The Gay King

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

I waited in my bedroom for everyone to arrive, around 7pm both Jeff and Daniel joined myself and James in my bedroom. "where is your family Jake" Daniel asked looking worried. "dont worry, my mother and father are in the war room talking and my brother is probably in his room playing" I assured. "anyone having seconds thoughts? Once we walk out that door theres no turning back!" Daniel told us firmly. "For the sake of Worthington this is what I must do!" I explained. "and us three are with you every second of the way!" Nathan told me. "ok then, lets get inside Jake's horse and carriage, I will drive and you three must get inside and stay hidden esspecially you Jake!" Daniel ordered.
We ran with our supplies out the back door seeing guards, Daniel handed James his bag while he walked over to distract the guards. While he did we each ran around the right side of the castle to see three carriages with two horses tied to them. We shoved our bags into my carriage, which was a beauiftul sliver and white carriage, with two stunning wide doors either side, with hand made seats imported from italy, a shiny roof, to finish it all of it had red gems around the edges. Combined with its black wheels and two white horses it was a stunning ride. We sat inside with the doors closed for a few seconds until Daniel came running up. "ok guys our first stop will be Gardens Peak, we should get there in about three or four days" he explained as he jumped on the outside of the carriage to take control of the horse and lead the way outside the castle. Myself, James and Jeff stayed down as we left we couldnt risk guards seeing us, this made the story Daniel gave to the guards more believeable, that my father requested the carriage to be repaired, due to it being night the guards couldnt see what was wrong with it so they let Daniel pass through the gates and out into Worthington.
"so what is Gardens Peak like? In fact where even is it?" I asked politely. "of course, you don't really leave Worthington a lot to know about the rest of the country. Well Gardens Peak is near enough on the other side of the country and I'm going to go ahead and say that we will be taking longer and quieter road through states we need to pass through in order to get there. Gardens Peak is quite a poor state, they are the state that has the most farmland, but unfortunatly they dont have much money. The very few guards that work there abuse the peasants and ignore most crimes commited. People are left starving on the streets, they have lost there land over the years most people live in sheds, shacks or on the streets" James explained. "thats terrible, have they always been so poor?". "erm... they have never been a state that has had much money but they were happy with what they did have, but over the last ten years or so things have gotten really bad and with the taxes raised even further over the last few years its not improving things". "so why are we travelling there then, if they are so poor they surely cant help us?". "you need there permission to kick Roger off the throne, you will need a signed document from the mayor of Gardens peak and youll need to win over 50% of the votes from the people who live there, they too must agree to kicking him off the throne. I woudlnt worry Jake the people are not your problem, the votes will be near to 100% its the mayor you will need to convince, he doesnt like the royal family at all. You will need to prove yourself to him. Oh and I almost forgot once all that is done you need a peace offering from them to prove they belong to us and you must look after there offering" Daniel called from outside the carriage. "Well hopefully they will be the start of our rebellion. What's happens when all the states and all the people agree?" I asked. "that is when we go to war! Each state will join us and we will attack Worthington" he explained. "Question... Will I be killed?" I asked looking worried. "Not with the country protecting you" Jeff told me.
It took about three days for us to get to Gardens Peak, the journey was uneventful nothing but really long paths to follow, trees passing by along with bushes and flowers and the occasional rare civilian. The only thing I did was sit the the carriage on my bum, spoke to the guys and slept in the carriage. We had the occasional break during the day to let the horses rest and at night we found somewhere to park up so the horses could sleep. However I didn't like my Carriage wheels getting so muddy as we traveled threw Gardens Peak. Everyone stared at us as we came by and this was clearly because they had never seen anything like this is in there lives, but probably when they spotted me travelling in the carriage they got somewhat excited. At least that's what I hoped, it could have been worst it could have been my father. To be fair it's not everyday a member of the royal family travels to Gardens Peak. As we travelled past the peasants, wearing rags and some had very little rags at all, all I saw was muddy, run down abandoned farms and shops. I saw several shacks, sheds and slums. The smell wasn't exactly pleasant either in certain parts of it. "Oh my I never knew Gardens Peak was this bad?" James said covering his nose with some white cloth. "It's ok guys, Pat and Roy the Mayors of the town live in a somewhat better environment" Daniel explained.
