First Sharakhai, Meryam mused. Then the desert. Then the world.
Yasmine laughed harder than ever.
Chapter 37
Çeda stood on the Red Bride’s foredeck as the tribes sailed west. Along their starboard side she could see Sharakhai’s famed aqueduct, a marvel of engineering. Its tall stone columns, elegant arches, and water channel cut a perfect line through the desert. Where the line faded in the distance, the tip of Mount Tauriyat could be seen, wavering over the vast field of amber.
If the strong winds held, the following morning would see them landing at the blooming fields, where Çeda meant to speak to Sehid-Alaz, to learn how he and the other asirim had fared, and what state the gateway was in before they continued toward King’s Harbor.
At a groaning sound, Çeda turned to see Dardzada climbing up from belowdecks. It was already mid-morning, but he looked like he’d just awoken from a dead sleep. He’d come aboard last night, saying he wanted to speak to Çeda. About what, Çeda wasn’t sure. She’d been pulled away at the last minute to speak to the other shaikhs, and by the time she’d returned, Dardzada was already snoring in a bunk. She was exhausted herself and didn’t much feel like launching into another conversation, long or short, so she’d laid a blanket over him and gone to sleep.
As he navigated the side deck toward the foredeck, he teetered several times. In his path, Emre was resting in the hammock Frail Lemi had hung between the foremast and the cabin’s roof. As Emre had done to Frail Lemi not so long ago, Dardzada gave him a shove in passing. It was with markedly less humor, though. Dardzada was a notorious grump in the morning.
“Get enough sleep?” Çeda asked with a wry smile.
He glowered at her. “I never get enough sleep these days.” His voice creaked like an ancient door. He jutted his chin toward the sand as the Bride crested a dune and the foredeck dipped. “To tell the truth, I never liked sailing much.”
Çeda loved sailing, but telling Dardzada so would only darken his mood, and she didn’t feel like bickering. “You wanted to talk?”
Dardzada groaned in affirmation, then jutted his stubbly chin toward Tauriyat in the distance. “Yes. About what happens when we reach it.”
Çeda shrugged. “We speak to whoever happens to be sitting on Tauriyat that day.”
Dardzada nodded in mock seriousness. “It is rather difficult to keep up, isn’t it?”
“It’s like a bloody carousel.”
“So we speak to them. Perhaps we win our so-called argument. What then?”
Çeda stared back at the massive fleet behind her. “You mean what happens to us? The people of the desert?”
Dardzada tipped his head, half an affirmation. “To them. The people of Sharakhai. The Kings.”
It was a fair question. If the tribes could ally themselves with what remained of the Royal Navy, they had as good a chance as they would ever have at saving the city. They might manage to stop Ashael. They might oust Queen Alansal from Tauriyat, without allowing the Kings to retake their power. What then? What would Sharakhai even look like without the Kings?
“One thing at a time, Dardzada.”
He looked as if he wanted to argue, or chastise her for not looking far enough ahead, but then his discontent eased and he nodded. “One thing at a time.”
“Is that really what you wanted to speak to me about,” Çeda asked him, “Sharakhai’s future?”
He looked suddenly and uncharacteristically self-conscious. “In truth, I wished to speak to you of the visions the tree gave you.”
She had suspected as much. Seeing Ahya would have stirred up a host of memories in Dardzada. “What about them?”
“You went to the acacia asking for help with Hamid. It showed you visions of Ahya instead.”
“And?”
“The tree grants prophecies.”
“We saw visions of the past, Dardzada.”
“I know, but I wonder if it was meant as a lesson of some sort, or a warning.” He waved toward Tauriyat. “Something to prepare us for what’s to come.”
Çeda shook her head. “You’re reading too much into it. I was focusing on Hamid, and the tree showed me a vision that included Hamid.”
Dardzada put on a skeptical frown. “You really believe that’s all there is to it?”
“Does there need to be more?”
“Nalamae’s acacias have helped to protect us for centuries. I think it was trying to tell us something.”
“They’ve helped to protect us, yes, but the trees are always guided by those seeking visions.”
