It was a dark and stormy night somewhere in the world, but not here in the city of Guha Taka where the birds where chirping, sun was shining, and the officials of the city where trying to siphon as much money from the poor as possible. In other words, a day as usual.
Creak! A door in the wall of a alley in downtown Guha was carefully opened and a boy about nine, clad in nothing but a potato sack tied around his waist crept out. He closed the door carefully behind him and set off at a jog down the alley towards the main street.
Thud! The door to the alley burst open and five knife-carrying, barefoot, shirtless men came crashing through in an explosion of cobwebs and dust. They sighted the boy and let out howls of wrath.
"There he is!"
"Thief! Get back here!"
"Aarg! My foot!"
One of the men had just stepped on a scrap of splintered wood. His comrades stopped for a second as he yelped and hopped in a circle on one foot before crashing to the ground moaning. Abandoning him, the other four continued the chase.
The boy stopped at the end of the narrow passage and blocked by a wooden fence, he turned. The four remaining men spread out in a half circle surrounding him.
"Foolish boy! What compelled you to run off with our shirts and shoes?" one asked.
"Dunno, mebbe ya shouldn't ah put yer stuff down while you was gittin ready to git in the pool." The boy said sulkily, cowering away from the men
"Listen you young rascal. Do you know who we are?" interjected the shortest of the party, who had a mustache and a limp. "We're five Guards from Mu Taka on our way to the King of Rinh Ha's coronation. And any interfere will result in death by order of King Gika himself!"
"Wasn't iner-fearin!"
One guard sniggered.
"Okay then lad, give our clothes back and we'll call it even." the mustache guard said.
"Don't want to"
"Boy! Listen! Give th- Wait where did you put them? Don't tell me you left them back in that house we went through."
"Nope!" The boy brought the clothes out from behind his back. "Gottem ri' here!"
"And our shoes?"
"Don't know nothin bout shoes." the lad said.
"You have one last chance, boy before we use force." said mustache man as the men started to close in around the boy.
The boy chuckled, a deep, hearty, chuckle that didn't seem possible to belong to someone so young. The guards paused, startled.
The boy smiled for the first time at the guards, revealing perfectly white teeth. The he spoke, but not in the voice that he had before.
"Don't you think a boy who spent all his life in the city would know better than to be corned in a place like this?" he said.
The boy stood erect, all hint of street ruffian gone. He murmured a word under his breath and a sword appeared in his hand.
On the other side of the fence a passing merchant heard a clash of steel, then a yelp. "Just another day in Guha." he thought.
