The Chronicle of Young Dastan Page 3

  “That’s not as easy as you made it look.” He panted.

  Dastan didn’t respond. He turned and ran full-out toward the next drop-off. There was a courtyard lying between this building and the next, one almost too broad to jump.

  Almost. Dastan didn’t hesitate. His foot landed at the edge of the roof and pushed off. His arms whirled, propelling him forward. His eyes remained trained on the ledge at the far side.

  WHUMP! His feet landed safely on the flat stucco of the next roof with several inches to spare.

  Dastan allowed himself a small smirk. Let the newcomer try to follow that! But a glance behind showed him that the other boy was doing just that. without faltering, the ginger-haired kid sprinted forward and hurled himself off the edge, not even looking down.

  Dastan held his breath as the boy went airborne. These buildings were taller than the others in Nasaf. A fall into the hard stone courtyard would surely mean broken bones or worse.

  THUMP!

  “Ouch!” the stranger yelped as his feet missed their mark and his lanky body slammed against the wall of the next building. He grabbed onto the narrow ledge at the top with both arms, hanging on for dear life.

  Dastan was tempted to help him up. But he held himself back. why should he encourage this newcomer’s foolhardiness?

  Instead he watched as the other boy pulled himself up, inch by painful inch. Finally he was safely on the rooftop. He lay there for a few seconds, taking in deep breaths. Then he sprang to his feet, shooting Dastan a triumphant look.

  Dastan hurried onward, suddenly very concerned. He’d become the best messenger in Nasaf because the others never thought to avoid the congested maze of city streets by taking to the rooftops. The few that did soon found it to be not as easy as Dastan made it seem.

  But this newcomer was different. He appeared to have no fear—or perhaps no sense. either way, he was keeping up long after any of the other messengers had dropped back.

  Dastan found himself looking down on a metalworker’s shop, where there was an outdoor display of swords, spears, and other weapons. reaching down, he was just able to grab the longest of the lances. He stabbed it into the ground and leaped outward, using the length of the shaft to propel himself across the narrow street. when he landed on the steeply angled roof opposite, he let go of the lance and slid down the sloped tiles.

  Just below him, a cavalry soldier’s horse was standing at the edge of the street. Its master was examining the metalworker’s wares.

  Dastan twisted himself in the air, aiming for the saddle. He landed a little off-center, almost tipping off as the startled horse let out a snort of surprise and leaped forward.

  “Easy, boy!” Dastan cried, grabbing a fistful of the horse’s mane and hauling himself upright. His legs clung to the beast’s sides as the horse skittered sideways and tossed its head.

  Dastan kicked with both legs, urging the horse onward. By now the owner had heard the ruckus and spun around.

  “Hey!” heshouted. “Get off my horse! Thief! Thief!”

  But his cries were useless. Dastan had kicked the horse into a gallop. Dust flew beneath its hooves as it headed down the street.

  Just before turning the corner, Dastan dared a glance back. He smiled as he saw the ginger-haired boy standing in the street, watching with a look of dismay as Dastan continued forward.

  Chapter Five

  “Here you go.”

  Dastan stepped in front of Kamyar and held out the small clay seal the recipient had given him in return for the parchment. “I delivered your message. Now I’d like my payment. Double the usual rate, as you promised.”

  The square in front of the spice shop was much quieter than the last time he’d seen it. Yusef was still there, watching his little brother play in the dirt with a bug he’d found. A number of shoppers were wandering along the street or examining the merchants’ goods. But the rest of the would-be messengers were nowhere to be seen.

  That was no surprise. only the ginger-haired boy had showed up while Dastan was still at the other shop. And even he had been several minutes behind thanks to Dastan’s skillful trick with the horse. even though Dastan had let the stolen horse go and made his way back to the spice shop on foot, he was sure nobody else would be there for a while.

  Kamyar turned and surveyed him. “Sorry, boy,” he said with the faintest hint of a smirk, plucking the seal out of his hand. “I regret to inform you that someone else got there first. I’ve already paid the reward to him.”

