That being said, there are still a few zombies left around camp; War likes having them patrol the grounds. He won’t chance them getting close enough to make me sick, but he clearly still has them around for the camp’s protection and—to a larger extent—my own.
As I stare out at the few remaining tents, two phobos riders step out of one, their torsos bare, save for the red sash they always wear around their upper arm. They lean in towards each other, chatting quietly. When they see me, one nods in my direction, and the other takes notice, the two falling silent.
The back of my neck pricks. Whatever they’re talking about, it’s not for my ears.
A short while later Hussain walks by, lifting a hand to me in greeting before joining up with the two other men. Together, the group of them head off, their heads bent together, their voices hushed.
They’re all obviously friends, and the sight of them together brings a sharp ache to my chest. I already miss Zara and the easy friendship we had.
Rolling my hamsa bracelets around my wrist, I head towards the outskirts of camp.
Off in the distance, I see Deimos grazing, and nearby him is War. The sight of the horseman still makes my heart flutter.
Like his riders, War is shirtless, and even this far away, I can see his olive skin ripple with his muscles. Standing there amongst Sudan’s barren landscape, he looks … different. Still fearsome in stature, but burdened somehow. It brings back that prickling, uneasy sensation I felt only minutes ago, though I don’t know why.
I make my way to him.
When I get to his side, he doesn’t turn to me.
“Wife,” War says, staring out at the horizon. Out here the world is all yellow, sandy soil and pale blue sky. “Where do you draw the line between those who are innocent and those who are not?” he asks, his gaze distant.
I shake my head, though I’m not sure the question was meant for me at all.
He turns to me, and his dark eyes unbearably tender. “I have seen it all,” he says. “There is no clear demarcation between good and evil. And who is to say that even the worst men can’t change?”
I search his face. I’m barely following his musings, and I certainly don’t have any sort of answer for him.
He stares at my lips. “I thought I could have it all—my wife, my war, and my sanctity. Instead, you have forced me to question everything—life, death. Right, wrong. God, man—myself. And I am not one to question, wife.”
He glances beyond me, looking at the horizon again. “I have spent so much time judging men’s hearts that I haven’t judged my own. Not until now. And wife, … I have found it wanting.”
Chapter 54
That night, War holds me close—closer even than usual. I feel his uncertainty and inner conflict in the desperate grip of his arms. He really isn’t the type of creature to question himself, and now that he has, it seems his identity is crumbling apart.
What is War without war?
The horseman searches my eyes. “I love you.” His voice is rough with his own emotion. “More than my sword, more than my task. I love you more than war itself.” He presses his forehead to mine. “I’m so sorry, Miriam. I’m so goddamn sorry for everything. For not listening. For your pain and suffering. For every last thing.”
War’s face blurs as I stare at him. There has been so much suffering.
“Why are you telling me this now?” My voice is hoarse.
He strokes my cheek. “Because I am making the decision to end the fighting.”
I love you but it has been destroying us both, the horseman had once said. I hadn’t realized that he might’ve meant that literally when referring to himself. War and apathy go hand in hand. To feel, to empathize, to love—that must be the beginning of the end for war itself.
Was he doomed the moment he laid eyes on me in Jerusalem? Or was it when I nearly died—or when I surrendered? I know by the time the horseman looked at me and wiped out the entire camp, it was there. He loved me then, though he had no name for what he felt; it was the burn of betrayal that set him off. But by then, the spark that set everything else into motion had already been lit. Sparing the children, then the righteous.
And now, War is considering stopping the destruction altogether.
It’s beyond my wildest hope, so I don’t know why I feel fear, but that oily sensation twists my gut.
“Why are you doing this?” I ask.
The horseman gives me a soft smile. “Always questioning my motives. I thought you’d be glad.”
“What will happen to you?”
I can’t bear to say, What will God do to you? But I’m imagining it all the same. The horseman is turning his back on his violent purpose. Surely there are some consequences to that.
War tilts my chin up. “Are you actually worried for me?”
My lower lip is beginning to tremble just the slightest. “Of course I am. I don’t want you to—die.” My voice breaks.
I know he’s said it’s impossible for him to die, but is it really any less possible than raising the dead or healing the wounded or speaking dead languages? Impossible no longer means the same thing it once has.
The horseman’s thumb brushes my lower lip. “And who says I will?”
“Tell me you won’t,” I say a bit desperately.
“My brother didn’t.”
I go still. “So Pestilence is still alive?”
War nods. “Do you want to know what happened to him?” he asks. “What really happened?”
“How he was stopped, you mean?” I say.
War’s fingers move to my scar, tracing the symbol. “It wasn’t violence that got him in the end. It was love.”
I don’t breathe.
“My brother fell in love with a human woman, and he gave up his divine mission to be with her.
Which is exactly what my horseman seems to be doing.
I try to keep my voice steady. “What happened to him?” What will happen to you?
“He and his wife live—they have children too,” War says.
I feel myself begin to breathe steadily again.
“So they’re alive?” I ask. “And happy?”
