The Desert Prince

by Peter V. Brett

  Now it’s my turn to look at him like an idiot. “Don’t you get it, Darin? They would have executed you.”

  “Bah.” He waves off my words like a bad smell. “Damaji said it himself. We’re too valuable as hostages. Somethin’ else is goin’ on. Think it’s got to do with that square-jawed prince you were holdin’ hands with.”

  I was defensive before, but mention of Chadan pushes me to a more aggressive posture. I ball a fist in Darin’s face. “I don’t owe you any explanations about that, Darin Bales. You and Selen never asked my permission to play kissy, so I don’t see why I need yours. I didn’t ask you to come rescue me, and I’ll stay if I want.”

  Darin raises an eyebrow at me then crosses his arms. “They never came back.”

  I’m confused. “Who never came back?”

  “Aunt Leesha.” Darin bites off the words. “My mam. Wonda. Demons hit their camp not long after they went into the borderlands. Slaughtered Hollow Soldiers and Warded Children, alike.”

  “Impossible.” The word is a reflex, remembering what it was like watching Ella Cutter tear her way through a pack of demons. What would it take to down the whole tribe of Warded Children, along with five hundred of Mother’s best armored soldiers? What would it take to bring down the duchess herself, or Mrs. Bales?

  Darin shrugs, unwilling to argue. “Whatever you’re thinkin’, we thought it, too. But the bodies were still smoldering when Selen and I found them. Don’t know how it happened, but it happened.”

  “Bodies?” A chill goes through me. “Did you find…?” Even now, after seeing so much death in the Maze, I can’t bring myself to say it. Mother is a force of nature. She can’t be dead.

  Darin shakes his head. “Couldn’t find any sign of your mam, or mine, except…” Darin reaches into his robe, sliding free a large and very familiar knife.

  Just seeing the weapon cuts me. I know what it means. That knife was like Mother’s hora wand. Mrs. Bales never let it out of her sight. “Oh, Darin.” I reach for him, but it’s Darin’s turn to push me back.

  “Don’t want pity,” Darin says. “Want to hear you’re going to stop all this nonsense and come home.”

  “It isn’t nonsense,” I say. “These people need me.”

  Darin looks at me incredulously. “Hollow needs you. You’re heir to the duchy.”

  I shake my head. “I don’t want it. Selen is the duchess’ sister. She can do it.”

  “Doesn’t work like that, and you know it,” Darin says. “You don’t come back, the throne goes to Elona.”

  I love Grandmum, but we both know she would be a terrible duchess. “At least she’ll want the job. How are you expecting us to get home, in any event?”

  “They can’t hold me,” Darin says. “I squeeze through cracks like water, and no one can sneak up on me.”

  “Don’t be so sure of that.” I recall the eerie silence of the Watchers who captured me. “And the others aren’t as slippery as you.”

  Darin waves dismissively. “I already know where the guards keep the keys. Give me a few hours and I’ll know my way around the harem, too.”

  “Bet you’ll love that,” I say, but Darin doesn’t rise to the bait the way one of my spear brothers would. He just lets my words hang in the air until I drop my eyes.

  “Point is,” he goes on as if there had never been a pause, “we can just gather everyone and go. City’s huge. Easy to get lost in while we steal supplies and crack open one of the older gates. Fort’s meant to keep demons out, not people in.”

  His plan is so similar to Micha’s that I am stunned. Is it really that simple, or are they desperately naïve?

  And what if I go? What will happen to my spear brothers if I abandon them to the storm coalescing around Desert Spear? What will happen to the people?

  “I can’t just leave,” I say. “It’s complicated.”

  “See that.” Darin takes the pitcher from the tray and pours himself a glass of water. “So explain. Got time. Bet the guards ent even noticed I’m gone yet.”

  “I don’t want to go back to Hollow,” I say. “I’m not that Olive anymore, Darin. I don’t know that I ever can be again. I don’t want to be.”

  “Then don’t,” Darin says. “Go home and be yourself. Or make a home somewhere else. Night, come to Tibbet’s Brook. Folk there love to gossip about their neighbors, but they generally get along. Believe it or not, we’ve got stranger folk than Olive Paper. Don’t need to stay with your kidnappers to be yourself.”

  “The Majah don’t want the real me, either,” I say. “But I can’t just walk away.”

  I show him the armlet. “It’s a lock only Belina’s blood can open. Micha wears one, too. They can track us if we escape, or trigger the bands to contract, and cripple us.”

  Darin squints at the armlet, studying its magic with his night eyes. At last, he shrugs. “Warding ent really my thing, but magic’s magic. Even if we can’t get it off, reckon we can muffle it till we get out the city. Bet it ent got a range of more than a mile or two.”

  “Muffle it?” I was a poor study in Favah’s Chamber of Shadows, but it makes sense. Magical energy conducts differently through the elements. There is always loss, but some are more pronounced than others. Gemstones and precious metals are the best conductors. Water is worst.

  “I could stick my arm in a bucket of water,” I say. It is both simple and utterly impractical for making an escape.

  “I was thinking a hogroot paste,” Darin says. “Maybe with a plaster cast to hold it in place.”

