For a few hours, we waited for our miracle. And then Kane, who had the eyes of an eagle if not the wings, caught sight of a dust plume moving quickly across the desert toward the mouth of the canyon. Soon, another mass of horsemen came into view. There must have been more than a hundred and fifty of them. Upon seeing them pounding up through the canyon, Maram gave up the last of his hope.
'Oh, my Lord!' Maram said. 'More Zuri!'
The arrival of these new warriors, however, did not seem to be welcomed by the Zuri encamped below us. They sprang up from beneath their flapping sun cloths and ran for their horses. I saw sixty sabers flashing in the sunlight. But they were outnumbered more than two to one. The new warriors thundered closer, drawing in more tightly as they rode up through the funnel of the canyon. They came to a halt almost shoulder to shoulder in a long line that completely blocked any exit into the desert. They waited on horseback with their sabers pointing at the Zuri fifty yards away.
'Can you not see?' Yago said to Maram, pointing out details in the garments of the newcomers, particularly the shawls drawn across their faces. 'Those are the Avari.'
He spoke this name as one might that of a werewolf or some other unnatural being.
'So,' Kane growled with a smile, 'now who is trapped?'
As Maram stood with his strung how. peering down the ravine into the canyon at these two groups of warriors, I felt him struggling to take a little cheer in this unexpected turn of events. But then Yago dashed his hopes, saying to Kane, 'Little good that it will do us. Likely the Avari will kill the Zuri, and then turn on us.'
I watched as two Zuri warriors rode out toward the Avari bearing a banner of truce. Two men in red robes rode with them, led by a man wearing a bright yellow tunic. His hair, I saw, shone golden. Now, at this distance, I could just barely make out the red dragon blazing from his tunic. From the Avari line, four men with swaddled faces urged their horses forward to meet them. They, too, bore a banner of truce. I wondered what lies Maslan and the droghul would tell the Avari as they sat holding council beneath the merciless sun.
I did not have to wait long to find out the answer to this question. The tallest of the four Avari, who all seemed to sit much higher on their horses than either the Zuri or the droghul, broke off council. He began riding slowly in the direction of the Zuri's line, which parted before him like a wave of water. He rode straight up into the ravine. Where the way grew too steep, he dismounted and walked beside his great, gray horse, leading it up toward the rocky shelf where Kane and Maram stood aiming arrows at him. Yago waited there, too, with his saber drawn. He had never met an Avari warrior, and was unsure how to greet him.
'May the sun warm your face,' Yago called out to him. 'May the rain fill your wells, Avari.'
'May the rain fill your wells, Masud.' He spoke with a strange accent, which changed the sounds of his words so that 'well' came out as 'weal', and 'rain' was rendered as 'reen'. From the tone of his voice and the deepness of his eyes, I guessed his age to be about thirty, 'From what I've been told, one of your wells has been poisoned by the very outlanders you ride with.'
The warrior climbed up and joined us on the rocky shelf. He stood nearly as tall as I. Silver bracelets encrusted with blue stones flashed from his wrists. Beneath his head covering his eyes shone bright as black onyx. He regarded Kane and me in astonishment.
'I am Sunji,' he informed us. 'Son of Jovayl, who is king of the Avari. My father sent me to discover who has invaded our realm, and why.'
I longed to tell him that I, too, was a prince of a realm far away. I wanted to give him my real name. But as I had relinquished all claim to honors and rank to live the life of a wanderer, I did not. Instead I told him much the same story that I had Yago. When I finished, Sunji stood staring at me as he might a viper.
'The one you call a droghul,' he said to me, pronouncing that name strangely, too, 'claims to be Morjin himself, king of the realm called Sakai. He claims that you are the poisoners of the Masud's well.'
'But why would we poison a well and so deny ourselves water?' I said to him. 'And why would one of the Masud ride with those who had poisoned his own people?'
'I do not know,' Sunji said to me. 'That is to be determined.'
'Determined how?' Maram asked him.
