by SM Blooding
She sighed and took a step back. “You have proven your worth as a worthy leader in the Families. You are the El’Asim now.”
“That doesn’t mean we cannot speak your language in your city. It is only right.”
She shook her head. “No. When you are in my city, we shall speak your language as befitting the honor of the Families.”
I hadn’t proven anything.
“But we have other things to discuss,” she continued in Adalic.
I sighed and forfeited. It was never wise to argue with Mother. “Yes. We do.”
She turned toward the table and gestured for me to join her. “We received your queen’s message.”
“She’s not my queen.”
“It would appear she thinks so.”
“She would.”
The large, oblong table was covered in a map. Peacock Rock was newly added next to the Koko Nadie Islands. Kiwidinok was the largest continent, but there wasn’t a single city marked on it. No ports. No trade.
“So are you her knight?”
“No.” I focused on the map, tracing the paths I’d traveled in my lifetime. “But I am undecided if I’m going to use the gift she gave me by naming me as such.”
My mother’s council of elders remained around the table.
“What are you thinking, young El’Asim?”
I glanced at my old teacher. “Yotaka-san, I am thinking that peace should be offered to all the tribes, not just the Great Families.”
His expression didn’t shift, but it did change minutely. His eyes crinkled just a bit.
The people around him relaxed as well.
“How would we do that, sayyd?” The woman on the other side of the table with the mole on her chin had a high pitched voice that was hard to forget, but I didn’t know her name.
“We treaty for it, like the Hands have offered.” I held up my hands for silence. “But the only way for this to work is if all the tribes are invited into the negotiations.”
“Synn,” Mother murmured. “We cannot allow that. The power would slip.”
“It would.” I straightened, staring at the map. “The world is changing, Mother. First of all, there aren’t seven Great Families anymore. There are five. Two have been decimated to a handful of survivors, most of which are related to one another. Their Families are gone.”
Mother raised her head, working out kinks in her neck. “What do you propose?”
I had to get Mother’s approval. Otherwise, it wouldn’t go far. Everyone might treat me with respect now, but I didn’t believe for one moment that they would follow me. “Zara needs to find a suitable mate.”
Mother nodded, as did several people around the table.
“But so do others. Joshua, Keeley, Haji, Yvette, Oki.” I bit my lip and stared at the map. “They are all either the last of their Great Families, or they have lost their betrothed. It’s time to form new allegiances.”
Mother tapped the table with a long nail, but remained quiet.
“I’m sure there are other families, other tribes, who are in the same situation. So, we invite all the tribes, all of them, to join us here in Ino City. We set up games, challenges, and tests. The winners will have the opportunity to present themselves as potential mates.”
Mother nodded.
“What if Zara chooses someone of a lesser family?” one of the men asked.
“Then he will be accepted into my Family.” There would be no question. “If she accepts him, then he is good enough for me. You have met my sister, haven’t you?”
“What are you going to do with your cities, Synn?” Mother asked quietly.
I took in a deep breath. “If someone other than an airman finds Zara’s hand, I will give her Asim City and I will take the fleet. If she finds an airman, she will get the fleet and I will take the city.”
“And what of your refueling station?”
I hadn’t forgotten about it. I just didn’t have an answer. “Where is it now?”
“We’re hiding it in Kiwidinok. Currently, its staying with the fleet.”
I would have to think on it. “For now, it can stay there. We will need the station if the peace talks do not go well. In the meantime, we can use it as a laboratory of sorts. There are modifications we will need to make to all the planes if we are to keep them.”
Yotaka narrowed his eyes at me with a careful smile. “What modifications are you thinking, sayyd?”
It was odd hearing someone I respected call me sir. “We do not burn fuel. If we continue to do so, we will have to find a way to either steal more, or harvest it ourselves. I have a feeling they kill the jellies when they harvest the gas. That’s never been our practice before. I don’t see why it should be now.”
Mother took in a deep breath and put her splayed fingertips on the table. “What are your full intentions, Synn?”
It was a risk. There was the possibility that I might succeed in gathering everyone, but then no one would decide to join. It was also possible that no one would trust me, thinking that I was working for the Hands. Or . . . this could start a far larger war than the one we were already fighting.
“When we gather the tribes, we serve two purposes. We rebuild the family lines, bartering, trading, build relationships. We discuss technology. We allow them access to the Librarium.”
Mother hissed.
“That is your power, knowledge.” I stared at her, daring her to tell me I was wrong. “But in order for this to work, we have to share its knowledge.”
“And if they use it against you?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Then they do so as a stronger unit. That is what we need. The Hands are stronger than we are. It’s our responsibility to raise the lesser families up, so we can all stand against the Hands should war come.”
Yotaka bowed his head. “This is very sound. I like this plan.”
“In order for it to work, we will have to mean it.” I stared at my mother when I said that. “We are not better than they are. We’re merely bigger. That doesn’t mean the same thing.”
“You have learned much, my sayyd,” Yotaka murmured. He looked around the table. “I agree with this.”
