The moment that Ako stepped into the city of Esai, she felt the stares. She couldn’t spot anyone looking at her, but she felt them. She had never felt so exposed before in her life, going into a major city in the Huzha Desert where her brother and his friends could possibly find her and drag her back to a life that she did not want. She wanted to turn around and find the people that were staring at her, but Ako didn’t. What if no one is staring at me and I am imagining it? I would look very foolish.

Still, the city of Esai beckoned, and Ako stared back, open-mouthed. Before setting out on her own, she had been to one city: Javen. Javen could barely count as a town, let alone a city. It had low walls, a small population, and barely any influence over the lands it claimed to control, let alone the rest of the Huzha that they tried to influence.

Esai was another thing entirely, with its twenty-foot-tall brown walls, thousands and thousands of people, and dozens of languages being shouted from everywhere at once. It was overwhelming as Ako walked down the paved roads of Esai, which felt strange underneath her feet. She had been on flat ground before, but the paved roads of Esai were something else entirely.

There were people everywhere, filling the roads completely. It was walking through treacherous sand, pushing past people that were all having their own conversations. Everyone was wearing something different in bright colors. I’ve never seen so much color before.

“Like it?” Jakub shouted over the noise. Ako looked up to see that he was grinning in a way that made him look decades younger. “Enjoying yourself?”

Ako rolled her eyes and elbowed Jakub’s leg. He laughed even as he winced from the blow. “It’s very loud!” Ako shouted back when Jakub had sobered. To Ako’s satisfaction, Jakub reached down and massaged his leg.

“So rude,” Jakub said, raising an eyebrow as he mock-glared at her from Ako’s mount. “So spiteful.”

“Says the one who can’t stop chattering,” Ako said icily, which made Jakub smirk.

“That’s part of my charm, Ako,” the bard said, settling back on his mount. He puffed out his chest and put on airs like he was a king. “Many love me for it.”

“I am sure,” Ako said dryly before someone elbowed her and she stumbled, almost getting swept up into the crowd. More elbowed her as they went by, and she saw stars. She was knocked almost flat on her back by another man, and it took some elbows of her own before she was standing somewhat upright.

Jakub, Ako thought, looking around for the older man. She swallowed, her shoulders tensing as she searched the crowds for him. Where is he?

“Ako!” Jakub called, sounding frantic. Ako looked to see that he was twisting and turning on his mount, looking around with a desperate look on his face. “Ako!”

“I’m here!” Ako yelled, and Jakub visibly sighed in relief as she made her way over to him. He had stopped, forcing the crowd to move around him. Some didn’t like that, but a nasty glare from Jakub was more than enough to stop any complaints.

“Thank the gods,” Jakub said, reaching down to touch her shoulder as if wanting reassurance that she was there. His face was pale. “We can’t get separated, Ako. These crowds have no reason to hate us, but they have little reason to love us either. We’re just two faces amongst thousands, and if you get swept away, I could search for weeks and not find you. Stay close.”

Ako was a little annoyed that Jakub was being so overprotective, but at the same time, she was warmed by his concern.

“I will stay close,” Ako said. “Is there anywhere we should go?”

“Passage to Ghada as quickly as possible,” Jakub said. “If we are to make our way to Velaire, we will need to take a ship.” Without another word he turned the camel and made his way down the road, slowly pushing through the traffic.

“With what coin?” Ako asked, pitching her voice loud enough so Jakub could hear her. “Jakub, we are not anywhere near Ghada, and we do not have any money.”

“Leave that to me,” Jakub said with a confident self-assurance that Ako wanted to doubt on principle alone. “Just stay close, Ako.”

Ako stayed close as they navigated the crowds. She saw street performers, many vendors, and guards marching through, wearing their orange and green tabards that signified they were royal guard. Jakub edged away from them as much as he could, turning his head so they couldn’t look at them.

“Don’t want to be recognized?” Ako teased.

Jakub shuddered. “No, I do not,” he said, shuddering again. “It’s been a long time, but some of those guardsmen would remember. If they recognized me, I would be dead in a ditch by morning.”