“As far as I know,” War says.
Relief washes through me. War won’t die, just as Pestilence didn’t. He can leave the fighting behind, and we can have a good life together. A mundane and happy and hopefully long life.
I study War’s expression again. “So you’re not worried about leaving your task behind?”
War hesitates. “I wouldn’t say that.”
Like snapping his fingers, my fear returns.
He must see it because he says, “Miriam, do you believe that I can be redeemed?”
“What do you mean? Are you asking if you can right your wrongs?”
The warlord gives a sharp nod.
He’s done so many abominable things. From the very day he arrived, he’s brought death with him. But what he’s done is a different question from the one he’s asking.
“I think you’re already redeeming yourself,” I say. “So, yes, War, I do think that can happen.”
The horseman gives me a soft look. “Then surely every man, woman, and child on earth is just as capable of redemption as I am. And if they want redemption, then who am I to cut them down before their true day of judgment?”
I shake my head, at a loss. “So you’re going to stop the killing?”
He gives a slight nod. “So I’m going to stop the killing.”
I don’t know when the two of us doze off, locked in each other’s embrace, only that I’m pulled from sleep by a phantom voice.
Surrender.
The word whispers along my skin, moving over it like a tender caress.
I sit up in bed, breathing deeply. The memory of the word seems to echo in that tent.
Surrender, surrender, surrender.
I touch my scar. This wound and the word it represents inextricably bound me and War together. He was sure I was supposed to surrender. The proof o
f it was carved into my flesh.
Like a strike of lightning, realization hits me.
The message wasn’t for me.
It never was for me. After all, I can’t read Angelic.
The message is for someone who can.
War.
Chapter 55
The next morning, I wake to War’s hands on my stomach.
“Mmm, what are you doing?” I say groggily, stretching in bed.
I feel the horseman’s hair brush my bare skin right before he presses a kiss to my belly. “It’s never going to cease fascinating me,” he says, “that you’re carrying my child.”
I blink my eyes open and thread one of my hands through his dark locks, which are mussed from sleep.
“Do you know what it is?” I ask.
I mean, he knows a shitload of other things … maybe he’ll know the baby’s sex.
War draws circles on my stomach, his expression soft.
His mouth curves into a small smile. “Human, I imagine. Or close enough to it.”
I laugh and push at him, though I’m not entirely sure he meant it as a joke. “Do you know what gender the child is?”
He looks at me fondly. “Even my knowledge has its limits. We shall find out together.”
I pull him to me, giving him a kiss on the lips. “Trading death for life,” I say when I break away. “It’s a good look on you.”
He takes my face in his hands. “I didn’t know I was capable of feeling this way, wife. Happiness is a new emotion—”
The tent flap is thrown open, and a phobos rider steps inside, interrupting us.
I yank the bedsheet up over myself, covering my breasts. Just like War, I’ve taken to sleeping in the nude. So shoot me, my clothes are becoming too tight.
War sits up, not at all bothered by his own exposed skin. “Get out.” He sounds just like his old self. Full of confidence and pent up violence.
The rider, a burly, balding man with a thick beard, looks a little unsteady. He gives a quick bow, then rushes in to say, “With all due respect, My Lord, the residents of Karima are riding out to ambush us. If we want to stop them, we must leave now.”
I glance at War, alarmed. Yesterday, the horseman was dead-set on laying down his sword, but what happens when the humans are the ones to attack? Does he stand by his words, or does he make an exception?
War stands, utterly naked and completely uncaring, swaggering across the room to grab his pants.
The phobos rider looks away abruptly. Then, muttering some quick excuse, ducks out of the room.
I sit up, the blankets pressed tightly to me, watching as the horseman pulls on his black clothing, then his armor. Lastly, he straps his massive sword to his back.
At the sight of it, my apprehension heightens. I can’t say what exactly is bothering me—that War might kill as he’s always done … or that he might do something else entirely, something that could have its own set of consequences.
War must see the terrible possibilities playing themselves out on my face because he strides over to me and kneels down next to the pallet.
He reaches out and strokes my cheek. “There is nothing to fear, Miriam. Whatever your worries are, banish them.”
I nod, trying to believe him.
The horseman gives me a kiss, and then he leaves.
The entire camp—or what’s left of it—empties. War is gone, his riders are gone—even most of the horses are gone.
I’m utterly alone, save for the few skeletal guards War brought back to life to guard me. I feel like I’m the last human on earth, my surroundings abandoned, the living nothing but memories.
My surroundings aren’t helping. This part of Sudan is all baked earth and sky. And aside from a few ruins and a handful of buildings I caught sight of during our ride in, there’s nothing to indicate that people have ever lived here.
But it’s not the loneliness that is painful so much as it’s the boredom. I’ve reread my romance novel so many times I could quote entire sections of the book by now. I’ve stared at the photo of my family until my eyes have nearly bled. And the idea of working on another arrow makes me want to pull out my hair.
Maybe that’s what drives me to start snooping around camp.