The rest of the elders nodded, some reluctantly, but they all agreed.
Mother was one of those in reluctance.
“We will have to devise a set of tests,” I said. “Something—”
“Leave that to me.”
I met Mother’s gaze. “I will be entering them.”
She stilled. “Why?”
“The main objective is to negotiate the treaty. In order to find a seat on the treaty table, I thought it might be best to prove our individual worth.”
Mother narrowed her eyes.
Yotaka tipped his head.
“By entering the games, I will prove something else. You have seen what I can do. You’ve even given me the honor of speaking my language while I am in your city, but the rest of the tribes have only heard rumors of a boy who hid while cities were destroyed in a mad man’s attempt to find him. I need them behind me, behind us, in order for this to work.”
She looked me up and down as though she’d never seen me before.
“I will be joining in the games.”
She thought about that for a moment. “You want to unite the Great Families to the tribes.”
“The time of the Seven Great Families has passed. It is time to create a new path.”
Mother shook her head slowly.
I took her hand. “These are the decisions your generation could not make.”
She raised her wizened, worried gaze.
I gave her hand a squeeze. “These are the decisions I must make. Will you back me?”
She cupped my cheek with her other hand, and said in Sakin, “Yes, musuko, I will do this thing for you.”
Now, I just had to pull it off.
CHAPTER 12
LET THE GAMES BEGIN
Time flew. With the promise of peace with the Hands, and the fact that we’d broadcast
ed to the world where Ino City was, there was no sense in hiding as we prepared for the games.
Every day, as people flooded the city, more names were added to the list of people seeking mates. The list of people seeking leadership positions was nearly double, though.
The list, however, was just names.
The flags were what truly impressed me. Stringers had been hung around the arena, which was massive. It could easily have held my entire fleet, minus maybe a dozen ships.
At first, there were only a handful, the Great Families. The El’Asim, Ino, Shankara, Leblanc. They were all that remained of the seven.
As each day passed, more flags were hung until there were so many, it was hard to distinguish one amongst all the rest. Some were large, some small. They had varying colors, different emblems.
Bugs filled the air, reminding everyone that we resided just above the ocean’s surface and that the letharan walls were open. I hated bugs. I wished more than once to be up on my ship, above the lower currents. Sure. We had pests, but we didn’t have anything trying to crawl up our nose while we talked.
Animals roamed the city, familiars similar to the El’Asim’s spitfyre falcons. I saw lizards, monkeys, cats, dogs, bats. I even saw hydrozoan, which surprised me. As the base of all jellyfish life forms, the hydrozoan’s didn’t have a great deal of . . . well, anything. At least, I didn’t think so.
Two weeks into the gathering, we were forced to keep most of our familiars aboard our own vessels. They didn’t all play together well, and the Ino people had started to complain about the mess they all left behind.
It was Mother’s job to develop tests proving the potential wives’ abilities. Her goal was to show what they brought to the table as far as leadership abilities among other things.
She was trying to coerce Keeley into signing up. As one of the few survivors of her Family, it would be up to her and her brother to carry on their traditions.
But Keeley and Joshua were just as happy to let their traditions change, to watch as other families rose to fill the position they didn’t want.
I could understand where they were coming from, but I didn’t think I’d have been able to make the same decision.
Haji’s name joined the lists of potential leaders. I didn’t know if he was looking for a mate to continue his Family line, or if he was attempting to regain what he’d lost. There were a few left of his Family. Most of them were children, though there were a few elders. Those who had remained behind that fateful day the Hands claimed their ships and killed them before my eyes.
The same day I’d lost my father and had been Marked.
Haji stayed busy. I hadn’t seen him once since he arrived. Granted, I was busy as well. My days almost had no end as I planned the events that would occur in the following month of games. Honestly, I had no idea what I was doing.
Ino City changed over the next several weeks. It was more than just the in-flooding of people. We changed entire floors, wings, and areas, rebuilding them for the events we planned to host. The marketplaces were dispersed to the neighboring letharan cities, mostly the larger ones that already had a well developed market areas.
The citizens of Ino City were relocated as well, though we tried to keep that to a minimum. It was difficult to do when people lived above their shops. Many grumbled, but the growing excitement drowned out most of it as more people showed up and were made welcome.
The tribes had never gathered like this ever before. I worried that we made too large a target. Mother chided me, reminding me that I had been given the queens’ approval to do this in the first place.
I didn’t think this was what Nix had in mind. If she was planning to double cross us, this was the time.
Yotaka listened to my concerns and focused on the security. We had patrols in the sky and in the ocean, as well as in the streets. If the Hands decided to attack, we would be ready.
I met tribes I’d never seen nor heard of, people who lived on the ocean in boats that looked much like the airships. There were the letharan cities, of course. The skies were filled with hundreds of airships, their hulls reflecting dully, their sails bright and cheerful.