Sunji looked at Maram, with his fly-blown sores, as one might a leper. Then he said, 'There will be a trial. Either this Morjin or Mirustral is lying. And so Mirustral will come with me now, that he might stand face to face with Morjin.'
At the thought of this, my hand moved of its own to grip the hilt of my sword. And Kane pointed down into the canyon as he growled out to Sunji, 'I'll not let my friend go into that dragon's den alone!'
Sunji bowed his head to Kane. 'You may come as a second, then. Rowan Madeus, if that is really your name. And the Masud.'
He looked at Yago, who assented to Sunji's demand. And I said to Sunji, 'And what if we will not stand at trial?'
'Then you may stand here and let the sun determine your fate!'
It seemed that we had no choice. Sunji waited patiently while we made our preparations. Master Juwain came over to me and led me in a meditation, the same one as he had before I fought my duel with Salmelu. Atara, in silence, kissed me on the lips. As I moVed to gather up Altaru's reins, Maram took me aside and said, 'I should come with you, too.'
'No, Maram,' I told him, looking down the ravine into tne canyon. 'You must stay here and guard everyone, in case there is treachery. With your bow, if you can, and with your firestone, if you cannot.'
His eyes blurred with tears, and he nodded at me. 'But how will you stand against Morjin and all his lies?'
'I don't know,' I said. I clasped hands with him and smiled. 'But there will be a way — there is always a way.'
Kane and Yago, leading their horses, came up behind me. Then I pulled gently on Altaru's reins, and we followed Sunji down into the ravine.
Chapter 21
We rode out onto the hardpack between the Avari and Zuri lines. The captain named Oalo waited there along with another Zuri warrior, still under the banner of truce. Next to them, on fine horses, sat Maslan and the droghul. In appearance, this double of Morjin seemed identical to the first droghul who had died so terribly in the forest of Acadu, except that he had two good arms and the sun had burned his fair face red. His hair shone all golden like the sun, as did his eyes. I could see nothing of his own will in these hideous orbs, and everything of Morjin. He radiated an overweening arrogance and the command of a king. The malevolence that poured out of him struck me like a hammer blow to the throat. I found myself bitterly wishing that I had not abandoned my steel mail. I wondered what armor I might find here against his sword, no less his inevitable lies and assault on my soul.
Three Avari warriors greeted Sunji, whom they treated as a prince. Although these three kept their faces covered, I could see from the webwork of creases around their black eyes that they were nearly old men. Sunji presented them as Laisar, Maidro and Avraym, and said that they were to be the judges of what was told here today.
With the fierce sun prompting all of us to speak concisely and quickly, we submitted to trial all the while sitting on the backs of our horses. The droghul and I gave our respective accounts of what had occurred at the Masud well. We told of our journeys and our purposes, as much as we dared. The three judges listened closely. The warriors in the two lines behind us tried to listen, too. Twice, Oalo, an ugly, much-scarred man, interrupted in order to clarify matters or make important points, speaking self-importantly in behalf of the Zuri's chief, Tatuk. Sunji silenced him both times. He and he alone, as he told us, would conduct this trial.
After we had finished speaking, Sunji swept his saber from Kane to me and called out, 'You claim to be landless knights guarding pilgrims; the names you gave are Rowan Madeus and Mirustral. But King Morjin, if such he really is, tells that your true names are Kane and Valaysu Elahad. Do you claim that he has mistaken you for others?'
The three judge
s, I saw, leaned forward on their horses, waiting for me to answer. Maslan, as with the four other Red Priests in the Zuri line, regarded me as might a spider a fly trapped in a web. The droghul simply stared at me with unrelenting hatred.
'No, he has not mistaken us for others,' I said to Sunji. 'Those are our true names, though little else he has said about us or himself is true.'
Now the eyes of Laisar, Avraym and Maidro, who sat on their horses close to me, grew as stonelike as obsidian. I sensed doubt and disdain hardening the hearts of the Avari warriors who watched me.
'Do you think to convince us of what you put forth as true,' Sunji asked me, 'by readily admitting a lie?'
