It was midday and the sun beat down on Agrabah. Not far away the weather was no better and it was windy to boot. The desert sands whirled around the solitary figure as she struggled to get her lazy camel to keep moving.
"Grrr! Durnit, go faster." She pestered. "Move! No, not that way, the other way."
The figure was Princess Jayde of Agrabah, a very impatient princess who didn't need the crap the camel was giving her. Also, a very entempered princess who was likely to kick the crap out of the camel if the argument had to continue. "I don't care if you're union, you stupid camel! You can still go... what the?"
A stranger in the distance attracted Jayde's attention and she felt a strange vibe from the person. Something... important. Being the only member of the royal family, as yet, with magic, Jayde often got these strange vibes but she couldn't decipher the meaning out of this one. It was like she had known the person before. The person, who was struggling through the dunes, looked in need of her help, or she liked to think so, and as Jayde had a habit of interrupting in other people business she rode over. As her and the camel, his name was Andri, got nearer, Jayde was able to get a better look at the person. For starters, it was a guy, and exactly the kind of guy Jayde liked though she wouldn't admit it. Tall, dark haired and cute, but with a certain oddness that only made him all the more attractive. Jayde barely managed to keep her eyes inside her head and she called over to him, from a distance of fifty metres. "Hey? Are you alright?"
The amazingly cute guy waited a minute, thinking to himself before he called back. "Yeah, I'm just looking for something!"
"Do you need a hand?" Jayde asked, coming a bit closer. "I could help you look." This was Jayde's not so suttle way of saying she wasn't going anywhere. The guy paused again before replying. "No, I'm fine thankyou. Hey, I found it!" The guy pulled a gauntlet from the sand and Jayde saw a flash of something white before the guy hurriedly put the gauntlet on, the sand still running in streams off of it.
Even though the guy didn't seem to need her help, Jayde decided to stay for a while and get to know him. After all, he was cute and she was desperate. She jumped off her camel and immediately tripped over and caught a mouthful of sand. Getting up and hoping the stranger had not taken much notice of her embarrasing nosedive, she asked her first question.
"What's so important about a single gauntlet, anyway? You can just buy a new set at the Agrabah markets. They're really cheap. Why, I've seen some...."
"You can't buy one like this." The guy answered, but didn't take his eyes off the gauntlet, as if to make sure he wouldn't lose it again. "And if you could buy one like this, or a set, it would definitely not be cheap."
Jayde, bored of the conversation which wasn't making much of a first meeting, held out her hand for to help the stranger up with. The guy gratefully accepted the hand, and as he stood he finally glanced at his helper. He visibly did a double take. Jayde pretended not to notice this, as it was much the same as how she had looked when she got her first look at him.
"So, uh..." Jayde started. "Do you need a lift anywhere?" Jayde couldn't see a horse, camel, donkey or and other mode of transportation around and she was eager to get to know this person better, seeing that he noticed her as well. "Sure, I could use a lift." He replied. "But you have only one camel."
"Oh, that." Said Jayde, and she magically zapped Andri into a buggy attached to a clydesdale cart horse. "Is that better? Because if it's not I can always change it."
"Not much." Replied the stranger, trying not to look impressed. Trying very very hard not to look impressed. "Will that thing be able to get through the sand?"
"It's magic." Jayde said simply.
"Well I realized it was made by magic... but wow, I've never seen such a large amount of creation magic used so easily."
"Don't ask me." Said Jayde. "I don't know how it works. I've just always been able to do it."
"Oh..." Replied the stranger, trying to regain his composure.
Jayde obviously hadn't answered the question very well but she was interrupted from further explanation of the god-like powers by a strange flying eel that came streaking to the guy's side.
"Master safe?" Questioned the eel in very broken English.
"Yes Xerxes." He replied. "This nice young lady has kindly offered to give us a ride home." Replied the guy, who seemed to understand the eel's broken English without difficulty.
The eel turned to Jayde, noticing her for the first time and he looked her up and down.
"Nice... lady..?" The eel Xerxes said, looking funny and confused which prompted Jayde to smile and laugh. He really did look comic. Xerxes broke into a grin and, swimming over, he greeted Jayde, "Hello nice lady."
"Hello... Xerxes, is it?" Jayde could only reply. "But you can call me Jayde." "All dat? More?" Asked Xerxes. "Name... more name?"
This haphazard explanation of what Xerxes was trying to say did it's job. "Well, I am commonly known in other places as Jayde the Traveller, but I like to keep it short. Just Jayde."
"The traveller? Not much of a title..." Commented the guy, who now spoke again. "Well now that you're introduced to Xerxes, I am Mozenrath, Lord of the Land of The Black Sands, Sorceror and general all-round bad guy."
He smile as if this was a good thing.
"Um... yes." Jayde was dumbfounded. He couldn't be the one her sister warned her about. It was a good thing she only told him the her title as traveller.
Jayde however decided that it couldn't hurt to be nice and polite.
"Nice to meet you, Mozenrath." She said, holding out her hand to shake, as was common practice amongst her folk, the travellers. Mozenrath took her hand, but instead of shaking it he suprised her by kissing her hand lightly and he bowed.
"Nice also, to meet you." Mozenrath replied. "...Jayde."
The name seemed familiar to Mozenrath but he couldn't quite pinpoint the familiarity... a folk tale or something.
Jayde leapt into the buggy and helped Mozenrath in after her. Unfortunately there was only enough room for two people and Jayde didn't see how he could sit anyway, so Xerxes has to occupy the saddlebox at the back of the buggy.
"So where are you from?" Mozenrath asked, obviously as eager to get to know Jayde as Jayde had been a while ago. Since Jayde has a penchant for mystery she decided definitely not to tell where she was from just yet. If Mozenrath found out...
