Earth

by Rosie Scott

  I found Nyx staring at the new member of our group, her eyes energetic and pleased. “I like you,” she said, bluntly.

  Jakan huffed in humor. “I'm glad,” he admitted. Given the events of the day, Nyx had been the only one to outwardly dislike him so far. Evidently, his use of magic had won her over.

  “You're going to teach me illusion magic,” she informed him, before she began to lead the way to the alchemist's shop. “The gods know it'll come in handy during my shenanigans.”

  Six

  Comercio was far behind us within the fortnight, for we could not allow news of what had happened in Sera to catch up to us there. I knew that we had made good time in our escape, and the closer we traveled to the Naharan border, the safer I felt.

  The brisk weather of Dark Star had warmed into the new beginnings of New Moon, melting the thick snows into the long grasslands and pulling color into the world once more. The silence which had accompanied the frigid weather dissipated, paving the way for the sounds of wildlife. During my watches at night, I found that the chirping of crickets was paired with the howling of wolves, some of which sounded larger than the wolves near Sera, their cries guttural and frightening, almost like the tortured wails of men. We were surely nearing Nahara, for the beasts grew larger.

  The land, too, began to change. Long, flowing grasses shortened over time, before becoming sparse, tufts of short grass rare between long stretches of dry dirt. Far off in the distance to our right, the Golden Peaks rose into the sky, the mountains which held the great dwarven city of Narangar. The mountains looked small, but I knew there was a distance of many fortnights of travel separating us, so they were surely grand in scope once one was upon them.

  Nearly a full season after leaving Comercio, the Naharan border showed itself. In the distance, what was left of the dirt and rocks of the dry lands at the southern edge of Sera molded into cream-colored sand, dunes rising far ahead of us past gigantic wooden guard towers. The towers were so tall that we were cast in their shadows for a full ten minutes before reaching them. Though they were separated by a long walk, I could see them rising up in intervals along either side of us, sitting upon the border separating Nahara and Chairel. Far above us, a dark-skinned man who was equipped with a heavy, thick steel arbalest watched us carefully as we passed, though he said nothing to us as we at last crossed into Nahara.

  High Star was upon us, now. The hottest season of the year just so happened to coincide with our entry into Nahara, one of the hottest countries in the world. It would be a miserable trek to T'ahal, and Nyx and Cerin would have the worst of it. Cerin's pale skin was sensitive to light and even moreso to heat due to his Icilic blood, and he spent his time sweating profusely from beneath the heavy cloak meant to protect him. Nyx's skin became so dry it began to flake from her face, where her burn was now completely healed. Thankfully, other than some slight bumpiness, the skin was not discolored or frightening in appearance.

  Jakan, on the other hand, was the only elf among us who did not mind the heat. Part of it was because of his childhood growing up in Nahara and being used to it. I had heard little of the Vhiri homeland of Eteri, but what little I did know told me it was a land of sunlight and vast, open skies, so I had to imagine the heat was not hard on him.

  The first night we camped in Nahara, I decided to open myself up to our new member. Now that we had crossed the border, even if he had any ill intent, he would find himself hard pressed to use it. Besides, we were safest in numbers, and he had a long trek to go by himself if he decided to leave us. Jakan had been quiet thus far, but not suspiciously so. I would have been quiet in his situation, too, if I was with a group clearly fleeing a land like ourselves. If he were going to ever learn to trust us, I would need to give him a reason to.

  We did not have a campfire, but it was due to a lack of resources more than anything else. There was no wood around for us to make one with. Instead, as night fell over us, we relied on Meir for light, given the large moon was halfway through its trek through the sky. We set our tents up just below the crest of a sand dune, so potential enemies would be unable to see them rising above the smooth horizon, but so we were close enough to keep watch on both sides. It was in the midst of friendly conversation when I caught Jakan's attention.

  “You have been with us for a season, now,” I said to him, leaning back in the sand. Even though the sun had set hours before, the granules were still hot beneath my skin. “I think it's time we got to know one another.”

