The grey walls of the capital city, Kasin, towered so high overhead Lukas had to strain his neck back to see the sky above. It wasn’t his first visit to the capital, but still, he couldn’t help himself from staring in awe. At least this time he remembered his etiquette lessons enough not to have his mouth open as he stared…

“-everything seems to be in order, then. Welcome to the capital, my lords,” an armour-clad guard said with a low bow. The portcullis, with the harsh, grating ring of chain on stone began to raise, the spiked bottom of the metal cage-like door raising high enough to allow their cart through.

“Whew, that was more of a hassle than it needed to be. What’s with the paperwork, huh? Gate wasn’t closed last time, either…” Adlet muttered as he got back to the others, Sarian right at his heels.

“I’m quite certain they have their reasons, Adlet,” Sarian answered as the four brothers now stood around each other at the door of the carriage.

“We’re free to enter now, that’s all I care about,” Adrian pitched in, rubbing the back of his neck. “I could use a real bed for once.”

“I’m quite certain the palace will have those as well,” Sarian said, a note of exhaustion creeping into his voice. It couldn’t have been easy for him, dealing with three of his younger brothers over two weeks of straight travel.

“Say, a proper bed! Doesn’t that sound positively grand right now. Alright kids, back in the carriage, let's get moving again so I can lay down, please?” Adlet said, ushering his younger brothers up the step to the carriage interior.

Lukas shot him a glare, but pulled his gaze away from the walls and portcullis to be the first up the step.

Surrounded once again by the familiar, deep red interior of the carriage, his elder brothers filed in after him and with a wave out the window, began moving again.

The windows were lightly frosted, just enough that they were hard to see through at night or from a distance. But now, in the midday sun and with the curtains fully opened, the sights of Kasin held his wide eyed attention.

The beginning of the city was almost nothing but guards. Barracks and stables, walled off training grounds and the entryways to towers… at first glance, they had entered not the capital city of Arkasia but a military fort large enough to call a city. As they rolled through, many guards and soldiers turned to watch them pass, eyes drawn by the extravagance of the carriage. But several minutes later, it all changed. A second wall, much smaller and made of a smoother, whitish stone, stretched upwards, this time with an already opened portcullis. The carriage passed through without slowing, and they entered the city proper.

If the sights before had been awe inspiring, the interior of the city was more so. The buildings, even this far out from the center of the city, were already at least four stories tall. Made almost entirely of stone, ancient and towering on all sides. Each was covered in staircases, walkways and bridges, some clearly built with the original construction and others of rickety wood that had been added later. It was a three dimensional jungle, the vertical maze almost dizzying to look at.

“Been a while since we’ve been here, eh Sarian?” Adlet said, leaning back with a smile. “Remember our last visit to Aunt Vanessa, when we were kids? Those were the days…”

Sarian ignored him, though his lips pursed slightly as he stared calmly out the window.

“What happened?” Adrian asked curiously, looking at both older brothers expectantly. Even Lukas perked his ears up a bit… it wasn’t often he got to hear about Sarian in his younger years.

“Well, we were about your age at the time, Adrian. See, we were making our way into the city, and our esteemed eldest brother here smelled a bakery as we passed by, and you could hear the grumblings in his belly from halfway down the block.”

Stolen novel; please report.

“...Adlet,” Sarian warned in a low voice.

“So of course,” Adlet continued, his permanent grin growing into a smirk. “Sarian and I decide, ‘oh, we have some coin with us, let’s just go get some!’ The only problem was, it was after dark by that point, and we had been forbidden to leave the manor.”

“...Adlet.”

“So what did you do?” Adrian asked, leaning forwards.

“Well, as is custom in our family when you want something, we ignored all authority and went for it behind Father’s back,” Adlet said with a nod, as if it was only natural.

“Oh, would you look at that, something other than Adlet running his mouth,” Sarian interrupted loudly, pointing out the window.

Hearing their eldest brother raise his voice even a little caught Lukas and Adrian’s attention, and they both strained instantly to see out the window.

On the right side of the carriage, a clearing of sorts could be seen. The cobblestone road opened into a large, roughly circular courtyard, shops of all sorts ringing the circumference. The interior though, was what caught their eye.

Kasin, as a city, prided itself on its regality. The home of more nobles than anywhere else in the known world, and more wealth than most of the rest of it put together, Kasin was the towering symbol of Arkasia’s absolute dominion over the world. But what they saw in that clearing was nothing like they had expected from the tidy, if confusing, streets of Kasin.

Spread from wall to wall in the courtyard was a sea of people, dirty, destitute and bedraggled as any beggar off the streets. It was such a contradiction to everything Kasin typically was that it was shocking to the brothers to see.

“...what in the world is this?” Adlet muttered in a rare show of seriousness.

A few of the people in the crowd noticed the carriage rolling by, and began chatting amongst themselves. Before the brothers even knew what had happened, masses from the crowd began swarming forwards, closing in on the carriage.

Now that they were closer, it was even more confusing than before. The crowd was dirtier than they had seemed at first, many wearing little more than rags with thin, bony limbs poking out from underneath. For all intents and purposes, it was an entire crowd of beggars, congregated into a single courtyard.

“I’m not sure,” Sarian said, brow furrowed. It seemed he hadn’t realised what he had been looking at when he pointed it out. “ However, it doesn’t seem to be anything good.”

As they drew closer, Lukas could hear the voice of the crowd rising in volume, from a dull, distant chatter to a low roar as they crept as close as they dared. There was shouting and pushing soon, the crowd holding empty hands out towards the carriage with desperate pleading apparent in their stance.

Lukas swallowed, hand slowly drawing out his coin purse, feeling the light clinking within. He took out all that he had in the bag and counted it… four small gold coins with the Arkasian Empyreon’s symbol engraved on them, and another ten pieces of silver. He carried with him no copper pieces.

A larger hand closed over his, gently pressing his fingers closed until the coins were held in a closed fist.

“Don’t,” Adlet said, not looking at Lukas but watching out the window intently. “Whichever one you give those to, the others will kill to take it from.”

Lukas put the coins back away, trying and failing to push down a growing sense of guilt.

Now that the crowd had moved, the brothers could see past them, to the center of the clearing. Tents of all sorts had been raised in the middle, from proper travelling tents to simple sticks holding a tattered tarp a few feet above the ground.

“Are they sleeping out there?” Lukas asked incredulously.

“No, I’m sure the tents are just there for decoration. What do you think, lil’ Lu?” Adlet replied, though he lacked the typical mocking tone in his voice.

There was silence in the carriage then, as the crowd began to disappear behind them. None of them said much at all, each of them lost in their own thoughts as the city grew up around them, the buildings becoming taller and wider as they went.

Lukas, for the first time on the two week journey, pulled the curtain closed over his window. Try as he might, he couldn’t seem to forget the sight of all those eyes staring at him, hands raised in pleading. He didn’t know what he was supposed to do with it, the countless faces asking him a question he had no answer to. He did however, know one thing for sure.

Something was terribly, terribly wrong in the capital.