The Seared Lands

by Deborah A. Wolf

  Maika smiled when she saw them and smiled again at the many Iponui woven in among the imperators, the shadowsworn standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Sulema’s newly bonded Baidun Daiel.

  In front of the gates stood an assemblage of persons most of the celebrants at best knew by name. Bretan il Mer, who had been named king of Salar Merraj now that his mother and the wicked Bashaba were among those whose bodies decorated the outer ramparts. He was accompanied by his brother Soutan Mer, and a score of Salarian troops all wearing the blue-and-green badge of those sworn to Sa Atu.

  Gaia, daughter of Davidian, had been raised to the position of imperator general in honor of her father’s sacrifice. In her blue mail she had the bearing of a hero of old, and stood beside Umm Nuara First Mother, Askander First Warden—and the bonesinger Ani, whose magics were no longer forbidden under Atualonian law and who appeared now younger in age than her former students.

  The parens of Atualon, emissaries from Min Yaarif and even from the distant city of Sindan, all vied with one another for positions of importance. Leviathus ap Wyvernus ne Atu—the pirate king—stood near his lovely new bride. Yaela herself was the center of a great deal of gossip and speculation as the erstwhile apprentice of Aasah, aunt to the refugee queen, and newly named Illindrist in her own right.

  Yaela caught Maika’s glance and smiled. Those jade eyes, which had been watching over Maika from the moment of her birth, shone with fierce pride and determination.

  Kentakuyan a’o Maika i Kaka’ahuana li’i stood amid the personages of Atualon, unremarkable in borrowed finery, accompanied only by Tamimeha and Akamaia. Wide-eyed and waifish she appeared, and knew it—she had perfected the look well.

  She met Yaela’s look with one of her own and inclined her head slowly.

  A hush fell upon the crowd as from the host the Divasguard appeared in their green dragon’s helms, red shamsi raised in salute. Beneath these strode the Dragon Queen, stern-faced and splendid, looking neither to the left nor the right. At her side walked Ismai ne Mur, the Lich King and king consort, fearsome and glorious. Each bore a dragon mask—hers of blue and green gems, his of gold—and were robed in white-and-gold. If ever a pair of lovers were fit to inspire hearts to song and to deeds of glory, Maika thought, it would be these two.

  Bretan il Mer strode forth from the assemblage and met them. He bent his knee and his bare, horned head in obeisance, took the thin golden circlet from his brow, and held it up to them.

  “The king of Salar Merraj begs your forgiveness, your Radiance, your Arrogance,” he said to them, “and mercy for his people, if not for his person.”

  Sulema took the golden circlet from Bretan and placed it back on his head. Then she raised him to his feet and kissed either cheek before slapping him so hard that the big man’s head snapped back with an audible crack.

  “Mercy is granted, where it was not asked,” she replied, “and you shall be our steward in the east, to keep our roads safe, and the hearts of our people true.” The king of Salar Merraj bowed again, and the crowd erupted in roars of approval, understanding that a civil war had been averted ere it had begun, and that an empire had been born, both in the same day. Then Bretan faced the crowd and spoke in a clear voice.

  “Peoples of Atualon, of the Zeera, of Salar Merraj,” he said. “Peoples of the west and east, listen to my words and rejoice! For the queen has come among you, the Dragon Queen of Atualon. Raised in the harsh Zeera by her mother, the formidable dreamshifter Hafsa Azeina, trained by her father Wyvernus Ka Atu, forged as a blade upon the anvil of Quarabala, in the deadly Seared Lands.

  “Before you stands Sulema an Wyvernus ne Atu, warder of the long sleep of Sajani, guardian of the Dreaming Lands, keeper of the Song of Dragons. Sulema Firehair, first of her name.” He paused, then added, “Long may she reign! Shall she be known to you as your queen and dwell among you, above you, keeping watch and faith from Atukos on high?”

  Before the crowd could react to his words, Atukos itself answered for them all. The dragonglass walls erupted in green flame and blue, a scintillating display so profound that for a moment the brilliance of the queen’s fortress eclipsed the sun itself, and it seemed as if Akari Sun Dragon cried out a welcome to his daughter.

