Crowns of Rust (Kingdoms of Sand Book 2)

by Daniel Arenson

  "So you've come to gloat before nailing me onto the cross?" Epher could manage only a hoarse whisper, and every word hurt.

  "To gloat?" Remus placed his hands on Epher's shoulders, pressing down just the slightest. Hanging from his wrists, Epher bit down on a scream as his arms creaked, the sockets threatening to pop. The manacles dug deeper into his wrists, and fresh blood trickled down Epher's arms.

  "No," Remus said. "Not to gloat. To offer you a deal."

  "Does this deal involve you and your brutes leaving Zohar and never coming back?" Epher rasped. "If not, I'm not interested."

  Remus's face was not made for smiling, but he smiled nonetheless—a tight, ugly thing that looked more like a grimace. "You Zoharites are special people. Even when I crush you under my heel, you find a way to jest. You believe in an invisible god, even as you perish in agony. You still think you can fight, even when your hosts lie dead and rotting in your fields. And yes, Epheriah Sela. Still there are those in Zohar who fight—like cowards, slinking through alleys, stabbing legionaries in the backs with crude shivs."

  "Return to us our swords and bows," Epher said, "and we'll face you in the field."

  "We've already danced that dance," said Remus. "You failed at it, rather spectacularly. Rats will fight like rats—from the shadows. A group that calls itself Zohar's Blade has risen in the warrens of this wretched city. Ironic, isn't it? You call yourselves lions, yet you fight as vermin. You call yourselves children of the light, yet you hide in shadows. Since I left you hanging here, awaiting your crucifixion, these cowards of Zohar's Blade have slain five of my men."

  Epher wanted to rejoice at this news. Every dead Aelarian was another vanquished enemy, another conqueror gone. Yet only fear filled him.

  When I killed a few of his men, he threatened to crucify six hundred, Epher thought. Only surrendering myself stopped him. How many more will Remus now murder?

  "What do you want from me?" Epher said. He could barely speak with the pain. He teetered on his toes, even as his feet cramped, struggling to keep holding the weight, to stop the chains from dislocating his arms. "Nail me onto the cross and be done with. Let me die in sunlight."

  "Ah, see, if you die, you will become a martyr," Remus said. "Already in the city, they sing of you, chanting your name. 'Free the lion cub!' they cry." Remus sighed. "I'm not deaf to the cries of Zohar. I'll let you live, Sela. And in return, you will infiltrate Zohar's Blade, this group of fanatical rebels. You will report to me their numbers, their locations, their plans. Do these things, and I'll let you see your family again. You will see Olive again. You will live."

  Lantana flowers, Epher thought, the name suddenly coming to him—the flowers formed of many smaller flowers. It was strange, he thought, how here, between death and life, in chains, in a captured city, he thought of damn flowers. Perhaps that memory—a day of spring, of family—was suddenly worth more than palaces and empires.

  "So I only have to betray my kingdom," Epher said, staring at that hard, leathery face that shone in the torchlight. "I can live, but live as a traitor."

  Remus pulled down harder, tugging Epher toward the floor. His joints creaked. His arms teetered on the cusp of dislocating. Remus stared into his eyes, teeth bared.

  "You will live as my dog, or you will die as my bitch," the general said. "You decide."

  Epher spat on his face. "I will die as a lion."

  Remus stared at him for a moment longer, and finally emotion filled those dead eyes—hatred. The Aelarian pulled keys from his belt and unlocked Epher's shackles.

  Epher crumpled to the floor, banging his ribs. He couldn't lower his arms, could barely bend them at all. His feet cramped, and the wounds on his back opened, dripping fresh blood. He gasped for air, only for Remus to kick him in the stomach. Epher curled up, gagging, spitting blood.

  "I see no lion." Remus stared down at him, torch in hand. "I see a worm." He turned toward the door and raised his voice. "Men! Grab him! Drag him out into the sunlight. We nail him up."

  Two legionaries entered the chamber, clad in lorica segmentata—the armor of the legions—and crested helmets. They grabbed Epher's arms, and he screamed in pain as they yanked him to his feet. He tried to stand, but his feet would not bend, and spasms racked his legs. He felt as if he'd been crucified already, his body unable to return to its previous form. As the legionaries manhandled him from the chamber, his feet dragged against the floor.

