by Barb Hendee
Ghazel pointed to Baseem’a and hugged herself with a wistful expression.
Magiere did not fully follow, but she guessed that as the female had grown sad, perhaps the male had attempted to provide her with company . . . a little girl. Somehow Ghazel had come to care deeply for Baseem’a. It also struck Magiere as possible that Ghazel had never once fed on a human being. The slaves would have been gone long before her arrival, and the orb would have sustained her all these years.
But if the girl had not come here until the lake began to dry, how did she know what had happened before then?
Magiere shook her head and pointed to the boat. “How did you know . . . ?” She pointed to Ghazel as well and tapped the side of her own head.
Ghazel pointed back at Magiere. When Magiere didn’t respond, she pointed to the image of Baseem’a and then to Magiere again. She gestured from her mouth to her ear.
Magiere nodded, ignoring the girl’s confusion about who she was. Baseem’a had told Ghazel everything.
Ghazel churned her hands, one around the other, and again: “Ahyaan.”
More time had slipped by. She pointed to the blue lake and again pressed her palm downward, this time all the way to the floor.
The lake had dried completely.
Magiere could imagine other changes that had followed. The heat would’ve grown unbearable, and all trees and flowers would have died.
First pointing to Mas’ud, Ghazel then slid her finger along the lake, curled her fingers as if taking something from it, and again acted out carrying something heavy. She took it to the table and dropped it with both hands, as if setting the orb where it rested.
When the lake or sea had dried up, the ancients had brought it back. By then, no one could’ve reached them in the searing heat—at least nothing living could have—but what had become of the guardians?
Magiere pointed to their picture. “Where?”
Ghazel’s small face twisted with sorrow. She put her finger on Mas’ud, and then once again put her hands to her head. Only this time she turned her head back and forth violently. Mas’ud had fallen further into madness.
Turning from the wall, she ran across the room, pointed down to the curved sword on the floor, and made a harsh slicing motion.
Magiere stood frozen as the girl knelt beside the robe nearest the thôrhk.
“Baseem’a.”
And Magiere understood. The robes were not merely clothing lying on the floor. They were the only remnants of where the ancients had fallen. Mas’ud had murdered his companion.
Ghazel grew visibly frustrated as she attempted to relate the rest. She struggled for Numanese words. “Mas’ud . . . make . . . me.” Again, she pointed to the sword and repeated the slashing motion.
Magiere exhaled quietly.
If Mas’ud had been the one to turn Ghazel, she would not have been able to refuse any order he gave her. Wynn had explained this once. The child of the creator was physically compelled to obey any order.
Mas’ud had ordered Ghazel to kill him.
Both ancients were dead, and the only one who knew the orb’s current location was a small, undead girl.
Then Magiere remembered something else.
Even the undead needed moisture, fluids to stay functional. How had Ghazel done so after the lake had dried out? As the girl’s mouth opened, as if to say something, Magiere waved her off.
“Water?” she demanded.
Her mouth still open, Ghazel tilted her head with a frown. She hurried to the painting of the lake. Instead of pointing, she gripped its bottom, pushed up, and pulled it off the wall.
Behind it was a crude opening in the stone.
Ghazel looked back as if this should mean something, but again Magiere shook her head. The girl stood there an instant longer and then grabbed the lip of the opening to pull herself up and in.
Magiere sheathed the falchion and followed to peer into a rough tunnel angling steeply downward. The girl waved her in and led the way as they crawled. In only moments, Magiere caught a taint in the air both humid and unpleasant. They kept on for far too long until Ghazel sat up, but her head didn’t hit the tunnel’s top.
Magiere crawled closer, and the knees of her pants were instantly soaked as a smell choked her. By the crystal’s light, water filled a small, jagged fracture in the earth in which they knelt. Even before Magiere raised a wet hand to lick it, she knew it wouldn’t help. The water was beyond briny, as if a shovel of salt filled her mouth. This might be all that was left of the lake that sunk deep into the earth. Perhaps it was even part of the source that had once created that body of water.