  As quickly as they had burst forth the flames subsided, but where the walls of Atukos had been dark and forbidding, they became bright with the promise of abundance.

  It would be seen as a blessing from Sajani, Maika knew, and that was just as well. The land that had been sundered was made whole, and the world that had been broken was made good by the coupling of the Dragon Queen and her consort, the twining of the songs of Sajani and Akari, as should have never been torn asunder.

  “Yes!” someone shouted, then more joined in, until the host cried out with one voice, then fell to their knees, overwhelmed by the tableau before them.

  Hannei, first warrior of the Zeeranim, stepped forward and set a golden casket by her feet. She drew forth a headdress of lionsnake plumes the likes of which Maika had never seen. The plumes were of purest white chased with gold, blue, and green. These were set in a crown of red gold crusted with diamonds and precious jewels. She held this above Sulema’s bowed head, and grinned, and spoke to her queen in hand-speak. They both laughed, and it pained Maika to hear the sound that came from the first warrior’s throat.

  Tamimeha grunted. “They are using Zeerani runner signs,” she whispered. “The silent one says to her sister, ‘I have killed this little thing for you.’” She looked impressed. “That must have been the grandmother of all lionsnakes, to boast such plumes. I have never heard of such a feat.”

  Maika looked long at Hannei, who wore two swords upon her back, the beaded vest of a Zeerani warrior, and a medallion around her neck that looked more than a little like stars hung in the Web of Illindra.

  That one merits watching, she thought. Perhaps even eliminating. But she said nothing, not even to Tamimeha whom she trusted, for a spider’s secrets were best kept to herself. Her own web was yet unfinished.

  Sulema knelt, and her sword-sister placed the crown upon her brow. Then Hannei raised a circlet of white gold and yellow and placed it upon the bowed head of Ismai ne Mur, at which point the crowd again erupted in a deafening roar. Horns were blown, flowers thrown, and babes raised high in the air by parents who wished their small new souls to be lifted and blessed by this grand moment.

  And when will our moment come? Maika thought. When will we set foot upon the lands we were promised, and raise our own flags, and our own babes to be blessed in peace under the sun? When will our sundered lands be made whole again, and good, when will the tears from the Night of Sorrows be dried? When? She looked upon the face of joy, and bit back tears of despair, of anger.

  Lost in the tumult, Yaela—swathed in spidersilk of gold, weighed down in precious gems as befit a high princess of Saodan and beloved of the pirate king—appeared at Maika’s elbow, leaned close, and whispered in her ear,

  “Long live the queen.”

  Maika turned, stared into her aunt’s cursed, all-seeing eyes, the eyes of Pelang—so like her own.

  She smiled.

  “Long live the queen.”

  FIFTY - EIGHT

  Akari Sun Dragon had long since flown beyond the horizon crying for his lost love, and the night unfurled silken-soft. Those warriors and wardens, mothers and craftmistresses—indeed, every member of the prides who could walk or ride, had left their homes before daybreak and traveled to the Madraj. Only a handful had been left to guard their borders.

  Dreamshifters were there, most of them newly raised too soon from apprentice or journeyman. Their youthful faces were hard and determined, nonetheless. Moonslight and starslight shone upon the faces of the Zeeranim, a remnant of a remnant, little more, but they yet breathed. “Where there is life,” old Theotara would have said, “there is yet hope.”

  In the days of their glory, hordes of mounted Ja’Akari had rolled across the Zeera like thunder and the songs of the Mothers
had fallen like gentle rain. Hannei had looked upon the census books, upon the thousands and thousands of names of the ancestors, stretching back in a proud line back to the dawn of days and the first ride of Zula Din. Time, and war, and the Dragon Kings of Atualon had worked their fell magics upon the people. Had almost driven the Zeeranim to extinction.

  Almost, but not quite.

  The voices of their ancestors echoed in the halls beneath the seats of the Madraj. They called for kishah, for vengeance. They called for her. Hannei, alone in the deep heart of the Madraj, looked up at her people and allowed herself a small, hard smile.

  They have not killed us yet, she thought. We are stronger than they know.

  The sword-sister of her childhood had argued that the people might someday regain their former glory, that the young riders and young vash’ai might again form bonds of kinship and blood, that they might once again breed great herds of asil, take up bow and shamsi, and work their will upon the world.

