We left him. I left him. Because he told me to. Because I let him. Because I didn’t know what the right thing to do was. And now he’ll spend the rest of his life in that strange place, unable to ever leave.
Because of me.
He sighed and looked up just as Azrael sat down beside him. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and held him tight. “Are you all right?” she asked.
“Just wondering if we did the right thing. Leaving Kamil.”
“It was his choice.”
“He’s a child.”
“I know.” The angel paused. “Can I tell you something that might make you feel better?”
“Please.”
“We can go back there again, whenever we want. We can see how he’s doing. And if he changes his mind and wants to leave, then we can help him leave.” She sighed into his hair. “Don’t think of it as abandoning him. We’re just leaving him in their care for now, while we attend to other business. But we’ll be back, someday soon.”
He squeezed her hand. “I love you.”
She leaned her head on his shoulder. “I know.”
Chapter 8
They slept a few hours in a sheltered depression among the tall stones where the sun cast long shadows and a warm breeze blew gently through the low hills, and Iyasu woke to a beautiful deep blue sky floating above him with a handful of thin white clouds stretched across it, drifting far above the world.
“Feeling better?” Azrael climbed down from the stone where she had kept watch over the plains and sat beside him.
“I dreamed about Kamil.” He looked at her. “I dreamed he was riding one of those machines, and chasing me across the desert, shooting lightning at me.”
“Sorry.”
He shrugged. “You know I… I think I envy him.”
“Really?”
“He may be young, but he’s not stupid. And back there, he took one look around and just knew. He just knew what he wanted, and he did it. No talking, no complaining, no worrying. He just did it.”
“Yes, he did. But he might have been wrong. He might be in for years of misery.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.” Iyasu sighed. “I just wish it was that easy for me, sometimes. I can look around and see everything, know every little detail about it, where it came from, where it’s probably going. But I still worry.”
Azrael laughed.
“Why is that funny?”
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t laugh.” She shook her head and looked away. “I know you worry. But… you have no idea what worry is. You really don’t. You don’t live with it the way I do.”
“How do you mean?”
She took his hand and touched it to her face. “A part of my mind is not my own. The part that is an angel, that is always an angel, that is always awake, always watching the faces of the dying, every moment of every day. I can’t stop it, and I can’t look away. Not ever.”
He nodded. He knew this already, but he only ever knew it as she described it, and every time she talked about it, he tried to glean a little more not just from her words but from her eyes and voice as well.
“And every moment of every day I dread what the next face will be, what the next moment of death will feel like. Because it might just be a quiet, wrinkly face fading from sleep into the next life, but all too often, it’s someone young, screaming or gasping, terrified, in pain, confused.” She inhaled sharply and her eyes darted very slightly, but then she focused on him again. “And it makes me die a little myself to see them, to feel them, to know that this is the world we all live in. That you live in. And that you will die in. One day.”
He squeezed her hand. “What can I do?”
“Worry less.” She smiled a broken, sad smile. “Be here, with me, and not out there, with the world.”
“I can do that.”
They kissed softly and tenderly, and they were slowly sinking into each other’s arms when a deep grunting sound rose not far away. Looking up, they saw Rahm and Hadara lying in a busy tangle of knees and elbows. Azrael burst out laughing and fell against the seer’s chest, and Iyasu held her tight and laughed with her.
Later, when everyone was mostly dressed, Iyasu said, “Well, here we are, free as promised.”
“Yes, indeed!” Rahm clapped him on the shoulder. “And well done, too.”
“So, we should get moving,” the seer said. “I doubt we’re going to find much water this close to the desert, unless we climb higher into the hills. And I imagine it’s quite a long journey from here to wherever Simurgh calls home.”
Rahm frowned at him.
“The angel?” Iyasu prompted. “Simurgh?”
“Yes, her. No, she’s days away, but that’s no matter now! Now we have our demon hunters. Now we can go to Messenad and save King Kavad!” The towering warrior grinned. “We’ll find water soon enough, and like as not we’ll find Raska there as well, waiting for us.”
