Was this captivating fruit the height of human achievement? Was this the pinnacle? It certainly feels like it. He savoured the bite, swishing the juices in and out between his teeth and over and under his tongue. He couldn’t get over how delicious it tasted, like every fruit he had ever eaten at the perfect ripeness and sweetness. All the flavours melded together in perfect harmony. Fruit juice on steroids, that’s what it was. That was just the first bite.

The second bite was just as delicious, yet the flavours were different, just not any less enticing. And each subsequent bite was the same. It never got old or bland or tiring, and it was constantly new and delicious flavours washing over the tongue.

He was halfway through when someone snatched it from him while he was distracted by the incredible taste. Someone stole from him, in broad daylight and in Brewyn! Supposedly the safest place in the country! Growling, he gave chase, but he was nowhere near fast enough to catch up with the pickpocket. “I’m going to get you!” He kept running even though the fiend was getting out of sight. He could tell it was a child of some sort, and typically, he would have let it go, but that fruit was something else. It was not willing to share. “Come back here, you little!” He kept yelling after the kid as he gave chase.

“Everything alright?” One of the other vendors shifted his gaze between the crowd at the fruit and veg shop and Aarav. No one seemed to have seen the snatch and run incident.

Not wanting to escalate the situation, he shook his head. “No, nothing, just some kid rushed past me and almost knocked me over. They should watch where they go.” He knew he sounded like a grouchy old man, but that was the way of it.

“Oh, yes, they do like to run, but if they can’t do it outside, where would they do it!?” The man said, “But they should watch for others, most adults would have just shrugged it off, but they should be careful or our smaller visitors!” The man’s sincerity was lovely and eased Aarav’s annoyance a little. Still, he had been pick-pocketed. Thinking quickly, he reached into his pocket and found all the coins still there. He knew precisely how many coins he had been given by Haemish, and there were all there. Whew! Getting ripped off is not the same level of embarrassment as getting robbed, especially when you spent the whole of your previous life doing the same to idiots.

Nodding one more time to the vendor, his shop held clothing items, Aarav went on his way. He could circle back to that shop later. He might not need to buy clothes, but textures were always nice to acquire. He would have to get a spatial pouch with various surfaces. I’m thinking like a colour wheel, but with textures instead of colours! Since he was limited to ten, it would be a good way around it. Could he do the same for smell as well? Of course, he could, and he would, eventually.

Anyway, those thoughts could wait until later. Aarav had a thief to catch. Making his way as quickly as his legs and Speed would allow, he rounded the corner where the urchin had disappeared and stumbled straight into the culprit. “Wha-!?” That idiot wasn’t even trying to hide. Laughing, the child handed the fruit back. After checking, Aarav saw that not a single bite was missing. The kid had been baiting him! “What is this about?” Aarav asked, straightening and trying to make sense of the bizarre situation.

“Aarav, great to see you again so soon!”

“Great to see you –!“ Wait, what? Who is this child? As Aarav looked closer at the child with a hood up, he had a sinking feeling. He recognised the voice, even if he had changed it a little. “How did you get out?” Standing in front of him was Boren, the youngest Prince of Darf. “I told you I couldn’t bring you out with me!”

“But you didn’t, and my parents can’t punish you for something you weren’t involved in,” Boren said quickly, like the problem was instantly solved with his quick thinking. Wrong, kid!

“Just the fact that I have seen you outside and now am accompanying you is enough to incriminate me in this scenario. You understand that your mother will not see the two as different. Right?” Aarav’s words seemed to take a few seconds to sink in before the boy’s eyes widened, and he looked at Aarav beseechingly.

“I’m already outside now, and it took almost all my Stamina to get out. At least let me stay with you long enough to recover it so that I can get back in the way I got out!” Aarav knew he would regret it, but what choice did he have? He wasn’t about to leave a nine-year-old alone in the middle of the city, no matter how safe it supposedly was. He could get trampled, like Aarav almost was.

With a deep sigh of regret and commiseration, Aarav acquiesced. “FINE! But you have to stick with me, no wandering off by yourself if you see something interesting, like a butterfly!” He had seen that in cartoons way too many times to leave that loophole out. Granted, it was for dogs, but what else was he going to say to a nine-year-old. He didn’t remember what they found interesting.

Aarav took another sideways glance at Boren. Come to think of it, this was the fourth or fifth time he was seeing the boy, and it was the first time he had seen the child acting his age. Usually, Boren was controlled, dignified and mature, like all the other adults in the palace. He was really behaving the way Aarav expected a child to act for the first time. Maybe the boy really did need to get out. Aarav would not be the one to dampen his experience now that he had done the taboo deed. He would just need to keep an eye on him in the safest city in the world. What could possibly –. Come on, Aarav! You know better than to tempt fate like that. Don’t say it. I thought it through, hopefully. Stopping the thought halfway means it doesn’t count.

Aarav turned and looked back wistfully at the palace. Maybe he should go back and cut this trip short, and he could always return tomorrow or later without the plus one in tow. But then he remembered that the boy would raise all kinds of alarms as they entered, and he would probably be put in jail for endangering the Prince. Let’s go!”

It felt like his life just kept getting more entangled and embroiled in politics and annoying dangerous situations. He couldn’t catch a break.

“Yes! Okay, where should we go first? The market? The library? Oh! Maybe we could go to the weapons shop! No, the Blacksmith, Marteen works there sometimes! Or, or we could just explore some of the residential areas. I heard the houses are all different colours and have different decorations and things! No, the best place that we can go is the sweet shops. There are a few of them in the city, and we can visit all of them! That way we can explore the city while we eat them! Ahh! I remembered where I wanted to go when I first got free, the lake! Let’s go to the lake, it is huge and surrounded by grass and people go there for picnics, at least that’s what I have heard. Can we get sweets and then go there? That way we have something to eat, and we can do a picnic-like city folk do! Can we?” Boren rattled off about a dozen options for exploring, jumping from one to the next before Aarav had enough time to consider their actual possibilities.

Aarav wanted to go everywhere, but it might not be possible to visit everything in a few hours. Not to mention, time was much shorter with a missing Prince on his hands. They would definitely be out and looking for him when they realised he was not in the palace.

“Boren, take it easy. We can’t be out long because people in the palace will notice and come looking for you. Also, they will be looking for me knowing that I have left.” A pointed glare at the young child was utterly lost in the boy's excited state. “We need to keep a low profile.”

“What does that mean? We need to stay crouching?”

Aarav sighed. “It means that we need to make sure we do not attract any attention to ourselves! Do you understand?” It was essential to have a firm hand with children from the beginning to show you would be pushed around.

“Okay, so where to first!” Boren said, decidedly not being inconspicuous. Aarav cursed his Luck one more time, just in case it hadn’t heard the other nine hundred times.