hundred feet away
from his current position. Though these floors were extremely
dusty, he could still see hundreds of slight bumps that elevated
from the ground in many various spots. On each side of the wall,
there were thousands of little pinprick holes.

Though he had little doubt that this hallway
was rigged, this minor setback didn’t stop him, even though it took
him quite some time using all his agility skills to cross over to
the other side, while always ensuring that his feet never touched
any of the bumps.

Nearly a half an hour later, he finally
reached the door at the far end of the hallway. After having
carefully checked for booby traps all around the door and doorknob,
yet discovering not a single one, he slowly cracked open the door a
smidgeon before checking just as carefully for any traps on the
other side.

Once he detected no booby traps upon, near,
or around the door, a minute later, he pushed the door halfway
open, and to the best of his ability, he checked around the floors,
walls and ceiling of the room for still more booby traps.

Ten more minutes passed before he felt
confident enough to enter; he carefully walked up to the pedestal
that was the only object lying in the center of the room—a pedestal
that looked exactly like the one in Pavelus, except for the fact
that this pedestal was black.

Strangely enough, about a dozen feet away, he
observed a soft, white light that had just begun to beam down from
some unknown source through the ceiling, and sparkle down onto the
pedestal.

As he slowly and cautiously drew closer, he
could see that just like with the other pedestal, there was a
small, hollowed-in pit at the top.

In the center of this pit, he discovered a
rod within the borders of this pit, resting on top of the bottom
half of a map!

He excitedly leaned in to gaze at what he now
believed to be the Rod of Ro’shain, as well the bottom half of the
world map, but touched neither. They might be booby-trapped.

Upon closer inspection, he first realized
that there were absolutely no markings upon this boring-looking
rod. Except for the handle that was made of stone, most likely
granite, the rest of the rod was made of a dark-stained pine.

Only seconds after the inspection had begun,
Baltor came to realize that this rod was monetarily valueless.

Because of the fact that the map lay
underneath the rod, he first pulled out the top half and positioned
it a half a foot directly over while comparing the jigsaw
patterns—it was a perfect match. However, as the handle of the rod
lay directly over the first portion of the runic writing on the
map, he could not begin to try and decipher the second half to the
message.

Once again, he stepped back to gaze more
carefully at the engraved symbols, in hopes that this pedestal
might tell whether or not this thing was booby-trapped or not, or
at the very least reveal some sort of puzzle, riddle, clue or
story.

Just like the pedestal in Pavelus however,
all of the symbols on this pedestal were chaotically placed
pictograms of stars, whose points ranged from three to nine. In
other words, the pedestal revealed absolutely nothing.

Deciding to do, or die doing, he reached his
hand over the edge of the pit in order to grab the handle of the
rod. Within inches from grabbing it, however, he heard a man’s
hollow voice say in Pavelian, “I wouldn’t touch that if I were
you.”