“Sir, you need to lie down,” he said. “I’ll get a healer.”
“Get me to the King!” he shouted.
Lucas looped under his shoulder and helped him down the tunnel. With every step, Torsten expected his feet to give out. He could barely feel them, only a slight pinpoint of pressure.
“One of you help me!” Lucas yelled back at the remaining guards.
“What about him?” one asked.
“He’s not going anywhere.”
“Watch him anyway,” Torsten demanded.
One stayed with Rand, the other reached Torsten and helped them along. Torsten was glad his eyelids had been burned off; otherwise, he wouldn’t have been able to keep them open. His blessed sight allowed him to stay cognizant.
They turned once, then again into the central passage. By then, Torsten’s right foot dragged slightly, and both Lucas and the guard groaned from the stress of carrying him. Now, there was no dust falling from the ceiling. The crowd was silent as they headed straight for the arch leading outside.
“Torsten!” Rand bellowed.
They all stopped and looked back.
In the chaos, Torsten had forgotten his weapon—how could he have been so careless?
The traitor stood, carrying Salvation, coated in the blood of the guard they’d left to watch him. It would have been threatening if he wasn’t propped up on the wall, his vision lagging from head trauma, and holding a weapon too heavy for his emaciated frame. More blood dripped from his mouth and a cut over his eye, courtesy of Lucas’ beating.
Rand’s features suddenly transformed from rage-filled to concerned. “You need to run,” he said. “You all need to run.”
“Enough of this,” Lucas growled, then turned to the other guard. “Get Sir Unger outside. I’ll deal with the traitor.”
Torsten tried to speak, but the effort it took just to open the left side of his mouth made a coherent word challenging to form. Lucas stepped out alone and drew his longsword.
“C’mon, Sir,” the guard groaned, struggling under Torsten’s weight.
Torsten looked back as he was slowly dragged toward the arena.
Lucas charged Rand and had him on the defensive, the loud clangor of their blades echoing across the empty undercroft.
Torsten’s neck muscles gave out, and his head drooped. Through the sunny opening, he could make out the figures of those partaking in the wedding ceremony. He saw Pi, across from Mahraveh, standing atop a low pedestal, so they were the same height.
They held each other’s hands. A cloth bearing the Eye of Iam wrapped them together, while Dellbar the Holy spoke to an entranced and silent crowd.
Adrenaline flooded Torsten’s system upon seeing them. His left fingers twitched as he started to regain tingling sensation.
“My King!” Torsten forced himself to scream. It was still slurred.
All eyes snapped toward him in the archway. Before Torsten could do anything else, a deafening boom shook the very earth. The struggling guard lost his grip, and Torsten collapsed.
His head hit the packed sand first. Then, all he could hear were screams…
XVI
The Caleef
Mahi’s bare foot slapped down in the shallow stream of water encircling the Tal’du Dromesh arena. The crowd silenced in a heartbeat. She gazed up and around at all the thousands of Shesaitju eyes fixated on her.
Throughout the boisterous walk out of the undercroft, showered in dust from the pounding feet throughout the stands, Mahi remembered fighting on these very sands. She remembered the adrenaline pumping through every muscle, the fire in her bones, the bloodlust. The quiet changed that. It unnerved her. Made her hear the steady thump-thump of her heart between the distant cawing of gulls and the waves pounding the beach and stone on the other side of the arena’s southern rock wall.
Her gaze shifted downward toward Tal’du Dromesh itself. Serpent Guards and Shieldsmen stood at arms around the circumference and within the stands at every entrance and aisle. Their alternating gold and silver armor, and pink and gray skin, would have seemed otherworldly if not for what was in the center of the sands.
King Pi stood there, dressed in elaborately crafted armor, a light blue cape flowing from his back and draping around his feet to hide the low pedestal, making him appear taller to the crowd.
Or is it for me? Mahi wondered.
During the only meeting they’d had prior to this, seated alone at the feast, they’d talked openly and candidly. He hadn’t seemed self-conscious about anything. Quite the opposite, actually.
