Georges stared. One of the teenage boys had just pushed another one of them out of the way of Khilliarkos’s blade and taken a cut to the face in his stead. It had been a heroic act of self-sacrifice which had taken them all by surprise. Even Khilliarkos seemed stunned.

Somewhere deep, deep down inside himself George heard himself thinking, Wow. That was so brave. He sacrificed his own safety to save his friend. And he’s just a boy. Like I am. Or, no, like I was, once...

Then, breaking the silence, the Larakian woman said to her companions “A scar on the right cheek!”

There was a brief pause while Georges and the other Shulties took this in. When they realised what she meant, they all leapt at the boy with the cut on his face. Georges’ dragon-nature took over again and he joined them. Khilliarkos was closest and jumped at the boy with a bloodthirsty scream, bringing the Larakian’s sword down again to finish the job it had started.

But the Shulites’ hesitation meant that this time the Larakians had got there first. All at once the woman was in front of Khilliarkos grabbing onto his sword arm and wrestling with him to retrieve her weapon, the old man was whirling his staff around his head sending Georges’ comrades flying in different directions, and the girl was before him again, dancing to and fro, repelling the sweep of his scythe.

Before long he and the other Shulties were all on the ground once more, tripped, knocked over or pushed back by the mysterious power that seemed to emanate from the Larakians. The three of them stood around the boy, weapons up to defend him. Georges fumed at them with hatred. Though, at the same time, he felt a strange pang of jealousy towards them, and towards the boy that they had just rescued. He listened intently to every word that they exchanged in the short time they had while he and his comrades regathered themselves.

“We have found him,” said the Larakian woman. “We must leave here now as quickly as possible. Since the Shulites have failed, they will flee back to Nachash.” Now she spoke to the boy. “Young man, you do not belong here.”

“Well, I know that!” said the boy, clutching his face, visibly trembling.

“Indeed. You are a prince of Larakia. We must get you away from these foul assailants—we will take you there now. You will be looked after there.”

“Do not listen to them, Jake!” These words came from the woman with dark hair who carried two long knives, whom Georges recognised to be one of their Shulite operatives in Ubal. As she staggered to her feet from where the old man’s staff had laid her out on the ground, she spoke to the boy in an urgent, imploring voice. Almost as if she cared for him. “These people want to kidnap you and force you to join their strange little cult! Come home with me, and I will make sure that you are looked after properly.”

The boy looked back and forth between the two women who were offering different things to him. Blood was trickling down his cheek and neck. He looked genuinely unsure about what to do. Why was he hesitating? The decision to make was obvious, George thought.

“Why don’t we just take him and run?” said the girl Larakian, which probably didn’t help their case.

“No, no,” said the woman Larakian. “We cannot force him to come with us. He must choose to come with us of his own accord.”

The woman was only a couple of paces away from the boy, standing with her hand stretched out to him, palm open, ready to be taken.

Georges just about managed to wrench himself up onto his feet again.

The Shulite operative lady was back on her feet now. “That’s nonsense!” she said. “Nonsense, Jake! You’re not a prince! You’re a king! A king among men! Come with me and I’ll make sure you’re treated like a king!”

The boy didn’t say anything. Everyone watched to see what he would do.

Eventually he said to the Larakian woman “I don’t know who you are, but you’ve been kind to me and protected me from these black soldiers. Thanks.”

The Larakian woman sighed with what sounded like relief.

Then the boy turned to the Shulite lady, and his eyes seemed to go glassy. “But Methistema has promised to take me in and give me food and board, and look after me. She is more than kind.”

The Larakian woman gasped. “We will give you much more than food and board,” she said, her voice climbing a semitone. “We can show you a hope and a future, a meaning and a purpose; we can lead you to your true identity and destiny.”

“Lies!” said the Shulite, Methistema. “They want to capture you and make you just like them! They take in children and deceive them, brainwashing their minds until they have no free thought of their own!”

The boy looked back and forth between the two women. Some sort of battle was going on behind his eyes.

Then, after what seemed like an age, he slowly started walking towards the Shulite lady.

“Yes!” said the woman. “You have chosen so well, my boy!”

She moved forwards to meet him and from his vantage point behind her Georges saw her reach down to the back of her belt to draw out another small, concealed knife.

“Chosen so well,” said Methistema, “let me embrace you...with your death!”

George threw his scythe. It turned blade-over-end in the air and struck the Shulite lady, by chance with the butt of its wooden end, on the back of her head. Before she managed to plunge her drawn knife into the boy, she collapsed forwards onto the ground, knocked unconscious.

“GEORGES, YOU PETULANT VERMIN!” Khillarkos was shouting at him from a number of metres away. He was still trying to get to his feet, apparently still struggling with the wound in his shoulder and from the latest beating he had received. “WE ALMOST HAD HIM! YOU FILTHY TRAITOR! I WILL KILL YOU MYSELF FOR THIS INSUBORDINATION!”

The other Shulite soldiers only looked at each other in confusion. They seemed to be losing. They were not ready for this. They did not know what to do.

“Thank you,” said the Larakian woman to Georges, surprise raising her eyebrows. She turned back to the boy. “Will you not now come with us, now that you have seen the wickedness of these people? A place is waiting for you in the Kingdom of Larakia.”

The boy looked down at Mesthistema, at the knife on the ground. “Er...OK then?” he said slowly. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, but if it’ll get me away from these black soldiers and murdering liars, sure. Can my friends come too?”

“Anyone can come if they are willing. Everyone is invited.”

Not many of the other boys had stuck around to watch the fight. Of the ones that had, only To’phoro walked over to the Larakians.