I’ve never been in any of the phobos riders’ tents. There’s never really been the opportunity or the desire. But now that there’s literally no one to stop me, curiosity gets the better of me.
I step out of War’s tent and cut across the camp, a hot breeze stirring my hair.
The closest tent to me is roughly ten meters away. I head over to it, pausing for only a split second at the tent flaps.
This is rude and invasive. It’s also not the worst thing I’ve done.
I pull the flaps back and step inside.
The place is an absolute mess. There’s already a day’s worth of dirty dishes stacked in a corner of the room, and another pile of bloodstained clothing. Flies buzz around inside the tent, and shit, that should be incentive enough to clean the place up.
The next tent couldn’t be more different. It’s Spartan, and what few possessions its owner has, they are arranged in a nice, orderly fashion. Even the blankets on the rider’s pallet are tucked in.
My brows knit at that. They were all in such a mad scramble to meet their foes, I wouldn’t have thought there’d be time to make the bed …
The next rider’s tent belongs to a woman, though you wouldn’t know it by looking at her things. My only clue is the framed photo next to her bed. I recognize her face immediately. It’s hard not to when there are so few female phobos riders. In the photo with her is a man—her husband?
All at once I feel some unwanted emotion towards this woman who’s undoubtedly slaughtered dozens of innocents. But I can’t help it. She once had a family, just like the rest of us, and somewhere along the way, she lost them—most likely to War himself.
For the millionth time I wonder what motivated these riders to not just fight for the horsemen, but to become his most trusted and lethal soldiers. Was it survival? Was it a love of bloodsport? Something else?
I leave the woman’s tent then, slipping out like a ghost.
Snooping is starting to lose its appeal. Reluctantly, I head into a fourth tent.
My last one, I promise myself.
This home looks like it’s a shared space; there are two pallets pushed together, the sheets mussed from sleep.
Looks like me and War aren’t the only two people in camp who are shacking up.
These riders have the unusual luxury of having a wicker chest in their room. Not many do since furniture is hard to travel with.
I head over to it.
Kneeling in front of the chest, I open the lid. Inside, I notice a hookah, tobacco, a spare set of clothes, and a Turkish coffee set. Amongst it all is a folded piece of paper.
I pull out the piece of paper and unfold it. On it is a hand drawn map of the area we’re currently in, right down to the Nile River we’ve been following, the road we’ve been traveling on, our temporary settlement, and the city of Karima, the latter which is situated in the top, right corner of the map. Certain areas on the paper have X’s on them, alongside the names of various phobos riders.
This is a tactical map, I realize. One that seems to include people and the places they need to defend … or attack.
But War had told me that he was giving up the fighting.
He wouldn’t lie to me—particularly not about this.
Which means the map is wrong. It has to be. My brow wrinkles as I continue to study it. The longer I look at it, the stranger I feel.
And then I realize why.
On the map, the phobos riders are positioned along the road, and judging from the markings, the plan is to lead their assailants towards a specific location, one where they can then ambush them. The only problem is, the map doesn’t show the assailants coming from the city.
It shows them coming from camp.
Chapter 56
War was
right. There is nothing to fear.
Until, of course, there is.
I put the map back where I found it, and then I sprint to War’s tent.
He’s going to be ambushed.
At least I think he’s going to be.
But … I must be wrong about what I saw. Not because I have faith in War’s riders—I wouldn’t trust them farther than I can throw them—but because they know better than anyone the extent of the horseman’s power and savagery.
They know he can’t be killed.
So why plan an ambush?
Maybe I read the map wrong. I don’t have a lot of experience looking at tactical maps. It’s possible I misinterpreted this one.
Inside War’s tent, I grab my dagger and holster and strap it to my waist. It takes a little while longer for me to find the bow and quiver War once gave me. I feel a little foolish, arming myself when I’m still so unsure of what I saw.
War’s riders must know something I don’t. Or maybe I’ve gotten this whole thing backwards. Maybe they’re not going to kill the horseman—why does my mind keep going there anyway? The man can’t die.
Nevertheless, unease sits like a stone in my stomach.
I stride outside, heading for the corral, where a few horses remain. I pause when I see them, another wave of uncertainty washing through me.
Am I really going to do this? It’s one thing to strap on weapons, another to saddle a horse and ride into battle on an assumption I made.
And even if my worst fears are true, what could I possibly do that War himself couldn’t?
I never get the chance to answer my own questions.
All at once, the earth comes alive beneath my feet, and it is angry. Violently it buckles and rolls, nearly throwing me to the ground. I stumble away as all around me, the tents shake and collapse. The horses shift nervously in the corral.
In the next instant, the dead are bursting forth from the ground, clawing their way to the surface. They move with unnatural agility; I’ve never seen them rise so quickly.
One of the horses charges, breaking through the brittle wood of its enclosure. The rest follow, galloping away.
I spin around.
In all directions, the dead are surfacing. There are hundreds of them as far as the eye can see. I’ve never seen War call so many.
War (The Four Horsemen Book 2) Page 38
