Author's Notes: You can find my story on RoyalRoadL as well, it's under the same name, go check it out if you're familiar with the site.

Chapter I

Ohmac wipes the sweat off his forehead, it was a hot summer afternoon, and he had been weeding the garden all day. He pulls out the last weed and stands up, finally completing the punishment assigned to him by Mr Derwent, his tutor. He looks around the garden and sighs as he realises, that he must also pick up all the tools he left lying around haphazardly. More work. Ugh.

He makes his way to the gardening shed to put away his gardening tools, his stomach growling for food all the way there. If he went to the kitchens now, begging for food without having cleaned up, he would only get a more severe punishment from his tutor.

After having made sure that everything was in its proper place, he quickly runs to his chambers to run himself a hot bath. Usually, this would be a task for his maid, but he hadn’t had access to her ever since his father had hired Mr Derwent. Mr Derwent was only there to tutor him on mathematics, geography, history, spearman ship, and politics. Despite this he had incredible power over him, the first thing he did upon being hired was to dismiss Ohmac’s maid, claiming that she wasn’t needed and that he should learn to be more independent. He had, of course, complained to his father, but his complaints had fallen on mostly deaf ears.

A short while after having cleaned himself, he gets out of the tub and reaches for his spare set clothes to change. His skin is all wrinkly from the water; he should stop doing that, staying in the water after having been finished. His stomach is still rumbling as he puts on his shoes and starts heading towards the kitchens. The familiar smell of freshly baked bread fills his senses and fills his mouth with saliva.

"You alright there?" The question wakes him up from his food-induced trance.

He looks up at the rotund figure of the cook. "Oh, hi Matilda, I’m fine, just hungry."

"Well then, there’s some gerghi bread left in the pantry, I’ll get you some." She said.

"Haven’t you started cooking lunch yet?" He said dismay clearly written on his face.

"It’s on the stove dear, do you want to wait for it?"

"No, I’ll have the gerghi bread thanks." He replied, looking around the kitchen and the bustling assistants to distract himself from his hunger.

"Here dearie," she handed him the plate of gerghi bread, "you need anything else?"

"Do you have some soup?"

"Yes, here you go" she bends down underneath the counter to pour him the soup, she stands up again to hand it to him, he takes the bowl from her outstretched hand.  

Sitting at a random table, he digs into the soup with the gerghi bread ravenously. Halfway through soup, he runs out of bread; he gets up to get more when someone steps right in front of him.

"Can I help you?" He looks up at the servant blocking his way, the man’s hawk-like nose staring down at him.

"Duke Bryon seeks your audience young sir," his scratchy voice like nails on a blackboard.

"Alright, but can’t it wait I’m eating here."

"The Duke did say that it was urgent young sir."

"Fine." He gets up; his hunger barely sated from the course gerghi bread Matilda had given him.

He makes his way through the dimly lit hallway leading to his father’s office. As the wooden doors to enter his line of sight, he becomes anxious ‘why did his father ask for him now of all times, did Mr Derwent rat out on him about that visit to the pup? But why, he already punished him for it, as already evidenced by his ‘gracious and out of character action of weeding the garden that morning.’ He musings are cut short as he steps in front of the door, he brings his fist up to the wooden surface hesitant to knock, the response comes anyway.

"Come in."

He pushes the door open to see his father sitting behind a big oak desk. It is new.

His father, however, is ill-looking, his grey hair unkempt and his face ashen, the hand holding the cup of tea, frail and spotted. 

"Father, are you alright, you look worse for the wear, have you come down with something?" All emotions of anxiety disappear from his mind as he witnesses his father’s condition.

"Yes, I’m alright son, here sit down we haven’t talked for some time." He says tiredness leaking out over his voice. Ohmac sits down opposite his father slowly, not buying for a second his father’s lie. They talk for a while, his father asking him about the lessons he's been having with Mr Derwent. He tells him everything, understating somethings and exaggerating others. After a while, it becomes evident that there is something on his father’s mind, he breathes in deeply, summing up the courage to ask.

"Father, why did you summon me today?"

"Can’t a man talk to his dear son?"

"Yes, he can, but we both know there’s something on your mind, come on, spill the beans, what’s the matter?"

"Fine, I have come upon a unique situation, you know as a spymaster for the king I get a hold of all sorts of interesting information.”

"Yes?" He replies to his father's seemingly innocuous statement.

"Well, I have been informed quite reliably in fact that someone seeks to kidnap you."

"Wait. What? Why, who, how?"

"They want to ransom you off to me for valuable information that I hold, you know, secrets about His Majesty and our fellow nobles, I have absolutely no idea as to whom they might be. I was thinking of sending you to one of my many safe houses to get you out of the way. After all, my enemies can’t kidnap what isn’t there."

"Wait, you have safe houses, where?"

"I won’t tell you that I can’t have any leaks as to your location."

"Father, I wouldn’t tell anyone about my location. I hardly want to get kidnapped!"

"No, you don't, His Majesty has forbidden me from divulging any of his secrets. Now go and pack your clothes, remember to pack only the essentials, we want to get st off as quickly as possible, and take as much powder as you can carry, you’ll need it."

"When are we leaving?"

"Right now, so hurry up."

"Alright, are you coming with me?"

"Of course not, I'm far easier to track down then you and I have duties that I can't just abandon, I have, of course, prepared some of my best men to accompany you."

"Alright, but what will you be doing while I’m gone?"

"I’ll be looking for them of course, what else, look Ohmac take care of yourself out there I'm sending some of my best men with you, but you can never be too careful."

"Okay, father but can I ask you a question?"

"Go ahead."

"Are you really alright, you look so pale and sickly."

"Yes, I'm fine, it's just stress, now go, we wouldn't want you to be late for your appointment, now would we?"

"No, father."

Ohmac gets up sighing, this was the second time his father had been faced with a threat like this, the first time being when a bunch of crazy cultists threatened to burn his mother at the stake, they failed but that didn't stop them from merely beheading her instead, or at least that was what they told him, he had been too young to remember her or her death properly. He forces himself to stop thinking about that subject, there was nothing he could do about it, and he had more pressing matters to deal with like packing his clothes, for example. He looks up at his father one last time and bids him goodbye before walking out the door, his thoughts racing with the incredulity of the meeting he just had. Someone out there wanted to kidnap him for Bast's sake. He wondered quietly what kind of secret could be so important that someone would take the risk angering a Duke like that to get hold of it. 

Extra Tags the site doesn't have: War and Military, Multiple Lead Characters, Male Lead.