Book I of III: The Swords of the Sultan (47 page)

The seven-year-old Baltor didn’t know which
parent was more right during this argument, so he silently watched
as they heatedly argued and yelled for over an hour—not surprising,
his mother finally ran off toward her room while crying.

His father, apparently the winner, looked
down at him and pronounced, “Baltor, I know that it’s time that you
become a man, even though your mother sees otherwise. You must
trust me on this. One day, you’ll be thanking me for it.”

That memory faded yet still another one
surfaced—an even earlier memory. It occurred when Baltor was about
five years old. He was sitting in his mother’s lap, while they
lounged on the porch outside.

He listened as she spoke, “My little baby
boy, Baltor! I know that I should probably let you do things more
on your own, but I need you by my side. Your father works so very
hard and long to keep us alive, but I get so lonely because I have
no one to talk to during the day, except for you.”

Baltor heard his own childish voice say back,
“I’ll always be there for you, Moma!”

That memory dissipated, but when another
memory didn’t surface, the twenty-one-year-old Baltor thoughtfully
asked,
So what do these memories mean?

When no answers came from the heavens, he
rationalized aloud, “Perhaps these are the very reasons that have
been keeping me from seeing the future. Perhaps there’s even
more!”

Just then, his eyes scanned to the south,
spotting a single column of lights moving east to west.

About thirty seconds later, his night-vision
was able to count out twenty-two of them all on camels, while the
one in the rear was riding on a beautiful, black warhorse—neither
was there a cage filled with slave women, as he had seen in the
vision.

For all of these reasons, Baltor realized
that this wasn’t the right caravan—he stopped jogging, though he
wasn’t out of breath or sweaty.

Unfortunately, he had none of his money with
which to purchase that horse, and even though he was a “Thief,” he
no longer wanted to steal, and so he contemplated for several
minutes whether to trade his grandfather’s sword for the horse.
After all, the sword was very valuable to him, yet so was his wife,
Brishava.

Once he had finally made his decision to sell
the sword, he yelled out, “Hey—hey guys!”

Meanwhile, he began to sprint toward the
caravan. Within moments, the caravan had already formed a complete
circle with each member facing out of that circle, clearly a
defensive position.

Baltor called out, “I am alone, and I mean
you no harm.”

Despite this assurance, the caravan remained
in their defensive position.

It took another minute or two before he
finally neared the circle, all the while holding out both of his
hands in a symbolic gesture of peace.

“Listen,” he said upon entering the
perimeters of the light, “I would like to purchase that horse
you’ve got.”

A woman’s voice, presumably the one with the
horse, asked back incredulously, “What could you possibly have in
exchange for my prized stallion? This horse is a pure breed and
could easily go for eighteen thousand parsecs.”

Baltor began, “I have this.” He stopped
through three-quarter of the sentence, just before he was about to
utter the word sword, but at that split moment, he remembered
Brishava’s backpack hanging on his back, and his mind stopped his
mouth.

Curious, he pulled the backpack off, opened
it up, and looked in. He pushed aside several other pairs of tunics
and pants, and angled the backpack so that a little of the lights
could shine inside.

What he saw made his mouth drop open in
shock—besides a bunch of small-to-midsized precious stones, there
were two huge diamonds inside. The larger was the size of an
apple!

He pulled out that very diamond and then
said, “I have this diamond here, which I’m guessing is worth more
than five times the asking price, maybe even six.”

The woman saw the reflections of the light
off the diamond, and though he could not see her excited facial
expression, he heard it as she gasped, “Let me check it out first,
to make sure it’s not a fake.”

With a wave of his hand toward the diamond,
Baltor said, “By all means.”

As the woman handed the reins to another
caravan member, still another member handed the woman a torch; she
then drew nearer.

The woman took the diamond in both hands,
examined it for a moment against the light, and said, “Give me some
glass, Bonsu.”