“What did you do?” Ako asked curiously. “Steal something valuable?”

Jakub crossed his arms and settled back on Ako’s mount with a smug look on his face. “Of a sort,” he said before he seemed to realize who he was talking to and swallowed. “This way,” Jakub said, pointing to a large building off to the side. He led them through it, and the crowds halved almost immediately.

“What?” Ako muttered, looking back to the packed streets and the street they were on now, which they could now walk on mostly comfortably. “Why?”

“We’re in the richer part of Esai, Ako,” Jakub said. “You have to have money in order to be here.”

Ako raised an eyebrow. “We do not have any money, Jakub.”

Jakub grinned. “We do not have any money right now, Ako. That is an important distinction.”

“Oh no,” Ako groaned, already beginning to regret allowing Jakub to lead them here but continued to follow him as he nudged her camel down the paved road.

“Don’t worry,” Jakub said, which made Ako worry even more. He smiled, and Ako shivered in dread that was not entirely feigned. “Nothing will go wrong.”

Ako didn’t bother gracing that comment with a reply. She shook her head, ignoring Jakub as she followed his lead deeper into Esai.

What followed was a comfortable silence as they made their way to wherever Jakub was leading. Ako looked through the city, no longer harried and having to worry about being cut off from Jakub due to the massive crowd. The crowds were still big, but with Jakub riding her camel, they made their own path through the crowds.

The second thing that Ako noticed was that it smelled different. When she had first entered Esai she had wrinkled her nose in disgust but quickly forgotten about it. She had been in the desert for over a week, after all, so who was she to think that people smelled?

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But now in the richer part of Esai, and Ako was wrinkling her nose again. Her stomach was curdling, and within a few minutes she was almost dry heaving.

“Ako? What’s wrong?” Jakub asked, looking and sounding worried.

“Their perfume,” Ako gasped, nearly choking down her spit from the smell. A woman wearing more pink silk than she had ever seen in her life heard her and frowned. She raised her nose in the air, huffing and walking away from her at a quickened pace.

“I cannot take it for much longer,” Ako said, trying her best to keep the bile down. “It is rank.”

Jakub roared with laughter, which made the rest of the people near them edge away. They turned a corner to see more of Esai’s royal guard riding down the road, but Jakub was laughing so hard the only thing he could do was shield his face with his arm as he wheezed.

“Are you all right, sir?” A royal guard asked, riding up to Jakub. Jakub was still laughing and couldn’t respond, so the guard turned his attention to Ako. “Is your grandfather alright?”

“He is fine,” Ako said. She nodded to Jakub, who was now calming down. “He is just simple-minded. Mother told me to take care of him as he likes to make a nuisance of himself.”

The guard smiled, and Ako found herself smiling back. She ignored Jakub’s glare as the old man echoed Ako’s description even as he laughed, beginning to smile like a simpleton. Ako turned her attention back to the handsome guard. He looked extremely sympathetic and had blindingly white teeth. “Try to keep him calm, if you will.”

“I will do my best,” Ako said, shrugging. “You know how the elderly are. They take care of us, and then they have to make enough trouble, so we must take care of them.”

The guard laughed, along with a few of his contemporaries that had ridden up as well. One older guard with a white handlebar moustache wasn’t laughing, peering at Jakub with some suspicion.

“What is your name?” the guard demanded, his hand resting on his sword. Curiously, he was white and an officer, a rarity in the Huzha Desert where most were varying shades of brown and black. “You seem familiar.”

“Grandfather?” Ako asked, straining to keep her voice mild. She was both inwardly amused at Jakub—who was now struggling to hold onto his simple smile—and terrified that the old fool had to start laughing so hard at her honest complaint! “He has come to Esai more than once before. Perhaps he has made a nuisance of himself there as well?”

“Hmph,” the guard said, nodding and taking his hand off his sword, thankfully buying Ako’s explanation as Jakub continued smiling like an idiot. So, his regular smile then, Ako thought with some irritation. “I can believe that,” the officer said. “Keep a tight hold on him, and there won’t be any problems.”