It was no good to Magiere, though an undead could’ve consumed it without harm.
She turned to crawl back up the tunnel, hearing Ghazel following behind her.
Once back in the room, the girl rushed past her to kneel by the robes. She grabbed one robe and the orb key and held both out to Magiere.
“You . . . stay . . . me?”
Magiere had never before looked at any undead as a victim. To her own disgust, she couldn’t help it now. Yet that didn’t alter what the girl was or that Magiere was here to take the orb.
Once the orb was gone, what would happen to Ghazel?
Magiere gripped the sheathed falchion’s hilt with her right hand.
The kindest thing she could do would be to take the girl’s head at the neck, quickly. She’d encountered vampires turned against their will before, and dispatching them had never made her pause.
What was wrong with her now?
She’d seen ancients—the Children—like Qahhar walk in sunlight. Though she’d never seen Li’kän do so, that frail-looking but powerful, feral woman had been awake during daylight in the six-towered castle where the first orb was found. But Magiere had also seen “offspring” of theirs perish and burn under the rising sun.
Taking Ghazel across the desert seemed unlikely. And later, what would happen to the girl once she was separated from the orb? Magiere had locked Li’kän away below that castle for fear of what might happen once she was separated from the orb of Water.
If the girl grew hungry, she’d eventually be driven to feed and kill, even if she didn’t understand what was happening to her.
Magiere couldn’t stand it anymore. She couldn’t bring herself to kill the girl, but the only safety for everyone else was to leave Ghazel behind. Steeling herself, Magiere stepped in and took the orb key out of the girl’s hands.
The sudden hope in Ghazel’s eyes made Magiere look away. She looped the key around her neck and then tucked her hand holding the crystal under one side of the orb.
Ghazel cried out in fright, but Magiere ignored the girl.
Grabbing the spike’s top with her free hand, she hefted it off the table and headed for the stairs. She heard Ghazel following with a stream of sobbing cries in Sumanese. Even if Magiere had understood any of it, she didn’t dare listen as she climbed upward.
Emerging into the main passage, she didn’t slow, but small hands latched on her lower arm beneath the orb.
“Stay . . . you stay!” the girl cried. “Baseem’a . . . stay!”
Magiere stalled, almost looked down, and then jerked free of that grip. With greater speed, she hurried for the doors out of that place, even as the child’s scream tore at her ears. The sooner this was over, the better.
Ghazel wouldn’t follow into daylight if she’d spent ages alone in this place . . . knowing she couldn’t.
The sound of sobs followed Magiere all the way to the door. When Magiere rolled the heavy orb into one arm and grabbed a door handle to pull, Ghazel threw herself against the door with a cry that carried no words.
Magiere shoved the girl aside and wrenched the door open. She ducked out, choked in the sudden heat, and stumbled away from the building.
In the blinding sun, hunger came burning up her throat as the dhampir inside of her rose up to defend her flesh. Her thoughts clouded as she clung to one purpose only: the orb in her arm
s.
After perhaps fifty paces, she stopped, gagging for air under a wave of guilt and indecision.
Should she go back?
What if she waited until dark and tried to get the child across the desert by traveling only at night and keeping her sheltered under the cloak by day? Might there be something Wynn could do? Wynn had claimed Chane was feeding only on livestock. Magiere didn’t believe that, but was it possible?
No! She was a fool to think of taking an undead into a city.
Still, she stood there, suffering at the thought of walking away and condemning a child to face the slow death of starvation. Her hand clenched on the top of the orb’s spike.
“Baseem’a!”
At that anguished cry, she whirled. It was too clear to have come from within the building, and Magiere dropped the orb. Hunger failed and heat won out as she screamed at what she saw.
Ghazel’s body caught fire as the girl raced out under the burning sun.
Magiere charged back. “No!”
