by C B Samet
I watched Allis wrap the long strip of meat around a stick and proceed to roast it over a somewhat miniscule fire suppressed by the desert wind. He rubbed the snake with oil and a coating of herbs that the Caballus had provided in our portable food stash.
The size of the snake was remarkably appropriate to divide among the four of us. It was well seasoned with garlic and basil though maintained a slight fishy taste. While we ate, Joshua entertained Allis with a description of the desert cave.
“What happens if you fall into the river?” he asked, enthralled.
“I believe it runs underground for many kilometers. I imagine you’d drown,” Joshua replied. “You can dive for cave pearls, but that’s done with a harness, rope and two of your most trusted friends to pull you out,” he added.
“How deep is it?” Allis wondered.
The Queen leaned forward, equally interested.
“It’s speculated to run fifty meters deep in some parts, but the pearl shelf is six to eight meters deep—divable depths if you’re a skilled diver.”
I was content to listen, eat snake, and relax into exhaustion. At one point, I think I was eating with my eyes closed.
I remember waking briefly as Joshua moved me from the dying campfire to our resting place of safety under the carriage, but then I fell asleep again.
I awoke after a peaceful night’s rest and began my animal tending routine. After they were fed and watered, I brushed savagely at the dried mud stuck to Phobus’s hide. He seemed to appreciate the brutish brushing.
“I need to give myself a good scrub,” I told him.
He looked at me and sniffed. Then, he nudged me with his nose reassuringly.
When I was done, I joined the others by the campfire where Allis had prepared tea and dried fruit for breakfast.
I sipped the lemon tea and looked over at the large elephant bones ready for burning. I could appreciate them better now in the daylight. The ribs were an impressive size. It must have been a large beast. Joshua had already laid the coals at the base.
“The fire is going to attract attention.” I addressed no one in particular, frowning. The attention of Scouters concerned me the most.
Nods of agreement surrounded me.
Suddenly, the horses whinnied, shifted their weight and pawed un- easily at the ground. Standing, we looked around, alarmed.
“There!” Allis cried, pointing to the north.
In the distance, a black speck approached. As it neared, it appeared human and then it was discernibly a man. He was jogging toward us.
“Inok,” the Queen breathed out in a barely audible sigh as though she had been holding her breath. “It is all right. It is Inok. He is one of my runners.”
Runners were royal messengers of the Queen trained to cover long distances, running for days.
Inok was lean and long-legged. His form was almost catlike and his skin the dark brown color of the Ntajidians. He looked like he was built to run endless kilometers. With bare skin and a shaved head, he could free heat easily and there was nothing of excess to weigh himdown. He wore only shorts and a satchel for water and food.
Upon arrival, he bowed low before the Queen, and for a moment I thought he might dissolve into the hot, parched ground. He stayed in the submissive position for an excessively long time. I wondered if he was overcome with exhaustion.
The Queen said nothing and graciously accepted his submission.
I wanted to yank him from the ground and explain that there was no time for absurd amounts of groveling. Instead, I stood there silently. When Joshua nudged me with his elbow and shook his head softly, I realized that I was scowling. I relaxed my face, resigned to wait.
The lanky runner finally stood, but still did not make eye contact with the Queen.
“Inok, it is good of you to travel all this way,” the Queen began. “What news do you bring?”
“The castle and the university have been overtaken.”
My heart sank and goose bumps surfaced despite the hot sun. Oxville University! I had friends there. Its students were the best and brightest young minds in the country. Joshua had even more friends he had left behind to join me. I was suddenly relieved more than ever that Joshua had accompanied us.
Inok continued. “Prisoners are locked on the grounds without food. They have received news that there is a quest underway to summon the Avant Champion. Scouters and Swallowers have been dispatched in every direction to search for you, with continued conquests on hold until your entire party is slain.”
The taste of bile filled my mouth. Hunted to be slain. Knowing we were actively trying to stop their conquest, the Malanook would hunt with more determination than ever. Like my dreams, Malos really did know what we were doing.