“I will do my best,” Ako said solemnly.

“Noam save the Empress,” she added when the officer didn’t move, remembering what Jakub told her about the ruler of Esai. At this, the officer nodded, echoing her words with a fist on his chest and waving the other guards back into line. The handsome one smiled at her again, and Ako smiled back as the procession slowly trotted away down the street.

“I’ll get you for that,” Jakub said with a scowl, his voice full of promise as the guards vanished around the corner. “You almost got us killed.”

“First, I almost got us killed? And later,” Ako said, waving him off. “You were leading us somewhere, remember?”

Jakub’s lips trembled, and he almost cracked up again at that before he visibly forced himself back to sobriety. “Yes, we were before you almost pushed me over the edge,” Jakub said lowly, almost muttering. “Calling other people out for their rank perfume. Very bold of you when you haven’t had to smell yourself.”

“What did you say?” Ako said before stealthily taking a sniff of her own armpit and almost coughing at the horrible smell. Maybe I should not cast stones without checking myself out first.

“Nothing,” Jakub said hurriedly, turning his camel to face a vendor who was chortling. He was fat, had three chins that wobbled as he chuckled, and was almost as old as Jakub. “We’re here,” Jakub said.

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” Ako said, walking over to the vendor. “Do you know who Jakub is?”

“Know him?” the vendor asked, still chuckling. He was wearing fine silks of varying colors that were stained with sweat. He pulled a paper fan out of his pocket to fan himself. “I’m the one who got him out of this city when the entire Royal Guard was after him!” Ako looked around nervously as the vendor admitted to aiding and abetting Jakub in breaking the law. With no guards around them any longer, the crowd passed by them seemingly without a care in the world.

The vendor pointed a stubby finger at Jakub. “Jakub, you old dog! It’s been twenty years, and you still owe me for that!”

Jakub said nothing, getting off the camel and walking over to the vendor. He passed the reins over to Ako.

“Lloyd, my friend,” Jakub said, finally smiling as he walked around the counter to give the vendor a hug, who returned it boisterously. “I’ve been away for too long.”

“You still came back too soon,” Lloyd said. He brushed a hand through his own almost-bald head. “You were almost caught there. I almost didn’t recognize you! Your laugh is still the same. Like a hyena!” Lloyd laughed, doing his best impression of a wheezing horse. “You must be truly desperate to come back to Esai.”

“I was beaten within an inch of my life and left for dead,” Jakub said, bowing his head. He placed a hand on Ako’s shoulder. “Ako found me and nursed me back to health.”

Lloyd cocked his head questioningly. “Isn’t she a little too young for you, Jakub?”

Ako couldn’t stop herself from making a face, making both Lloyd and Jakub laugh. “I joke, I joke!” Lloyd said, abruptly sobering. “What do the both of you need from me, Jakub?”

“I need a way to get to Ghada and then to Velaire by ship,” Jakub said.

“Tricky,” Lloyd said, running a hand over his smooth face. “Tricky. And you don’t have any money, either.”

“Nope,” Jakub said. “Not a penny between Ako and I.”

“That does make this difficult,” Lloyd said, beginning to speak until he paused. A smile began to worm its way across his face.

“No,” Jakub said immediately. “I refuse.”

“Now you know what it feels like,” Ako said, which both men ignored in favor of staring at each other.

“You don’t even know what I was about to ask!” Lloyd said. He began to pout, which looked disturbing on the old man.

“I know you will get me in trouble,” Jakub countered. “Besides, I have to set the standard for Ako here.”

“You have standards?” Ako asked before she could stop herself.

Lloyd chortled again. “I can see why you like her,” he said. “Now shut up and listen, Jakub. You do this one tiny thing for me, and you will be given food, supplies, and enough gold to see you and Ako to Velaire.”

“I’m listening,” Jakub said cautiously.

Noam, please protect us from their idiocy, Ako prayed as Lloyd started to outline what he wanted Jakub and Ako to do. Save me from these two idiots.

Noam didn’t respond. Ako was forced to watch as Jakub agreed to get the object that Lloyd wanted from the Empress.