"While Mother and Maya ride out," Epher said, "we prepare for war."
Koren sighed. "A bloody prince, I could have been. I tell you, a bloody prince!" He patted his sword. "Ah well, I suppose it's time to get this blade wet. The blood of Aelar is like wine to it."
Jerael looked at his boys, and a deep coldness filled him. He spoke so softly he could barely hear his own voice.
"No, boys. You two will also ride out tonight."
Their eyes widened, and they began to object at once.
"What? Father, no!" Epher said. "I'm heir to House Sela. Gefen is my home. I won't flee from battle."
"Nor will I," said Koren. "Atalia here needs somebody to save her life." He yelped as his sister punched him.
Jerael smiled thinly. "I do not ask you to abandon Gefen, nor to flee from battle. I ask you to bring aid as well, but not from Beth Eloh. You must take the two remaining horses, and you must travel north as fast as you can. Travel to the mountains of Erez. Raise the wild tribes that dwell there. Bring their forces here to the port."
Their eyes widened even further.
"Father!" Epher said. "The tribesmen are wild and uncivilized."
"That's what the Aelarians say of us," Jerael countered. "Of all of us. The hillsfolk of the north are Zoharites, just like us. They speak our language. They worship Eloh. They sing our songs, and they celebrate our holy days. And they will fight for us, brave and strong. It's two days north to the mountains, maybe three. You must travel swiftly. The walls of Gefen are built for a long siege. We will hold those walls until you return."
The boys looked at each other. Jerael knew they did not like this idea.
Nor would I at their age, he thought. I would have wanted to stay here, to fight at my home.
Epher turned back toward him. "The people of Gefen need to see me here, fighting with them."
"The people of the hills need to see you," Jerael said. "Go to Uncle Benshalom. He'll heed your counsel. He'll follow you here to war."
Will my brother truly listen? Jerael wondered. Benshalom was two years younger than him, a wild flame of a man. In their youth here in Gefen, Benshalom had felt like a trapped animal within the walls of the city, even within the walls of the villa on Pine Hill. The boy would race into the wilderness, hunt with spears, live fierce among the trees, often not returning for days. The child of nobility, Benshalom preferred to live as a hunter, a man of the wild.
Then one day, after Eriel died, you left for good, Jerael remembered.
Eriel, their younger brother, had been only twenty when he died at Cadom—a handsome, smiling young man, forever young in their memories. After his fall, Benshalom had finally left this villa, had traveled north, had united the wild men who lived in the rocky hills of northern Zohar. Across the kingdom, they now spoke of him—the fierce warrior, an untamed man who held no loyalty to queen nor king, who saw the northern hills as free lands that owed no fealty to Beth Eloh. Benshalom had returned to Gefen only once—a visit for only a few days, one that had filled the villa with tension, that had left Benshalom feeling trapped again. He had not returned since.
Will my brother listen to my sons? Jerael thought. Will Benshalom hear reason, bring his men to fight for a kingdom he barely feels he belongs to?
"Let Epher go, but let me stay," Koren said, interrupting Jerael's thoughts. "Uncle Ben probably barely remembers me."
Jerael sighed. "If I recall correctly, the one time Benshalom visited our villa, you placed a frog on his plate and a serpent beneath his blanket. His howl woke half the city. I doubt he forgot your face, Koren."
"The serpent wasn't venomous!" Koren said. "He's my beloved pet. Or was until Uncle Ben tossed him into the forest. I still say old Benshalom frightened my snake far more than the other way around." He sighed. "But very well, I'll go north with Epher. Maybe I'll find another snake on the way."
More hugs were exchanged, these ones stiff and struggling to cling to manliness, as the stars shone above and the crickets chirped.
"Don't you get lost on the way." Atalia punched Epher's chest—hard enough to knock the young man back a step. "And you, Koren." She punched him too, a blow to the gut that knocked the wind out of him. "Don't walk into any trees while ogling the northern girls."
"That only happened to me once!" Koren bristled. "Well, once and a half. And they were very little trees. Shrubs, really."
The boys too entered the house to pack supplies for the journey. For a moment, Jerael remained alone on Pine Hill with Atalia. He felt empty. He felt scared.