Joshua placed a reassuring hand on my shoulder. I twitched slightly.
“And my counsel?” The Queen’s voice was laced with more concern. It occurred to me that I might have asked a similar question with the same earnest tone if Joshua had still been at Oxville at the time of its fall. Did the Queen have some similar form of affection for Aman?
“He weakens, but holds out hope,” Inok said. “He had me bring this to you.” He opened his palm and revealed a dark blue Chevorik Ambria. Before our eyes it took on a low, smoldering azure glow.
I glanced at Joshua, who shrugged quizzically.
“Wonderful,” she said. She looked at it, but left it in Inok’s custody.
Joshua stepped forward and offered Inok a drink of water. He accepted it with a grateful nod and guzzled it. They exchanged introductions.
“This is Abigail Cross and Allis of the Caballus,” Joshua said.
Inok looked at me appraisingly, which dissolved the smile I had started to form. His lips thinned and eyes narrowed in an expression of distaste and distrust. With a slight nod, his expression then returned to neutral. He turned stiffly and greeted Allis with a handshake. I knew the customs of the Ntajid, and they included warm welcomes toward men and women alike. His rudeness seemed to be something personal.
Walking back to the animals, I scowled and turned, feeling my face flush.
That was a greeting fit for a Queen’s servant. While I may have been just a servant four days ago—dusting busts and fluffing potpourri—I was far from just a servant now. I was the leader of this group. While it was still to be determined if I was leading them to victory or death, I felt I deserved some sliver of respect from anyone intent on joining us. I brushed Phobus, though I had already done so earlier that morning. I was still bitter when Joshua approached.
“Am I going to get burned by the fire coming out of your eyes?” he asked after watching me for a moment.
“Did you see that greeting?” I snapped.
“Abbey, he’s run all the way from Marrington, and before that he was captive for four days. I’m sure his manners are better when he’s not tortured and exhausted.”
I snorted, but part of me wondered if Joshua was right. He turned and left. I walked irritably over to the ox and picked rocks out of his hooves until my wave of anger subsided. Covered in dust and smelling like a horse, I again longed for a bath.
I rejoined the camp and saw that Allis was lighting the lignite beneath the elephant corpse.
I scowled, one eye twitching slightly. “Didn’t we agree this was going to attract Scouters?” I was especially worried knowing a vigorous search for us was underway, with creatures “dispatched in every direction.”
Allis nodded, smiling. “Yes, but Inok brought the Veil Stone.” Seeing the confused look on my face, he added, “The Veil Stone hides everyone beneath it in an umbrella of invisibility. Scouters cannot see us under here.”
That would explain his escape, I reasoned. I looked over at the horses and ox. “What sort of radius does it have?”
“Whatever radius he chooses, but it is about fifteen meters at its maximal distance.”
So they are hidden, too, I thought. I looked around but couldn’t discern any sort of barrier. I envisioned us with
in a protective half-shell and felt comforted. We could create elephant ashes without announcing our location to the Malanook. Just to test the stone’s ability, I walked beyond the barrier. I felt no different but when I turned around, I could not see the camp. It was as though everyone and everything had vanished. I saw only the barren desert and a distant petrified tree.
“Mount Kapri,” I murmured in amazement. Taking a few steps forward, everything reappeared as it had been before. No one had noticed my lingering at the border, walking in and out of the veil. I stepped back inside one last time.
I looked around for Joshua.
Allis tilted his head toward the carriage. “He is inside,” he explained, “healing Inok.”
I sat down and fumbled with a stick, stewing once more. I’d lost my brother, been beaten in an alley, nearly drowned in whitewater rapids; however, I had never been offered the luxury of the Queen’s carriage. Inok arrived dehydrated with a few scratches and a magical stone and was allowed the privilege of lying down in it.
The Veil Stone.