Bonsu gave her a piece of transparent glass,
after having retrieved it from his backpack. She set the glass onto
the ground, held the diamond in both hands, and then drew a circle
upon the glass. After handing the diamond back to Baltor, she
picked one end of the glass off the ground, and then tapped the
center of the glass one time—this caused the circle to pop out.

Immediately, she replied with quite a bit of
excitement, “Deal!”

Baltor nodded his in relief. He glanced up
into the skies briefly, and noticed that they were beginning to
lighten up, and he realized that he would need to care for his
horse during the day, somehow.

The woman said, “Opsam, give the warhorse to
the man, please. You can ride with me on my camel.”

Baltor gave the woman the diamond. In turn,
Opsam handed over the horse’s reins to Baltor, before climbing onto
the woman’s camel.

Baltor said, “Listen, the day is nearly upon
me, and I have no water to care for me or my horse. Is there anyway
that you guys can hook me up with some water?”

“What else do you have to barter?” the woman
asked.

“Hey—I just gave you that diamond which is
worth far more than the horse, and you’re going to ask for
more?”

“Well I guess you’re right, but that deal has
already been concluded. Pity, without water, neither you nor the
horse will be alive by tonight.”

Baltor pulled out a small ruby, handed it
over, and said, “Fine…a week’s worth of water.”

“Deal—we’ll even graciously give you a water
bowl for your horse.”

Opsam set two sets of large, water bags—tied
shut at the ends—across the horse’s back. At the same time, Bonsu
handed Baltor a large bowl made entirely of brass.

“Anything else we can do for you?” the woman
suggested. “Maybe some food for you and your horse?”

“True,” he replied. After pulling out a
slightly bigger sapphire and holding it out, he asked, “Do you have
fresh food to sell, as well?”

The woman answered, “No—we currently carry
only extra dried rations, hay, and water, as we sold all our other
goodies. Currently we’re enroute to Pavelus for more.”

“That’s fine,” he replied. “I want a week’s
worth of everything.”

The woman again exclaimed out the word,
“Deal.”

After he handed her the sapphire, he watched
as another large bag was tied to each side of his new horse’s
saddle, and he began to inwardly wonder whether or not this horse
would be able to move swiftly with all of the added weight on it,
not to mention his own.

The woman appeared to recognize the dubious
look on Baltor’s face, for she said, “Oh. You got a good deal,
don’t you worry about that—this is the most powerful warhorse my
eyes have ever witnessed! Took four men to tame her.”

The skies had turned another lighter shade of
blue, and Baltor took a second look at his new purchase. Indeed,
this warhorse’s legs were twice the normal size that he’d ever seen
on any other horse, and her height was about seven feet tall.

He turned back toward the woman with an
appreciative smile—but they had already begun to continue on their
journey.

After putting the bowl into the right
saddlebag, he climbed into the saddle, grabbed the reins, and
spurred her on. He decided—in the next moment—that he would name
the horse after his mother, “Grasha.”

Within moments, he had rapidly snapped her
reins several more times, which in turn, caused her to pick up a
speed that was breathtaking.

It wasn’t even a minute later when he
happened to look into the eastern sky—the sun would be rising
within the next fifteen minutes. So about five minutes later, he
pulled back on the reins and she halted.

After hopping down to the ground, he pulled
out the bowl, put it under the tap at the base of the water bag,
filled it up to the rim, and set it on the ground in front of his
horse. She immediately began to drink.

Nearly a minute later, after having consumed
a quarter of the bowl, he picked it up, refilled it to the rim, and
again set it before Grasha. He next pulled out a very large chunk
of the hay, laying it down on the ground.

With only seconds left, before the sun would
rise above the eastern horizon, Baltor furiously dug into the loose
sands, while firmly holding onto the reins in his right hand. Once
the sun had risen, he instantly fell asleep.

The moment after the sun had disappeared
behind the western horizon, Baltor returned to consciousness. Even
though he could see and hear absolutely nothing, due to the fact he
was still buried under the desert sands of the Sharia, he did
experience a minute amount of relief as he still felt his
warhorse’s leather reins in his right fist.