  I sigh. “Even if that worked, even if we could just steal away, the Majah need me.”

  I tell him about the prophecy and what happened on Waning, but he remains unconvinced. “Say it’s true,” Darin says. “Who’s to say what joining blood really means? Could be you’ve already done that in the Maze. Said yourself there were no attacks last Waning.”

  Perhaps he’s right, except things feel…unfinished somehow. Last month felt like the night was holding its breath, and now, with Darin and Selen suddenly in the city with Waning about to fall, the trap is set.

  I shake my head. “Something’s about to happen, Darin. I can feel it. Our mothers have been missing for months. The Majah are in danger now.”

  “And what if they are?” Darin demands. “They kidnapped you and Micha. You saw what they did to Arick. Creator only knows what they’ll do to Rojvah and Selen. Don’t owe them anythin’.”

  “There are sixty thousand people in this city, Darin,” I growl. “I won’t condemn them all because their leader is a misguided old relic.”

  I lay a hand on his shoulder. “You said they don’t know you’re gone. Go back and wait out the new moon. You’ll be safe in the Holy City.”

  “While you go out and fight,” Darin says.

  I nod. “When Waning is over, I will hold Aleveran to his word. If he won’t set you free, we’ll escape together.” I gesture to some of Chadan’s lavish gifts. “I can trade these for provisions to take us across the waste.”

  “Startin’ to think the waste was comin’ here in the first place.” Darin reaches into his jacket, pulling out the warded cloak my mother gave me on the night she cast the dice. “Brought you this, if you even care.”

  He tosses the cloak at my head. I catch it, but my vision is blocked for a moment. When I can see again, Darin is gone.

  I look at the cloak and am filled with fear. Where is Mother? Is she alive, or is this the last gift she’ll ever give me?

  I fall to my knees, pressing the cloth into my face, and sob.

  * * *

  —

  I’m still weeping when there’s a knock at my door.

  “A moment,” I call, wiping the last of my tears on the cloak and quickly shoving it into a cabinet. No doubt my eyes are red and swollen, but there’s nothing for it. I put on Kai Olive like
a cloak, projecting confidence and control in case it is one of my little brothers, nervous about the coming Waning.

  If it is Chadan, I don’t know what I’ll say, but I won’t hold back. Not anymore. I have too much at stake.

  But it is neither my prince nor one of my brothers at the door. Drillmaster Chikga bows. “Prince Olive. There are battle plans to discuss for tomorrow’s Waning, and Prince Chadan is…indisposed.”

  I blow out a breath. “Of course, Drillmaster.” I wave the big man into my room and close the door behind him.

  I’ve just started to turn when a steel cable drops over my head and pulls tight, choking me. Something drives into my neck, and I’m shoved hard, stumbling until I hit the heavy door. The cable burns across my throat as I twist to see Chikga holding me at the end of an alagai catcher—a hollow metal staff run with a loop of cable at one end that the user can give slack or tighten at will. Alagai catchers are designed to negate the strength advantage of demons, keeping them out of striking range while the cable cuts off their air.

  I grab the pole before Chikga can crush my windpipe, but already I am unable to breathe. I try to force it back on him, but the drillmaster is ready, dropping into a roll and using his own weight in an attempt to pull me down. I manage to keep my feet, but I’m forced to stumble helplessly along with the pull, feeling my face swell as I struggle for blood and air.

  “I knew you were a traitor.” Chikga whips me around the room, smashing me into a dresser, a support beam, the wall, the floor. All along he keeps his balance, always moving, always controlling the battlespace.

  I curse myself for a fool. Darin might be able to hear the heartbeat of a fruit fly, but one of the first items Favah tried to teach me to make in the Chamber of Shadows was a listening device. A demonbone split into two pieces, each with wards of resonance carved upon it, will carry sound from one to the other, even at distance.

  But was Chikga the one listening, or is he simply an agent? I’ll never know if he kills me.

  I’m whipped by Darin’s tray and snatch up the water pitcher, hurling it at Chikga’s head. The throw is true, but Chikga yanks at the pole, dragging me along as he lifts his guard to bat it aside.

  Blackness begins to creep into the edges of my vision as I watch his feet. When he moves to throw me again, I match him step for step, pulling on the pole and sending both of us stumbling toward the support beam. I roll around it, bracing the alagai catcher like a lever and pulling hard. The drillmaster attempts to hold on, but he’s thrown into my writing desk and loses his grip as pens and ink rain down on him.

  I drop to my knees, pulling the cable from my throat. I draw a hoarse breath and immediately begin coughing, but there is air in the hacks and wheezes—blessed air.

  Chikga is unfazed, already on his feet and stalking in with quick punches and kicks meant to break bones, hyperextend joints, and stun major muscle groups—a blunt but effective form of Micha’s Precise Strike school of sharusahk.

  I accept a few blows as the cost of getting the noose from my throat and struggling to my feet, but I still have armor plates in my robes, and I’m tougher than I look. I get my guard up, catching a punch on my rolled-up arm, batting another aside, and rolling under a third.