“And did you guide the tree when you first visited Saliah’s acacia?”
“Not consciously, no. But Nalamae did when she collected her memories and began piecing herself back together. I did when I exposed Hamid’s treachery to the shaikhs.”
“It just didn’t feel like a coincidence,” Dardzada pressed. “Your mother went to Yusam’s vault. Maybe there was something else there? Or maybe she did something else after the theft.”
“Maybe,” Çeda conceded, “but if so, I have no idea what. And without the acacia—”
Çeda stopped talking as a sour feeling wrenched her gut.
Dardzada frowned. “What is it?”
She swallowed the spit that had gathered in her mouth. Pressed one hand against her belly. “Can you not feel it?”
“Feel what?”
“It feels like the blooming fields used to. The curse on the asirim.”
“Are they being attacked?”
She flexed her right hand, concentrated on the sensation. “No,” she realized, and swung her gaze over the Bride’s port bow. “It’s coming from the south.”
The feeling suddenly intensified, and she remembered where she’d felt it before. The vision of Ashael lifting from the black pit in the desert felt precisely like this.
“It’s Ashael,” she said breathlessly.
Dardzada stared at the horizon with a fatalistic look, as if he’d already made peace with the fact that they would have to face the fallen god. “So what now?”
Her first inclination was to continue toward Sharakhai, but her sense of the desert allowed her to feel more than Ashael, more than his vast horde. She felt mortal souls huddled in the desert, those who all too soon would be threatened.
“We go to face him,” Çeda replied.
Without so much as a flinch, Dardzada nodded to her. It was a simple thing, an expression of fatherly approval, but it gave her heart.
After nodding back, she began calling orders for the fleet to turn south.
Chapter 38
Less than an hour after the battle in Mazandir’s harbor, Ramahd sailed south on Alu’s Crown with the remains of King Hektor’s fleet. Everyone, including Ramahd, had been terrified Meryam and her demonic horde would give chase and ensnare them with the winged ifin. They hadn’t, though. They’d headed north so Meryam could claim her prize.
Ramahd was preparing to swing over to King Hektor’s ship to convince him to change course and lend aid to beleaguered Sharakhai.
“It won’t be easy,” Cicio said. “Basilio’s words are like poison. He’s made Hektor almost as craven as he is.”
Ramahd didn’t wish to speak ill of his king, but he knew Cicio was right. “Hektor will see reason. He must.”
When Alu’s Crown was sailing alongside Hektor’s capital ship, Ramahd, Cicio, and Fezek swung over, and King Hektor met them on the main deck. Basilio and several naval officers, including an admiral and two commodores, stood behind him. Ramahd and Cicio held fists over their hearts and bowed to their king. Fezek, meanwhile, put on a serious face and performed an overly dramatic bow.
The ship groaned as it heeled over the dunes. The sun glinted off King Hektor’s crown. His chestnut hair flapped in the stiff wind. Though he’d grown somewhat in his role as king, Hektor was still a
young man and was visibly shaken by all that had happened. “That was you, wasn’t it?” he asked with a wave toward Mazandir. “You forced her away.”
“By Alu’s grace, yes.”
“But how?”
Ramahd explained all he knew of Meryam and Ashael, how the elder god dreamed, and Meryam was manipulating him. He told them of the black powder from the Hollow, how he’d used every last grain of it to invade Ashael’s dream. Ramahd finished with a plea to give chase. “The lives of our soldiers depend on it, my king.”
It was Basilio, looking haggard and scared, who answered. “But you said yourself you have no more powder. What would we accomplish beyond sacrificing everyone who survived the attack by that bloody horde?”
It was with no small amount of effort that Ramahd ignored Basilio and focused on King Hektor. “Two thirds of your fleet has been taken, the ships’ crews and soldiers dominated by Ashael’s servants. Meryam will use them to take Sharakhai.”
“It’s unfortunate, to be sure—” Basilio began.
But he stopped as Cicio, red in the face, stormed toward him, one finger pointing over the nearby gunwales. “Interrupt one more time—ah?—and I throw you from the ship.”