Thousands screaming, hands reaching out from the water.
Ships burning.
Marcus holding a dagger to his boys' throats.
His wife walking toward him, face blank, the wind blowing her black hair.
Atalia touched his arm, bringing him back to the present. "We will win, Father. You and I, on the walls of Gefen. We will hold them back."
Am I making a mistake? Jerael thought. Should we allow the Aelarians in, let them crush the hosts of the two princes, let them place me as their puppet on the throne? If my family dies in this war, because of me . . .
He tightened his lip. But no. He had made his decision. Zohar had shone for three thousand years in this land. He would not allow Aelar to claim it. Not without a fight from him, guardian of the coast. He would be remembered as one who defied the enemy, not served them.
He nodded. "You and I, Atalia. Against the wrath of an empire."
MAYA
How did one say goodbye? How did one leave a home, not knowing if that home would exist at the end of the journey? As Maya moved through her bedchamber, stuffing her belongings into her pack, she wanted to believe she would be back here in a few days, that the eagles would fly away, that soon all this terror would end.
But Maya could not believe that. She wasn't a little girl anymore. She was fifteen and knew that the world was cruel, that war was here.
Her eyes stung and her fingers trembled. She lifted her old doll from her bed, a raggedy rabbit made of felt, then put it back down. No. She would have to say goodbye to her childhood as well as her home. She took a few scrolls from her shelf, her favorite ones, the ones with poetry about lovers and animals. These she packed, for on a road of darkness she would need a reminder of beauty and light. Her spare simlah dress went into her pack too, and the little wooden camel Koren had carved for her, and the geode she had once found near the beach. She would want to keep these mementos.
As she packed her clay lantern, the one shaped like a dove, Maya realized that she wasn't packing for a weeklong journey to Beth Eloh and back. Not anymore. She was packing knowing she would never see this house again.
She had to leave this room. She could not pack everything, but everything in her chamber—the seashells on the shelf, the scrolls of prayer, the little model ship, her olivewood box of spices, the mancala board with snail shells for pieces—it was all too sweet, too painful, redolent with too many memories.
Tears in her eyes, Maya turned and left her room, carrying a lantern. She moved through the house, this large villa, almost a palace to her. She let her bare feet walk across the mosaic in the courtyard, the tiny stones forming the shapes of falcons, sparrows, wolves, hinds, turtles, and many other animals of Zohar. She stood on the mezzanine over the dining room, and she looked at the great painting—it was wider than she was tall—of the elephants. She walked into the kitchen and the pantry behind it, smelling the dates, oats, figs, dries apricots, the smells of home.
"Please, God," she whispered, standing in the pantry. "Please don't let the eagles destroy this place. Please don't let them kill my family like Seneca killed the dog."
A voice spoke behind her. "They won't kill anyone. Not so long as I defend our home."
Maya turned. In the lamplight, she saw Atalia.
Her sister was nineteen, third born to Lord Jerael Sela and Shiloh. Growing up, Maya had always thought Atalia so old, so tall, so powerful, far closer to her parents in importance and a
ge than to herself. Even now, fifteen and a woman herself, Maya thought her sister a true heroine. Atalia stood much taller than her, almost as tall as the boys. Her black hair was smooth, like Ofeer's, but cut to the length of her chin. And while Ofeer was slender and willowy, Atalia was powerful, graceful, built for war, less like a beautiful bird and more like a lioness, deadly and hungry. Even here, in their home, Atalia wore her full coat of scales, and her curved sword hung at her side. The woman led an entire phalanx in the army—a full hundred warriors—and she was the bravest, strongest person Maya knew. If anyone could hold back the eagles, it was her.
"You have to kill Seneca," Maya suddenly blurted out. "You have to. He's . . . he's a monster."
Atalia stepped closer and placed her hands on Maya's shoulders. "I promise you, little sister. If that pup Seneca dares growl at me again, I will shove my sword so far up his ass, I'll clean his teeth with it."
Maya wrinkled her nose, but she couldn't help but laugh. "You're horrible, Atalia."