  Jakan hadn't had the chance yet to see me fight, so he was clueless to my abilities and even more clueless to the gravity of my criminal record. Any time he had ever heard my full name, I had given it as Kai Berg. Perhaps that would be where I should start.

  “My name is not Kai Berg,” I offered evenly, “But Kai Sera.”

  Jakan tilted his head up slowly with a suspiciously curious nod. “You are Seran,” he commented. It was clear he found that distasteful, given the past between his race and the humans of Sera.

  “Seran royalty, in a sense.”

  The Vhiri tilted his head. “Wait...are you Sirius's daughter?”

  “His adoptive daughter,” I admitted.

  “Then you are no healer,” he replied, sitting up straight in intrigue. “You...are everything.” Though it was an odd statement, it was true, in a sense.

  “So you have heard of me.”

  “Heard of you? The Vhiri...” he trailed off, before looking embarrassed. He laughed in a huff. “They despise you.”

  This was news to me. “Why?”

  “Because you wield necromancy, and are not criminalized for it, as all others. The Vhiri find it hypocritical.”

  Nyx burst into laughter beside me. “Oh, dear, then the Vhiri are far behind the times. Do you not find it odd that a person who was once Seran royalty is fleeing Chairel, with a necromancer in tow?”

  Jakan hesitated, thinking. “Actually, yes. Why are you fleeing?”

  Within the minutes afterward, I caught the elf up to speed. I described how I'd never practiced necromancy until the past year, and how my relationship with Cerin had nearly gotten us killed. I told him of my display in Sera, and of Sirius sending his armies after us.

  “If I found necromancy as terrible as most do, I would not wield it, and I would not have Cerin beside me,” I finally explained. “My hope is that I can find a way to negotiate with Nahara...perhaps get their support in standing up to the armies of Chairel.”

  “Nahara's armies are vast, but they mostly are tied up with dealing with the beasts which threaten their cities,” Jakan mused. “I am assuming they know of you, because most countries do. But given you are on the run from Sirius and they cannot make a deal with you and him at once...” The elf trailed off, before a shrug.

  “I am much more powerful than Sirius, so it is possible I hold an advantage,” I replied.

  “Advantage in power, but not numbers,” Jakan pointed out.

  “You have not seen her fight,” Cerin spoke up, from the opposite side of me than Nyx. “She does not need numbers.”

  “Well...” Jakan trailed off, watching me curiously as if imagining what I could do. “I haven't seen her fight, but neither has King Adar. You may have to prove it.”

  I shrugged. “I would rather prove it and gain his support than continue running. Might as well kill a huge beast while I'm out in Nahara, right?”

  Jakan smiled, amused, before feigning interest in a patch of dirt on his boot, and leaning forward to rub it off. “I suppose so.”

  “How old are you, Jakan?” I asked him then, curious. If the elf normally appeared young, he barely looked a day over eighteen when he smiled.

  “Thirty-two,” he replied. That made him older than all of us other than Theron.

  “You look like a kid,” Nyx protested.

  “I feel like one,” came the response, before a light-hearted chuckle.

  I had told Jakan most of everything there was to know about me, other than the fact I was part g
od. I never really wished to hold the title above someone's head, or to announce it and be mistaken for boasting. Besides, he would find out at some point because it had come up from time to time. For now, I wanted to know more about him and his plight.

  “How did you fall in love with a slave in Nahara?” I questioned.

  “I didn't,” he replied, frowning as he drew designs in the sand below, distracted. “I fell in love with a man in T'ahal, almost ten years ago. I was still struggling to find my place in life, and my parents were exasperated with me. I refused to get a job and stole what I needed from the rich of the city. I still lived at home and was escorted there by the guards a number of times after being caught or getting into fights. I finally made the mistake of attempting to steal weapons from a blacksmith, and he caught me.” He hesitated, before wiping the sand smooth from his doodles. “He didn't call the guards. He said that if I stayed, he would teach me how to make weapons, so I wouldn't have to steal them.”

  “Did you?” Nyx asked.