The girl kept screaming the name of the one she thought had returned to her . . . until she fell. On impact, ash rose from her in a cloud amid the smoke and stench of burning flesh. When Magiere reached her, there was nothing left but smoldering, blackened bones that began cracking and falling apart amid the ashes.
Magiere stared down, growing dizzy and sick.
Heat made everything in her sight begin to waver. There wasn’t even a wind to scatter the remains and wipe the sight away. When the climbing sun crushed her to her knees, she looked over and saw the staff she had dropped upon her arrival. Somehow, she crawled over and picked it up and then rose to stagger back to the orb. She barely managed to push up the cloak tent to shield herself. But she refused to go back inside the dwelling. She couldn’t bring herself to do it.
Magiere lay there, barely shaded, and the sight of a burning child wouldn’t leave her mind.
* * *
Magiere lay silent, staring up into Leesil’s amber eyes looking for . . . something.
What did she want from him? Understanding? Absolution?
She didn’t dare look to Chap for that.
She’d done what she had to, and she still heard Ghazel screaming . . . even in the tent’s silence as Leesil said nothing. Or did he want to know the rest after that? Did anything else matter, considering she was here and had brought the last orb?
The girl had died long before on the night that Mas’ud had taken her. Magiere had never felt that she killed any undead. She only finished something that shouldn’t have become what it was. So why should Ghazel have been any different?
Shifting her gaze, Magiere looked to Chap.
—It is done . . . either way— . . . —And you . . . came back . . . to us— . . . —Think of only . . . only . . . this— . . . —Nothing . . . else—
Magiere glanced away. It wasn’t that simple. And then she felt Leesil stroke her hair.
“Rest another day,” he whispered. “We’ll leave when you’re ready.”
She knew Brot’an and Ghassan were in the tent as well, but she didn’t look for either of them. She had no idea what the aging assassin thought, and likely the fallen domin’s eyes and thoughts missed little.
But they’d understand even less about this than either Leesil or even Chap.
To all of them, only the orb mattered, for better or worse and in different ways.
Once, she’d thought so too.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Wynn counted the days since Magiere and the others had left. More than a moon had passed. At first the days and nights had felt long, but then the five left behind fell into a routine.
Without much discussion, they all took to Chane’s sleeping schedule for the most part, though this surprised Wynn slightly. Neither Osha nor Wayfarer had any interest in spending time with Chane. Wayfarer simply claimed it would be easier if they were all awake together. Then again, perhaps she was afraid to fall asleep when Chane was up, now that Magiere and Leesil—and especially Chap—were away.
Aside from this, much of the tension over Chane’s presence vanished.
While Osha and Chane didn’t like each other, they had learned to work together without the past glares and posturing. Wayfarer didn’t interact with or speak to Chane unless necessary, but if she disapproved of him, she was too well mannered to show it.
They were all in limbo, waiting to learn the fate of departed friends and companions.
Wynn and Shade tended to rise first in the late afternoon. Since Chane remained dormant all day, this was longer than the rest of them could stay asleep. Before dusk came, one of them would walk to the market for fresh food or anything else needed. Later, they ate supper together, though of course Chane only sipped water or tea.
After that usually came chores.
Wynn attempted to reorganize various texts and scrolls on the shelves. She scanned through all of them, but none held anything related to Ghassan and his sect’s practices.
Osha, having acquired more materials, set to fletching additional arrows to replace the ones lost. More than once Wynn glanced at the new steel arrowheads, knowing he still had white metal ones in his quiver.
Wayfarer mended a few items of torn clothing she’d found in the travel chest, though she soon ran out of much need for that. Late one afternoon Wynn decided it was time to act upon something that Leesil and then Chap had asked her to do.
Getting Shade to cooperate was a bit of a bother.
“Make it something not . . . disturbing,” she instructed the dog. “Maybe from childhood, just running about with your brothers and sisters.”
Shade’s jowls quivered with a hiss through her teeth. So far, she had refused to interact with her father, Chap. Any references to the short childhood she’d be driven from, to cross the world to Wynn’s side, was something Shade avoided.
