The Seared Lands

by Deborah A. Wolf

  Maika found herself standing on…

  Nothing…

  “Best not think of that,” he told her, still smiling. “And best not to look down.”

  Maika kept her gaze fixed upon the stranger’s laughing dark eyes. “It is you,” she insisted. “I have seen you in my dreams.”

  “Have you?” He sounded so much like Akamaia that Maika could not help herself. She rolled her eyes in exasperation.

  “Yes,” she told him. “In dreams and visions. Illindra has sent you to help us. You are meant to lead my people to safety.”

  “Am I indeed?” His smile faded, and he stared into Maika’s eyes as if reading all the secrets she kept there. “How can you be so sure, little one? Prophets are false. Visions lie. The dreaming eye finds no beauty in truth.”

  “I have seen it,” she insisted, frustration threatening to overwhelm her. “You are meant to lead us out of the Seared Lands.”

  “Yes, but then what? How do you know that I am meant to lead you to safety, and not to some worse fate? Prophets lie. Visions are false. Your own heart will lie to you, if you let it.”

  “Anywhere you choose to lead us is better than where we are,” she cried. “You cannot lead us into a worse fate than the one we are suffering. See for yourself.” She turned, looked down upon her own prone body.

  He had been right. To look down nearly made her sick.

  Still she looked at the tiny figures surrounding her. Beloved Akamaia, and Tamimeha, her tiny warriors like ants determined to sacrifice all for their queen. The shadowmancers, falling beneath the strain of Akari’s assault. The Dragon Queen, brilliant and doomed, and her mute friend—

  “Oh.” The figure behind her breathed out a long, low sigh. “Oh. I did not know. I will come.”

  “Praise Illindra,” she breathed, turning to face him again. “We are saved.”

  “Perhaps,” he replied, eyes dark and unreadable. He lifted the bird-skull flute to his lips…

  “Perhaps not.”

  …and pip-pip peeeee, pip-pip peeeee-oh he played a tune that sent Maika dancing away, away…

  THIRTY - SEVEN

  She looks like a candle that has been blown out.

  Even as she held Sulema’s head in her lap and brushed the short wizard locks back from her face, Hannei was certain they had failed. Her onetime sister’s face, more familiar to her than her own, was wan beneath the dirt and freckles and the gem-crusted Mask of Sajani. Her cheeks were pale and her long, muscular limbs shook as if the Nightmare Man of stories had seized her and would not let go.

  Though Sulema gripped her fox-head staff till her knuckles went white, the air about them shimmered and swirled as the Dreaming Lands resisted her attempts to open a doorway and usher them to safety.

  A hot wind blew down from on high as Akari tried to claw his way down, and the earth beneath them trembled as Sajani sought to wake. Hannei ignored them, as she ignored the frightened mutterings of the crowd and the whispers of that girl queen and her advisors—that they were up to something was painfully obvious. She ignored the pain in her tailbone and back and neck as she bent over Sulema and hummed, though the sound that came from her brought shame. It was a silly song, one known only to herself and the youth who had been her sister. They had made it up on the night they snuck into the stallion herds of Uthrak and braided breeding-rights beads into the manes of Zeitan Fleet-Foot and Ruhho the brave-hearted black.

  Moons ago, years ago, lifetimes ago.

  In those days she had been whole and hopeful. Neither of them had wanted anything more than their horses, their bows and swords, and the approval of the pride. Sareta had praised them, Ani had watched over them, Nurati had baked honey-cakes for them with her own hands. To steal a kiss from Tammas Ja’Sajani had been the greatest quest they could imagine, and being denied a place among the warriors of their pride the greatest fear. They played at aklashi, not this game of dragons and dreams and spiders…

  Sudden realization took Hannei and stopped her song short.

  Sulema never wanted this, she realized, no more than I did. She would have shunned the staff she clings to now, would have shunned the mask and the dragon’s legacy that goes with it. She wanted neither of those worlds, and now lies trapped between them, caught like a fly in two spiders’ webs.