It may have tripled our chances of actually succeeding, I grudging admitted to myself. I poked the stick at the blue star on my palm.
Joshua emerged and explained that Inok was sleeping. Having helped someone in need and done a good deed, there was a look of contentment on his face. He was right to feel good about it, and he was a good healer. I felt guilty over my peevishness toward Inok.
How could I act like a neglected child and be an effective leader? My eyes traced Joshua’s slight smile to his square jaw, then down his neck to his broad shoulders and muscular arms. He narrowed at the waist, and I went on to imagine powerful legs that once stormed the shullby field.
Why couldn’t Joshua be the Champion? I wondered. He was already my hero.
Then I thought about Malos striking him with his bladed scepter while two dozen Swallowers descended upon him. My stomach turned and heart sank. For a moment, it was hard to breathe. I suddenly felt fiercely protective of him.
When I looked up, Joshua was sitting beside me. He looked down at my hand where I had buried my fingers into the flesh of his thigh.
“You okay, Abbey?”
Embarrassed, I quickly released my grip. Scrambling to my feet and murmuring an apology, I left to help Allis agitate the burning coals.
The fire grew to enormous proportions. I realized that it would have to burn all day and maybe all night before the bones were metamorphosed to ash. Thick black smoke billowed into the air. It rose some ten meters and hung there as if trapped by an invisible canopy. The canopy was circular and the smoke seeped around the edges in all directions, but was too well dispersed to be appreciated as a fire and hopefully would not attract attention. The cloud of smoke also provided shade from the sun.
I sat back down next to Joshua. We would have a day of reprieve from travel, which was a welcome change but it also made me swell with nervous energy. As long as we were moving, we were progressing in the journey, but sitting around camp felt like a delay, even if the ashes were an important step.
Why they were important was a mystery.
“Tell me about diving at Kwixi Bay,” I said, wanting a distraction.
Joshua thought a moment then settled into his story. “It actually wasn’t voluntary. It was part of the initiation onto the shullby team. There is one spot where the cliff is about six meters from the bubbling ocean and the ocean floor is deep enough that the dive is of minimal risk. Of course, as first years, none of us knew that.”
I swallowed back the lump in my throat that rose at visualizing steep cliffs and crashing waves in a background of a vast and vicious ocean.
“We traveled to Marrin Beach, then hiked through the sand up to the cliffs. They walked us right along the edge of the cliff, so we saw nothing but jagged rock and angry waves for six hundred meters. We feared we were going to plummet to our death, and the fact that no one has ever died during the shullby initiation was suddenly of little comfort. We wished we had asked around to see if anyone had been maimed doing this dive. We stopped at a little cove where we were instructed to make the dive and then climb back up the rock in that very location. It is the only cove where ocean meets rock in a somewhat tame fashion. Leave the cove and we would be smashed against the rocks. I was the biggest, so I was goaded into going first. I leaped off the cliff, holding my breath and expecting the worst. For a moment, it was like flying. Death was out of my control. Then the cold water enveloped me, and I knew I had survived.
“It was even more fun over the next few years being the one to march new players out there and watch their terrified faces. After the first jump, it’s all fun and everybody’s jumping and climbing until we’re too exhausted to continue.
He added, “Back at camp, we lit fires and acted like fools until the early morning.”
I wondered if life would go back to such reckless fun once Malos was banished. How long would it take to repair the wounds of lost loved ones?
Inok emerged in time for dinner, looking refreshed but still sullen. Allis had managed to snare a desert hare in a trap he had laid the day before, and I had prepared a soup with it and some kale from our food stores.
As we ate, Inok reported on the status of the kingdom. Many of the Queen’s advisors—the ministers of agriculture, defense, transportation and finance—were dead. Science, education, and health were captive. The minister of trade was unaccounted for and the minister of foreign affairs was abroad. The Queen’s counsel, Aman, was alive but ill as Inok had mentioned previously. Of the university population, one-fourth were dead by resistance, one-fourth were captives and the rest had fled west.
