“Behold Cato, our new lord!” cried the shepherd. “Bow before him and beg forgiveness, all you unfaithful villeins, lest you feel his wrath!”

Over a hundred villagers had gathered in the square to watch this scene. The yeoman Remiro stood atop an empty pedestal, looking down on the proceedings like an ill-tempered judge. A pair of shepherds had their arms to the sky and raised their voices like preachers, demanding the people give their obedience to a new master.

Nobody knew quite what to think, least of all their new lord, Cato Rehm.

“You moronic lout! If I don’t whip you bloody, my name isn’t Remiro d’Cour!”

Remiro stepped down from the pedestal, unwinding a loop of heavy, knotted rope tied around his waist.

Inna shouted back “Just try it you bastard, our lord is stronger than you could ever imagine!”

No, no he wasn’t, Cato thought. He desperately wished people would stop putting words in his mouth.

Remiro waved the knotted rope through the air like a whip. Cato felt a thrum of power in the air, like the spells the shepherds had used earlier that day, but much more dense and focused. The whip arced through the air and slammed down on the ground with a deafening crack. The tiled stone shattered, the fractures stopping just shy of the shepherd’s feet.

“Get on the ground and make amends for your offense,” Remiro spoke softly, “and I’ll let you walk out on your own two feet.”

Myshkin took a step forward, his shoes crunching on the pulverized stone. He didn’t even speak to Remiro. He just turned toward Cato with a wide smile.

“See, my lord? I won’t let anyone dirty your good name.”

He closed his eyes.

Remiro raised the whip, trained on the shepherd’s defenseless body.

In a split instant, Cato was overwhelmed by emotions. Shock and confusion were chief among them, but so was… love. Concern.

In his old life, Cato used to take care of a stray cat in his neighborhood. It was always dirty, mangy, and refused to get too close to anyone. He put out food for it and watched it from around the corner. It ran away whenever it got close, but it slowly got more comfortable around him. By the end, it let him get within a few feet without running.

The next day, Cato saw it get run over by a speeding car.

For what it’s worth, he loved that cat. He’d wanted to protect it, and he’d failed.

Strange as it was, he felt the same emotions for a couple people he’d just met a few hours earlier.

So he stepped in front of the whip. Pain blossomed across his chest and right leg. He felt fractures spread across his ribs. But he didn’t stop. With all the energy in his strong, new body he took Remiro by the wrist and squeezed.

An audible grinding filled the square, and the same crowd that was salivating at the sight of a whipping recoiled in sympathetic pain. Remiro cried out pathetically and dropped the whip.

And so did Cato.

Agony much worse than the crack of the whip erupted in his left wrist, the same place he had hurt Remiro. It took all his willpower not to bend over and scream. He threw the yeoman back and pulled his dagger with his good hand.

Remiro snarled, reached for the fallen whip… and froze, pale. Like Inna and Myshkin earlier that day, he fell to the ground and begged forgiveness.

The crowd broke into confused squabbling and murmuring. Then, some others noticed the same thing as Remiro.

“House Gulphay!”

It was his dagger, bearing the twin lions on its crossguard, the same symbol which made Inna and Myshkin so obedient. The villagers pointed, gasped, and backed away. Most joined Remiro in bowing.

Inna and Myshkin didn’t.

Inna clambered up to the pedestal and addressed the gathered villagers, arms high like a victorious athlete. “The truth was in front of you, but you couldn’t see! Our lord, who swore before Heaven itself, to protect us all and deliver us from harm, has rescued me from the oppressor’s whip.”

Myshkin took hold of Cato and lifted him up, showing his broken, purpling wrist. Inna gestured toward him, “And yet, even this rotten bastard is one of us, and our lord took the same injury he dealt! He has sacrificed himself for the sake of one who would harm him, so how can you deny that he is our rightful lord?”

Cato struggled to listen to all of this through the blinding pain. Bit by bit, he gathered energy in his body and concentrated it in his wrist and the line of flame across his torso. It soothed him, and eventually his mind was clear enough to think.

He swore to protect them? That couldn’t be right, he didn’t remember doing any such thing. He didn't know how to.

Except…

Cato cast his mind back to his conversation with the shepherds. What were his exact words?

In the name of Heaven,

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

Oh, no.

I, Cato, guarantee

No, no, no

that no harm shall come to you or your people.

Those had been his exact words. An undeniable, intuitive truth rang in his mind.

Whatever the source of his body’s power, it was paying attention to what he said. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t meant it, didn’t understand it, and only meant to calm down a pair of crazy shepherds.

He had sworn before Heaven, whatever that meant, and it fully intended to hold him to his vow.

Worse, he hadn’t just made a promise, he had guaranteed it. If he broke his promise, he needed to pay a penalty.

And he had nothing to pay with but his body.

What he did to Remiro was done unto him. The whip marks had already closed up under his clothes, but his wrist had barely begun to heal.

But maybe…

Cato snapped himself out of his reverie. The pain was intense, but he could grit his teeth and press through, at least for now.

The villagers were all crowded around him, close enough to touch, but too afraid to lay a hand on him while he still grasped the dagger. Leaning on Myshkin, he stood up and peered over the crush.

“Remiro d’Cour, was it?”

He lifted his chin toward the yeoman, still nursing his own injury. He now seemed so pale and small, practically a ghost.