  For a moment she felt pity for Sulema, fear for the delicate bones beneath the thin freckled skin, sorrow for the warrior’s locks shorn away even as hers had been. They had wanted so little, asked so little from the world, and now found themselves crushed like millet between hard stones. Beneath the heavy dragon’s mask Sulema pressed her eyes shut, and her body shook with effort as she tried to force her will upon a magic she hated.

  She would kill herself trying to save people she does not know, Hannei thought with a surge of fierce pride. Some of whom would see her dead. She is trying so hard…

  Too hard. Hannei had watched Hafsa Azeina, more than once, as that dreamshifter had sloughed off her mortal cloak and slipped into the world of dreams and nightmares. She needs to relax and let it happen, lest it break her.

  That thought was enough to make her laugh, almost. Sulema was fire and rocks and hasty arrows. She never simply relaxed and let things happen. The only time she could ever fully concentrate was when she was fighting.

  Oh.

  Of course!

  Hannei eased herself out from beneath Sulema’s stiff and shaking form. Golden eyes flew open behind the jeweled mask, startled and bloodshot and desperate.

  “What are you doing?” Sulema whispered hoarsely.

  Hannei grunted and drew one of her swords. She pointed it first at Sulema, and then up at Akari, unfathomably high above them but still there. Then she used the point of her sword to draw a wide and careful circle in the dust. She wiped the blade clean and sheathed it, then clapped her hands together once, twice, three times before her heart, never once taking her eyes from her onetime sister.

  “Ahhhh,” Sulema breathed. She removed the mask and set it aside, laid the staff beside it as well. Sitting up slowly she then stood, shrugging off the touch of those who would have helped her to her feet. She stepped slowly, deliberately, into the hoti which Hannei had drawn, drew back her arm, and slapped Hannei hard across the face once, twice, three times. Then she threw back her head and laughed.

  The people of Quarabala stared at them.

  “Challenge accepted, sister!” Sulema said. “Show me yours!” She laughed again as if there was not a care in the world, the very picture of saghaani, beauty in youth.

  Hannei spat blood at Sulema’s feet, and grinned. Let the kings and queens and sorcerers play their games. Let the spiders weave their webs. She and Sulema had been warriors—were warriors, no matter what the world thrust upon them or stripped away. Hannei looked into Sulema’s eyes, hoping that her own bloody smile might convey the words that were in her heart.

  If I die today, she thought, though I die in exile far from the singing sands, let me die as a warrior, shedding blood that the people may live. Let me die Ja’Akari, under the sun.

  THIRTY - EIGHT

  If I die at dawn, Jian implored silently, though I die far from the Twilight Lands, let me die as the son of Tsun-ju Tiungpei, facing the sword with such grace and honor as she has always shown.

  Let me die as the son of Allyr, shedding no coward’s tears. Let the blood I shed spare the blood of my most beloved.

  The men shoved Jian through a narrow doorway and into an ink-black room so that he stumbled and nearly fell. A heavy door slammed shut, sealing him off from the world, sealing his fate. His own breathing sounded harsh in his ears, a discordant final note in the song that had been his life. He stank of anger and despair. There came to his mind an image of three dead girls, bound to their thrones of prophecy by the same blackthorn vines which bound Sajani to her blood-soaked bed. He heard their rotting voices murmuring, as if they had lain in wait in the chambers of his heart.

  “He thinks he knows fear,” the first sister h
ad said, “but he has not yet heard the drums of war. He will.”

  “He thinks he knows pain,” the second sister had answered, “but he has not yet seen the face of despair. He will. He will.”

  “Aaaaaah,” the third sister rattled then and now. “Aaah aaah aaaahhhh.”

  They were right, he thought. I knew nothing of fear or pain. The torments and terrors I had suffered then were mine alone. To fear for one’s own life, he realized, was as nothing compared to Tsali’gei’s. My mother. My son. My little son.

  A cry of pain escaped his lips, as it had not then, waking echoes of mocking laughter from the shadows.

  “Jian?”

  The voice was weak, so weak it was almost lost in the shadows. Jian’s heart tripped and he fell to his knees in the darkness.

  “Mother!” he cried, for surely it had been her voice. He shuffled forward in the darkness, widening his eyes as if by doing so he might drink in light by which to see. He found her soon enough by feel and by smell. The scent which had enveloped him in comfort and love now danced with a smell Jian knew only too well: the sharp tang of imminent death. “Mother,” he said again, softly this time as he bent to gather her to his chest. She hissed through her teeth a little as he pulled her close, as good as a scream of pain from any lesser woman.