Behind him stood the High Priest, bare white robes cascading down his body like snow-capped mountains. A shorter distance away was one-armed Lord Jolly and a few other noble-looking Glassmen who’d made the journey. Torsten was inexplicably absent. Though, even only knowing him so briefly, Mahi imagined he was somewhere, high up in the boxes, watching for the safety of his King.
Across from the Glassmen stood Bit’rudam and Tingur. Sages dribbled nigh’jel blood along Mahi’s path and toward the center, humming prayers in Saitjuese. Others stood atop the rocky dam, facing out to the Boiling Waters. Over it, the angled sails of two warships could be seen, the fabric bright against a backdrop of looming storm clouds. Thunder rumbled in the distance, also now perceivable with her people quieted.
Within the Tal’du Dromesh, however, the sun was bright and hot. If there really was an Iam, it was hard to deny he was watching.
“And so, your rebellion ends, Father,” Mahi whispered to herself. She closed her eyes and breathed in the moment, salt spray from the sea and all. Then, drums broke the horrible silence, and she strode across the sand.
Memories ran through her mind, of all the countless ceremonies held in this hallowed place by Caleefs of old. Tournaments, executions, funerals—none were so momentous as this. She wasn’t nervous, though it remained strange to hear her heartbeat so clearly, pounding along with the drums and no other sound.
Pi watched her on approach, his chin lifted proudly. His lips were straight, and his expression stern, but Mahi had been around enough young men. Could he do what was required to consummate their marriage by Glassmen law after the sun fell? Could she?
Bit’rudam wore a similar expression, likely concerned over the same thing, being brave, even though Mahi knew he had to be agonizing on the inside. She knew she’d made the right choice having him be her guard. If Pi grew large like his father and violent like his mother, Bit’rudam wouldn’t hesitate to stab him in the back.
All those thoughts and more assailed her mind until she stopped directly across from King Pi. Dellbar the Holy put on a weak smile, the lines around his lips far more profound than his age would indicate.
“You look stunning, my Lady,” Pi said. Again, his tone was confident, though difficult to read. Mahi knew how she looked in her outfit and makeup—like a goddess. Any other young man Pi’s age might have been drooling, but not him. It was all so business-like. She couldn’t even tell if he meant the compliment, only that he intended to flatter her.
Mahi smiled and nodded.
“Friends. Allies. Men and women of the Glass and Sands. What a fortuitous day, here, beneath the vigilant Eye of Iam,” Dellbar pronounced, loudly as he could.
He seemed in better spirits than at the feast. The winds swirling within the arena should have muffled his voice, but instead, it projected far beyond Mahi expected it would. Judging by the vision of the man, she’d expected little more than a whisper.
“And the Lord of the Sea, graciously inviting us to walk upon sands where, in his honor, so many have spilled their blood,” Dellbar added.
Mahi couldn’t help but note the improper use for her god’s name.
“The God of Sand and Sea,” Pi corrected, gently, so only they three could hear.
Mahi’s breath caught. Dellbar cleared his throat.
“Yes, of course, my King,” Dellbar muttered, then raised his voice. “A rift has existed between our lands for far too long. Yet all a
re here, in the name of love and unity. In the face of death and curses, these two young souls are intertwined by a history of miracles.”
“Our Caleef is the only miracle!” barked a man from the crowd.
All eyes snapped up to see an older Shesaitju man standing in the middle of the lower level. No sooner was he revealed than Serpent Guards were on him, dragging him away, squirming and shouting in Saitjuese.
“Afhem Babrak is right about her!” yelled another, across the arena. A few others rose to join that man in protest, and they too were removed, though in a far more aggressive manner.
Before any more dared speak, the Serpent Guards made a show of force. They emerged from all the arena entry tunnels along the concourse’s edge, slamming their weapons down in unison. A deafening clank echoed, followed by a growl of thunder from the nearing storm.
Dellbar winced. Mahi peered down, expecting the same from Pi, but his attention had turned to the west archway into the arena undercroft. Concern rippled across his features, but when he turned back to Mahi, he was back to his young, intrepid self.