"Everywhere and anywhere." Jayde answered, or didn't answer, depending on how you look at it, and she made a sweeping hand gesture to the horizon. "I am a traveller, a nomad... I've visited nearly every country in the world and made all of them my home."
"But where were you from to begin with?" Mozenrath persisted. "Where were you born?"
"It's been so long that I don't remember."
"Nonsense."
"Well most recently I have come from Indonesia, if that helps."
"Indo-what?"
"It's a group of islands very far away from here, in the tropics." Said Jayde. "I stayed there about a year, but you won't have heard of Indonesia I guess." "You're right. I haven't." Replied Mozenrath. "Was it nice there?"
"Well it was very hot and humid but there was alot of fresh fruit and much more water than you would find in the desert around here."
Suddenly their buggy hit a rock and threw them in all directions.
Jayde found herself pressed against Mozenrath, their facies millimeters apart.
She moved quickly back to her side of the buggy, and blushed red with embarrassment. "Um..." Said Mozenrath, uncomfortably. He had kind of enjoyed the accident, although he did not understand quite why he was so taken with this... Jayde. "So where are you from?" Jayde prompted, eager to change the subject.
"Where were you born?"
"My citadel in the Land of the Black Sands." Replied Mozenrath. "I was born there too."
"And there were more people there then, as well." Mozenrath though to himself, but he did not voice his thoughts out loud.
"How do we get there?" Jayde asked a very relevant question as she had no idea where to lead the buggy, she had just been continuing towards Agrabah. Without saying a word Mozenrath reached out with his gauntleted hand and pointed it in front of them. A bolt of black lightning shot from the gauntlet and a portal opened in front of the buggy, with black magic flickering at its sides. "Through there." Mozenrath said, once more tring to impress Jayde.
Jayde now realized why he couldn't simply have replaced the gauntlet at the Agrabah markets. It was obviously a magical artifact. She prompted the horse towards the portal but the clydesdale shied away from it.
"C'mon, Go through!" Jayde exclaimed, but to no avail. She most certainly did not have a way with horses. Jayde stopped the horse and took her from the front, by the reins and had to lead her through. Jayde looked back at Mozenrath, who looked drained so she hurried through the portal to relieve him of the responsibility of holding the portal open.
Once through Jayde looked around her, at the rolling black dunes that circled for as far as the eye could see.
"WHOAH....." She cried in awe, although the size of the place silenced her also. "Its... Big" That's all she could say about this land. With rolling black desert dunes and a starless black sky one would wonder where the light to see by came from. Black on black it was, a decorators nightmare.
Jayde returned to the buggy, stepping over a crumpled Mozenrath who looked signifigantly pained as she passed. Gripping the reins in an effort to disperse all this awe she started the horse. Setting the clydesdale into a gallop she could now concentrate on other things.
"Nice place" Jayde complimented. Which way do we go?"
"Yeah, it is nice. Takes a while to get used to though" Mozenrath replied, looking up. "It doesn't matter which way you go. You always end up at my citadel."
"Very useful."
Xerxes appeared just then from the side of the buggy and startled Jayde, who practically jumped into Mozenraths arms.
"Are there yet?" Asked Xerxes.
"Uh... Nearly" Jayde said, slowly recovering from her near heart attack.
"Don't worry, he wont bite" said Mozenrath as Xerxes slithered away in the opposite direction, obviously confused by his masters new interest.
"I know that because..?" Jayde replied.
"I give you my word.., Now please get off me"
"And if I dont?" Jayde asked, feeling indignant.
"Well, then I wont be responsible for my actions" Mozenrath said with a cheeky smile.
"Hey, is that your citadel?" Jayde cried, jumping up as she saw buildings in the distance.
"Yeah, Big eh?"
"Yeah"
"Um..."
"Ahhh... Loss of things to say"
Jayde glanced at her watch and nearly had another heart attack.
"Shit, it's LATE!"
"Whats that...?" Asked Mozenrath when he saw Jayde's wristwatch.
She quickly took it off and shoved it in the backpack which she had just zapped into existence. People were not supposed to see that for a couple of hundred years yet. "Hey? You mind if I crash for the night at your citadel?" Jayde asked, both because she needed a place to stay and because she needed to divert the mortals attention from the watch he had just seen.
"Sure stay a week, a month,..... a year if you dont mind the mamluks." He answered quickly.
"Very kind of you but I could hardly stay a week. I have some business in Agrabah... REALLY important, that."
"What business would that be?"
Jayde yawned, "Man, I'm tired. Where can I sleep?"
Jayde zapped the horse and buggy out of existence and Mozenrath and Jayde entered Mozenrath's palace.
"Just a few hundred meters to the sleeping quarters" He said, joking, as he led Jayde up the stairs, down a hall and into a VERY large and comfortable room. Jayde threw her arms into the air in exclamation and turned to look at the whole room, "Are all your guest rooms like this?" She asked with enthusiasm in her voice.
"No", He replied, "This is my room."
"Oh"
Jayde zapped a cot into one corner of the room. Seconds later Mozenrath promptly zapped it back out of existence. He patted the bed which he was now sitting on, gesturing for Jayde to sleep in HIS bed.
"You're giving up your bed for me?" Jayde was awed by this generosity, Mozenrath didn't look THAT nice and kind and he was certainly differing from little sister's description.
"Well that cot didn't look very comfortable", He replied, "Besides, I'm not giving up my bed."
"..." Jayde was SPEECHLESS.
"I'll be back in a minute" Mozenrath called as he left the room.
"..." Jayde thought as she zapped into her nightgown. "Oh well, he IS cute, I just hope he doesnt expect anything or I may have to get murderous."
Jayde pulled back the covers and was asleep before her head hit the masses of pillows stacked on the bed.