Along the Banks of Alke River

Part 2

Days flowed into nights in the Adobe Estate outside the port town. As the doctor had predicted, the sea air worked well for Lionel and he greatly improved in health. I do not wish to imply that he was healthy. By no means.
Whereas before he spent his days unable to get out of bed, now he spent his days either in the library or outside in the garden. He did not play among the plants as one might expect a seven-year-old boy to spend his time, no he still did not have the strength for that. Instead, he read. His mother's library was filled with books. There they filled the floor to ceiling shelves overflowing onto the floor in chaotic piles, littering every available surface with literary masterpieces.

Lionel did not just read either.

The servants of the house were quite astounded when they found their young master taking notes while comparing two large volumes on the geography of the eastern regions. (They would have been even more amazed if they had known that the notes Lionel was taking actually compared the two books before him with another he had read several days ago on the meteorological patterns in the same region. His notes now sit, in published form, upon the shelves in my library.)

When Lionel had read all the books the library had to offer, Philip got him a tutor. The tutor soon found that he knew nothing the young prince did not know, and he left feeling a little disheartened. Philip got another tutor. This one much enjoyed working with Lionel and he often compared him to a sponge when it came to knowledge. And it was true. Lionel thirsted after knowledge like a riverbed in a drought. The more he knew, the more he wanted to know; he was interested in everything. Soon this tutor too found himself out of his depth and decided to move on to share his learning elsewhere.

On the day before he was to leave Lionel lay before him a proposal: on account of their shared fascination with all things related to knowledge and learning he would accompany the prince on a trip to Filos, the nearby village. The purpose, of course, would be entirely intellectual and not at all to satisfy Lionel's growing interest in the people and places so near to where his mother had grown up.

Unable to deny his favourite pupil anything, teacher and student set off to town followed by Philip and a few guards as protection for the prince.

It was noon when they arrived. Quiet hung over the sleepy coastal village. Flies buzzed lazily around the open fish stalls scattered up and down the dusty thoroughfare, the stall keepers had long since given up on trying to keep them away. The door of the Records Hall opened, and a mother and her daughter walked out onto the street putting the total number of pedestrians up to five.

The hooves of the two horses pulling Lionel's coach kicked up little puffs of dust as they pulled up in front of the Records Hall. Had there been more people on the street the coach may have attracted more attention but at this sleepy time of day few people noticed a guest in their midst.  Those who saw it, also witnessed the events following its arrival, although their eyewitness statements were barely more believable than the events themselves.

Not far away in a small alley between two houses, a situation was developing that would play a role in events that were soon to change the course of history. Two large men had a child backed into a corner. They had stalked him like prey before cutting off his escape in a dead-end alley.

But this was no ordinary child. This boy had been stalked before, he had been cornered before, he knew his way around big bad men.

Now, he waited.

Something made the men hesitate. Their instincts, however, were sharper than their brains, so they shook off the doubt and advanced. "Capture, don't kill," had been the job instructions, yet the kid was slippery, and he might require a few smacks upside the head to instil obedience.