“Yes, and so…” Dellbar cleared his throat again. He regarded the sun, blinded eyes unaffected, then circled them with his fingers. “It is with great pride and honor that I present beneath Iam’s vigilant gaze, these two brave leaders. Pi Nothhelm, the Miracle King, Lord of the Glass Kingdom and Herald of Iam’s Light; son of Liam Nothhelm the Conqueror. And Mahraveh of Saujibar, Caleef of the Black Sands, daughter of Muskigo “the Scythe” Ayerabi, and champion of the Tal’du Dromesh.”
Dellbar reached into the folds of his robe and produced a small vial filled with Black Sand.
“Your hand, Lady Mahraveh,” he instructed.
She glanced over at Bit’rudam and Tingur. The latter nodded her along while the former watched without really watching. Mahi extended her hands, and Dellbar opened her fingers, so her palm faced upward.
“In your hand, you hold your land,” he said as he uncorked the vial and poured the dark sand out over her palm. She welcomed the feel of the grains against her fingers and within the grooves of her hand. It felt like home.
“My King, your hands,” Dellbar went on.
Mahi noticed Pi peer again toward the west entry to the undercroft before he, too, followed the instructions.
“In your hand, you hold your land,” Dellbar said, pouring a vial filled with tannish-red colored sand. Having only seen her own black sands, and the pure white sands of the M’stafu Desert to the north, Mahi had never seen sand like it and imagined it had to be from the coast off Yarrington.
“And so those lands, in your names, will be as one,” Dellbar said. He lightly positioned their hands, one atop the other, with Pi’s in the upper position. Mahi resisted a bit out of instinct.
“It is said that Iam’s greatest gift to us is the light which guides our way from above,” Dellbar went on. “But I don’t believe so. That same light allows the wicked to prey, and the vengeful to find their quarry. It is why we of the priesthood do not see with our eyes, because in truth, Iam’s light comes from within. His greatest gift to Pantego… is love.”
Dellbar produced a cloth that glowed like a nigh’jel, as if covered in luminescent paint. In its center, stitched in pure white, was the Eye of Iam. Dellbar raised it to the sky, the sunlight catching its folds and glinting.
“And love will blossom here today,” Dellbar said. “Beneath Iam’s vigilant Eye, two souls have found their light. And now, in heart, mind, and land, they shall be as one.” He began to wrap the cloth around their sand-filled hands, then tucked the remaining fabric.
The grains shifted and blended. She could feel the gazes of her people fixated on her, judging her every move.
“Just as these sands could never be separated, so shall you two be.”
Mahraveh stared down at their hands.
“Do you, Pi Nothhelm, King of the Glass, take Caleef Mahraveh of Saujibar, as your Queen and wife? Will you swear, in Iam’s name, to be true to her, to foster her light, and to protect her with all that you are until the Gate of Light greets you?”
Pi’s cobalt eyes stared straight into Mahi’s. A hint of fear now showed in them, but only for a second. He blinked, likely thinking she’d see it as a sign of weakness. Instead, Mahi welcomed it. It would be weakness to deny what he was feeling, and for a boy locked in a castle all his life, she was as foreign to him as he was to her.
The sand continued trickling through his fingers as they remained merged with hers. Blending them thoroughly would take time. But they both were clearly willing to try.
“I do,” he said, soft, but firm.
Dellbar then turned to Mahi. “Do you, Mahraveh, Caleef of the Black Sands, take Pi Nothhelm as your King and husband? Will you swear, in Iam’s name and on the Eternal Current to be true to him, to foster his light and to protect him with all that you are until the Current takes you.”
Murmuring began as he mentioned the Current. It surprised Mahi as well. She noticed the slight smirk tug at Pi’s lips as Dellbar spoke it, and realized that it had to be his doing. From what she knew, his father would have cut out his own tongue before uttering such a thing, ceremony or not.
“I do,” Mahi stated proudly so all could hear.
No sooner were the words through her lips than an incoherent shout echoed from the western entry of the undercroft. They all looked that way and spotted Torsten Unger standing in the opening. Blood covered his side as he leaned against a Glass soldier, hardly able to stand.
His eyes went wide. An earsplitting crack rang out, and the ground shook, throwing Mahi and Pi. Pi fell off his pedestal, and hands bound together dragged her with him.