The El’Asim Fleet was by far the largest. Most of the fleets had maybe a dozen ships each. I saw the red sails of the El’Asim, blue sails, pink, orange, green, patchwork, black, gold, silver. It was amazing to see. Sails of all different shapes, hulls of different forms greeted my eyes.
One of the fleets, about twenty strong, had hulls modeled to look like the great sky cat. They were painted white, their sails long and branching far over the rails. I’d never seen anything like them.
How were there so many different peoples that I hadn’t seen? I thought we’d been well-traveled, that there was no port closed to us.
Just how terrifying were we, the Seven Great Families? Did they see us as no better than the Hands? Is that the reason they’d remained hidden to us?
The seas were dotted with letharan of all sizes. They would periodically disappear under the waves in search of food. Ino City was constantly on the move as well. Mother’s lethara needed to eat, and with his incredible size, he ate a lot. Mother had chosen this location well. There was a lot of ocean and a lot of sea flax for her lethara and the others to eat for months, if needed. Though if we stayed much longer, we could do irreparable damage to the ecosystem. We knew this as well, and were already making plans to relocate as soon as everyone had arrived and the games began.
The storms had abated while we prepared, but I knew that was only a lucky break. This was the rainy season. Many of the tests I’d put together with the help of Yotaka tested the ability to work in the weather. On an airship, there was no protection against the elements.
But we had other tests as well. Since there were so many looking to compete, we had to devise tests for every city type. With that in mind, I aksed Ryo to assist, and several others I’d just met.
We all spoke Adalic, even though Ino City hosted the games. There were several people who struggled with this language choice. Adalic was far from the most common language of our planet, but there wasn’t one everyone knew. It was going to have to change as the needs permitted and translators were being set up and schedule for every event.
Finally, the day arrived when everything was as ready as we could make it. There was nothing else to do but to let loose the ball and watch it roll.
That was the day the queen ship showed up, flying the flag of truce.
The city quieted as we watched the large black, metal ship moor at the longest dock of Ino City. The other ships, boats, and letharan cleared a path for the large, noisy beast.
I pushed my way through the gathered crowd.
A long black plank lowered, revealing a doorway. Once it made contact with the dock, four women dressed in bejeweled dresses displaying the colors of their Houses emerged.
Queen Dyna wore a dress, the skirt loose, her bodice tight. A silver belt encircled her waist and atop her blonde head was a gear-work crown, a single, silver sky cat spinning at the top, the two wings flapping with the gears’ movements.
The other two queens, I didn’t know well. However, they appeared to be wearing their best dresses, their gear crowns working. The short, stout woman wearing the green dress had four dancing gold bears. The tall woman with the full figure wore a gown of turquoise and pink, a dozen silver fish fluttering over her brown hair.
Instead of her normal, form-fitting dress, Nix wore a something that was quietly elegant. The bodice was tight and scarlet red with a black lace. Her full skirt was red with a black sheer overskirt and more lace. The spider she always wore twinkled in the light of the lethara, her phoenixes twirling on her crown with chirps and squeals as the gears moved.
Dyna led the way. She stopped in front of me, her ice blue eyes warm, the corners of her mouth rising slightly. “We have accepted your invitation.”
I nodded. “And your soldiers?”
“Due to past relations—” She sent a quick glance in
Nix’s direction. “—we decided it would be best to leave them behind. I trust you can keep us safe.”
I narrowed my eyes. There was an entire city of people who hated these four women. Keeping them safe was going to be difficult. “I would recommend you bring a small band of guards to oversee your safety.”
Dyna raised her hand. “We trust you.”
A sinking feeling hit my stomach. I was already nervous enough as it was. I didn’t need them there relying on me to keep them safe. What if I failed? War tip-toed around every corner, in every twitch. Imagine what would happen if one of the queens were hurt here.
Dyna took in a deep breath, surveying the crowds at each level of platforms. “Besides, we are able to protect ourselves. You forget, Synn.” She pushed passed me. “We are queens, not pages.”
I looked skyward. There were a thousand ways this could go badly.
I led them through the city to the dais Mother had erected at the main arena. There were seats for each of the leading members of the Great Families, though I’d fought hard to have seats available for all the tribal leaders. Mother was willing to bend only so far.
Four seats had been added, off to one side. Mother’s chair reigned supreme just to the left of center front. Mother knew how to play this game of politics. She wasn’t about to allow anyone to forget who the most powerful leaders were.
My seat sat empty in the center front.
My belly churned just looking at it.
Hundreds of people crammed into the arena. Several more filled the crannies and roofs of the surrounding buildings. This was the first event like this anyone had ever witnessed, and we were all eager to see what would happen next.
I was supposed to address them since this had been my idea, and Nix had assigned me the task of negotiating the treaty. My mouth went dry and my stomach cramped. I knew in the arena I would do well, but standing here, in front of so many, all seeking a safer way to live, a better world to raise their children—It would be easy to disappoint them all and then where would we be?
They needed words that would guide them, make them believe there could be something better.
Oh dear Sky. What had I been thinking?