  They took him down a corridor, up a flight of stairs, and out into a courtyard awash with sunlight. Epher's eyes burned, nearly blinded after so long in the dark. He squinted, struggling to see. Walls of craggy limestone rose around him, broken by arches. A palm tree grew from a ring of stone, and a camel flicked his tail, laden with brass pots. A cedar cross leaned against the wall.

  "Give him water," Remus said. "Give him food. I want him to live for a long time on the cross."

  The legionaries shoved Epher against a wall. One handed him a waterskin. When Epher shook his head, they grabbed his jaw, forced it open, and spilled the water down his throat. He sputtered and spat.

  Remus watched the display, shaking his head. "Drink," he said. "Eat. Or the six hundred will still be nailed up with you."

  Epher choked as they shoved the bread into his throat. He wanted to spit it out, to roar, to charge toward Remus and fight with tooth and nail—to die fighting, not on a cross.

  But he couldn't let the six hundred innocents die.

  For them, he thought. This is my fight.

  He drank the water and he ate the bread.

  "Good rat," Remus said. "Now lift your cross. Bear your shame through the city."

  His march began. The last walk of his life, through the city of his god. Epher bore his cross, and he walked on weary legs through Beth Eloh, city of gold and blood, city of light and death.

  Remus rode his horse, leading the procession. Epher marched behind, and legionaries walked farther back, whips in hand. They passed under an archway and down coiling alleyways. Houses rose around them, weeds growing between their limestone bricks. Towers and minarets and domes rose toward a pale sky, and the sun beat down, blinding, scorching. The roads twisted between the hills, and the great Temple of Eloh shone above, its light unable to heal him.

  The people emerged from their homes, lined the streets, watched from their rooftops. Silent. So silent Epher heard every scrape of his feet, every ragged breath. They stared, eyes damp, hands on their hearts.

  "Lion of Zohar," a veiled woman whispered.

  "Bless you, lion of Zohar," said a man, reaching out to him.

  "Praise Eloh," whispered a young woman.

  He kept walking through the city, bearing his cross, forcing every step on shaking legs—to save them. For six hundred. Under blinding light, through canyons of stone, through a silent city of mourning and prayer.

  Cemeteries and tombs rose around them across the hills, for here was not only a city of the living but a city of the dead—of three thousand years of Zoharites who had fought here, prayed here, died here. Here too would he rest—here among King Elshalom, the prophets, the freed slaves of Sekadia, here in the home of his god, in the sight of his Temple.

  "If I forget you, Beth Eloh, may I forget my right arm," he whispered the ancient prayer. "If I forget you, city of gold and copper and light, may I forget all love and home."

  Lumers claimed that they could feel God's grace in this city, a presence in every stone, every olive and palm tree, every breeze. They claimed that Eloh himself dwelled in the Temple on the hill, that his lume filled the streets and courtyards of his city. Epher was no lumer, but he was a man of Zohar, a lion of the desert, and here—in this grace that was invisible to him—he would rest.

  Ahead he saw it—the Valley of Ashes. The place where Remus had crucified the rebels of Gefen. The place where crosses still rose. The place where Epher's life would end.

  "Epher! Epher!"

  No. Epher lowered his head as he walked, bearing the cross. God, no, don't
let her see me like this. Don't let her remember me as this dying wretch.

  Yet she ran toward him, tears on her cheeks. She wore the white linen dress he had bought her, and a pomegranate pendant hung from her neck. Her red hair was cut the length of her chin, and she reached out to him, weeping.

  "Epher!" Olive cried.

  She tried to run to him, only for legionaries to knock her back. They laughed as she fell. Olive leaped back up, elbows skinned, following the procession of soldiers, crying to him.

  "I love you, Epher." She reached toward him between the soldiers. "I love you."

  Epher could not reply, too weak to speak anymore, too hurt. The sight of Olive made the pain worse. He could hardly bear this cross. He fell to his knees.

  Legionaries cursed and whipped him, and Epher cried out. Olive ran forward, barreling her way between soldiers, and knelt before him. She wept and kissed his lips.

  "I here, Epher," she whispered, stroking his cheek, smearing her fingers with his blood. "Olive here."

  She helped him rise as the legionaries laughed.

  "His whore has to help him stand!" said one man.