We continued our journey and we tried to ignore looking out the carriage completely, we did this until Daniel stopped the carriage and told us we was here. We looked out the carriage and saw a small wooden hut, and to be fair it seemed luxury compared to what I had just witnessed. The roof was made of straw and twigs and the walls were wooden. "I think this is the right address? I thought more people would be gathered around the house?" Daniel said looking puzzled. "Why would more people be here?" I asked, as I stepped onto the stone path that was somewhat clean that lead to there house. "Because the Mayor Roy and Mayor Pat are doctors and considering this is a poor state you'd think more people would be....dying to get inside" Jeff giggled thinking if his joke. "quite literally dying" I giggled after and even James smiled to himself. "behave yourselves you three this isn't a town that particularly care about royalty, if we mess this up, we can't even start the rebellion" Daniel told us firmly.
We calmly walked up the path and Daniel knocked on the door. A old white man with a small white beard, blues eyes and average figure opened the door. He wore a brown plain jacket, black trousers and shoes. "Hello Daniel! It's been such a while since we spoke!" He said sounding cheerful. "Hello Roy, I know it's been a while and we need to talk. May we all come in?". "Yes of course" he replied not noticing myself, James or Jeff. As he closed the door I saw how small the room was, there was a brown old sofa, a blue rug and a wooden table in this room which had lots of herbs and bottles by it. He turned and saw me and I'm guessing didn't like what he saw. "So royalty walks into my home! Your far from the castle aren't you!" He snapped. "Now Roy lets not fight straight away" a elderly lady said walking in from another room, she had grey short hair, a white face and a skinny figure. She wore a dark blue dress that came to her feet with a white apron over the top. She seems nicer and more caring and I instantly knew she must have been Pat who must have been his wife. "What do you think of our state then? Do you like what your father and reduced us too?" Roy asked. "We came to ask you to join our revolution, Jake here wants to be king and he wants take his fathers place on the throne" Daniel said. "So what he can do the same? Or worst?". "I will make things better for you and your people you can trust me" I pleaded. "Trust! How can I trust Royalty after your father? However the idea of a rebellion does sound appealing". "What can we do to make you trust us" Jeff asked. "Hmm, you will have to prove to me that you are a leader this country needs! If you can do two tasks for me I will be able to join you along with my wife and the entire state and we will fight!". "What tasks?" I asked. "First you will need to go into the woods in Gardens Peak, somewhere in the woods are a group of robbers, they are criminals of this state, they mug women, take our little possessions and sometimes murder people. You will have to do something to stop them, persuade them or kill them I don't care which! The second is you'll have to travel to Pleasant Plains, our next door state and persuade them to share some food with us, people are dying on the streets, we know Pleasant plains are not rich but they must have food to spare. If you can do both tasks I will sign the document you need and give you our peace offering". "That sounds good to us. We are fighting to put Jake on the throne as he wants gays to be legal so he can marry his boyfriend one day but also to make Worthington a better place" Daniel explained. "I do not care what we fight for, as long as it ends with Roger not on the throne!". "Ok you call for the people's vote now, get that done, write out the document and get the peace offering and we will do as you ask" Daniel told him.
We walked out the carriage and made our plans. "Ok here is the plan, I will take the carriage and all it's things to Pleasant Plains to convince them to send some food over, I know the Mayor there. Then we can hopefully get them to join us, I will give you three a few handfuls of gold coins to buy a house. Don't worry you can live in a small hut for now, and you can defeat whatever is in the woods. Once you have done that and the food is sent over, collect the document and offering from Pat and Roy and you can get a lift to Pleasant plains, I'm sure if you offer someone a few coins they would be more than happy to let you ride in there wagon or something" Daniel explained. "One problem we don't have any weapons!" I told him. "Yes you do! Before we got into the carriage and put some top class swords into the boot of the carriage". He opened up the boot and pulled out three swords. "This ones for me!" He said as he put a heavyish looking, black handled sword in his belt. He handed a golden handled shiny blade one to Jeff to put in his belt. Finally he gave me a golden handled sword with red gems around the top part of the handle, with a very shiny blade which was also in weight very light and seemed very sharp. "Wow thanks Daniel" I replied looking at my reflection in the blade. He gave me a small bag of coins, probably had around 150 in total and then gave us our personal bags. With that he then took off to travel to Pleasant Plains. "I think it would be wise for us to buy a house near Pat and Roy, in case we need to speak to them" James suggested.
