The Black Sky

The Black Sky

The Slave Prince: Book Two

Copyright Matthew Holmes, 2014, 2022

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Published by Matthew Holmes

Smashwords Edition

Cover design by Connor Magill

Manufactured in Canada

First release June 2014

Newest Edition 2022

For Emily, who motivated me to write this faster.

The Slave Prince

Book One: Sea of the Dead

Book Two: The Black Sky

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Dreams Have Merit

Chapter 2: Blackridge

Chapter 3: Nobody Crosses the Black Sky

Chapter 4: A Price to Pay

Chapter 5: Dreaming Demons

Chapter 6: Purging

Chapter 7: Poverty and Famine

Chapter 8: The Tyrant King

Chapter 9: First Flight

Chapter 10: Edge of the Pit

Chapter 11: The Vixen

Chapter 12: Tongues of Flame

Chapter 13: The Traitor Revealed

Chapter 14: Strength and Weakness

Chapter 15: Choosing Battles

Chapter 16: Parrish

Chapter 17: Call to Growth

Chapter 18: Wishful Thinking

Chapter 19: Duspen

Chapter 20: The Sand-Walker

Chapter 21: The Black Sky

Chapter 22: Ey Ou Ses de Cor

Chapter 23: The Dungeon

Chapter 24: Things to Learn

Chapter 25: A Certain Danger

Chapter 26: The Skin-Seer

Chapter 27: Departure

Chapter 28: The Corrupter

Chapter 29: Alone

Acknowledgements

Chapter 1: Dreams Have Merit

Everything was dark. Michael heard a sound like a mighty river, but he saw nothing. The prince listened closely and realised that it was not water he heard, but a voice. He strained, but he could only make out a few words.

"The road… Michael…you will be betrayed by …the world…my voice.

"… Face your greatest fear… The wolf… find your own way…

"Be aware…understand…The blind eye…man’s heart… believe in me…I will be with you."

Michael awoke as the ground shook violently. All that was left of the Sea of the Dead was a ring of water around this mound of flaming rock. The fire hill was still spewing fiercely as it released not only ash and smoke, but also magic, into the land. It was all because of a single decision made by Prince Michael to drop a stalactite on the creature that had attacked him and his companions in the underwater labyrinth just the day before.

His companions—a large blacksmith named Reno, a tall young man with a scar on the back of his head named Ryan, and the young marksman named Tristan—were all still sleeping soundly on the ground of their campsite.

The sky was painted a deep red, highlighting the band of light which always rested in the northern sky. It was early in the morning and the others were still asleep. Michael slowly stood and looked around. He scrawled a message in the dirt to tell his companions that he was going for a short walk to clear his mind.

Michael wandered back through the trail they had taken from the beach. He wanted to see the fire hill in the daylight, and to try and make sense of the message in his dream.

Betrayed by…the world? He thought to himself. It doesn’t make any sense. And the ‘blind eye’? It must be my left eye, he thought back to when he first realized that his left eye was rapidly losing its sight, the morning after their first fight with the soldiers that had come to arrest them at the beginning of their journey. What’s the sense in worrying about some dream anyway? It’s not like I’m a believer in that sort of thing.

Paying more heed to his thoughts than to his feet, Michael stumbled over a tree root protruding from the damp earth. He fell, scraping his hands on the ground.

With a sigh, he raised himself to a crouch and turned his head to look at the root that had tripped him. He was about to stand, but something caught his attention. There was a dim shimmer of color in a single spot on the root.

Michael leaned towards it, but it vanished. He angled his head and saw it again. Keeping it in sight this time, he slowly reached for it. He felt a tiny slit in the outer bark of the root with his fingertips.

There was a narrow groove cut into the root, and something was shoved into the slot. Using his small hunting knife, he cut the hole a little wider until he was able to get the tip of the knife under the edge. With much concentration, and even more frustration, Michael managed to get the strange object out of the root.

The bizarre item was small and round, like a coin. It was mostly blue, but it changed to hues of red and pink as the morning light hit it from different angles. There were strange golden glyphs floating around the edge, but the rest was unmarked.

Michael could hear something emanating from the disk. He brought it up to his ear and realised that it was somehow producing words. As he listened, he made out a segment of a conversation, and realized that the voices belonged to him and his companions.

"What was that about?"

"Nothing."

"Where is Kai going?"

"I don’t know; she’s just not coming back. Neither is Sphergol."

"We should make camp. It is late, and we are all tired."

"Not here; I want to get as far away from this cursed place as we can."

"I agree, it would be too dangerous to stay here. Active fire hills are too unpredictable."

Somehow, this object was able to imitate the sounds made in its presence. But why would it be hidden so carefully, and who had made it?

This was no simple trinket; it was a tool magically designed to be used by a spy. The prince feared the worst, that one of the members of his group was leaving these disks where they could be found by the soldiers of Malumous—the very monster who murdered Michael’s mother and father, claiming the throne of Jenoth for himself.

Michael dropped the disk on the ground and picked up a large stone. Bringing the rock down hard upon the magical recording tool, he split in half.

The disk became stark white and lost all shimmer. The glyphs disappeared and the voices cut off abruptly.

The warning of betrayal from his strange dream flashed through his mind. He tossed the broken disk into the woods away from the path and headed back to the campsite, his pace quickened by the fear of a new threat from within.