  “What?” Dastan snapped. “But I was the first one there. The seal proves it.”

  “What seal?” Kamyar’s smirk grew as he tucked the seal into his voluminous muslin stole. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, scab. I already told you, someone else won the prize.”

  Yusef left his brother to his game and he came closer, his eyes darting from Dastan to the shopkeeper and back again.

  Dastan’s confusion turned to outrage as he realized what was going on. “You’re a liar!” he declared, clenching his fists at his sides.

  A few people glanced over when they heard these words. Little was more reviled in Persian society than a liar.

  “Nobody got back before Dastan,” Yusef added, his voice quiet. “I’ve been here the whole time. I would have seen.”

  Kamyar’s beady eyes barely flickered over the younger boy. “If you don’t mind, I am very busy,” he said. “The prince’s birthday is tomorrow, and there is much to do.”

  He started to turn away. Dastan darted forward and grabbed him by the arm.

  “You owe me that reward!” he shouted. “Give it to me, or else!”

  “Or else what?” The merchant spun to glare at him. “Take your hand off me.”

  “Give me my money,” Dastan retorted.

  Kamyar pushed him away. Before Dastan could respond, the shopkeeper turned and let out a whistle. A muscular young man appeared in the doorway of the spice shop. He was holding a dagger lazily at his side and sucking on a shank bone that was held in his other hand.

  “Yes, sir?” the man said.

  “This street trash is blocking the entrance to my shop,” Kamyar said with a nasty look at Dastan. “Clean it up, will you?”

  “With pleasure, sir.” The man tossed the bone aside and stepped toward Dastan and Yusef. “Move along.”

  Yusef scuttled away immediately, grabbing his little brother and heading off in the direction of the dump. But Dastan wasn’t going to give up that easily.

  “Get out of my way!” he yelled at Kamyar’s beefy employee. “I have business with your boss, the liar and cheat!”

  By now his cries were attracting even more attention. out of the corner of his eye, Dastan saw Javed appear in the square. But his real focus was still on Kamyar.

  “Get back here!” he cried as the merchant disappeared into his shop. He lunged forward, but found his way blocked by Kamyar’s henchman.

  “Leave, boy,” the man growled. “Now.”

  Javed hurried forward. “Sorry, sir,” he said, bowing as he grabbed Dastan by the arm. “He’s just excited. Didn’t mean any trouble.”

  “Let me go!” Dastan struggled against Javed’s grip. But his friend wouldn’t let go, dragging him off across the square.

  “Easy, little brother,” Javed panted as he pulled Dastan around a corner into a deserted alley. “Come on. It’s not worth it.”

  “Who says?” Dastan fumed. “He owes me!”

  “I know.” Javed finally let him go. “And he knows it, too. But he’s a respected businessman with lots of wealthy friends, and you’re, well . . .”

  “Street trash.” Dastan spat out the bitter words, stomping to the end of the alley and glaring across the square at the spice shop. “I should sneak in there tonight and light his precious myrrh afire. Maybe feed his turmeric and saffron to whatever rats I can find while I’m at it. I could steal all his black pepper and blow it in his window while he’s sleeping.”

  Javed chuckled. “He’s not wort
hy of the effort, little brother,” he said. “Save your energy for a more important cause and simply learn from this experience.”

  “Learn what? I already know that Kamyar is a liar. what more is there to learn?”

  Javed shrugged and wandered back out onto the street, peering hungrily at a baker’s goods. “Learn to demand payment up front from now on,” he told Dastan. “You’ve now proven yourself the fastest messenger in Nasaf, if there were any doubt before. That means you have something of value to offer. You can state your own terms.”

  “Yes. Something of value—such as risking my life to deliver his stupid message.” Dastan clenched his fists again as another wave of anger rolled over him.

  But then he sighed. Javed was right. what good would it do to make an enemy of Kamyar? He would only have that huge worker of his beat Dastan to a pulp, and there would be nothing Dastan could do about it. Nobody would take the side of a street rat over a wealthy merchant. It wasn’t fair, but it was the way of the world. or his world, at least.

