"Come on," Teleu said flatly, shouldering his pack. "We need to move. Where there are three, there are usually more."
The princess hurried after him without argument this time, her earlier stubbornness replaced by numb compliance.
They walked in tense silence, Teleu setting a brutal pace through the densest parts of the forest. He avoided game trails and kept to terrain that would be difficult to track.
An hour later, he stopped suddenly.
The princess nearly collided with him before she saw what he was looking at—a tree trunk with herbs arranged beneath it in a way that seemed almost natural.
Almost.
Teleu's instincts were screaming at him. He picked up a dead branch and stabbed at the herb pile several times before using the stick to move the vegetation aside.
Three more bodies lay beneath.
These wore the same black kente clothes as the mercenaries he'd just killed, with red paint across their faces. But they'd been dead longer—at least a day, maybe more. The wounds were different too. More desperate. More brutal.
One had seven bleeding orifices, blood coagulated between them. The sight suggested poison or some kind of internal damage technique.
The princess made a choking sound behind him. He turned to see her face transform—shock giving way to desperate hope.
"He's still alive," she whispered, then louder: "He made it! He's still alive!"
She sobbed with relief, repeating it like a prayer, her composure completely shattered.
Teleu watched this display with growing understanding. These three were part of the group that had been hunting her. Which meant someone else—someone "he"—had killed them.
Her guard. Had to be.
"Were they after you too?" Teleu asked, his voice cutting through her sobs.
The princess clenched her fists, trying to compose herself. When she realized he was watching her breakdown with that same cold, evaluating look, embarrassment crept across her face.
"Yes," she finally managed, her voice hoarse. "They were after me too. My guard... Dakare... he stayed behind to fight them. I thought... I thought they killed him. But if these three are dead, that means..."
"That means he's still alive and fighting," Teleu finished. He studied the bodies again. "And he's good. Three professional killers don't die easy."
Hope blazed in her eyes. "Then we have to find him! He could be—"
"No."
The flat refusal stopped her mid-sentence.
"If your guard is as skilled as these corpses suggest, he doesn't need our help. And if he's already dead, we'd be walking into a trap." Teleu turned away from the bodies. "We continue as planned."
"But—"
"Six assassins for one target means this is a coordinated contract with serious backing. Your guard staying behind was smart—it split their forces. But it also means the survivors will be regrouping, and they'll be looking for you specifically." His eyes were hard. "Do you want his sacrifice to mean something, or do you want to throw yourself back into their hands?"
The princess's face crumbled, but she nodded reluctantly.
"Good. Now tell me—where were you trying to go when this started?"
"I... I need to get to the Gold Land. I need to get home."
"Gold Land." Teleu considered this. "That's where I'm headed anyway. We can travel together until we reach the border. After that, you're on your own."
"Thank you," she whispered. "My name is—"
"Don't." Teleu held up a hand. "No names. Names create obligations. For now, you're just someone who needs to get to Gold Land, and I'm just someone going in the same direction."
She looked like she wanted to argue, but thought better of it.
"Keep up," Teleu said, already walking. "I won't wait if you fall behind."
As they disappeared into the deeper forest, neither noticed the raven perched on a high branch, its black eyes tracking their movement with unnatural intelligence.
Some ravens, it was whispered, served masters who paid in more than grain.
Hundreds of miles away, in a garden kissed by the western sun's rays, five women sat before a massive wooden lion sculpture made of intricate beadwork.
The garden was a riot of colors—flowers of every hue spread across carefully tended beds, their varied scents mingling in the warm air. Kaleidoscopes of light danced through the space as sunlight filtered through the trees and reflected off strategically placed mirrors and water features.
It was beautiful. Peaceful.
And yet, tension hung thick in the air.
"It has begun," said an elderly woman dressed in colorful Ndop clothes. A rope of sapphires gleamed around her brown neck, and her wrinkled face held an expression of profound knowledge—the kind that came from seeing truths others couldn't perceive.
Grand Sage Ajna held a rose to her nose, seemingly lost in deep reverie. But her tiny eyes held secrets that would make kingdoms tremble.
The four other women—younger, dressed in the finest clothes of noble houses—turned to her with confused expressions. They'd been admiring the scenery when the Grand Sage spoke, and her words had the quality of pronouncement rather than conversation.
"What do you mean by 'the great choice,' Grand Sage Ajna?" they asked in unison, their voices carrying notes of nervousness and curiosity.
Ajna smiled faintly—that knowing, mysterious smile of someone who has glimpsed the threads of fate themselves and found them both tragic and beautiful.
"The pieces move across the board," she said softly, her eyes still closed. "The heir who runs from shadows in his own house. The princess who flees from knives in the darkness. The kingdoms that sharpen their swords while speaking of peace. The conspirators who plant seeds of war in gardens of trust."
She inhaled deeply from the rose, her expression serene despite the weight of her words.
"And in the center of it all... a choice that will reshape Nubia forever. A choice between the path of honor and the path of survival. Between the crown and the grave. Between love and duty."
The other women exchanged nervous glances, uncertain whether to press for clarification or accept the cryptic pronouncement.
One of them, braver than the others, leaned forward. "Grand Sage, whose choice? Who stands at this crossroads?"
Ajna's eyes opened slowly, and for just a moment, the four younger women could have sworn they saw flames dancing in those ancient pupils—the fire of prophecy, burning with truths yet to unfold.
"All of them," the sage whispered. "And none of them. The great choice belongs to Nubia herself. Will she drown in blood, or will she find a path to something new?"
Her eyes closed again, and the moment of revelation passed.
The four women sat in stunned silence, the beauty of the garden suddenly feeling fragile—like a paradise balanced on the edge of a sword, waiting for the slightest breeze to tip it into chaos.
Grand Sage Ajna said nothing more. She simply sat there in the dappled sunlight, surrounded by flowers and the scent of roses, that mysterious smile playing at her lips.
The great choice had begun indeed.
And blood would water the gardens of Nubia before the answer was known.