We walked down the dirty path and saw in the distance quite a few small huts every single one was for sale. Each looked either run down or shabby. We picked one out and bought it for 50 coins which is nothing really, houses really are cheap here but the fact no one can afford 50 coins is shocking. Myself and James walked into the shabby looking hut, with a straw roof and wooden walls after he pulled up the for sale sign from the ground. Meanwhile Jeff walked back to Pat and Roy's house to give them the money for the house, technically the money should go to the States economy but Pat and Roy probably needed something like medical supplies or something. When Jeff returned without the money so it was obvious that Pat and Roy didn't mind letting this one house slip from the economy.
"I think we need to get this place... More tidier!" I said looking around the tiny bare room that was dirty and shabby. There was three rooms, a empty room that we stood in, a kitchen well I say kitchen I mean a tiny room with a burnt floor that someone used to light fires on and another small empty room which I just assumed was a bedroom. "Ok how about you and Nathan travel into the woods and get started on your task. I will remain here and go into the town and find some furniture to spend on this house, I imagine I should be able to fill the house with stuff by the time you return" he explained. "Sounds fair to me, I'd rather not sit in this hole people call a home". "Don't worry my Prince when you return you'll be happier" James assured.
Myself and Jeff took our swords and walked for about an hour being completely ignored by everyone, no one seemed to care I was the Prince, well people seemed shocked to see me and a few gave a wave but no one was exactly happy or over the moon. In a way it was nice to not be hassled by people but in a way I thought show me a little attention please. Eventually we walked into the woods and all I have to say is the woods seemed a much prettier place to live. For one thing everything was quite pretty looking, there were flowers and wildlife such as birds, squirrels and other animals. At one point after walking deeper into the woods we saw a lake and decided to stop for a drink. The lake had fresh clean running water and I still wondered why no one came to drink it. We sat down on the edge and drank from the lake. "This water is lovely, why don't people come here?" I asked. "Maybe the gang is near and it's to risky to come?" Jeff suggested. "I don't see anyone?". I spoke to soon as a gun was fired but it completely missed us both. We jumped out of our skin and leaped into the air to stand. As we turned around we saw two men wearing black jackets, brown rags around there waists, black boots. One held a shotgun and the other held a weak slightly damaged sword. "Well well well, I don't believe my eyes it's the Prince! What are you doing here?" The man with a shotgun asked pointing it at me. "Look we don't want any trouble" I told him looking a little scared. "Neither do we, you will have to give us some gold for us not to kill you" he replied. "I don't have any on me and neither has my friend". "Well we have a problem then! Don't we!" The other man snapped. "I think you have a problem as our friends just showed up behind you to protect us" Jeff said and pointed behind the men. The very dumb and gullible men actually turned around and in one quick motion myself and Jeff stabbed the men into there backs, letting our swords pass through there bodies to the other side, as we pulled them out they dropped to the floor dead without a clue what happened to them. "I've never killed anyone before... That felt good!" I called as I stared at the blood that ran down the blade of the sword. "I've killed a couple with Daniel once, a few months back we was training and some guys gave us trouble". "Oh that's right I remember you telling me your story". "There camp can't be far, let's go the direction they came from" Jeff ordered. "Wait I'm to tired right now, let's sit here and relax first. We can't go fighting all willy-nilly when we have no energy".