“I’ll come with you,” he said, smiling at Jake. The others all ran off.

The woman nodded, then looked at Georges.

“You can come too, you know.”

Georges shook his head and looked at the floor, taking a step back. He was not sure what had come over him.

“Another time, perhaps,” said the woman Larakian. “Let us depart at once!”

The other Shulites had just about got back to their feet. They were not going to be able to stop the Larakians from getting away and they were no longer in a fit state to chase them. They had lost.

But then someone else spoke up.

“I’m not going.”

They all looked around to see who had said this.

The words had been spoken by one of the two Larakian girls. Georges could not tell if it was the one that he had captured on the flight to Ubal and who had been rescued by the Larakians, or the one that had helped do the rescuing. She stood a way apart from them all, completely still, showing no signs that she was going to join them in their escape.

The Larakians and the Shulites alike halted in their tracks. Something important was about to happen.

“Chloe, what do you mean?” said the lady Larakian. “Come quickly, it’s time to go!”

“I’m not Chloe, I’m Hannah!” said the girl. “And I’m not going with you, Katey. You heard me.”

“Sorry, my mistake. Please, Hannah, this isn’t a game! We’ve found the heir now; your mission has nearly been completed. It’s not safe here and we need to head back to Larakia! Come with us!”

“No.” Astonishingly, the girl, Hannah, now turned to Khilliarkos. “What can you offer me if I come over to your side willingly?”

“Hannah, please, what are you saying?” said the other young girl. “Don’t do this! Please!”

“If you come to us willingly,” said Khilliarkos, back on his feet at last, “and not as our prisoner, we can offer you more than you ever imagined: Power, protection, pleasure, beyond your wildest dreams. And you will be on the winning side in this war, the side with the true power and authority!” He licked his lips.

“Then I will stay with you.”

“Hannah! No!” cried the other girl.

Hannah turned on her for a moment. “Shut up, Chloe! We’ve been in this place for a long time now, but did you ever stop to think that Katey and Hotzeh might be fighting for the wrong side? They weren’t powerful enough to protect me from being captured by these soldiers, after all. And who ever gave them permission to come into this town and kidnap this boy in the first place? The ‘One True King’? Maybe he isn’t really the ‘One True King’ at all! Maybe he doesn’t even exist! The Shulites are stronger. The Shulites are better. They have more to offer.” She turned back to Khilliarkos. “I’m going with them.”

“Hahahahaha!” Khilliarkos exalted, his laughter coming out in shrill cracks from the depths of his chest like wisps of smoke from a ravine. “Yes! You have chosen well, daughter of Echthros!” He signalled to two of his soldiers. “You two! Take her to Shul, now!”

Two of the Shulites walked over to Hannah and took an arm each. She put them out willingly, allowing them to pick her up. She closed her eyes and they lifted her up to fly away with her.

“Goodbye, Chloe,” said Hannah. “Maybe I’ll see you again one day. Or maybe I won’t.”

The Shulites took off.

“NO!” screamed the other girl, Chloe.

“Hannah, please, don’t!” shouted the man and woman Larakian.

There was nothing they could do. She had gone entirely of her own choice.

“NOW KILL THEM!” Khilliarkos thundered. The collective shock rippling through the Larakians gave the Shulties just the opening they needed to relaunch their attack. Apparently re-energised by this change in fortune, he started to transform into his dragon shape. Georges heard the sounds of the Commander’s bones twisting and snapping and lengthening. Normally, Georges knew, he would not have risked showing this form openly in Dahma, preferring for them all to remain in the shadows, hidden, undetected by the wider public. But he was desperate now, so he was gambling everything. The Larakians had the heir, but they were within his grasp and vulnerable from surprise after their hesitation over the girl’s betrayal. So near and yet so far.

Georges joined the battle once more and found himself making for the Larakian woman. He locked his scythe with her sword. Behind them, Khilliarkos writhed and moaned as he underwent his transformation.

Over their weapons, the Larakian woman looked Georges right in the eyes,

“I can still see something more in you,” she said. “I can see something else.”

Despite his hatred, despite the dragon nature which had taken over again, Georges hesitated. The dragon in him, the dragon that drew its strength from whatever power was turning Khilliarkos into a dragon right now, wanted to tell her that what she saw in him was her death. But something inside him had stirred. Himself. His self. His true self.

“What do you see?” Georges asked.

“I see a young man, scared, confused and enslaved to powers he never really wanted to give himself over to. I see a royal child of the One True King. I see a prince.”

Georges could almost not believe what he was hearing. But he did. The woman’s words struck deep, deeper than her steel sword could ever pierce, and hit something buried under layers and layers of hatred and bitterness. They carried an authority that was not hers alone.

“Do you want to be free?” said the woman.

Georges wrestled with his thought “How can I be free?” he heard himself asking.

The woman reached around his scythe and placed a hand on Georges’ helmet. He let her do it.

“Come out of him, power of Shul!” the woman commanded.

The woman pulled off Georges’ helmet and his vision was flooded by light. He shook and cried out as he felt something leave him; it was if something was being sucked out of his mouth, or fleeing through it. His skin rippled and quivered. His jaw contracted and realigned itself to its old shape. Strangest of all, he felt the wings on his back retracting back into it and disappearing until he could no longer sense them there. He looked at his armour, which transfigured from jet black to reflective silver. He looked down at his hands, which changed from scaly black to human pink. He looked up at the woman.

He was free.

“What is your name, child?” said the woman.

“George,” said George.

“Arise, Prince George! You are no longer a servant of death—now you will be called a reaper for the Kingdom of Larakia!”