“Go on!” Wynn insisted.
Shade turned away with another growl and padded across to where Wayfarer sat at the table stitching up a tear she’d found in one blanket. Shade didn’t wait for the girl to notice her approach.
She shoved her nose under Wayfarer’s wrist and flipped her nose up, and then the girl’s hand slipped over Shade’s head.
Wynn took a quick step in whispering, “You obstinate little pain in the—”
Wayfarer sucked air in a squeak, lurched away, and fell off the chair.
She popped up instantly on her knees and stared wide-eyed as Shade turned away with a grumble. When Wynn reached the table, Shade pressed briefly against her leg.
—My memories . . . not your . . . tool—
At those memory-words from Shade, Wynn glowered back.
Hopefully Shade had stuck to something nice in the type of memory. And yes, in all the time since Wynn had arrived in the Suman Empire, Wayfarer had stayed close to only Chap. The girl never once touched Shade . . . until now.
Wayfarer peeked over and around the chair at the black majay-hì. Even Osha looked puzzled for a moment, though he wouldn’t know what had just happened. It was exactly as Wynn suspected and feared—as Chap and Leesil had needed to know.
Shade had direct Fay ancestry through her father, so she wasn’t completely normal for her kind. It appeared that Wayfarer—once called Leanâlhâm—experienced the conscious memories of a majay-hì with a touch.
Wynn wasn’t certain what it meant as she thought of the girl’s name given by her people’s ancestors: Sheli’câlhad, “To a Lost Way.” That might have more meaning than the others could guess at, though Wynn had only a fragment . . . a piece of that puzzle.
There was one other person she’d met who appeared to do what the girl had just done. In the forests of Lhoin’na, when Wynn had gone to their guild branch in her search for the orb of Earth’s last resting place, she’d met a lone woman in their forests.
Vreuvillä—“Leaf’s Heart”—was a priestess of ancient ways, a Foirfeahkan.
That term was so old that even her people, the Lhoin’na, could not accurately
translate it. She lived in the wild with the majay-hì packs of that land. Like Wayfarer, Leaf’s Heart was notably short for her people. And though the girl had green eyes and the priestess’s were the normal amber, they both had hair far too dark for either a Lhoin’na or an an’Cróan.
And apparently both could catch the memories of a majay-hì, though Leaf’s Heart was supposed to be the last of her kind.
Wynn thought again of the meaning of Wayfarer’s final name given by her people’s ancestral spirits.
...to a lost way . . .
Chane sat up in his usual corner, having risen again.
Wynn looked to the window at the back of Ghassan’s ensorcelled hideaway. Dusk had come and she hadn’t even noticed. For now, she kept what she suspected to herself.
Sometimes, to pass the nights, Wayfarer, Osha, and Chane worked under Wynn’s guidance to learn a little of the most common dialect of Sumanese. Even if Magiere acquired the orb of Air, there was still the matter of hiding it—and the orb of Spirit as well. There was no telling how long they would remain in the south. She also suggested Wayfarer stick to conversing with Osha in only Numanese or, if need be, Belaskian.
Twice Chane went out at night, and Wynn assumed he needed to feed on livestock in secret. However, he never grew unduly pale as he had before when hungry. When he came back, he was not flushed as he’d normally been after feeding.
She wanted to ask about this, but something held her back.
They managed to get through the days and nights. Every once in a while, Wynn succumbed to self-indulgent petulance over having been left behind to wait in ignorance. These bouts did not last long, and then one afternoon . . .
Wynn counted off another day as she, Osha, and Wayfarer began discussing what might be needed at the market. Without warning, they heard scraping outside the sanctuary door.
They all looked at one another, then at Chane, who was still dormant in the back corner. In a flash, Osha had a dagger in hand and stepped around to put everyone behind him as he faced the door. Wynn froze, but Shade didn’t begin to growl, and this brought a hint of hope.