The entire crowd screamed but were soon drowned out by a guttural bellow that was far from human. Shieldsmen and Serpent Guards ran to the King and Queen. Mahi scrambled to lift herself and Pi to their feet, tearing the cloth tied around their hands in her efforts, spilling the mixed sands.
The ground quaked again as the dam made of immense boulders at the south end of the arena blew apart along with the warships moored just beyond. The rocks fell loose, some heaved up into the stands, crushing people there. Wood splintered and shot out like arrows, and through the many growing breaches in the rock extended what looked like massive tentacles.
They thrashed and tore, breaking apart more rock. Seawater and debris gushed through, assisting them further. The storm offshore was now closer than what seemed possible in so short a time.
Mahi saw the embodiment of evil rise over the breaking barrier; soulless black eyes and a maw filled with thousands of razor-sharp teeth. One massive wave sent it tumbling into the arena, limbs flailing.
Guards were pulverized, crushed, their armor doing absolutely nothing to protect them. More thrashing tentacles sent others through the air. As water cascaded in, one of the warships snapped in half against the rock. It was impossible to tell if there was more than one of the beasts.
“Run!” Mahi shouted.
Pi froze, staring. That subtle show of fear turned to full-on terror. She grabbed him and ran for the arena walls.
“What is that!” he screamed.
She had no idea how to answer, even if there’d been time.
In ancient times, sailors told stories of great sea beasts like giant octopuses called Current Eaters. Still, Mahi had always thought them things painted on maps to turn travelers away.
She and Pi reached the wall, the sound of rushing water and terrifying roars at their backs. Lord Jolly was on one side, his sole arm around blind Dellbar the Holy, guiding him to safety, if there was such a thing. The stone wall surrounding the sands was tall, with the top half coated in spikes. Impossible to climb for a reason.
“My Caleef, this way.” Bit’rudam waved them over.
It was now clear there was more than one of the things, and Tingur stood facing the legendary beasts as if he could do anything to slow them.
Bit’rudam barked orders and Serpent Guards formed at the base. Without hesit
ation, they launched one up. His chest plunged into the spikes and pinned him there in sacrifice. Then, they started lifting people over, using his body as a shield against the spikes. Thankfully, he had no tongue with which to scream.
“Sir Unger!” Pi yelped. Mahi grasped the King’s hand as quickly as she could, stopping his attempt toward Torsten and yanking him back toward Bit’rudam instead. Torsten Unger laid on the sand nearby, both hands digging to drag himself toward them. Floodwater slowly filled in around his face.
“My Caleef, you first!” Bit’rudam said.
“No, take them,” she replied.
Before he could respond, she sprinted for Torsten. Without him to lead the Glassmen, fighting Nesilia would prove even more challenging.
The floodwater had neared her knees by the time she reached him. A Current Eater had caught onto the side of the arena and clambered up the stands, devouring and mashing everything in its path. Stone blocks, which had stood for thousands of years, were torn loose and flew every which way.
“Sir Unger, get up!” Mahi yelled.
She knelt and wedged her arm beneath him. Luckily, he was mostly out of his armor, or he would be sinking like a rock in the rising water.
“She played us for fools,” he mumbled. “She wanted this.”
“Nesilia did this?” Mahi asked, peering back at the dam. With every passing second, its integrity was further compromised. Waves and ship debris surged over and through it, filling the arena, sloshing onto the stands and causing the crowds to slip or fall in.
“Who else,” Torsten said.
Mahi continued digging her way beneath him and groaned. “Sir Unger, you have to get up!”
“Can’t move… I…”
A Current Eater roared so loudly, Mahi’s very bones chattered. A large wave carried another, and it smashed through what was left of one warship and into the dam, blowing it fully open.
The coast of Latiapur was one of sharp bluffs with shallow beaches forming along it at low tide and very few treacherous paths up. Until now, the water rarely rose more than a few meters up the dam. The sea had been rough from the storm, but this was something else. She’d never witnessed the tide so high or winds so fiercely focused on a single spot—nor had the memories of all the Caleefs within her. Warship sails became thin shreds as if the very air was filled with knives.
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