We sat down by the water, I sat on my bum with my legs around Nathan's waist and his arms around me so we faced each other. "You know we can die doing this right?" He told me looking into my eyes. "I know, this isn't going to be our only battle, fighting these criminals today is just the bread appetiser to what leads to the starter, which is getting the other states to agree with us, that leads to the main course, the fight for the throne and the dessert is me actually running Worthington. So your right every single day for a the rest of my life there's the chance we can both die, and when we go into a battle our chances raise even further" I said as my face started to look worried. "That actually makes sense, but hey! I will always protect you, I will fight by your side until the day I die". "That's just it, what if you get killed! Then this whole rebellion is worthless. I want to know that one day we can get married, but if your dead then what's the point in me being King?". "There's a lot of points Jake, your dad is running Worthington into the ground! You can make gays legal, you can then know that you can marry and be happy". "I won't ever be happy with anyone else Jeff, I want you and only you". He pressed his head against mine and we stayed still for a few minutes not saying a word. "I won't die Jake, you won't either we will see this to the end". "I hope so" I said and kissed him passionately not wanting to let him go. Feeling his lips against mine felt good, like we truly belonged together in each other's arms.
We had to move on and fight whatever is in the woods, and it only took us around half an hour to finally see what we was up against. It wasn't a sight I was happy seeing, we looked out from a bush and saw two wooden watch towers and a very large wooden gate. "I'm thinking there's going to be more than a few criminals" I told Jeff. "We need a plan, I think I can work something out... If we kill the men in the towers we can get inside, and we will have to kill them off one by one". "That's your plan?" I asked looking distugusted. "Got a better one?". I paused as I didn't have another plan, I may have thought this one would get us killed but there wasn't a plan b, these men weren't going to listen to reason, they were not going to be persuaded. "Ok how do we kill the men in the tower?". "If we walk around the perimeter by the trees and bushes we can safety climb the two ladders up to the towers and we can silently kill them".
We walked our separate ways, I went right he went left. I snuck around the empty grassland, walking behind trees and bushes until I was in front of the ladder. As Jeff also got into his position, we sneakily ran to the ladder, out of sight of each of the men as they stood in the tower. Slowly we creeped up the ladder heading up to the floor of which the men stood on keeping guard. The man who I could just see was dressed the same as the others we killed, he only had a sword which was chipped a little. Looks like they can't afford the best weapons. While the men stood still looking out seeing if there was any danger, myself and Nathan made our move. We each stood on the floor behind the men with our weapons ready. Each was unaware there death was near, I slowly approached the man ready to swing as he turned his head to the left and saw Nathan. "Look out!" He called as he turned to the left. But the other man was dead the second he turned around, Jeff stabbed him in the chest and saw his sword stuck out of his back. In a split second the man I stood behind turned around. "I wouldn't move if I were you" I told him quietly as I held my sword ready. "The Prince... What do I owe this displeasure?" He asked as he raised his hands. "Only your death" I told him as I then plunged my sword into his upper chest. Myself and Jeff turned south and saw over the gate, no men stood near it, but there was a brown dirt path to follow. It was quite a drop but myself and Jeff had to jump over the gate onto the grass beside the path. We hurt both our ankles jumping down, but we soldiered on. I wasn't going to let some minor pain to my ankles get me killed. We followed the brown path until it turned right, we carefully peaked around the corner we saw three men standing talking to each other. From what we could see only two had weapons, one with a shotgun, one with a jagged sword and the other with nothing. "Shall we charge or wait for them to move?" I whispered. "I don't know if charging is the best option one has a gun". "The one with the gun has his back to us, his friends will have to see us and then alert him and then he'd still have to turn aim and fire. That's a lot of time for us to stab him". "I don't know if I like those odds Jake?". "I do lets kill them!". "Ok if your sure, lets charge silently, they might be to into there chat to notice us until it's to late". Jeff was right, the men stood around twenty metres or so from us they would have to spot us pretty quickly to have a good chance to defend themselves with there weapons.
We charged together and ran out in the open to the men, the first five metres were fine, the silent charge was fine, they haven't picked up on us. About ten metres came and my heart pounded and it was nearly jumping out of my skin when the man without the weapon detected us. Fortunately for us he was to late to see us. The man with the sword immediately held it ready to fight. However the man with gun had to turn around, aim and fire. He managed to turn around but his aim wasn't done quick enough, Jeff reached him and stabbed him. The man without the weapon started to run away as the one with the sword whacked his sword against mine. He knocked me back with his man strength but it was two against one. By the time he knocked me back, Jeff had pulled out his sword and held it up with wet blood dripping down it. Jeff whacked his sword against the man and they each pushed there swords against one another. It wasn't for to long, I sliced the mans upper right leg and watched him screamed in pain as he stopped pushing on his sword. Jeff shoved him to the floor and before he could scream again he was stabbed into the heart. I watched Jeff do it myself. "Now what? That man has ran off to tell the other possibly hundred men that we are here" I panicked. "We have to fight, we shouldn't run" he told me trying to stay calm. "See this is why I should get a bow and arrow, I'm good at archery, you saw that guy knocked me back I'm not strong enough to fight these men". "Perhaps it would help us, if you had one... Now I think we should run". Jeff told me as we started running away from our deaths after we herd noises we didn't like in the distance.