I gazed at the shawl wrapped around Sunji's face. I said to him, 'You and those of your tribe keep yourselves well-covered against the sun that would burn you. So it is with me and my companions. We have chosen these names to wear just so this droghul and his kind wouldn't discover us, as he has.'
It was a good answer, I thought, the best I could give, but none of the Ravirii approved of it, especially not Yago, who clearly didn't like it that I had kept secrets from him. He sat on his horse next to me gazing at me in anger.
'I do not know yet what to believe,' Sunji said, now pointing his saber at the droghul and then at me, 'but it is clear that the two of you are mortal enemies. The king of a realm called Sakai, or his sorcerous double, a droghul as you name him. And an outlawed prince of a faraway realm called Mesh.'
'I am no outlaw,' I said, wiping the sweat from my neck. 'I left my homeland of my own choice.'
'To seek this Well of Restoration that you have told of?'
I commanded my hand not to wipe at the sweat pouring from my face* It had come time to tell of things that should be kept a secret. I said, 'In a way. We seek the one who would use the Cup of Heaven to restore Ea. We call this one the Maitreya.'
As I told of the Lightstone, Sunji's eyes gleamed, and a great excitement filled the three Avari judges and rippled through their fellow warriors who sat watching us. Sunji allowed me to finish speaking and then said to me, 'Is this another of your truths clothed in the dirty robes of a lie? Do you ask us to believe that you would risk your lives journeying into the desert in search of this Maitreya?'
From the Avari line, which had moved in closer to us, a young man called out: 'What I cannot believe is his story of entering the Stone City. Burning holes through rock with sorcerous fire, and slaying dragons — dragons! And this man and a few companions slaying nearly a hundred men? He told that a blind woman fired arrows into their hearts! He lies, surely, and more, he must be mad to think that we should listen to such — '
'Be quiet, Daivayr!' Sunji suddenly barked out, cutting him off. He turned back to me and said, 'My brother is impulsive, as it is with the young. But he only voices questions we all have. You say that you risked your lives seeking the Cup of Heaven in the great Quest, as you do now in search of the one you call the Maitreya. Why?'
'Because it is the only hope for Ea — and for much more.' As Sunji and the three judges listened to every word I spoke, and the droghul's golden eyes never left mine, I tried to tell of my love for Ea's forests and mountains, her oceans and grass-covered plains. And it would all be burnt to ashes, I said, and washed in blood if Morjin and his Red Priests had their way. 'I.. would see an end to war. The Maitreya might bring this abiding peace, if he can be found.'
'But how could you hope to find him,' Sunji asked me, 'if you do not even know his name or what tribe has given him birth?'
It was a good question, and I knew that my judges would find my answer weak as I said: 'There is one among us who is gifted in finding things.'
'Through the aid of sorceries?'
'We are not sorcerers!' I cried out.
Although the droghul's face remained implacable as he regarded me, his whole being lit up as with a triumphant smile. Then he opened his mouth to speak. His voice, ever golden and persuasive, swelled with a new power. His words fell like irresistible weapons thatJaid people open and left them utterly vulnerable to his command: 'This Elahad has impugned everything about me, going so far as to deny who I am. I am King of Sakai! I have risked much in coming into the desert, as I have. In the past, I have sent priests to your people — the bravest and freest of Ea's peoples! — to help them understand the nature of the menace that would undo us all. And to help them unite against sorcerers such as the Elahad and his kind. My priests have not always been well-received. I do not blame you Ravirii for this, as the world is hard and our enemies are not always as they seem. But we are not your enemies! I have come here, in my person, that you might hear the truth of things from my own lips.'
The droghul, I knew, almost had a mind of his own, although at the moment I could sense no particle or flame of his own self-ness. So compelling was the smoothness of his voice — the perfection of pitch and tone and utter certainty in itself — that he almost convinced me that he was the real Morjin.
'Lord Morjin,' Maslan said hoarsely, coughing at the dry air, 'is known in all lands as the most veracious of kings.'