West. To the beach. To await the Champion. Coincidence or had they known?
I found my appetite waning. Partly from the account of the deceased, partly from Inok’s unemotional retelling of it all, and partly because I didn’t think I seasoned the rabbit very well. The meat was stringy, tough and bland.
Wasn’t Inok at least a little dismayed at the death of his country- men and women?
Perhaps I was more disgruntled at his brief, detached mention of my brother’s death. The fact that the finance minister was dead may have had no effect on him, but it devastated me.
He continued his recount. “Of the Queen’s security, half are dead and half are controlled.”
“Controlled?” I asked. I remembered the Queen saying her guards had been “overcome” back when we were on castle grounds.
Inok shot me an irritated look at the interruption, and I shot one back.
The Queen explained with more patience than I was accustomed, “The Queen’s security is comprised mostly of Hunju Mixers, men and women from the southern plains, beyond the kingdom, who are trained in combat and as watchers. They are not as evolved and intellectually developed as humans—more like Muglik but less violent. The Hunjus’ disposition makes them easily trained and obedient, but their simpler minds predispose them to Malos’s ability of mind control.”
Mind control. My head swirled. Was Malos attempting mind control on me? Was that how he inserted himself into my dreams? Was I simple and susceptible? No one else here suffered his mental intrusions. Although, maybe, I was the one intruding on him.
Inok continued, but I was already lost in a sea of self-doubt, self-conscious worry and self-pity. I wrapped myself in my red cloak and sat by the fire with everyone, but felt utterly alone for the first time since we set out from Aithos.
6
I surveyed my surroundings, recognizing the dream world Malos and I shared. Tonight we were in the Queen’s dining chamber. A large oak table suitable for twenty stretched down the middle of the room. Only the end chairs were in position. Malos occupied the far end and glutinously sat before a half-eaten roasted pig. He glanced at me but did not stop eating.
The end nearest me had a plate with a slab of meat, roasted potatoes, and turnips. Red wine filled a goblet. The smell was enticing especially after my botched attempt to cook gamey rabbit.
&nb
sp; I could scarcely remember the last time I sat at a table and partook of such a sizable meal. I thought of eating, but hesitated. I didn’t understand our meetings and which parts of them were real and which parts imagined.
Can poisoned dream-food kill me?
Malos chomped at his carcass brutishly, but quietly, as though waiting for me to say or do something.
Looking around the room, I noticed that its appearance had been altered since the last time I had dusted it and set the table. The surrounding walls were carelessly lined with mounds of silver that hadn’t been there previously. Silver plates, platters, jewelry, and decorative figurines were strewn haphazardly along the edges of the room. They shined brilliantly in the abundant candlelight, but there was a dull, mourning edge to their luster.
I sank with a heavy heart into the nearby chair. Taxco has fallen.
Malos smiled greedily. “I thought I should fix the place up a bit for your next visit.”
I imagined the quaint town ravaged by Swallowers—the shop owners devoured, their stores robbed of all the silver. Shattered glass from broken windows strewn along the streets. Abandoned ox roaming the town. Orphaned children hiding in closets.
“You’re a monster,” I said, barely above a whisper. I set my hand on the table, resting it over a knife.
“I am evil,” he conceded, unabashedly. “But monsters show no mercy. I am willing to spare you and your pathetic, cowering queen, who has abandoned her people. All you have to do, Cross, is disavow this little quest of yours. “You’re exhausted, hungry, thirsty, and apparently in need of a good bath.” He surveyed me with his beady eyes. “I can remedy all of these things.”
As he spoke, I pressed my finger against the tip of the knife. I felt the pain of its blade, but persisted until it drew blood.
The sight of my own blood pulled me out of my dream, and I was back beside Joshua in the dark night. Back to safety. I slid closer to him.
The next morning came under a bright sun. I looked at my hand. How could I have a wound from a dream? Impossible!
