Empire of Sand

by Tasha Suri

  “She needs to be prepared for the next storm,” Amun said abruptly, breaking Mehr’s focus. “The Maha said it will be upon us soon.”

  Mehr did not think she’d ever heard Amun speak directly to Edhir. It startled her. She wasn’t alone in that. Edhir’s eyes were wide. The other mystics were watching, some covertly, some not so covertly.

  “Yes,” Edhir said, after a moment’s hesitation. “It will be.”

  “When?”

  Mehr wanted to wince at Amun’s behavior. If this was how he talked to the mystics, then it was probably wise that he was so often silent. He showed Edhir none of the ease or careful gentleness he so often showed her. Instead he spoke abrasively, his voice unashamedly cold and unfeeling.

  Edhir’s jaw tightened, but he made no complaint. Instead he stood and made his way to one of the many shelves lining the walls. He lifted a mounted sphere from one low shelf and brought it over to the table. It was a strange tool—Mehr had never seen the like of it before. The sphere was faceted glass, etched with symbols, and surrounded on all sides by movable dials and calipers, all etched with small, intricate measurements. Without a word Edhir began adjusting the calipers and dials around the sphere, his eyes narrowed. Another mystic brought over a scroll and unfurled it. This one was covered in lines and equations. Catching Mehr’s questioning look, Edhir said, “This is a map of the stars.”

  “I didn’t know stars could be mapped,” Mehr said honestly.

  “Oh, they can,” Edhir said, distracted. He adjusted another dial in slow increments. “The Maha, praise him, discovered that by tracing the movement of the stars, we can predict storms.”

  “How is that possible?” Mehr asked. She leaned forward, her eyes fixed on the sphere. Now that she was looking more closely, she could see that the symbols were etchings of the celestial bodies: the moon and sun and dozens of stars, all arrayed across the sphere’s surface. As Edhir moved the dials, the facets moved too, the sphere turning in a smooth arc.

  “Everything in the world comes from the dreams of the Gods,” Edhir said, still moving the dials with care. “Almost everything they’ve dreamed is perfectly designed, and adheres to its own laws. Just as we obey the law and the faith, the seasons, the tides of the great ocean, the movements of the stars, all follow the order set down by the Gods. But in Irinah, when the dreamfire falls, the order—bends.” He stopped to look down at the map at his side, then adjusted one dial a mere increment to the left. “Look.”

  Mehr looked. Mehr did not know anything about the order the stars obeyed, but she knew there was something subtly wrong with the surface of the sphere. There were hairline gaps between its facets, a strange order to the stars.

  “As we grow near a storm, the celestial bodies begin to change their behavior,” Edhir explained. She could hear the enthusiasm in his voice, the sheer love he had for his subject. “Their patterns alter. We’ve theorized that the storms are a time when the world the Gods have dreamed is at its most fragile, softened so it can be remolded. But—it’s only a theory,” Edhir said, looking up, a flush rising on his cheeks.

  “It’s a wonderful theory,” Mehr said, trying to reflect his enthusiasm back at him. Bahren had told her Edhir fancied himself a scholar. Looking at him now, Mehr realized Edhir was more than just a pretender to that title. He was clever and—praise the Gods—unable to resist sharing his knowledge with an interested listener. “We must talk again, brother.”

  “How long until the storm?” Amun asked impatiently.

  His voice was a dull blade, and it forced the light from Edhir’s eyes. Edhir blinked, swallowed, and said, “Two weeks. That’s as much accuracy as I can give you.”

  Amun nodded sharply and turned to go.

  “Our thanks,” Mehr said, and followed him. She realized all eyes in the room were still on them. She stood straight, avoiding those eyes, and swept out after him.

  Amun was walking so fast that Mehr nearly had to run to keep up with him. “Two weeks,” he repeated. “That’s no time at all.”

  “Amun,” Mehr said. Hearing her voice, breathless as it was, he slowed down. Marginally. Walking by his side now, Mehr said, “You could have spoken more kindly to Edhir.”