  “Saghaani,” Sulema had argued, years ago, “there is beauty in youth.” They were young, they were strong and unconstrained by the failures of their elders. They would find a way to secure a future for the people. If there was no way to be found, they would make one.

  “Ehuani,” young Hannei had countered. “There is beauty in truth.” She had seen neither beauty nor wisdom in an attempt to deny the inevitable. The time of the Zeeranim was over and done, and the world would move on without them.

  They had both been right, if only through ignorance. There was beauty in all things. In truth, in youth, in death…

  In vengeance.

  The clouds to the east glowed an angry orange-red, seared with torch and bonfire, and the night was rent with sound. Hard sounds, angry sounds, hammer and anvil, whip and shout. The Zeeranim, who had never in their history traded in human flesh, had refused honorable deaths to Ishtaset’s people, the Mah’zula, choosing rather to enslave them and bend their backs to labor. From the ashes of Aish Kalumm a new city was rising, one with walls and towers for archers, with narrow stairs and deep dungeons, with armories and forges and stables for war-horses.

  Aish Kalumm itself was no more, nor ever would be again. Aish Kishah, this city would be called, the City of Vengeance.

  She stood upon the very ground where Tammas had once danced with Azouq and Dairuz, beneath the moons, in those lost days when the world had seemed a good place in which to live. The sky grew dark as a bruise, dark as old blood. Dark as a scream with no tongue to give it voice. The moons Didi and Delpha raised themselves in the sky thin and sharp as pale shamsi, and they were pointed toward Atualon. It was an omen of death if ever Hannei had seen one.

  Khutlani, she admonished herself. Your mind is too small to hold such big thoughts.

  Hannei could hear the breath of the people of the prides, hot with long-suppressed anger. She could feel their heartbeats shivering through the air like the drums of war, could feel the silent horn-blasts of their impatience. The wind shifted and she could smell the cat musk, stronger than ever. Eyes flashed in the deepening dark, first by the dozens, then by the hundreds. Low growls and soft snarls punctuated the silence, and a warm presence curled heavy in the back of her mind. They were there, in the night, watching and waiting.

  For too long have we watched from the shadows, a voice snarled in her head. Too long have we waited. It is time to hunt.

  A great fire roared to life, shattering the night. Hannei’s heart leapt in her breast like the flames, hot and hungry. A gasp rippled across the assembly like wind through sand, and somewhere a baby cried. Even this far from the people Hannei could feel the tension of held breaths, of bellies hungry for what crumbs the Dragon Kings and Queens in Atualon had left for them.

  The prides’ most powerful dreamshifter stood before her, above her, wreathed in flame. Once a sickly boy, weak and shy, he had been claimed by the moons as their own child, had walked among the stars and through time.

  “I have seen the future,” he had told her, touching her face, “and it is us.” Now he stood hale and whole and powerful, naked skin gleaming gold in the firelight, eyes dark and deep as the furious stars.

  Daru held in one hand a horse-head staff of some strange metal, and a pale stone globe in the other. As he raised the staff above his head, Inna’hael—first kahanna of the vash’ai—bled out from the shadows to stand beside Daru. He threw back his head and roared, and the desert sang in answer to his call. No vash’ai had ever seemed so magnificent, no dreamshifter so formidable, as they.

  Nothing in Hannei’s short, brutal life had prepared her for a moment that felt so right. As she stared up at them, man and vash’ai, dreamshifter and kahanna, the tears streamed down her face hot as blood.

  The child chose that moment to announce herself with her very first kick. Hannei laid a hand over her belly and stared unblinking into the fire, into the future.

  Remember this night, little warrior.

  Hannei felt her sa, the breath of her spirit, quiver like a star trapped in Illindra’s web. She refused the fear that would have risen in her soul, consigned it to fire and smoke and the memories of childhood.

  This is our world now, she thought, mine and my child’s. And his.

