Chapter 1
"Out of the way people, coming through!" I yelled at the men guarding the border between Sitia and Ixia. As I barrelled towards them on my horse, Liza, I watched the guard's expression turn from shocked surprise, to scared shitless; they knew I wasn't going to stop. I thought that the soldiers would jump to the sides to get out of my way, and most of them did, but there was one who stood his ground.
I drew my sword as I got off my horse; I intended to get around him one way or another. As the man in front of me stepped forward, I got a better look at him. He had short hair, a goatee and was missing part of his right ear. His skin was bright orange; probably the result of a bad tan. The other thing that I noticed about the man was that he was wearing the uniform of the second in command to the Ixian Assassin Valek. This was going to be… interesting.
"Who are you?" The man with the missing ear asked.
"Jasmine… sir," I replied with my usual cockiness and a mocking salute. The man kept looking me over, checking to see whether I was lying or treating him like he was an idiot.
"Well, Jasmine," He replied in a sarcastic voice, "The border between Ixia and Sitia is no place for someone to be travelling alone. I would think that someone crossing the border would have guards… unless she is running from them." He frowned at me with a curious glint in his eyes.
"You seem to be assuming quite a bit. Neither of those are things I would even consider doing. You see, the reason I don't have any official guards, is because I killed them-"
And that's when the fight started.
His quick jabs and blocks let me identify not only what his fighting style was, but who the man himself was. If I remember correctly from my list of 'Great Ixian Heroes and Heroines', then this person was Janco, one of the three people in the world who had bested Valek in a fight.
As I stepped forward to end the fight with a blow to Janco's head with the flat of my sword that would have left him concussed, he flipped over the top of me and threw a dart at my neck. As the dart pierced my skin, I knew the fight was over, and that I was not the victor. The drug started to paralyse my muscles. "Oh Shit," I mumbled before my face muscles froze… it was curare.