Golden Age (The Shifting Tides Book 1) by James Maxwell Read Free Book Online Page A

as he looked across the table at Aristocles.
    ‘This is a fine sword. The steel is good quality. Where is it made?’
    ‘It comes from Xanthos,’ Aristocles said.
    ‘Xanthos?’
    ‘The neighboring kingdom to the west, located between Phalesia and Sarsica.’
    ‘Hmm. It seems I have much to learn, but I am only here for a short time.’ He picked up the sword again, looking sideways along the steel, with his eye close to the blade. ‘May I have this?’
    Stunned, Chloe waited for her father to react. Nilus opened his mouth, then closed it.
    ‘You may,’ Aristocles said tightly.
    ‘Tomorrow we will talk about payment for the use of your harbor. Your gift will ease negotiations.’
    Kargan replaced the sword in its scabbard and then, straightening, he bowed to the two consuls of Phalesia.
    ‘I bid you good night.’
    He left with a slight weave in his step, having put away a prodigious amount of wine.
    Chloe’s father let out a breath.

6
    Bright sunlight sparkled off the waves, strong rays that poured from the rising sun and lent growing heat to the morning. It was a good day for sailing.
    Dion, youngest son of King Markos of Xanthos, felt his spirits soar as the small sailing vessel skipped over the waves, riding the peaks one after another, the sail pocketing the wind and making the boat’s timbers groan like muscles stretched by a sprinter at the Games.
    He pulled the rope that traveled from his fingers to a rounded cleat, smoothed from friction, and then to the boom. As he hauled the sail closer in with the wind coming across his beam the boat leaped forward.
    He heard a familiar grumbling voice nearby.
    ‘If the narrows are truly blocked we are going too fast. Slow down, lad.’
    ‘Of course, Master Cob,’ Dion said with elaborate respect. He grinned and tightened the sail still further.
    The sailing boat heeled in response, listing hard to port. Dion clambered across to put his weight on the starboard side. ‘Move across,’ he said to his companion. ‘We can still get more speed out of her.’
    ‘In the name of Silex, why is it we need such speed?’
    ‘We have a big day ahead of us.’
    ‘Our task is simple. We confirm the fishermen’s reports that the narrows are blocked, and then we return to Xanthos.’
    Dion ignored Cob, instead looking ahead to check their course. The boat was sailing with the looming mainland cliffs on the left and the lower but still imposing heights of the isle of Coros on the right. As the boat sped along, the passage became slimmer and the opposing cliffs grew closer. The air smelled of salt and sea and even on the higher gunwale cool water splashed his face.
    Soon they would be at the narrows, the place where the cliffs were at their closest. It was the only sea route between Xanthos and Phalesia. Well, there was another, but Dion wasn’t ready to talk to Cob about that quite yet.
    Glancing back at Cob, he saw the old man with his hand on the tiller, glancing up at the jagged black cliffs and grimacing. He was stunted and bald, a full foot shorter than Dion, and were it not for his aptitude with boats Dion wasn’t sure what the old sailor’s place in the world could have been.
    ‘Just like me,’ Dion murmured to himself.
    In his full growth of manhood, twenty years old, Dion should by now have been commanding regiments in his father’s service. His older brother Nikolas was not only heir to the throne, he was commander of Xanthos’s powerful army, with King Markos now too old to lead the men.
    But Nikolas and Dion were as unlike each other as two men could be. There was nothing wrong with Dion’s strength or agility, but the handling of swords and shields had never come to him, no matter how hard he’d tried. Despite staying up late into the night in the practice ground, hacking at dummies and getting instruction from anyone who would teach him, the sword simply fell out of numb fingers when he tried to make a strike, and the shield dropped every time he took a