Her older sister smiled, then embraced her. "Stay safe, Maya. Stay near Mother. Bring us back a whole bunch of warriors from Beth Eloh. Not that I need them! But they deserve some fun too."
Maya laid her cheek against Atalia's armored chest. "I'm going to miss you, big sister. I'm going to miss this house. I'm going to miss you all."
"Maya!" Atalia held her at arm's length and laughed. "You sound like you're saying goodbye forever. A week or two from now, we'll all be back in the dining room, having a good meal—one without sniveling Aelarians in the room—and laugh about all this."
Maya wished she could believe those words. Yet she wasn't a soldier like Atalia or Epher or father. She was a daughter of lume, ever able to sense the movements of the waves and sky, the breathing of the world, the passage of time. She had reached a great shift in her life, in the life of her family, her city, her kingdom. Something was ripping apart. Something was tearing through the fabric of lume that wove around Zohar. Her life, her family, the entire Encircled Sea would never be the same. Maya knew this in her bones, as surely as she had ever known anything, yet could only nod. How could she explain her fear to her sister?
Atalia's eyes softened. She reached to her belt and unstrapped her dagger. She handed it to Maya. "I want you to have this. Bit sharper than that butter knife you've been wielding."
Maya took the sheathed weapon. The hilt was carved of olivewood, wrapped in leather, and the pommel was forged of iron, shaped as a pomegranate with three spikes. Hesitantly, she drew the blade. It gleamed.
Maya looked back up at her sister. "It's your favorite dagger."
"I still have many blades. I want you to have this one. It'll keep you safe on the road to Beth Eloh. But bring it back to me! I expect to have this dagger with me again in a week."
Maya nodded and attached the dagger to her belt, then hugged her sister again, a crushing embrace, and her tears flowed between the iron scales.
When Maya stepped back out into the gardens, the boys were already saddling their horses. Epher, the oldest of the children, was preparing Moosh, a chestnut gelding, a tall and noble animal. Epher worked in silence, buckling the saddle, eyes dark. The heir of Gefen, Epheriah Sela had always carried a burden on his shoulders, one his younger siblings could not understand. Someday, many years from now, Epher would rule this house on Pine Hill, the city by the sea, and all the farms and vineyards and countryside around them, and he would be tasked with protecting this precious scrap of coast, the last port the Aelarians had not yet claimed.
By him stood Koren, his younger brother. Koren was twenty-one years old, a grown man, yet to Maya he always seemed about the same age as her. Even now Koren grinned as he saddled his horse, and he sang a lively tune. He stood almost as tall as his brother but was thinner, quicker, and while Epher's beard was already thick, Koren sported only stubble, and his hair dangled in a messy mop. When he saw Maya, Koren's grin widened, and he walked toward her.
"Hullo, little lumer," he said. Mother hated when he called her that, but Mother was by the vineyard now, talking to Father in the darkness.
Maya couldn't help but smile. "I'm not a real lumer. Mother won't let me find a teacher. Maybe in Beth Eloh I can find one."
He mussed her hair. Maya had often wished she had hair like her sisters, smooth and easy to manage. Hers was a wild mane of endless curls, and whenever Koren messed them up, they became even wilder.
"If you do, can you learn how to make people grow pigs' tails?" Koren said. "Ofeer would look lovely with one."
Maya laughed and hugged her brother. "I'll see you soon, Koren," she whispered, hating that she felt like she was lying.
Epher approached her next. Throughout her life, Maya had often thought of Epher as a second father more than a brother. He was eight years older than her; he had always seemed like an adult. The tall, somber man stared into her eyes.
"Be brave, Maya," he told her. "Stay close to Mother."
She nodded. "I will."
Epher held out an olivewood box. "Take this with you. For good luck."
She took the box and opened it. Inside, wrapped in silk, was a polished ram's horn, curved and mottled with black and brown. Many in Zohar blew rams' horns on holy days; they were symbols of purity and good fortune. In the old stories, the legendary King Elshalom had sounded the horn to summon armies to his call.
"Thank you," Maya whispered.
"Sound the horn in Beth Eloh," Epher said. "Maybe it'll bring us good fortune."