  “What would have been the point?” Amun’s voice was cool, glassy. “You want to be kind to them now, Mehr?”

  Them. She preferred his stony silence to this sudden upwelling of bitterness. She preferred it to the reminder that they were alone, with no one to trust but each other. She crossed her arms.

  “People are more helpful when you treat them well,” she pointed out.

  “He’ll do what his duty requires.”

  “I’m not talking about his duties. Amun, he had maps,” she said, speaking as quietly as she could without being inaudible. “Not just maps of the stars or of the Empire, but maps of Irinah itself. If we ever want to escape, we’ll need some way to find a safe route through the desert.”

  “There is no escape for me,” Amun said woodenly. “I’m bound.”

  Mehr bit her lip. Then she said, carefully, “But I’m not. Not entirely.”

  “Not yet,” Amun said. There was a pause. Then Amun said, “Do what you must. They don’t need to like me. Just … don’t involve me, Mehr. Please.” There was a long pause. Then, abruptly, Amun said, “I can’t hope. It would—hurt.”

  Mehr suddenly felt very foolish.

  “As you wish,” she said softly. She said no more.

  Amun couldn’t escape the Maha, bound as he was. No wonder the thought of escape—the possibility of something he could never achieve—pained him.

  For all that she wasn’t entirely bound, Mehr had precious little chance either. Before Mehr had even spoken, she’d known that the idea of escaping the Maha was at best a foolish girl’s fantasy. With eyes always on her, how could she possibly slip away from the temple without being noticed? How could she leave Amun here, knowing what the Maha was and how being bound to him felt?

  And even if she did escape, how long would she survive? Without a map, without food or water or a robe to protect her from the sun, she would perish in short order.

  But hope was insidious. It had its claws in her now, and it wouldn’t let her go.

  Edhir has maps, she thought. And Hema works in the kitchens. She’ll have food. Water.

  A way to look again at the maps of Irinah, a way to hide food and water, and find a robe to protect herself, and a way to set Amun free along with her. That was all she needed now.

  She wanted to laugh. Ah, she’d set herself an impossible goal, hadn’t she?

  “I’d hoped to work on your technique longer,” Amun said, after a long silence. “But you will need to be taught the rite immediately.”

  “Tell me about this rite,” she said, pushing her hopes to the back of her mind. “For a start, what is it called?”

  “I don’t know if it has a true name,” said Amun grimly. “But the person who taught it to me called it the Rite of the Bound.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  They returned to the same dim hall they had practiced in the evening before.

  “We won’t perform this rite in the desert until the dreamfire falls,” Amun told her. “The daiva don’t like it.”

  Mehr could well imagine how little the daiva cared for a rite intended to bend their mothers and fathers to mortal will.

  Even though it was daylight outside, the hall was timeless nighttime. Lanterns flickered where they hung upon the walls. The light illuminated Amun’s face in fractured shadows. He turned to look at the doorway, where another mystic already stood, watching them.

  It was no surprise to Mehr to see the man there. Wherever she and Amun went, mystics followed. The Maha had many eyes.

  “Leave,” Amun said shortly. “We’re at the Maha’s business. We need to be alone.”

  The mystic nodded and stepped out of the room. Mehr was sure he was still out there, hovering just beyond the entrance. But there was nothing to be done about that. She pushed her discom
fort away and followed Amun deeper into the hall.

  “You understand the basic forms,” he said.

  “I do.”

  “You need to be solidly tethered to the world around you,” he went on, as if he hadn’t heard her speak. “Your feet are earth, your hands are heaven. Your body is the bridge. Your body must be strong. Straight and tall.”

  “I know, Amun,” Mehr said, arms crossed. She watched him pace about, for all the world like a creature trapped in a cage. “My technique isn’t as terrible as you seem to believe.”

  He shook his head. “I didn’t mean—”

  “No,” Mehr said. “I’m sure you didn’t.” She gestured impatiently. “Continue.”

  His footsteps slowed as he tried to will himself calm.