No, I thought, the most voracious. If these desert tribes let him, he would swallow them up one by one as he had the great kingdoms that surrounded them. Little sense of this peril, however, seemed to have made its mark on the Ravirii, at least not the Zuri gathered here. They seemed to regard Maslan and the other Red Priests as keepers of a great and mysterious power. They looked upon these five terrible men with something of the same awe that my people held for the masters of the Brotherhood. Only Oalo, I sensed, suspected how vile they really were. The tightness in his chest told me that he lived in great fear of them, even as the priests themselves dreaded the droghul and Morjin himself.
'I would enlist the aid of all the Ravirii tribes,' the droghul said, looking from Oalo to Yago and then at Sunji. 'The Lightstone has been taken back from the Elahad, who stole it and claimed it for himself. Even now, he seeks other stones of power that he might cast his ensorcellments over all peoples and all lands in hope of stealing back the golden cup yet again.'
'He lies!' I said, shaking my fist at him. 'He accuses me of his own evil dreams and deeds — even as he did the poisoning of the Masud well!'
'I do not lie,' the droghul said. 'And I am no poisoner.'
I tried to find the right words to gainsay this, but I could not. So excruciating was the burning of my blood, from the kirax within and the fiery sun pouring down on me, that I could hardly speak at all.
'The Cup of Heaven,' the droghul said, letting his golden voice carry out to the lines of Zuri and Avari warriors pressing in even closer, 'will remain safely in my hall in Argattha, where I invite any and all to come drink of its light.'
'The urna has been found!' Avraym marveled as he gazed at the droghul. Until now the judges of this trial had been as silent as stone.
'In my own lifetime, sought and found. All glory in the One!' The droghul smiled at him, a bright, open smile all full of the promise of happiness and otherwordly riches, even love. And he said to Avraym and the other judges, and to all the Avari and Zuri: 'When the time comes and victory is ours, I shall bring the Lightstone into all lands. The Ravirii shall be its keepers, and here it will do its most wondrous work. A golden light will poor itself out onto the desert's sands. Trees will grow here again, soft grasses and flowers. Water will run in the dry river beds, and lakes will shine in the sun. The desert will be green again.' 'As it was, it shall be again,' Avraym intoned.
'All glory in the One,' Laisar said.
The droghul, I thought, through his master in Argattha, knew the Ravirii well, even as he knew all peoples. He gave them precisely what they wished to hear.
'This Elahad,' he said, 'claimed the Lightstone for himself. Even as he claimed to be the Maitreya.'
Sunji looked at me and asked. 'Is this true, Valashu Elahad?'
'I… yes, there was a moment,' I stammered out. 'Only a moment when I claimed this. But I was wrong.'
My admission did not make a
good impression on those judging me. The droghul smiled at me. I could feel him using the raw power of Morjin's passions to pull at the heartstrings of everyone gathered here. He touched their passions. He played on their vanities and fears, and spoke to their deepest dreams. I vowed again that I would never use my gift this way to violate people's souls and work such evil.
'From his own lips, he admits another lie!' the droghul said. 'How many more must we hear before we judge him as what he is?'
How, I wondered, could I ever prevail here against this double of Morjin? The droghul sat up straight on his horse, disdainful of the sun and radiating all of Morjin's power and authority. Morjin was a king, even if an evil and false one, and people heeded what he said.
'The Elahad has no more respect for you,' the droghul said to the judges, 'than he does your laws. He and his fellow conspirators invaded your lands solely to flee a richly deserved justice. With his own hand, he poisoned the Masud well so that he could — '
'He lies!' I called out. 'Can't you hear how he lies?'
Sunji waved his sword at me. He Said, 'You must keep your silence unless you have testimony to offer. Calling King Morjin a liar does not constitute such, nor will it serve you.'
The droghul bowed his head to Sunji, and then smiled at me. He drew in a breath of burning air hi order to further defame me. His cleverness cut with all the precision of a surgeon's knife as he called out: 'When the Masud discovered the Elahad's true purpose, the Elahad poisoned their well to keep them from turning against him. And what is his purpose? He seeks gelstei and other stones of power. He found suchlike among the Masud, the very skystones that are sacred to the Avari.'
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