“Raska?”
“My horse!” Rahm stretched his back and shoulders, and turned to hike up the slope toward the top of the hill, and Hadara followed him.
“Wait, wait! No, we’re not going to… wherever it is to kill… whoever your demon is. At least not now,” Iyasu called after him. “We have to see Simurgh, right away. She knows where we can find the Book of the Sun, and we’ll need that to find the city of the djinn, Ramashad.”
“Djinn? We’re not hunting your djinn today, we’re hunting demons!” the warrior yelled back, now rather high up the slope.
Iyasu sighed and then hurried after them, his voice rising in volume and passion with every phrase, “I told you, your demons probably are the djinn! That’s why we need to see Simurgh. We need to find answers, not rush into battle! Plenty of people have already done that, and they might be doing it again right now for all we know. But these djinn are too powerful, too dangerous. If the clerics of Shivala can’t stop them, what chance do you think you have?”
Rahm paused and looked down at him, his face gradually sinking into a thoughtful grimace. Hadara stood at his side, her long hair snapping in the wind like the flags on a battlement, and she said, “These demon-djinn are truly stronger than the holy magi of Shivala?”
Iyasu nodded. “Hundreds died just a few weeks ago, and they were only fighting one djinn. One. And they lost.”
“Hm.” Rahm cleared his throat. “Well, no need to decide just yet. We still have to find my horse, and some water. I’ll think about it.”
Iyasu frowned. “All right. I guess.”
They hiked up and over the hill, and the three hills after that, making their way north and east as the land rose higher beneath their feet, growing more rocky and jagged as they went. By the end of the day, they were well into the bare crags of a range of pale mountains where tall tufts of yellow grass stood between the stones and lonely, twisted trees arched outward from cracks in the cliff faces, and where dark gray hawks watched the travelers from high above the ground.
As the sun rode low over the distant dunes of the White Desert, they came down into a shadowy ravine where the sounds of running water played merrily off the rocky walls, and moments later they stood at the edge of a pebbled stream of clear, cold water. Everyone knelt to drink except for Azrael, who paced upstream away from the others, paused, and then called back down, “I think I hear something up here.”
“Does it sound like an impatient horse?” Rahm asked.
The angel tilted her head. “Possibly.”
The echo of hooves on pebbles heralded the arrival of a huge black stallion with a long braided mane and a heavy leather saddle trimmed in gold, carrying several satchels and the sheathed blade of a long, curved sword.
“Raska!” Rahm grabbed the horse’s tack and rubbed his neck. “Look at you. A month on your own and not a hair out of place!”
Iyasu stood up from the stream and looked at the animal. The first glance told him everything. The numerous cuts and gashes full of splinters, the dried blood, the caked mud studded with dead leaves and dry gras
s. But he also saw the nervous stutter-steps, the wild eyes, the bared teeth, and the flaring nostrils.
“Actually, he has quite a few hairs out of place. Something’s wrong. Something’s scared him.” Iyasu looked up and around at the rock walls, but didn’t see anything to frighten a large warhorse.
“Nonsense, nothing scares Raska.” Rahm brushed some of the debris off the horse’s flanks with his hand.
“No, something did.” Iyasu walked past the horse, taking a second look at the cuts and the splinters in them. “Something chased him, and he ran through some sort of thorn bush. See here? These cuts are deep. He must have been panicking to hurt himself so badly.”
“You’re wrong,” Hadara said. “Raska’s courage aside, I know these hills. We’ve been here before. There are bushes, but none have thorns.”
Iyasu frowned and looked around as though hoping to discover a thorn bush right there. “But… then what could have…”
The black stallion looked up sharply and danced lightly on the pebbled ground, then neighed and snorted as he reared up on his hind legs. Rahm fought to keep the horse on all four hooves, but Raska yanked his head free and darted away down the streambed.