  “Everything you know, this rite demands you discard. You cannot be grounded. You cannot be strong. You need to ignore the earth beneath your feet and the sky above you. When you dance the rite, the storm will lift you up. It will raise you and fill you up with the fire of the Gods. In order to direct the fire as the rite requires, you will need to reach beyond the mortal world, the desert salt, to the place where the Gods dream.” He spoke slowly, carefully, weighing his words. “You need to touch your own immortality in order to become the vessel of their fire. And when that power has almost consumed you, you need to open yourself up to the will of the mystics and the Maha, and let them use you. That is the Rite of the Bound.”

  Mehr swallowed. Dreamfire was beautiful, holy, but it belonged to the Gods. For all that the Amrithi were far-distant descendants of the daiva, and therefore long-distant descendants of the Gods themselves, Mehr knew that she was all blood and bone. There were no shadows in her skin, no gold in her eyes. She was mortal.

  She couldn’t imagine how it would feel to try to hold the dreamfire within her. Couldn’t imagine, and didn’t want to.

  “That doesn’t sound pleasant,” she said quietly.

  “No,” he said. “It isn’t.” His expression was grave. “This is what I was taught, Mehr: When a paired man and woman perform the rite, they become a channel between the dreams of the Gods and the prayers of the mystics. They can suppress dreams the Maha and his mystics don’t want in the world, and draw forward only the dreams that are desired. They become the perfect tool for sculpting the Empire. That is what I was taught, and that is what I have to teach you too, pleasant or not.”

  “Why a man and a woman?” Mehr asked.

  Amun shrugged fluidly. “Because the rite is an act of creation. Apparently.”

  It was perverse to call this terrible rite, this destruction of the natural order, an act of creation. But Mehr didn’t say so. She doubted he would disagree with her anyway.

  “Once you’ve mastered the first step,” Amun continued, “I’ll teach you the sigils you need to make yourself into a conduit for the dreams of the Gods and draw forward or suppress their dreams as the mystics demand.” He hesitated. “It’s important to be confident in your technique because when the Rite of the Bound threatens to consume you, moving to one of the true rites may be the only thing to keep you whole.”

  Mehr nodded without a word. She had nothing helpful to say, no real questions to ask. She wanted nothing more than to argue with him. This rite—the Rite of the Bound—sounded like utter nonsense. Rites were worship shaped by the body, by flesh and ritual and rhythm. To put the body aside was against everything Mehr had ever learned, and everything she understood the rites to be. Did Amun expect her to do nothing but stand still and will her body away?

  “We begin with the breath,” he said. “Close your eyes.”

  Mehr squeezed her eyes shut. Apparently he did.

  It was the breath they concentrated on for a long time, and nothing but the breath.

  Amun told her to look inward. He told her to look deep inside herself, beyond the rush of blood, beyond skin and sinew, beyond muscle and bone.

  “There is a part of you that isn’t simply mortal,” Amun told her. “Reach for it.”

  Mehr tried. She breathed carefully, slowly, as she’d been told to. She tried to see beyond her own flesh.

  She believed in the soul. She’d seen its power in the marks on Amun’s skin and in the spidery white lines carved into her own chest. But to reach for it, to feel its presence and nothing but its presence, to the point of forgetting flesh—that seemed utterly impossible.

  In. Out. Despite her efforts, her body was all she could think of. The cool floor, the darkness pressing against her eyelids; the sound of Amun breathing along with her, matching each inhalation and exhalation until it sounded like they were no more than one creature.

  Her breath stuttered. She opened her eyes.

  “I can’t feel it.” She didn’t say I’m never going to feel it because she wasn’t a petulant child, but the words were still there tucked away in her voice, frustration simmering under the surface.

  “You will.” Amun’s own eyes remained closed. “I feel it in myself. You’ll feel it in you eventually too.”

  “We’re not the same, Amun.”

  “In the ways that matter to the Maha, we are.”

  That was true. Mehr touched her fingertips to the seal around her neck, reminding herself what was at stake. Then she closed her eyes once again and tried to breathe her flesh away.

  She tried to wind deeper into herself. To forget the cool air, the night darkness around her. After a moment, she heard Amun begin to speak.