  As the newmade slaves hurried to light torches all around the Madraj, Hannei felt hope—wild, fierce, and terrible—rise from the ashes and curl itself around her heart. This was the night she had dreamed of, fought for, lived for. No longer would the Zeeranim be as children seated before a stranger’s fire, fed on crumbs and pity and denied their birthright. No longer would their children be hunted, their warriors dismissed, their voices go unheard. They were born of the desert, bred of the blood of Zula Din, beloved of Akari.

  We are not alone.

  Never alone, the soft and deadly voice agreed. Never again.

  The wind picked up, and the Zeera sang, and Hannei’s heart sang with it.

  Three Zeeranim stepped into the light. One was Ja’Akari, tall and proud, and in her hands she bore the Book of Blood. The second was Ja’Sajani, straight and true, and in his hands he bore the Book of Asil. The third was a mother, gravid with child. In one hand she bore a stylus of bone, in the other a bowl made from the fresh white skull of a woman. Hannei looked upon this, noted the broken nose, and smiled.

  Rehaza Entanye, she thought. I would recognize that face anywhere.

  The three were naked, even as she was naked, for under the moons and stars all women, all men are equal. Their faces were painted to honor the vash’ai, their skin deeply dappled as well, for each of them had long been Zeeravashani, and their kithren had not abandoned them even during the recent troubles.

  Their heads were bare, new-shorn, and what little hair had grown back had been rubbed with ash and fat so that it sprang up from their scalps like pale manes, in the old fashion. These three were among the first to have been made Aulenui, the First People come again, a new and stronger pride born from the ashes of the weak.

  The Ja’Akari and Ja’Sajani opened their books, each to the first blank page. Hannei held her arms out from her sides, like the wings of a bird, and stared without flinching into Daru’s eyes as the young mother jabbed the stylus into the flesh of Hannei’s inner arms and let the blood drain drip, drip, drip into the broken-nosed bowl. When enough of Hannei’s life had been drained away the mother dipped the stylus into the skull of her slain enemy and wrote in the Book of Blood with a tidy, deft hand.

  “Nazmah Din,” she intoned, “born Hannei of the Shahadrim, daughter of Deaara and of Mazuk Ja’Sajani of the line of Zula Din. Also, Hannei Ja’Akari, champion of the Zeeranim under Sareta Ja’Akari Akibra, also—” She glanced up, and with Hannei’s nod of approval she finished. “Also known as the slave Kishah, renowned among the pit fighters of Min Yaarif.” She went on for some time, naming skirmishes in which Hannei had fought, and the battle in Atualon, and those people whom Hannei had killed and whose names she could remember. Her dalliance with Tammas son of Nurati was noted, and his bloodlines,
and that he had died, and that she had loved him and of that love had conceived a child.

  When the mother had exhausted the story of Hannei’s short life she used the blood, now cooling and congealing, to write in the Book of Asil. In this book she named those horses which Hannei owned—her mares Mekkia and Lalia among them, as well as Zeitan Fleet-Foot and Ruhho the brave-hearted black, and Azouq, and others whose owners had gifted them to her as tokens of goodwill. Last named was Atemi True-Heart, who had once belonged to a sword-sister. That sword-sister had passed into Atualon, never to return, and so care of the fine golden mare had been passed to her.

  Hannei pushed aside the pain in her heart. Though Sulema an Wyvernus ne Atu yet lived and ruled from Atukos, Sulema Ja’Akari was gone from the world. Atemi belonged to the people, and with them she would remain.

  By the time they were finished, Hannei had stilled her pain and stifled regret. The books were carried away with reverence—of all the treasures in Aish Kalumm, these alone had been spared by Ishtaset and her riders, and they were precious—and Hannei walked, alone, up to the roaring fire and to Daru.

  Dark eyes old and wise peered out at her from a stranger’s face, a stranger who smiled with Daru’s smile and spoke from Daru’s heart. They burned like stars, as though they would sear away the layers of her names and find her worthy. The words, when they came, were deep and resonant, and the shadows leaned in close to hear them.

  “Hannei Shahadri.”

  “Nnnnh,” she refuted, shaking her head. There are no Shahadrim here, only the people, now and always.

  “Hannei Ja’Akari.”

  “Nnnnh.” Again she shook her head, more vehemently this time. The truth of the world has broken my heart. I am a warrior no more.

  “Kishah of Min Yaarif.”