We herd gun shots and men shouting, it sounded like a lot of men were coming for us. We ran as fast as could all the way to the gate, Jeff quickly started rotating the handle which opened the doors. The men were now in sight and I saw a good fifty of them. We ran out into the woods and the men didn't bother following, by the time they got to the gate they couldn't see us, we were out of sight and looking for us seemed hard work to them.
Eventually after hours of walking back home, it was night and all me and Jeff wanted to do was to sleep. Luckily for us as we walked into our hut, James had the entire house cleaned and furnitured. James was sleeping on a old brown used sofa, in front of him was a purple used slightly stained rug. In the corner was a old wooden desk and stool. We stepped into the bedroom to find a old wooden bed with hay for us to sleep on. Jeff closed the door and spoke "James really tried hard with this place didn't he?". "I think he did a lovely job with what he had" I told him. "This place is horrible but James did it and therefore it's nice". "Tomorrow we will buy a bow and some arrows and we can hunt those men down and kill every one of them". We laid on the lumpy old bed and slept in each other's arms until morning. I liked it when myself and Jeff slept in the same bed. Back in the castle there were times when Jeff came over and he slept with me in my Royal bed. Occasionally I came over to his house in Worthington to stay with him in his bed, he didn't live to far from the castle. I loved being held in his arms with my back pressed against his manly body. Feeling him breathing down my neck as my hands touched his on my waist. James awoke us the next morning with breakfast, a few chicken legs each. "Where did you get this?" I said rubbing my eyes as I pulled myself up. "It came with the bed. If you know what I mean" he told me as he put a the plate on my lap. "Oh my god this hay belonged to the chicken?" I freaked. "How did it go yesterday? Your alive I'm guessing you won?". "No we had to get out of there two many of them they were going to attack and kill us" Jeff explained. "Today we will buy a bow and some arrows and we can finish them off that way" I told him.
After breakfast it was exactly what we did, myself and Jeff walked with James into the Circle Market well I say market I personally didn't think it was suitable to be classed a market. There were about four stalls with people who looked like tramps owning them. A man had weapons on a wooden cart, so we came up to him first. The man looked around late forties, he leant on the cart wearing a red top, ragged shorts and brown boots. "So what I can get you my Prince" he says looking at me like I'm a normal customer. "I need a bow and lots of arrows" I told him. "I got a fine bow right here and I've got about twenty arrows, I can sell them to you for a price" he told me pointing at a wooden bow with a string and wooden bows. Considering this is one of poorest states the bow and arrows didn't look that bad, they actually seemed stable and might do some harm. "If your thinking of overcharging us because we have money, I wouldn't try it" James told the man. "Hey my prices are fair I'll give your the bow and all the arrows forty coins" he told us. "How about thirty?" James told him. "Thirty five is my lowest". "Deal" James said he was about to pull the coins from his pocket when suddenly screaming was herd. Women, children and men were running past us screaming. Suddenly we herd gun shots and men shouting. Each of us looked to our left and saw the men from yesterday charging towards us. I immediately grabbed the bow and loaded an arrow and started firing one after the other at the men. Either killing them with one hit to the chest or just taking them down not allowing them to get up. Jeff got ready with his sword and James ran off for he would have been killed. I stuck to just firing at the men with guns to stop them shooting at us. By the time the men got close to us, I had already taken down fifteen men, some were still alive to be fair, but they were hurt enough to stay down. There was around twenty men or so maybe more still standing and I had only four arrows left. But I didn't let that stop me, I continued to fire arrows until the men aware about two metres from us. I took down another three before then.