  “The Gods created the daiva, the daiva birthed our ancestors, and our ancestors birthed us. So it goes.” There was a low, singsong quality to his voice that reminded her of the way she had spoken to Arwa, once upon a time, about the daiva. Here is a story, his voice seemed to say. An old story. A true story. “And here we are, mortal men and women, with immortality in our blood. Seek out the immortality inside you, and you will find the place where the Gods sleep. You are an Amrithi; it is your right.”

  “A speck of immortality,” Mehr muttered. “It can’t be more than that.”

  “A speck is enough,” Amun said.

  Mehr breathed. Breathed. Curled her hands into helpless fists. “I don’t know where to look,” she said.

  “Look to the part of you that dreams,” Amun said.

  Mehr shivered. Snatches of last night’s dream flickered through her head, as blurred as candle flame. Golden eyes. Arwa crumbling to ashes. She was glad she could remember no more than that.

  Dreams were a strange place. Often dark and terrible, but at least the pain they inflicted was easily lost. Easily forgotten.

  Mehr sucked in another deep breath. Tried again.

  Once more. Once more.

  Kamal

  It was an unfortunate day for bartering. The heat was blistering, the sun fat and unforgiving in the sky. As a result, the village was full of Irin who were by turns irritable and listless. Kamal—who’d volunteered for this job, curse it—was struggling to exchange his blood for anything useful.

  “It’s worth more than that,” he protested unwisely to one villager, who promptly narrowed her eyes and cursed him colorfully.

  “You take what we offer,” the villager said finally, “or I tell the tax collector your kind are near here. See how long your clan lasts then.”

  The threat kept on irritating him like a sore tooth, long after he’d accepted the villager’s paltry trade and started making his way back out to the desert proper. As he reached the outskirts of the village, a child threw a rock at him and ran away shrieking with laughter, which only served to sour his mood further. Gods curse the lot of them.

  He wished one of his clan had come with him. Sohaila, maybe, who always knew how to make him laugh even when he was in the blackest moods. But Kamal was alone, and wouldn’t see his clan for days yet.

  He’d learned young—as all Amrithi learned—to keep clan and Empire at a safe distance from one another. Once, that had meant avoiding larger towns and the city of Jah Irinah, where Ambhan officials and merchants from other provinces wer
e likely to reside. Now it meant avoiding every small village scattered across the desert’s back. Even the Irin, who understood the worth of Amrithi blood and the danger the daiva could bring in a way outsiders never could, were not trustworthy any longer. His clan were camped two days’ walk away, but he’d take a long route, just in case he’d been followed by a villager in search of glory or coin.

  In three days then, if all went well, he’d be home.

  He walked for a time, under the weight of a burning, cloudless sky. Then he stopped and swore into the air until he felt mildly better. He took out his water container, drank three swigs in succession, and kept on walking. There was shelter ahead—an outcropping of rock that would provide him shade until the hottest part of the day had passed. He could remain there until the air had cooled a little, then continue his journey in peace.

  When he reached the shelter, he found it occupied.

  A woman was sitting in the shade, her legs neatly crossed, her face swathed by the hood of her robe. Both of them were frozen for a long moment. Then Kamal took a step back and began to reach for his dagger.

  “Calm yourself,” the woman said. She lowered her hood, then raised her hands to show him they were empty. “There’s no need to be afraid of me. I’m a fellow tribeswoman.”

  “What are you doing here?” he asked.

  She was a tribeswoman, he didn’t doubt that. But it had been a long time since he’d crossed paths with a member of another clan, and he didn’t know how to feel at the sight of her.

  Her eyes searched his face with equal unease.

  “I’m looking for a clan,” she said finally. “They used to pass through this area. A clan led by a Tara named Ruhi. Do you know where I can find them?”

  Kamal kept his mouth shut. The woman stood and began to approach him slowly. With the sun above her, he could see her far more clearly. She was beautiful, dark-skinned and long-haired, but she was painfully thin, great shadows carved beneath her eyes.