  “Listen,” Javed said, steering Dastan around the corner and out of sight of Kamyar’s shop, “I was talking to your friend Haxam while you were gone.”

  “Haxam?” with some effort, Dastan dragged his mind away from Kamyar’s treachery. “who’s . . . ? oh, right. The lunatic.”

  “He told me what he heard about the Torch of Atar.” Turning to face Dastan, Javed leaned against a clay wall, resting his bad arm behind his back. “It sounds . . . interesting.”

  “You don’t mean you believe his tall tales?” Dastan asked, still too distracted to fully take in what his friend was saying. “I just thought you’d get a laugh out of it—and perhaps find it an interesting puzzle to think about.”

  “An interesting puzzle,” Javed said as he rubbed his chin. “I’ve heard similar tales of the Torch of Atar before.”

  “You have?” That finally got Dastan’s attention. “You mean Haxam didn’t conjure up this magical Torch business using an elixir made of the empire’s finest grapevines?”

  “No. There’s an inscription about the Torch on a building in my old village.” Javed paused, his eyes briefly taking on a faraway look, as they always did whenever he spoke or thought of his life before the fire. Then he blinked and glanced at Dastan. “I also heard about it from that old blind man who used to work in the king’s library. He loved to talk about all he saw in the books there when the gift of sight was still his.”

  Dastan knew Javed was interested in history, politics, literature, and pretty much anything else that had intellectual value. Dastan didn’t pay much attention to such matters. The only thing he was interested in was surviving. But he respected Javed. He looked up to him. If Javed thought this Torch was real . . .

  “Ah, it can’t be true,” Dastan said, kicking up sand with his bare foot. “A torch that controls all the world’s light and darkness—it’s crazy.”

  “It sounds as much. But the ways of immortals will only seem strange and impossible to ordinary mortals such as we.”

  “If it is real, just imagine the power . . .” Dastan looked over his shoulder. “If I got my hands on a torch like that, I wager old Kamyar would pay me what he owes me fast enough!”

  Javed shot him a look of alarm. “The whole reason that the Torch and flame were separated was to prevent any man from manipulating their power for his own benefit, little brother. only the pure of heart are capable of wielding the Torch.

  “If what the oracle bones revealed to Haxam is true, this could be the best chance in generations for someone to reunite the Torch and its flame. Think of all the good we could do with it—all the street rats we could feed, clothe, house. Think of Yusef and his little brother. If both Torch and flame are here in Nasaf, all it would take is figuring out who’s in possession of the Torch, then following the clues to the flame.”

  “Right.” Dastan shot his friend a skeptical look. “You mean clues such as talking to a crimson elephant?”

  Javed grinned. “I know it sounds impossible. But it could be fun to give it a try, don’t you think? And remember, tomorrow is the prince’s birthday celebration. The entire palace will be distracted.” His eyes twinkled as he glanced in the direction of the palace rising above the rooftops in the distance. “I imagine a couple of clever street rats might be able to sneak into the royal stables for a look at the elephants without anyone noticing.”

  Dastan chuckled. “Do you think so?”

  “Who knows until we make the attempt? Let’s go over to the palace now and see how things look.”

  Dastan shrugged. why not? At least helping Javed with this little game might further distract him from that scoundrel Kamyar. He was trying to follow his friend’s advice to learn from the incident. But it wasn’t going to be easy to let it go. The money Dastan was promised for the job would have allowed him to replace that chicken he’d lost earlier—and add an entire feast more.

  Dastan and Javed hurried through the maze of streets, heading toward the center of the city. It was approaching noon, and the sun beat down upon Nasaf, baking the dusty streets and the people who occupied them.

  But Dastan hardly noticed the heat as his mind returned to his recent humiliation. It didn’t seem right that Kamyar could cheat him out of a fairly earned reward. But he had. And as a street rat with no power of any kind, it seemed that Dastan could do nothing but accept it and move on.