Basilio pulled himself tall. “My king, I will not stand for—”
He’d no sooner said the words than Cicio, in a blur of movement, grabbed him by his shirt and dragged him toward the gunwales. It took no small amount of effort—Cicio had been serious about his threat—but eventually Ramahd pulled him away and waited until he’d calmed.
Ramahd had never seen Cicio so angry. He’d been horrified over what had happened to the fleet, and that horror had turned to fury when King Hektor chose to sail south while the rest of their fleet was enslaved by Meryam.
“I will not stand for this!” Basilio shouted, then turned to the admiral. “He will be thrown into the brig this instant!”
The admiral, a willowy man with thick sideburns, looked like he wished he were on another ship entirely. He was just waving toward the ship’s master-at-arms when Hektor raised a hand.
All fell silent. Everyone, including the master-at-arms, went still. As they waited for their king to speak, the mainsail fluttered, then filled with an audible whump.
Hektor had been a brash, even reckless, young man before wresting the crown of Qaimir from Meryam, but the king’s mantle lay heavily upon his shoulders. He’d begun second guessing every move he made, always choosing the safest approach. The trouble was, the safest approach wasn’t always the right approach.
Basilio, clearly sensing Hektor’s mood, was the first to speak. “Excellence, our people are depending on us. Meryam wants the desert so badly? I say let her have it.”
“You think she’ll be content with the desert?” Ramahd said. “You think she won’t come for Qaimir when she’s done with Sharakhai?”
“That”—Basilio smoothed down the wrinkles on his shirt Cicio’s manhandling had caused—“is a problem for another day.”
“She’ll be stronger then! She’ll have the power of Sharakhai behind her, plus our soldiers and ships.”
“Meryam is being used by the desert gods,” Basilio countered. “Do you really think she’ll survive whatever fate awaits the city?”
Ramahd paused as the ship eased over a dune. “What did you say?”
“I said Meryam is lost, Lord Amansir. And good riddance.”
But that wasn’t what Ramahd had been getting at, and he could tell by Basilio’s shifting eyes that he knew it.
“You know what’s about to happen to Sharakhai,” Ramahd said. “You know, and you’re willing to let it happen.”
“Not me!” Basilio shouted. “Nor our king, nor you, nor anyone else. The gods are the ones who are about to let this happen, and there’s nothing any of us can do about it. Not anymore. It’s too late, Lord Amansir!”
“Sharakhai is a city of hundreds of thousands.” Ramahd paused, let the statement sit between them. “All will perish if the desert gods have their way.”
“And we will be safe in Qaimir under Mighty Alu’s protection when they do.”
Ramahd was so angry he nearly drew his sword, but he knew the moment he did, he would lose King Hektor. “When we were in Sharakhai,” he said to Basilio calmly, “shortly before the crystal broke, you saw through Meryam’s lies. You saw that she threatened us all and came to warn me and the Sharakhani Kings. I saw bravery in you that day, Basilio Baijani. I saw a man ready to fight for Qaimir.” He stared into Basilio’s scared eyes. “What happened to that man?”
Basilio’s face turned splotchy red. His gaze slid to Cicio, who’d been there as well. Basilio had nearly been assassinated by Amaryllis, which had scared him enough to betray Meryam, but there had been genuine bravery as well. It had vanished, however, the longer he’d been with King Hektor and his position grew more and more secure.
“I have children,” Basilio said. “I have a wife.” He waved around the ship. “We all have families who await our return. Don’t you want to see them again?”
Ramahd shook his head. “I could never look them in the eye again, if I took the coward’s path home.”
“I am a realist,” Basilio shot back, while the redness in his cheeks and neck deepened.
“No,” Fezek said sharply, startling Ramahd. He’d been so quiet Ramahd had all but forgotten him. King Hektor took a half step back as Fezek approached.
Basilio stared at Fezek. “Pardon me?”
Fezek replied with perfect calm. “You are no realist, as you claim, but the man your wife and children will be ashamed to speak of.”