  Another Aelarian guffawed. "We're going to fuck her as you hang from the cross, boy. All of us as you watch."

  Epher stood, shaking, cross on his back as Olive helped him. He took one step, trembling, toward the valley ahead—the place where idolaters had once sacrificed their children, where today Aelar crucified its victims. Several bodies still rotted there on their crosses, the crows feasting.

  "I will fear no death," Epher rasped. "Not in the city of light. Not in my home. Not among lions."

  They walked onward, Olive guiding his way, the legionaries around him. The city people watched from the streets, roofs, windows, praying for him, saying their farewells to Epheriah Sela Ben Jerael, lion of the desert.

  The procession passed along the Road of Tears, an ancient alleyway where ancient mothers would weep for children sacrificed to Baal, when fire and iron rained from the sky.

  It was there, before the Valley of Ashes, that the lions of Zohar roared.

  They leaped from the roofs, tan robes fluttering, faces veiled behind prayer shawls. They landed on the street, lashing daggers, tightening garrotes around necks. Ten men, maybe more, only their wild eyes visible.

  "Death to eagles!" a man cried. "Zohar rises!"

  One man leaped forward, blade lashing, and tore into Remus's horse. The beast reared, neck slit open, spraying blood. Remus cursed on his horse and swung his sword. More robed men filled the alley, stabbing at the legionaries, slamming bricks onto their helmets, smashing in their faces.

  "Rise free, son of Zohar," one man said, lifting the cross off Epher. He placed a dagger in Epher's hand. "Shed the enemy's blood with us."

  Epher closed his fingers around the dagger. Olive grabbed a brick and stood at his side.

  A legionary ran toward them.

  Epher didn't even have an instant to think.

  Olive roared with rage, a lioness of light, face twisted and feral. She tossed her brick, slamming the stone into the legionary's face. He fell back, cursing, blood spurting, and Epher ran toward him. He howled—not a roar of pride, not a lion's cry, but a howl, a torn thing, tortured, a sound of pain, a keen, the sound of a wounded animal. He howled and he plunged his dagger forth, digging the blade into the legionary's neck, shoving it down, past the shoulder blade, into the torso, digging, twisting, seeking the heart, sounding that howl as the man died.

  He pulled the dagger back with a gush of blood, trembling, weak but thrumming with fear and rage.

  He stared around him. The battle still raged. Remus swung his sword, tearing a man down. Three other corpses lay at the governor's feet, one with a severed arm, the other spilling its entrails. Several rebels still fought, trampling over dead legionaries, and more Aelarians raced into the alleyway.

  "Come, son of Zohar." The man who'd given him the dagger grabbed Epher's arm. "Follow!"

  Laughing and crying out, the rebels leaped toward a humble wooden doorway in the alley wall. They raced into a chamber, pulling Epher with them. Fifty or more clay vessels rose here, the height of men, rank with the smell of bitumen. The men raced between the amphorae, herding Epher along. Olive ran here too, teeth bared, eyes wild, holding a gladius sword she had grabbed in the battle.

  "Catch the rats!" rose Remus's voice from the alleyway. "Nail them up!"

  Legionaries raced into the chamber, knocking over the clay vessels. The tar spilled across the floor and washed over the Aelarians. Epher and the rebels ran toward a back door and leaped into another alleyway.

  "For the light of Zohar," one rebel said, grabbed a torch from the wall, and tossed it at the pursuing legionaries.

  Flames exploded, roaring through the chamber, grabbing legionaries like demonic claws. Men fell, screaming. Epher did not linger to watch the deaths. He ran, pulling Olive with him, the others running with them.

  Zohar's Blade, Epher knew. The resistance.

  They rushed down the alleyway, through another doorway, through a trapdoor under a rug, down into a tunnel. They moved through the darkness, blood dripping. Epher could barely walk; the fear that had given him strength was waning. Olive had to help him limp forward. It seemed that they moved for entire parsa'ot underground. From above, Epher could hear thumping feet, shouting men, their words muffled.

  I'm alive. He limped onward. Olive is with me.

  He squeezed her hand, and she smiled at him, tears in her eyes.

  After what seemed like hours in the darkness, the men reached a shaft and climbed a ladder. Epher's arms screamed in protest as he climbed. Every rung tore at his shoulders, but he forced himself onward, finally emerging into a dusty chamber.