"I will," she promised, placing the horn back into the box, then placing the box into her pack.
Finally her father approached her. Jerael stood even taller than his sons and wider, built of muscles over big bones, his arms so strong Maya thought he could smash the Aelarian fleet with only his fists. He had put on his armor, and his eyes stared from under his massive black eyebrows. His beard was mostly white now, closely cropped against his copper skin, as were his temples, but those eyebrows remained dark as night.
Maya leaped toward him and embraced him, her cheek against his wide chest.
"I'll see you again soon, sweet Maya," her father said. "In only a few days. I promise you."
His words were strong, confident, not a single crack or stutter to them. Yet Maya was a daughter of Luminosity, and she sensed the storm inside him, the fear within his armor.
"I too have a gift for you," said Jerael. "To keep you safe on the road."
He handed her an embroidered velvet purse. When she opened it, Maya found a tasseled scarf of blue and gold, a holy artifact. Maya gasped. In Zohar, women were equal to men, and in some ways superior; they could join the army and fight alongside their brothers, they could ascend to the throne, and unlike the men, they could become lumers and weave the light of Eloh. A prayer scarf, however, belonged to men alone. Every boy of Zohar, at age thirteen, spent a week meditating in the wilderness, hunting for his food, praying to his god. When he returned, his parents wove him a tasseled scarf of blue and gold, a symbol of his purity, of his coming of age.
"But . . . Father!" She looked up at him. "I can't take this. I'm a girl."
And now his voice did betray his emotions. His eyes dampened. "I wove this scarf for Mica, many years ago. He never grew to wear it. I want you to have it."
Maya's tears stung her eyes. Her sweet brother had lived for only a day, and now he rested in the garden beneath the pomegranate tree. She nodded, took the scarf, and wrapped it around her neck. "I'll wear it on the journey." She hugged her father again.
As the boys mounted their horses, and as Mother emerged from the stables with two more horses, Maya wished Ofeer were here. As much as she clashed with her sister, Maya deeply wanted to hug her too, to say goodbye. Ofeer was closest to her in age, only three years older; they had always been the two youngsters, the silly little girls of the family. But Ofeer had changed, had become something dark, hurt, angry.
Where are you, Ofeer? Come back to this home. Come back to your family. I'll miss you too.
> The boys rode out then, after many hugs and prayers and tears, heading north toward the hills. Maya rode with her mother, heading eastward along a dirt path, the moon shining overhead. The wind ruffled her curls and tasseled scarf, and she tightened the cotton garment around her neck. When they crested a hilltop, Maya turned in her saddle and gazed back west toward her home.
The villa stood there on Pine Hill as it always had. Father and Atalia still stood in the yard, watching them leave, their hands raised in farewell.
We were eight souls, Maya thought. Now only three remain on Pine Hill—two to defend it, one sleeping underground. Now I'm scared. Now I don't know if we'll ever come together again.
The fear was almost too great to bear. Mother must have seen her anxiety. The slender woman rode closer, reached out, and placed a hand on Maya's knee.
"We'll see them again soon," Mother said, smiling softly, her teeth pale in the night.
Maya nodded, wishing she could believe that, praying it was true. They rode onward until Pine Hill disappeared in the distant shadows.
EPHER
They rode their horses across the dark hills, two brothers in shadows, leaving their home behind.
The city of Gefen sprawled in the west along the coast, its lights twinkling, a hundred enemy ships waiting in its harbor—waiting for dawn, waiting for war.
"I have to enter the city," Epher said. "Koren, I have to see her. To say goodbye." His voice dropped. "To warn her."
Koren held a tin lantern. Its light revealed a rising eyebrow. "Epher, I told you. Old Master Malaci's cat is a lovely critter, but she hates being woken this late."
"You know who I mean." Epher tugged his reins, halting his horse. "Koren, I have to. Give me an hour. Just an hour. Will you wait for me?"
His younger brother sighed. "Epher, the girl is Aelarian. Her people are besieging our city. Why don't you find a lovely little venomous snake, maybe a she-demon from Ashael, or an amorous leper to love? All safer choices."
Kings of Ruin (Kingdoms of Sand Book 1) Page 8