Chapter 2: Blackridge

It was still early when Michael arrived at the resting place. Nobody had stirred since he left, but something was different. Looking around in the dim light, his companions seemed to be shimmering with strange colors.

The sunrise seemed to reflect off Reno as a dark red, Ryan was cloaked in deep imperial purple, but Tristan was the most surprising. Instead of shimmering with color, Tristan was cloaked in shadows. There was a black haze hanging over him, like smoke over a smoldering tar pit.

All throughout that day, Michael never spoke a word of the strange magical listening object or the colors, which even in clear daylight shrouded his companions.

As they walked in a downward slope to a city resting in a deep valley, the forest thinned, and the brilliant green grass gave way to frail brown shrubs and patches of lifeless white sand. The group of four walked the beaten path in silence until they came across a neglected sign with chipped paint reading Blackridge, edge of The Black Sky. Beyond the sign was the entrance to the city. There were no walls, but rather tall buildings pressed tightly together with only a gap wide enough for a single man to walk through every mile or so, aside from the main gate.

The Black Sky was their goal. They were tasked to somehow cross the vast wasteland in search of the Defre-Lanc, a hidden society Michael believed would help avenge the death of his parents. He was told by an old woman in Renadale that to find what he was searching for, he would have to go under the Sea of the Dead, over the Black Sky, and to the peak of an ominous mountain known as the Highfiend’s Hand.

At a glance the city seemed oddly undefended, but then Michael noticed the rows of crossbows in the arrow slits in the tall structures. There were also small holes near the top of the wall inside of the narrow gaps which lead to the inner city. These holes, Michael assumed, were a means of pouring boiling liquids over unsuspecting invaders.

Surprisingly, there were no guards posted at the gate. The travelers entered the city casually and stepped in among the bustling crowds.

The streets were made of cobblestone, but there was so much sand that it was hard to tell. The walls were worn and cracked from years of exposure to the violent sandstorms. Clothing lines stretched across the alleys and streets overhead. The wide streets had two separate lanes going in each direction. People traveling on foot kept to the outside, and faster moving horses and carts were on the inside.

Michael passed by an elderly man resting against a wall. His cloths were barely holding together, and his knobby knuckles clutched a wooden cup with a few low-valued coppers. The man gazed up at him with sad grey eyes, shaded by what he had left of his thinning eyebrows. His tangled white hair clung loosely to a spotted scalp, translucent in the sunlight. His nose was bent at an odd angle; accented by the wart which grew from the edge of his nostril. What he had left for teeth were jagged and twisted out of shape when he attempted a smile.

Michael felt a twinge in his throat, and everything inside of him told him to have sympathy, but he walked on. I might be able to spare some money, but if I need it, I won’t have it. Besides, he would probably just waste it anyway. The old man hung his head back down in defeat, and Michael never gave a second glance.

The group wandered among the decrepit city for an hour or more.

Where are we going? Ryan asked.

I have no idea, Michael said. First of all, we need to find out all we can about this city, then maybe we can find a way across the desert.

Maybe we should split up; we might have better luck, Ryan said.

No, Michael replied, remember where we are. People should never be alone in Acosh, half of these people would gut us if they had the chance.

How would you know what the people of Acosh are like? Ryan asked indignantly You’ve never left the capital of Jenoth before we set out on this journey.

I don’t have to be an adventurer to know what is said about these people. The rumors must exist for a reason.

If anybody knows how to cross the sands, it would be the merchants, Reno said, sensing the rising tensions.

Then we should start at the market. We need provisions anyway, Tristan suggested.

They made their way to the closest market, asking for directions along the way. The city was long to the east and west but narrow to the north and south. Michael guessed it would take at least a day to travel from one end to the other if there were no delays. The main gate was in the center of the southern wall, and it seemed that there weren’t any gates to the north leading into the wasteland.

A handful of the people that Michael passed on the street shimmered with colors in the same way that his companions did. Blue, red, green, purple, and black seemed to show up the most.

The group was about to emerge into the market square when something caught Michael’s eye. There were two slips of parchment nailed to a wooden sign that read WANTED in bright red paint. Michael walked over, followed by the others.

Oh no, Ryan said, fear quavering his voice.

It appears that we aren’t as safe as we thought, Michael said, pointing at the charcoal image showing him from waist up. Reno was depicted on the other, though the likeness was not quite there. At least yours looks nothing like you, Reno.

What are you talking about? Yours bears less semblance than mine.

That looks exactly like me! Michael said. He thought Reno must have been joking.

No, Tristan said, There is not much likeness for either of you. Michael, you have much broader shoulders than this, and Reno is thinner than this drawing. Not to mention that your faces look much different with all of that grime.

Michael hadn’t thought about it, but it had been almost a month since he first escaped Jenoth. Somehow, the wanted posters had not been updated, and the grueling weeks of travel had worn on them. Reno thinned out noticeably, and Michael increased in muscle tone, and his left eye was pure white. Tristan’s hair was longer, and his face was scarred slightly from being whipped by his snapped bowstring back in Renadale a week before.

Michael walked over to a shallow well in the middle of the market square and looked at his reflection. His hair was matted, and his face covered in filth. He even had a shrub of fine facial hair sprouting in patches