  A curtain hid a single window. A doorway led to a second chamber. Rugs covered the floor, and three divans stood along the brick walls. A cat drank milk from a bowl, and alcoves held candles, a ram's horn, and a decorative pomegranate forged from silver. A humble home like thousands of others across the city.

  The men moved about the room, checking the window, the doorway, the trapdoor in the floor. Three men went to guard the entrances, daggers drawn, while the others laughed and dropped their loot on the floor—two gladius swords, a crested galea helmet, a few coins, and a golden eagle amulet.

  Epher could stay standing no longer. He fell onto a divan, breathing raggedly, still bleeding.

  Olive glared at the men. "Get . . . get . . ." She gestured wildly, then tugged at her dress. She pointed at Epher. "He hurt!"

  The men removed their scarves, revealing tanned, bearded faces. They were a dozen young men, some barely more than boys. The eldest couldn't have been much older than thirty. That one was a tall man, his beard closely cropped, his eyes startlingly green in his bronze face. A scar rifted one of his eyebrows, and a silver pomegranate hung around his neck.

  "My cousin is wounded," the tall man said to his companions. "Fetch him some ointment and bandages. And wine too, for his strength."

  Epher knew him, had fought with him in the forests of Ma'oz.

  "Kahan," he said.

  Uncle Benshalom's son.

  Kahan Sela smiled. It was an easy smile, one that came naturally to that face, that crinkled the eyes, that revealed many white teeth.

  "Welcome, Epher." He gestured around him at the humble home. "Welcome to the grand palace of Zohar's Blade, the army that will bring Aelar to its knees."

  Epher's head swam. He could no longer sit up. Olive helped him lie down on his stomach, and he grimaced as she applied ointment into the wounds on his back. The pain grabbed him, tugged him, welcomed him into a cold, black embrace. He sank into it gratefully.

  SENECA

  He stood on the palace balcony, watching the city burn, watching the Empire crumble, watching his life destroyed.

  "Hail Empress Porcia!" the legionaries below were chanting. "Hail Empress Porcia!"

  Battering rams were swinging, slamming into the Senate's columns, knocking
them down. Two columns cracked and fell. The triangular pediment tilted and slammed down, its statues shattering. The rotunda followed, and the great dome—largest in the Empire—collapsed. Dust flew and the legions cheered. Porcia paraded through the Acropolis, holding the severed head of Senator Septimus, while her legionaries brandished the limbs.

  And I'm next, Seneca realized.

  He left the balcony. He moved stiffly. He could feel nothing. He was in shock, he knew. He was terrified beyond terror, unable to think, able only to move, mindless.

  He stepped into his father's bedchamber. The slaves had looted it already, or perhaps the Magisterian Guard. The drawers were opened, the chests smashed, the gems cut out from the candleholders.

  Jackals, Seneca thought, taking only a little satisfaction that Porcia would find the room bare.

  He shoved the bed with all his might. It screeched across the mosaic floor, tearing tiles loose. The looters, most likely, hadn't known about the trapdoor. Seneca grabbed the handle and tugged, revealing a tunnel.

  He stepped into the darkness.

  Perhaps Ofeer still hid in this palace. Seneca no longer cared. She had lied to him, manipulated him, then fled him at his hour of need. Perhaps Valentina still loved him, but so what? From behind the cypresses, he had seen her embrace Porcia. His legionaries, those who had fought with him in Zohar, now served Porcia too.

  They all betrayed me. They'll all pay.

  Tears stung Seneca's eyes. He blinked furiously.

  No. No! No pain. No tears. Only rage. Only hatred.

  The trapdoor led to a tunnel that delved deep under the palace. A sack of gold, a dagger, a lantern, and a vial of poison hid in a secret alcove. Seneca slung the sack across his back, hung the dagger from his belt, and stuffed the poison into his toga. He walked through the darkness, holding the lantern. The tunnel was so narrow his shoulders brushed against the walls, and the ceiling was so low he had to walk with his head bowed.

  "You carved this tunnel, Father, to save your life from an invasion," Seneca said as he walked. "Then you died like a dog. Slipping on the poolside." His voice shook. "Would you have named me your heir, Father? Would you have exiled Porcia?"