  “My boy,” she murmured against his shoulder as he sat on the cold stone floor, rocking her as once she had rocked him. “My sweet, handsome boy.”

  “You will be okay, Mama,” he told her in a voice that cracked and wept.

  “Do not lie to me,” she scolded, her voice faint as a shadow’s sigh. “Jian, listen to me. Listen…”

  “Yes?” he asked, when she paused for breath.

  And paused…

  and paused…

  for breath…

  * * *

  Long into the night Jian held Tiungpei close, cradling her body in his arms as her flesh cooled and stiffened, as the smell of death rose about them like the perfume of wicked flowers. He sang to her—songs he had learned from her in his childhood, songs he had learned from the other yellow Daechen, songs he had heard in the Twilight Lands. He sang with the voice of the sea, of the wind, he sang with the voice of a boy who was lost in the woods and trying to find his way home.

  When his breath failed, he hummed to her.

  When his heart failed he wept against her thin shoulder.

  At last, at long last and far too soon, Jian removed his own outer robe and wrapped her body, doing so by feel, then laid her out as best he could with her hands folded over her chest. He wished for a silken shroud covered all in seed pearls. He wished for a red-robed priest with a shaven head, one who could pray to the sky for his mother’s peaceful journey to the Lonely Road and beyond. He wished to hear her voice just one… just one last time.

  As he knelt beside his mother’s still body, Jian could hear a rushing as of distant thunder, feel the floor tremble beneath his fingertips as grief and fury rose up in a dark tide. Caught unawares he threw his head back, gasping for air as the storm found him, found its heart, and tore him all asunder. That part of him which had been human was ripped loose and flung screaming into the void. That greater portion of his soul—daeborn, fellborn—rose up and he rose with it, snarling his defiance.

  The living rock screamed as he raked his claws across it, and the night’s face went pale with fear beneath the gaze of his daemon-spawn eyes. Jian had seen his father shift his shape many times, but had never been able to achieve the change himself.

  Now I am truly an Issuq, he thought, and now I am truly alone. For surely they had killed Tsali’gei as well, and murdered their unborn babe.

  “Motherrrr,” he cried, an animal’s howl, and gnashed his teeth with impatience. In allowing harm to befall Tiungpei, the emperor had broken their treaty, and unleashed the Sea King’s child.

  * * *

  Dawn broke over the land as it always would, dead mothers or no.

  When they came for him, he was ready.

  THIRTY - NINE

  Dawn broke over the land like a new-forged sword. Sulema sat cross-legged across the hoti from Hannei Ja’Akari and allowed herself to be prepared for battle. Keoki the shadowmancer stood as her second. Rehaza Entanye stood for Hannei. As a horde of long-limbed and giggling children took turns beating the travel dust and sweat from her clothing, she sat still as a vash’ai at hunt and he sponged the stink from her body with perfumed manna water. He painted her face as best he could with colored dust and kohl so that her visage would resemble a cat’s snarl, kneaded her muscles until they were loose.

  Neither she nor her opponent had a proper warrior’s braids, having been shorn of their pride by wicked outlanders. Keoki smiled slyly and insisted that he knew what to do with the orange hair that had now grown to a finger’s length along her scalp. Oils and combs were proffered up by Nanevi and the two of them had tugged and muttered at her head until she sported a short mane of wizard locks, not as crazed and untidy as her mother’s had been, but neat and fierce, adorned with precious beads of red salt clay.

  Gazing into a polished brass mirror, Sulema thought it suited her better somehow than had the braids of a Ja’Akari. She made a face, and the warrior in the mirror snarled back at her. It would suffice.

  The seconds pulled back, allowing the warriors time to meditate. Akamaia raised her voice to Illindra, beseeching guidance and deliverance for their people, and strength for their chosen savior. A handful of the refugees brought beaten metal hand drums and played them with intricate, repetitive tones that were soothing and arousing at the same time. Focusing on the way her heart beat in time to the drums, Sulema closed her waking eyes.