“Raska! Get back here!” the warrior shouted.
Iyasu moved quickly to Azrael’s side and whispered, “Something is coming.”
They stood very still and listened, and by small degrees, they began to hear a soft shushing sound in the distance. To the seer, it sounded just like the wind playing through the leaves of a young tree, rustling for a moment and then falling silent, then rustling again, then silence, as it grew louder and closer.
“What is that?” Hadara asked.
“Nothing. The wind.” Rahm finally succeeded in grabbing Raska’s halter and dragging the huge destrier back up the streambed, but the animal struggled every step of the way.
Hadara reached over and drew a long dagger from behind the saddle and spun the curved blade cleverly between her nimble fingers. “It doesn’t sound like the wind to me.”
“Something’s coming.” Iyasu closed his eyes, trying to focus on the rustling sound. “I can’t tell what.”
“I’ll go look.” Azrael stepped away from him, but he grabbed her wrist.
“No, don’t. It could be the djinn.”
“All the more reason for me to confront them away from you.” She freed herself with a firm push to his arm and started walking up the ravine, approaching the corner that hid the upper stream from view.
“No, Rael, please!” Iyasu whispered as loudly as he dared. “We don’t know what they’re capable of!”
“All the more reason,” she repeated.
The rustling sound grew louder still, and now it no longer slowed or paused, it came on faster and faster, hissing and shushing and clattering as if an avalanche of leaves and grasses were spilling down the mountainside. Iyasu stood still and alone, looking down at the tall warriors and then up at his beloved as she disappeared around the corner out of sight.
And then the noise stopped.
“Rael?” Iyasu took a few steps after her. “Rael?”
There was no answer.
Swallowing his fear, Iyasu hurried up the streambed as quietly as he could, and a moment later he turned the corner around a large pale boulder and saw Azrael standing in the center of the ravine with the cold, clear water pouring over her sandaled feet. She held her arms out to her sides and was staring straight ahead at something farther upstream.
The seer peeked out and saw the tumbled remains of a small landslide blocking the ravine, a thick tangle of sun-bleached timbers and thorn bushes, all wrapped in a thick layer of yellow grass and dark green moss. He stepped out into the open, saying, “What are you looking at?”
“Iyasu, no!”
The landslide stood up.
The timbers groaned, the thorn bushes crackled, and the yellow grasses shivered and hissed, and the entire mass of dry, dead things rose up and up, shifting and turning until it all stood together on four thick legs and shook its head crowned in long, deadly thorns. Then the creature opened its wooden jaws and roared.
Iyasu stood petrified, staring up at the colossal beast armored in brown and gray bark, and armed with slender, needle-like fangs and claws. The monster bellowed from its massive lungs, and when it finally lowered its head, it revealed two tiny green glows above its jaws, two green eyes that might have passed for the soft lights of fireflies to an unwary traveler.
The creature snapped its jaws at Azrael, but she stood her ground and kept her arms raised, and the beast fell back a step, snarling and shaking its head.
“Rael, what is it?” he whispered.
“It’s a taneen,” she said. “A spirit of the land.”
“Did we offend it?”
“It’s not that kind of spirit. It’s hungry.”
The mountain beast screamed and lashed out with a huge claw, swiping a dozen thorny blades across Azrael’s face and chest, but the angel barely moved, and her skin remained unbroken.
“What do we do?” he asked.
“Run. Now.”
Iyasu hesitated, and then he ran. He dashed around the bend in the ravine and waved violently at the waiting couple. “Go, go!”
They did not move. “Why?” asked Rahm.
“Big animal! Very dangerous!” Iyasu reached them and bolted on by, but then skittered to a stop so he could turn back. “Come on! Now! We have to go. Azrael can’t hold it back there forever.”
“She can’t kill it?” Rahm raised an eyebrow.
“She won’t kill it. She won’t kill anything,” Iyasu explained, more than a little exasperated that they were still talking and not running. “That’s why we have to go!”