“Y-y-yes, my lord. Please, show me mercy.”

“Come here.”

He flinched. Cato spoke as gently as he could, given the pain, but even this command terrified the yeoman.

It was the third time that day, the third time since arriving in a new world, that Cato saw someone be afraid of him.

He was sick and tired of it already.

He pushed off Myshkin and stumbled toward Remiro, then knelt down to eye level. The poor man trembled, but was resigned to whatever Cato would do.

He gathered energy in his fingertips and pressed them gingerly to Remiro’s wound. With a subtle push, it entered and mingled with the other man’s energy.

It felt… simple. Right. It barely felt different from when Cato was healing his own injuries by the river.

And though he wasn’t concentrating there at all, his own wrist mended as well. Relief washed over Remiro’s face, and after a few minutes of stunned silence, He stood and raised his arm, as whole and healthy as it had ever been.

“Healing hands!”

“The hands of a king!”

The villagers broke out into a frenzied excitement. Only Remiro, Inna, and Myshkin’s efforts kept them from mobbing and crushing him by pure accident.

Instead, they lifted him up, and, passing him from person to person like a crowd surfer, brought him to a tall-backed cushioned chair precariously balanced on a pile of furniture at the edge of the square.

Then they backed away to a respectable distance, and pushed Remiro to the front. To his credit, he regained his poise quite quickly, and settled into a well-practiced routine as intermediary between villagers and their lord.

“By my word and troth, I have witnessed this man protect the innocent and heal the injured. Who else had witnessed this?”

A great and powerful “Aye!” Erupted from the crowd, with Inna and Myshkin doing their utmost to be heard above the din.

Remiro reached under his tunic and pulled out an amulet. It was a disk of bronze inscribed with astrological symbols upon a red thread, and the villagers gasped when it was brought out.

“In our time of need, God has delivered to Inillo a worker of miracles, a living saint who has twined his fortunes with our own. Upon the Oracle of Inillo, I swear this oath, to defend and obey my lord, Cato of Gulphay. Will you join me?”

“Aye! Aye! Aye!”

⚜ ⚜ ⚜

“Aye! Aye! Aye!”

The cheer went up in the drinking hall of the Keeper of the Way, Light of the Faithful, Desolator of His Enemies, the Sultan of Abyssinia. Four long tables of polished marble bore a hearty victory feast, and his invincible force, the Four Thousand Immortals, ate and drank as they pleased.

The sultan himself was more subdued in demeanor, content to watch his men enjoy their well-earned reward.

To the sultan’s left lounged his wife, the high priestess and astrologer Jullanar, immersed in the music of harps and flutes.

To his left, steadfastly refusing the ever-increasing portions piled onto his plate, sat his prize captive, Prince Maximilian of Gulphay.

“Come now, my good prince,” the sultan purred in a luscious and molasses-dark voice, speaking fluent classical Achaean. “Eat. Drink. Enjoy yourself. I have entertained many guests, but few have had the honor of being seated at my side.”

He waved his hand, and servants brought another tray, this one covered with barbecued golden aurochs ribs. The sultan took a dainty portion and pushed the rest toward his guest.

The prince muttered through gritted teeth. “I thank you for your hospitality, your Puissance, but I’m afraid I lost my appetite on the journey over.”

The previous night he had seen his men butchered, his family kidnapped, his home and city burned, and he himself had been taken captive by an enemy ruler. Suffice to say, he was in no mood to enjoy the celebration of his own defeat.

“That is a shame.”

The sultan stood and clapped once. Immediately, the Four Thousand paused their revelry and looked toward their master.

Sayih, the first of the Immortals, came to the sultan’s side. “Keeper of the Way, what is your order?”

“To my great shame, our guest is not enjoying the festivities.”

A murmur rumbled through the feasting hall, rolling like a wave in deep water.

“So long as our guest does not enjoy himself, neither shall any man here. Take to your spears and steeds-”

The prince shot up and his fist hit the table with a small, impotent-sounding tap. “What are you planning?”

“My good prince, my men and I have just returned home from the rigors of war and wanted to enjoy the fruits of peace. But it is impossible to relax when there is an unsatisfied guest in my house. If I cannot fill your days with enjoyment and relaxation, then I will punish myself with days of battle.”

The sultan stood and produced from under his robes a key of shimmering adamant. Maximilian of Gulphay cursed himself. He knew the Abyssinians must have possessed some outrageous means of striking the Holy City without warning and returning to their planet in less than a day. He even suspected this was the work of an ancient artifact, but he had not been pessimistic enough to think the sultan possessed the Key of the Lucid Gate.

Before his very eyes, the sultan turned the key in the air and a door opened. At first it was only as tall as a man, but it grew to the height and width of the feasting hall. Beyond, he saw the familiar red-and-blue globe, his home, the planet Fleur.

The Four Thousand Immortals picked up their weapons without objection and servants rushed in carrying their armor and steeds. The fiery hooves of stallions formed from the most rarefied flame burned into the floor, winged lions flew in and hung from the walls, even a colossal war elephant squeezed in through the colossal doors and deftly navigated between tables.

The sultan looked back at him with a pitying expression. The prince hung his head, sat back down, and started shoving the most delicious food of his life down his throat.