Two Princes

Prologue

Two princes. One dark, one fair. They are brothers in arms, but pitted against one another in a savage battle to the death. One, the dark one, is armed with a mighty sword, forged from enchanted steel . The other, the fair one, brandishes a rapier he seized from a vanquished Ruggarian warrior.

"Take that!" the fair one cries as he jabs his brother in the thigh.

"Be warned!" the dark one growls ominously, "I cannot be vanquished that easily," and he deftly spins around and whacks his brother on the back of his knee so he finds himself sprawling on his back in the dirt, his brother's sweaty face staring down at him.

"Do you concede?" he snarls.

The fair one's face breaks out into a wide grin. "Gabriel, you fathead," he laughs. "Get off me!"

"Not until you concede," the dark one growls again, his round face set in a grim scowl, pressing his mighty sword against his brother's throat.

"Gabriel, I'm serious. Get off! You're hurting me!" the fair one complains, wiggling under the larger body of his brother.

"Not until you concede, Nikolai."

"I concede!" Nikolai said, far too readily and Gabriel sat back on his haunches, and dropped his wooden sword to the ground.

***

"You're no good at this, " he complained, almost pouting. "You always give in too easily."

Nikolai struggled to sit up. "You know you're a better swordsman than me," he said, rubbing his lower back. "You always beat me, so there's really no point in even trying. You know I wanted to ride today, didn't you?" And then he smiled his big wide crooked smile, "but you won't go riding because you're scared!"

Gabriel picked his sword up from the ground and lovingly stroked it. "I'm not scared," he muttered, his dark curls covering his face.

"Are too. Horses terrify you and don't pretend they don't."

"You're such a baby."

"And you're such a fathead."

Gabriel broke out into a rare smile and laughing, gripped his little brother in a headlock and grappled him to the ground. Nikolai loudly guffawed and protested as they rolled around in the dirt, giggling.

But they both soon tired and lay on their backs staring up at the fluffy white clouds that sailed across the blue sky.

It was then that Gabriel felt a prickling on his skin, the uncomfortable sensation that someone was watching him, and when he looked up, he saw high above him, a face leaning out from one of the Palace windows. It was a lily white round little face surrounded by a cloud of hair the colour of ripe peaches. For a moment Gabriel felt light headed and a strange fluttering sensation ran over his body all the way to his toes, but then he blinked and focused and realized who it was and saw that she was scowling down at them, with an expression of pure disgust.

"Oh bloody hell," Nikolai swore. "It's that silly bitch, the Lady Helene."

"Niko!" Gabriel admonished, "If Mother heard you calling her that!"

"I don't care, " Nikolai pouted. "She's just a stupid girl."

"A stupid girl you're going to marry some day."

Nikolai rolled over onto his side and theatrically gagged. "I'll run away before that happens," he groaned.

Gabriel snorted. "Run away where?"

"I don't know! Somewhere! Away from this stupid Palace!"

"You wouldn't last two minutes without Mother," Gabriel laughed, and glancing upwards noticed that the face and the hair had gone.

Nikolai was still lying on his side, his cheek in the dirt. "I wish it was you who was going to be King," he said quietly.

"Yes, well I'm not," Gabriel said for what felt like the thousandth time. "Bastards don't get to be Kings."

"Bastards are bloody lucky," Nikolai muttered and despite himself, Gabriel had to laugh.

***

They eventually struggled up from the ground and brushed the dirt off their clothes, aware of what their mother would say if she saw them in this state. There would be the usual lengthy admonishments about suitable Princely Behavior and Courtly Decorum. Picking his wooden sword up, Gabriel noticed with dismay there was a crack developing right down the middle of the 'blade'. His father had made this sword for him two years ago for his tenth birthday and it was probably his most precious possession. It had been given to him with such ceremony that one would have thought it actually had been forged from enchanted steel. Gabriel was more than aware that Prince Consorts did not spend their evenings laboring in the carpenter's workshop to make their sons their very own sword. But his father had done just that.

Nikolai was still brushing the dirt off his britches, or at least trying to when a high-pitched growl ripped through the air and a whirlwind of dark curls and homespun dress came flying towards them.

Nikolai had time to let out a startled yelp before he was knocked down onto the ground once again.

"You son of a mongrel bitch!" the whirling dervish spat as she gripped his wrists and pressed him down into the dirt.

Despite the fact that his head was spinning, Nikolai managed to laugh. He always managed to laugh. It was how he dealt with every single situation that was thrown at him. "I think its treason to call the Queen a mongrel bitch," he gasped.

"Shut up, you fathead!" the dervish yelled and dug her knee into his stomach.

"What has he done now?" Gabriel asked calmly, looking down at the entertaining scene with bemusement.

The dervish looked up at Gabriel, big brown eyes sparking with fury. "He told the blacksmith's boy that I wanted to kiss him," she said, her face a picture of righteous indignation.

Gabriel tried and failed to keep the smirk off his face. Nikolai wasn't even trying. He let out a loud guffaw. "Did he do it?" Nikolai asked with glee. "Did he kiss you?"

"Of course not," she growled, loosening her grip slightly. "He didn't get anywhere near me. I whacked him over the head with a broom."

"Ha! Theodora strikes again!" Nikolai cried with glee.

The dervish gripped his wrists again and ground her knee into his stomach. "I told you. Do not call me that name."

"Why not? That's your name isn't it, Theodora?

Gabriel sighed. His brother had a death wish. It was always the same. Theo and Nikolai going at it like hammer and tongs. It had been this way for as long as he could remember and it was getting boring.

"Get up, the pair of you," he said. "Niko, we need to get back to the Palace before supper or Mother will not be pleased." Grabbing hold of Theo's arm. He attempted to pull her upwards and then kept a tight hold of her arm as Nikolai once again struggled up from the ground and ineffectually brushed at his britches.

"You really shouldn't attack the heir to the throne," Nikolai muttered. "Not when you're nothing but a lowly apothecary's daughter ."

Gabriel held on to Theo as she surged towards his brother, making an ominous growling noise in the back of her throat. "Niko," he warned.

But Nikolai was unstoppable when he was in one of these moods. "You're really nothing but a scrappy excuse for a girl and you should have been grateful that Roddy wanted to kiss you."

For a moment, Gabriel thought he wasn't going to be able to hold Theo and she was actually going to kill his brother but just at the right moment a deep voice broke through the air.

"Nikolai, Prince of Carthenia, get over here now!"

It was their father.