  “Why are there so many people about?” Javed wondered aloud as they turned onto the main avenue leading from the city gates to the palace square.

  Dastan blinked and looked around. His friend was right. This was a residential area of large, grand homes occupied mostly by priests, tax collectors, and other important people. Normally at this time of day there might be a few residents wandering around on some errand or other, but not the throngs that were currently gathered on both sides of the street. People were jostling for space, laughing, and talking loudly as they craned their necks toward the far end of the street.

  Dastan and Javed traded a confused look. what was going on?

  Chapter Six

  “Stand back!” a palace guard shouted, striding along the avenue with a phalanx of his cohorts. “Make way for guests of the king!”

  Dastan stood on the tips of his toes to peer past the women in front of them. “I wonder who it is.”

  “Must be someone important. I can’t imagine so many people would turn out to watch some Mesopotamians or Scythians go by, let alone some satrap from another part of the empire.” Javed chuckled. “Can you see anything?”

  “Not much.” Dastan hopped up and down in place, still hoping for a glimpse of the spectacle.

  Just then a cry of excitement went up. As it did, the crowd shifted in front of the two boys and they were able to squeeze through. Now they had an unobstructed view of the procession that had just appeared at the far end of the block.

  The delegation was led by at least a dozen foot soldiers followed by several rows of men on horseback. The horses were wiry and alert, their necks and haunches draped with silver-threaded tapestries.

  Javed peered at the flag the lead horseman was carrying. “It’s the white Huns, come from the northern borders,” he reported.

  “You sound surprised, my friend.” Dastan was watching the horses, admiring their showy way of moving.

  “Indeed I am,” Javed replied. “we have only recently defeated the Huns in the wars. I hope that their presence in Nasaf means that relations have sweetened between our two peoples—and not something worse.”

  Dastan shrugged. Politics and wars were matters for the king and his men, not for him. what difference did it make in his life whether the Persians were at war with the romans or the white Huns or anyone else? It didn’t increase the number of maggot-eaten lamb shanks to be found at the dump, nor make it any easier to sneak a piece of fruit out from under the nose of a shopkeeper.

  He watched as the procession came closer. Behind the riders was a pair of litters carried by muscular, bare-ch
ested servants. Upon each of the litters lounged a young man dressed in the finest silk and linen.

  “Those two must be princes of the Huns,” Javed guessed.

  Dastan shifted his gaze from the horses to the litters. The younger of the princes was dressed in rich reds and russets, and the draping on the litter matched his clothing. The other litter was draped in purple and green, but Dastan barely took in the figure upon it. His attention was caught by something else. He stared at it as the litters moved forward, nearing the spot where they were standing. Could it be . . . ?

  “The Torch!” he blurted out, poking Javed in the ribs. “Look—it is just as Haxam described!”

  “Very funny, little brother,” Javed said. “I think you have torches on the . . .”

  His voice trailed off as he saw what Dastan had seen. Displayed in a place of honor at the front of the older prince’s litter was a large, unlit torch crafted of solid gold. Its handle was shaped in the body of a sinewy lion, and at the tip the beast’s open mouth was lined with ivory teeth offering the spot for a flame. The object gleamed dully in the sun, its whole appearance ancient and otherworldly.

  “I cannot believe it!” Javed exclaimed. “It seems that this is the Torch of Atar. But how can it be?”

  Before Dastan could respond, Javed leaped forward, his gaze trained on the Torch. He scurried right past the front of the first litter, causing one of the litter bearers to stop in midstep to avoid bumping into him. It took a second for the other men to stop, which caused all the litters to wobble.

  The red-clad prince upon it had to grab hold of the sides to keep his balance. He let loose with a torrent of angry words in his own language. Then he grabbed a wicked-looking scimitar that was lying beside him.

  “Who is responsible?” he cried in accented but fluent Persian, glaring around at the litter bearers. “Perhaps when your head is rolling about these filthy streets, the others will be less clumsy!”

  “Easy, brother,” the elder prince said. “I saw what happened. It was not our people’s fault; they had to stop to avoid tripping over that.”