  Focusing on her breathing, she matched it to the flow of the song as Aasah had taught her, letting sa and ka flow freely through her body and out into the world. Blood and bone, breath and heart, earth and sky, water and wind, she was one.

  It was all, and it was enough.

  Sulema opened her dreaming eyes, and beheld Shehannam. The Dreaming Lands, which before had seemed dim and strange, now felt cool and comforting and overfull of life. She did not miss the hard stare of Akari, but welcomed its absence, and sucked in a great lungful of misted air, grateful for this brief respite. Birds trilled from the otherworldly trees all around her and small animals scurried through the underbrush, unconcerned with her presence. She may have been the Dragon Queen of Atualon, but in this place she was nothing more than another two-legged interloper.

  It was oddly reassuring.

  In front of her, cutting through the dense woods, lay two distinct paths. Sulema took another deep breath and stilled her mind. Her mother had warned her about such tests.

  One path was made of soft, golden sand and seemed to shine even in this drear land. At the beginning of it lay an elaborate headdress of lionsnake plumes, and a golden shamsi had been thrust into the loam. Sulema could see herself donning the headdress and drawing the shamsi, choosing the way of the warrior. It felt natural to her, and right. For the space of a breath she could not imagine choosing any other course.

  Am I not Ja’Akari? she asked herself. A daughter of the dreamshifter, riding free under the sun? Ehuani, this is who I am. She took a step forward, but something fluttered and caught her eye.

  The second path was straight and neat, cobbled with smooth dragonstone which glowed a warm welcome. The blue and gold robes of Sa Atu hung from a blackthorn bush, and the golden crown of a queen winked at her from among the midnight blooms. Sulema could feel herself slipping into the linen and cloth-of-gold and taking her rightful place on the golden throne of Atualon. This was her path, her legacy and birthright. For the space of a breath she could not imagine ever having considered any other course.

  Am I not Sa Atu? she reasoned. Daughter of the dragon, champion of my people? Ehuani, this is who I am. And she took a step toward the second path…

  Then stopped, shaking her head.

  “There is more beauty in truth,” she said aloud, “than in the lie
s of the most beautiful dream.” Because the truth— and she knew it—was that the way of the warrior was no longer hers to take, any more than the robes of Sa Atu were hers to wear. “I am not a warrior of the Zeera, daughter of Hafsa Azeina,” she said again, addressing Shehannam itself. “Neither am I the Dragon Queen of Atualon, daughter of Wyvernus. I am myself, and nothing more.

  “I am Sulema.”

  A hunting horn sounded once, twice, three times through the darkling sky, and the paths to the left and right of her disappeared as a figure emerged from the woods. A magnificent beast of a woman clad in skins and furs, antlered and doe-eyed, with skin pale as sand and a wild tangle of hair that hung past her knees. Her smile was as sharp and predatory as those of the dark hounds that rose up from the shadows to surround her, and when she clapped her hands together the birds stopped singing.

  “Maith-na thau,” she growled at Sulema, and the hounds growled with her. “Issa tir aulen.”

  Thus saying, she drew her hands apart, and a third path sprang open through the trees, midway between where the other two had been. Before Sulema could blink, or say a word of thanks, the woman and her hounds disappeared.

  A single, shaggy-haired white beast remained behind, a great hound with a bloody muzzle and one torn ear. It gazed upon her for a moment with sorrowful golden eyes before it, too, faded away.

  “The Huntress,” Sulema breathed. Her mother had warned her away from the guardian of Shehannam, who did not suffer intruders to live. And yet, she had offered no harm.

  Or had she?

  Sulema walked forward, slowly, until she had reached the beginning of this new path. The fox-head staff of a dreamshifter lay upon the ground at her feet, and the Mask of Sajani nestled against it, winking up at her from a bed of soft grass.

  “Neither Zeerani nor Atualonian, then,” she said, her voice a soft song in that hallowed place, “but both.” She took up the staff of a dreamshifter and it felt true, fitting her callused hand better than a warrior’s shamsi. She took up the Mask of Sajani and placed it against her face. It felt natural, settling more comfortably against her skin than a queen’s golden crown. A breeze sprang up, ruffling her fiery locks.