“Won’t kill anything?” Hadara frowned.
“No matter. I’ll do it.” Rahm pulled his great curved sword from the sheathe on his saddle and began striding up the streambed.
“No! Stop!” Iyasu charged back up the trail, past the nervous Raska and eerily calm Hadara, stretching out his hand toward the warrior. But Rahm’s stride was too long and too quick, and he soon turned the corner of the ravine.
A fresh chorus of roars and screams erupted from the ravine, and when Iyasu turned the corner for the second time, he saw Rahm slashing at the taneen’s wooden hide. Already there were long red gashes on the man’s arms and his blood was running in rivers down his skin and pattering on the dusty ground. But still he fought on, swinging his sword at the monster’s legs and snout, driving it back one small step at a time.
“Rael!” Iyasu ran to her side. “I couldn’t stop him.”
“I know.”
“Can you help him?”
Slowly, the woman in the dark Daraji silks lowered her arms and stepped back from the violent battle before them. “And do what? Maul and cripple the taneen for the crime of trying to feed itself? Or drag Rahm away and leave the creature free to kill you?”
“No, I…” Iyasu shook his head, his thoughts flying in a hundred directions at once. The huge beast was only a stone’s throw away, bellowing and shaking its horned head, scraping its long claws down the sides of the ravine and across the bright steel of Rahm’s sword. Dusty and bloody thorns flew through the air, and every time the taneen roared, the sharp scent of burnt cedar stung the young seer’s nostrils. “I’ll run. You save him.”
“I’ll save him!” Hadara strode past them with her knife in one hand and a small rock in the other. She burst into a sprint and just as Rahm smashed one of the taneen’s claws down against the streambed, she planted her foot on that same claw and leapt straight up toward the monster’s roaring maw. Her body spun like a flower in the wind, and she struck the taneen’s jaw with her stone just as she drove her dagger into the beast’s left eye.
The taneen reared back and shrieked like ten thousand bats all crying out with one voice. It shook its mossy, grassy mane and clawed frantically at the walls of the ravine as though desperate to climb away from the pain searing into its head.
The warrior charged forward, straight up to the exposed breast of the taneen, and with his heavy scimitar he struck the creature’s throat. He struck again and again, swinging his huge sword so fast that Iyasu marveled at his strength. Chunks of bark and wood exploded from the taneen’s throat with every swing, and with each strike the beast shook and gasped for breath, its long thin claws swatting weakly through the air near Rahm’s head but never quite able to reach him.
On the seventh strike, Rahm cleaved clear through the taneen’s throat and the beast’s head smashed down to the ground as its body slumped backward and collapsed. Instantly it lost the clear shape of a living thing, and even to Iyasu’s keen eyes the legs and neck and tail all seemed to vanish into nothing more than a mound of old mossy wood, skeletal bushes, and tangled yellow grass.
Only the head still resembled a head, though vaguely. Iyasu crept forward and knelt down beside it, peering into the remaining eye, which still glowed faintly. But then the light died, leaving only a dark rotten hole in an old cedar log.
“It’s gone,” he whispered.
Hadara took back her dagger, and Rahm rested his sword on his shoulder. They both wiped away a faint sheen of sweat, exchanged a chaste kiss, and walked away from the corpse without another word.
Iyasu reached out and laid his hand on what had been the brow of the taneen only a moment ago. The moss felt like moss and the bark felt like bark.
“It’s just… gone.” He looked back at Azrael. “I’m sorry.”
The angel turned slowly and followed the others, leaving Iyasu alone.
He sat there a moment longer, wondering why he felt so sad, so empty, so hollow.
It was just an animal. It wanted to eat us.
And yet…
It would still be alive now if we hadn’t come here. If I hadn’t come here.
How rare are taneen? I’ve never even heard of them, let alone seen one. And now there is one less in the world. And maybe none at all.
Angels and Djinn, Book 3: Zariel's Doom Page 8