  Jakan chuckled, overwhelmed with nostalgia. “Well...I tried, but I was no good at it. But no matter what, he never held my crimes above my head. He told me about his past, and he came from a hard place, and had done some things he hated himself for, but felt was necessary. We bonded over that. The next time I started to steal, I stopped myself, because I thought it would disappoint him.”

  “Somebody fell hard and fast,” Nyx commented.

  One side of Jakan's mouth lifted in a boyish smile, before it fell from recent events. “Yeah,” he admitted.

  “And that was ten years ago?”

  “Ten years in just a few weeks.” Jakan started drawing in the sand again, twirling his finger through granules. “So, yeah, we fell in love. And my parents loved him, because he kept me grounded. He had no family, so he loved them like his own. I got a job as a fruit picker, and we started building a life together. Then, three years ago, my parents announced they would be traveling to the city of Al Nazir, because the temple they'd helped to build in T'ahal when we moved there was booming in attendance.”

  “What gods do they subscribe to?” I questioned.

  “The sky trinity,” Jakan replied. “Aleyah, the goddess of communication and travel; Ciro, the god of the sun; and Vertun, the god of weather and seasons.”

  “Why those in particular?” I asked. Being one who was not religious, particularly now that I knew my own roots, I was intrigued by the reasons people chose to worship the gods they did.

  “Eteri is a land which is open, where the sky appears even larger than the land,” Jakan answered. “My people are at the mercy of the skies, so we seek to be on the good side of those who control them.”

  I found that interesting. “You worship these gods, as well?”

  “I do, but not as closely as my parents did,” he admitted. “I have seen their prayers work, but I do not wish to dedicate my life to servitude like they did.”

  “Why did they come to Nahara, of all places, to spread their religion?” Theron asked, breaking his own long silence. The ranger was in the midst of snacking on jerky he'd prepared long ago during our trip.

  “Nahara's skies are as vast as our own,” Jakan replied, nodding upward as if to prove it. Above us, the sky was limitless, particularly as we sat on the crest of a high sand dune. “The land has problems with sandstorms and heat, and its droughts are long, even near the rivers. These are the things our gods can mend. Nahara is also full of temples in each of its cities...my parents believed it to be ripe for missionary work, and it was. The people have accepted their teachings with open arms.”

  “So...T'ahal built temples to your gods, and your parents wanted to continue their missionary work in Al Nazir,” I commented, trying to bring us back to the original story. “Did you go with them?”

  “Yes. Anto and I decided we could re-root in Al Nazir, and Anto insisted on helping to protect the caravan they were riding with. So we went, and nearly a season later, our caravan was attacked, just weeks away from making it to our destination. They killed most of us.” Jakan stopped for a moment, before looking off to the moon. “My mother and father were weak. They did not fight. They were first to die.”

  The elf stopped speaking again, so there was silence. I understood it was hard for him to revisit his memories, and none of us really wanted to interrupt him during such a time. Jakan visibly swallowed, and pursed his lips in thought. Then, he went on.

  “Anto fought so well they decided not to kill him, but to subdue him, so they could sell him. The stronger a person is, the more they are worth. Me, on the other hand...well, they had every intention of killing me. I charmed a few of their men with my magic, and they all started turning on one another, but I didn't have enough energy to turn them all. Eventually, they agreed not to kill me if I would teach them my magic.”

  “Who were these people?” Asked Cerin.

  “They call themselves the Blades of Meir,” Jakan replied, looking disgusted. “It is a crazy cult of people who reject modern society and live in the ruins of Nahara. They believe that the more blood they spill and people they eat, the sooner they will receive the salvation of Meir.”

  “Meir...” I flicked my eyes up toward the sky. “The moon? They believe the second moon will save them?”

  Jakan nodded. “They believe the mortal races are sinful and think they can begin anew on Meir. They believe that because it looks so similar to Nahara, it is a vast desert.”

  “'People are sinful,' he says, whilst chewing on a man's heart,” Theron mused. Nyx chuckled at the ranger's jest.

  “So...really, you were lucky to make it out alive,” I commented. “Both you and Anto.”

  “Lucky as we were ever going to get,” Jakan said.

  “How did you escape?” I asked.