However, that relief lasted but a moment, as
three serious worries from this morning immediately began to flood
back.

One, Grasha might not have enough water to
survive the extremely long and extremely hot desert day. Two,
someone might see her, cut the reins, and steal her. Three, a
ferocious sandstorm might come along and kill her!

None of these possibilities would prove very
fortunate for him at all, which is why he worried, though those
worries wouldn’t be there much longer—already he was in the process
of pushing himself up toward the surface, and as quickly as
possible.

Once his head and neck had finally cleared
the sandy ground, a few moments later, he shook his head to clear
away a bunch of the sand.

About ten seconds later, he stopped shaking
his head, and then he opened his eyes.

Not two feet away stood Grasha, chewing on
the last bit of hay that he had left out, though he unhappily
discovered that dry sand halfway filled her water bowl.

“How ya doin’, Grasha?” he asked.

He next had to spit out a bit of sand that
had accidentally gotten into his mouth, and then spit again to get
out the additional sand that followed right behind.

She threw her head back with a bit of
irritation, coupled with the sounds that came along with it!

After spitting another time, he replied, “I
know you’re thirsty, Grasha. Before you know it, you’ll be drinking
some delicious water, okay, girl?”

She made a
Hhhhrrrrmmmmpppphhhhh
sound.

It took a grand total of twenty seconds to
get free of the sandpit, until he was standing again on solid
ground. Once so, he walked several feet farther from his horse, and
then began to shake himself around vigorously in order to get as
much sand off as possible, without getting any on her.

After clapping his hands together several
times, he used his dusted off hands to wipe off the remaining
particles of sand that still clung to his ears, face, neck, as
well, his other personal areas.

Once complete, and feeling relatively
comfortable, he walked back over to the bowl, emptied it of sand,
filled it up with water, and set it before her—without haste she
began to drink deeply.

As she continuously drank, he released his
grip on the reins. He then began to groom her face gently with his
fingers, while talking to her in soothing tones.

About a minute later, just after she had
finished drinking the entire bowl, she snorted her nose back into
the air, but this time, it was a much shorter
Hrrrmmppphhh
sound.

He lightly laughed, and while refilling her
bowl with seconds of water, he said, “Of course you can have some
more, girl! You truly are a magnificent creature, but you already
know that, don’t you?”

She darted her head up and down several times
in the affirmative, and then she dunked her head back into the bowl
to continue drinking.

“And smart too,” he concluded with a laugh,
as he pulled out her brush out of the saddle so that he could give
her a quick grooming.

By the time she was finished, several minutes
later, the bowl was about a quarter full.

He, not wanting to waste anything, most
especially water, poured the rest of it back, while mentally
noting,
Brishava can just drink from the other water bag—once
I’ve gotten her back from those slave-trading, wife-stealing
bastards! They’re soooo dead meat
.

As he reflected upon this last thought yet
again, despite the anger that was firmly etched onto his face, only
pure determination was revealed through his squinting eyes.

Several moments later, he grabbed a hold of
the reins, climbed into the saddle, sharply snapped the reigns
while kicking his feet into the stirrups, and roaring out at the
top of his lungs, “
To Brishava!!
”

His words echoed for miles across the lands
and the skies. Despite all the weight from the nearly full water
containers, Grasha instantly charged into such a furious gallop
that it felt more like flying—the scenery rapidly passed them by,
not the other way around.

“And so powerful too,” he whispered aloud in
awe.

Perhaps a minute later, once the adrenaline
rush had finally tamed, he called forth his wife’s image in his
mind’s eye.

This time she was standing outside the cage
and stretching out her body’s limbs, as were the other women—only a
few moments later, he saw that the entire caravan, currently camped
at a small oasis, was guarding them and preventing their escape.
Still in his mind’s eye, he then called forth the world map, and
the two separate images quickly merged into one.