I dropped the bow, and grabbed a medium sized bag from the stall which looked familiar and started to run with Jeff. We wanted to fight them but we couldn't fight that many at once and it wasn't like they were going to stand in a line and take us on one by one. We were outnumbered. I ran beside Jeff with the men on our tails, we ran as fast as we could gaining a few seconds in front. We ran into our own hut and shut the door. "What's in the bag?" Jeff asked. "Black powder" I told him. "Your a genius Jake!" He told me as his face lit up. I placed the bag on the floor on the rug and Jeff ran into the kitchen. He saw that some sticks used for the breakfast this morning were still slightly burning they glowed orange. Jeff grabbed them and rubbed them together to get them going again and set the rug on fire. As soon as the fire gets to the bag the hut and will explode. Just as the fire started to kick up on the rug the men busted in and we ran into the kitchen and burst out the back door. In about five seconds after running the hut exploded. The force of it pushed us forward to the ground. As I looked back I saw the hut that James had tried to make a home turn to rubble. A couple of men were still alive and cried in pain. Myself and Jeff limped over to Roy and Pats house and told them the news. "So they are all dead?" He asked as he stood in the doorway. "Well not all of them, they are all either dead or very injured. I think the inured ones won't bother you again" I explained. Well your first task is complete but the second is yet to be filled" he told me as he rubbed his beard. "I'm sure Pleasant Plains have already sent food to you, I'm sure they will be here in a day or so?" I told him. "What about your end of the deal, have the votes been coming in, is the document done and the peace offering?" Jeff asked. "The deadline for votes is tomorrow at 6pm, the document is wrote out but not yet signed, but I do have the peace offering inside" he explained. "So one out of three then" Jeff told him in a tone. "Do not get snarky with me boy! Your yet to become anything to me, my hands are not yet to old to not be able to kill" he said with rage. "Let's go Jeff"I told him before he made situations worst.
James came running up the path to us. "You blew up our home... But I'm glad your alive". "Sorry we didn't want to but we both would be dead otherwise" I told him. "Well all we have to wait for is the food".
James managed to find us a place to stay tonight for fifteen coins. Its worst than I thought, I thought we'd be sleeping in a shed or slum but it was worst it was a barn, with animals living inside it. There were three cows and two horses inside. It smelt like poo, to be fair we didn't sleep with the animals we slept on the second floor above them on some hay but that wasn't the point it still smelt.
In fact that wasn't our only night in the barn I spent two nights in there, I had gone about a week without washing and I had worn the same clothes everyday. However my troubles were over when two large carts pulled by four horses each came into town. They had food on them and some better dressed men got off there seats and started handing out free food. Myself and Jeff ran to tell Pat and Roy about the food. He seemed shocked at first but once he ran down to the town and saw for himself and took some food back to his home, Roy seemed happy with us. "Come inside you two" he told us. As he did he took us over to his desk, "the votes were a success you got 100% votes from the people to kick your father off the throne. This is the document you need from us" he said pointing at a piece of paper. He then took out his pen and happily signed it along with Pat also signing next to him. He then handed me the paper rolled up and kept tied with a ribbon. "However Jake, if you want the peace offering you'll have to do one more thing for me". "What's that?". "You will need to sign this other document I made, this one is making us a promise that once your on the throne that you will give each of the farm lands back to the people who last owned them and there house. This way people can start to get back on there feet and not be left to die on the streets". It's a lot to ask for, but I guess it makes no effect on me in fact it might a benefit to me we would gain taxes from this, the homeless don't pay taxes and having Gardens Peak as a state doesn't earn you very much in taxes. I signed the paper and Roy handed me a small black box, inside was a glass chalice, it didn't look very spectacular but I can see what this would be worth to someone who lived here. "Where did this come from?" I asked holding the slightly rough chalice. "Just something that's been used for healing, several times" Pat told me. "Well thank you". "Now we are on your side, and myself and the many others from Gardens Peak are too" he told us with a smile.
We returned to James and he told us the kind men travelling back to Pleasant plains would give us a ride for twenty gold coins. He hopped on into the cart which had some hay for us to sit on and we was on our way to the next state.