Basilio looked to King Hektor, as if he expected him to order the ghul to remain silent. Hektor didn’t, though, and Fezek went on. “You are the man their children will try to strike from the family annals as a stain on your house, because even after everyone has forgotten your name, your house will be plagued for generations, because Baijani will become a synonym for craven.”
“You’re dead,” Basilio said, as if that proved anything at all.
“I may be dead,” Fezek said with a flourish, “but I’m also a poet, and I recognize a story that will refuse to fade with time. They are populated with only two types of characters: those who manifest heroism”—he looked Basilio up and down—“and those who try to steal it from others.”
Basilio was shaking. He seemed to be avoiding King Hektor’s gaze. Before Ramahd knew it Basilio had drawn the ceremonial dagger from his belt.
Ramahd was ready to pull Fezek back, but Basilio never made a move. He merely stood there, breathing hard, his gaze passing through Fezek. The officers watched in stunned silence. Even the crew had stopped what they were doing.
King Hektor, meanwhile, had undergone a transformation. Unsure of himself only moments ago, he now stared at Basilio in disgust.
The flush of Basilio’s anger faded from his cheeks. Then they turned bone white. After an interminable silence he turned to King Hektor and whispered, “My King, please. We must go home.”
King Hektor motioned to the nearby hatch. “Lord Baijani, you will retire to your cabin and remain there until summoned.”
Basilio’s mouth worked. He looked lost. Then all the energy seemed to leave him at once. Without another word, he turned and walked stiffly away.
King Hektor turned to Ramahd. “Basilio’s question remains. How can you hope to fight Meryam without that powder?” He motioned aft, toward Sharakhai. “What lever can you pull that might slow that dark machine?”
In reply, Ramahd reached into the small bag at his belt and retrieved a necklace made of red beads that were worn at the edges, showing the white ceramic beneath. “We have this.”
Hektor stared at it in wonder. “Meryam’s necklace.”
“Yes.”
Hektor looked like he wanted to say more, but was distracted by something behind Ramahd. Ramahd turned to
see sand swirling on the hatch’s lid. More sand gathered, creating a column, which solidified into the form of a woman. Suddenly, a goddess stood among them. Nalamae, in her new incarnation, with graying hair and bright armor, and a magnificent spear in one hand.
As she stepped down from the hatch lid, she focused not on King Hektor, but on Ramahd.
Ramahd bowed his head. “Goddess . . .” For long moments, words failed him. “Why have you come?” he finally managed.
“I’ve come to lend aid.” She pointed to his right hand, which still held Meryam’s necklace. “You’ve chosen the right message, but you’re going to need help if you hope to deliver it.”
Chapter 39
In the captain’s cabin of the Miscreant, Ihsan sat in a rocking chair. On the floor before him was Ransaneh. With Ihsan’s help, she was making a passable though rather comical attempt at standing on her own. She would stand tall, topple like a stack of wooden blocks, then stand again.
When she managed to hold the pose for several breaths, Ihsan smiled. “Who’s that I see standing like a big girl?” Speaking was still moderately painful, but the palliative he’d mixed in with his water and wine that morning, a combination of cloves and red nettle, was helping. Still holding her wrists, he gave Ransaneh more of her own weight. “Can you try on your own?”
For a moment, just a moment, she stood tall. She burbled and blinked her mismatched eyes. Then her legs buckled from underneath her.
“Not quite ready, I see.” Ihsan propped her back onto her feet and winked. “Perhaps tomorrow.”
No sooner had he said the words than she waddled toward him. It was only a few steps, and he was still holding her hands, but she did it with such a heartbreakingly beautiful smile on her face that Ihsan smiled too.
“Well, there we are!” he said. “Soon we’ll need to tie a rope to you to keep you from climbing over the gunwales!”
A knock came at the door, and Ihsan’s joy all but faded.
“Come.”
The old storyteller, Ibrahim, entered the cabin and closed the door behind him. In one hand he held a tiny ceramic cup. The foamy liquid inside it smelled of rich kahve. After taking a stool near the bed, Ibrahim lifted the cup to his nose, breathed deeply, and took a sip. “Are you sure you don’t want some? It’s surprisingly good.”
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