  “Well, we were taken back to the ruins that were their home, and I was pulled aside to teach one of the cultists illusion magic. Once we were alone...” Jakan shrugged. “I used my illusion magic. And then I walked out of the tent, and he let me go, because he was charmed. I sneaked my way out of the camp, and somehow made it all the way back to T'ahal with little food or water. It wasn't long after I convinced the guard of my story when I saw Anto, standing up on a stage, being sold to the highest bidder.”

  “He lived and worked in that city,” Theron pointed out. “They allowed him to be sold into slavery, despite knowing him?”

  Jakan shrugged. “T'ahal is split drastically into two sections of the populace. The rich and the poor. Anto was just a blacksmith who worked for the weapon's wealthy shop owner, nothing more. And he left his job to leave the city with us, which inconvenienced his boss. Nobody was going to help him, and I couldn't afford to outbid the others. The only people who have gold in Nahara are the wealthy. The poor all deal in trade. I was never used to having gold, unless I stole it. And I'd stopped stealing because of Anto.”

  “And started stealing again because of Anto,” Nyx mused.

  “Yeah...well, it was all I could do.” Jakan's tone betrayed his disappointment for having fallen back into the clutches of thievery. “That is why I took a risk, and moved to Comercio. Everyone carries gold in Comercio. Besides, then I wouldn't have to watch Anto fight in the coliseum. He has never lost, but...” The Vhiri shook his head. “Nobody can win forever.”

  “I don't understand this cycle,” I said, softly. “Someone buys a person to throw into a pit, where only one can remain? Why would a rich person take such a risk with their money?”

  “Because if your slave wins, the riches are great. They build brands around their fighters, and make riches off merchandise alone. If a slave wins, the earnings can make up for not only the cost of that fighter, but of many others who were not as talented.” Jakan's youthful bronzed face was overcome with sadness. “And Anto...well, he is not the most muscular man in the world, but his build is intimidating and his muscles are great. The winning bid for him was four hundred gold, which was higher than most, but less than bulkier men and the occasio
nal fighter which happens to have giant blood. It ended up being quite the bargain for the rich asshole, as Anto has been a gladiator for two years, and has not yet been defeated. His owner lives in a mansion paid for by his work.”

  “So...this spectacle happens legally,” I deduced.

  “Oh, yes,” Jakan replied, disgusted. “King Adar makes sure to attend every battle.”

  That frustrated me, to say the least. If I'd been hoping to find a more benevolent leader than Sirius in Nahara, I was quickly disappointed. But I could not cherry pick those who could offer me a mutual benefit in my situation. I had my own goals in mind; I could not worry about fixing every perceived injustice, because then I would have neither the time or the energy to fix anything at all.

  Hours after our conversation, I sat alone at the top of the sand dune, watching over the desert beyond, the sands glistening silver beneath the blue and gold light of the double moon. Behind me at our camp, Nyx and Jakan both snored softly beneath the moonlight. As always, Theron and Cerin both slept as silent as death.

  Nahara was beautiful. Throughout our walk through it thus far, it had been nothing but golden sands and blue skies, stretching farther than the eye could see. The dunes rolled out in all directions from our path, the sands forming hills that burned the muscles to ascend. Once Caravaneer Road had hit the sands, it had turned from a well trodden dirt path to nothing more than a lost route marked only by tall, stone pillars adorned with red flags which blew with the desert winds. Some of the pillars stuck farther out into the skies than others, proving sandstorms often would alter the landscape and move sands to different locations. Jakan had promised us that once we were closer to T'ahal, the dunes would flatten out to vast sands which allowed the eye to see farther into the distance than most lands would allow. By all accounts, T'ahal was a vast city, so I expected we would see it far before we reached it.

  “Kai,” it was just my name, murmured on Cerin's voice. I glanced over, pulling myself from my thoughts to find the necromancer coming to sit beside me. Oftentimes, he would stay up late with me for my watch if he was able to, and we would talk together while the others were asleep. Tonight, though, he had been exhausted. It had been a few hours since the others went to bed. Perhaps he had dozed off and had gotten back up.