Prince Edward, heir to the throne of the kingdom of Thornhollow, crouches behind a crumbling stone wall, looking up at the sky overhead. The Prince is a tough, muscular, handsome young man in his prime at the age of twenty five, with wavy brown hair emerald green eyes, and a rugged scar across his cheek, adorned in steel mail and bearing the Thornhollow royal blade on his hip. He peers up at the Tower of Lights rising above him, a spindly, ramshackle thing of dull blue and red stone.
"Your Highness!" his squire shouts, half out of breath, "Your Highness, please, wait up!" Henry is a boy of but fifteen summers, with ragged blond hair and amber eyes. He wears a leather jerkin and carries a sword of his own, but underneath them, he still wears the same ragged clothes he once wore as an urchin on the streets of Everkeep, before Edward took him into his care.
Henry collapses, hands on his knees, panting. "I'm... I'm sorry, Your Higness..." he says, "I didn't mean to..."
Edward puts a finger to his lips, before pointing up at the sky. Henry looks up, and the expression on his face immediately makes it clear that he wishes he hadn't. High above, the great dragon Volon circles the tower. It hasn't seen them. Yet.
"...it's big," he whispers.
"It wouldn't be much of a trial if it wasn't."
In theory, after all, that's the point of this entire exercise, why the Tower of Lights even exists in the first place. Five hundred years ago, the last Emperor of Vale perished, and left behind only a young daughter and fifteen different petty kings begging for her hand in marriage. Rather than risk a civil war that would tear the Empire apart, the Imperial Magician, Lady Ember, put the princess into a kind of everlasting sleep, and locked her in the Tower of Lights behind a series of trials, all so that any man who would seek to rule the Empire would have to prove himself by freeing her.
It worked, in the sense that it had prevented the petty kings from fighting each other for the Imperial throne. It didn't worked so well in terms of keeping the peace, now that the throne has sat empty for five centuries.
"Are the two of you finished gawking?"
Henry nearly jumps out of his jerkin, but Edward just rolls his eyes and turns around. He's grown to expect this sort of thing by now. The man who peers at the two of them over his glasses is nineteen years old, and wears a white and green tabard bearing the arms of Everkeep. He holds a scroll in one hand, and keeps looking at it impatiently.
"I have to admit," he says, "you've gotten farther than I expected. Farther than anyone else, in fact. I'm almost impressed."
Edward sighs. "I assume there's a reason you're here, Nicholas?"
"A message from Lady Ember," he says, "she wanted to congratulate you. Apparently she thinks you're actually going to succeed."
Edward smirks. "At least SOMEONE has faith in me."
"I'm sure she does." Edward could swear he hears a note of resentment. "She also wanted to offer you some advice."
"And that would be?"
"'Don't panic.'"
"You can't possibly be serious."
"No, she was very specific. 'Don't panic.' I'm as confused as you are. You're a man of many flaws, but cowardice has never been among them. Still, that was her message, and now it's delivered." Nicholas rolls up the scroll and seemingly pushes it into the palm of his hand, where it vanishes. "I'd love to stay and watch the two of you get roasted, but I have business to attend to."
He turns on his heel, waves his hand, and vanishes in a puff of pale green smoke.
"...show-off."
"...Your Highness? What... what do we do now?"
Edward looks down at Henry and smiles. "What do you think? We climb the tower."