  But my return blows never land. I’m dizzy and slow, still gasping for air while the drillmaster is fresh, his breath smooth and even. Like a dancer he bats aside my blows, more often than not with a stinging counter.

  I’m taking more blows than I can evade, feeling like the clapper in a bell as the drillmaster pummels me. Then he sees an opening and hooks my legs, dropping me to the floor and pouncing as he seeks a submission hold.

  “Prince Olive!”

  The drillmaster and I look up as one to see Faseek standing horrified in the doorway.

  “Stay out of this, boy!” Chikga growls, but in that moment of distraction, I heave with all my might. With solid floor beneath me, I have leverage, and Chikga is unprepared for my full strength. I reverse the hold, putting an arm around Chikga’s neck, pulling to cut off his air and force a submission, much as he tried to do to me.

  But I’m too desperate, too angry, and fighting for my life. I don’t hold back, and with my muscles at full flex, the drillmaster’s neck breaks with an audible snap. He collapses to the floor, killed instantly.

  * * *

  —

  I kneel on the floor, breath heaving as I stare into Chikga’s dead eyes, waiting for Faseek to cry out, to summon our brothers and the palace servants, to call me a murderer.

  But he doesn’t. Instead, Faseek quietly closes the door and comes over to stand beside me. “What did he do?”

  I look up at him in confusion.

  “It doesn’t matter.” Faseek’s eyes scan the room. “You would not have killed him without cause. We can restore your room to order, but it means nothing if a dead drillmaster is found here. We must get rid of the body.”

  The words are such a relief, it is all I can do not to start weeping again. “There is no we, Faseek. Killing a drillmaster is a high crime, even for a kai. If we are caught…”

  Faseek cuts me off by spitting on Chikga’s body. “He would have let me starve to death, or cast me out in shame. If I have a life, it is thanks to you.”

  I lay a gentle hand on Chikga’s face, closing his eyes. His head lolls bonelessly as I turn it, seeing the resonance ward on one of his earrings. If the drillmaster was spying directly, then I have a chance.

  I am numb as we clean the room. I feel the maelstrom of emotion swirling around me only at a distance, focusing my attention on sweeping up shards of broken pitcher and righting scattered furniture. The result is not perfect, but on casual inspection, the room appears normal.

  With Faseek scouting ahead, we make our way up to the ramparts. It’s forbidden for any save Sharum and dama to go out at night, and there is no one about save a handful of my brothers, still unaccustomed to patrolling the palace walls.

  We wait until there is a gap and take Chikga to a secluded spot on the west wall. Faseek produces a bottle of couzi, pouring some into the drillmaster’s mouth and on his clothes, then shoves it into Chikga’s stiffening hand before we pitch him off the wall.

  We do it so casually, as if we murder people every day. I worry the patrolling guards will hear, but the drillmaster makes less noise than I expect, striking the cobbles at the base of the wall with little more than a muffled thump. Off the west wall, his body will be in the shadow until noon, at least.

  We slip back inside with little effort. It was so easy. I killed a man, and it was easy. I want to sick up, but I squash the feeling, reaching out to put my hand on Faseek’s shoulder. “Thank you, brother.”

  “Always,” Faseek says. “My life is yours, my prince.”

  “You should go,” I say, wondering how long it will be until they discover the body. The longer he goes without being found, the more his blood will congeal and be less useful to the dama’ting in determining his cause of death if foul play is suspected.

  And it will be. Chikga wasn’t using hora magic to spy on me without orders. His disappearance will draw scrutiny, but from whom? He was friends with my brother, but what reason would Iraven have to kill me? Aleveran seems more likely, or Chavis.

  I wonder, just for an instant, if it could have been Chadan. Bile rises in my throat at the very idea, but I choke it back down, refusing to believe it.

  “What will you do?” Faseek asks.

  “Return to my quarters,” I say, “but first I will visit the palace harem, and make sure I am seen by the Jiwah’Sharum.”

  Faseek nods. “Good luck, brother.”

  48

  HAREM

  The warrior’s harem is much as I had imagined from my brothers’ descriptions. Dimly lit, the air is thick and cloying with incense and the scented smoke of great water pipes. Women move through the haze in vari
ous states of undress from their brightly colored silk robes and diaphanous veils.

  They are beautiful, and it is no wonder they hold the men entranced. There is artistry in their movements, clothing, and powder kit, in the music they play and the strength and complexity of their seductive dance.

  The men speak of conquests among the Jiwah’Sharum, but seeing them with my own eyes, I know the lie. These women have power the men do not understand.

  My role is to be seen enjoying the harem as a man, but watching the women undulate and writhe atop small podiums reminds me of laughing with Selen in my chambers as Micha and Kendall tried to teach us the Krasian pillow dance. I remember the steps, and part of me wants to snap my hips to the beat of the music as I cross the room.

  With no call to muster, most of my spear brothers have come to the harem tonight, lying in the pillows among pipes and bottles of couzi as they are attended by the Jiwah’Sharum.

  “Prince Olive!” Gorvan booms. I turn to see him beside a large water pipe with a thinly clad Jiwah’Sharum on his lap. Her hand is somewhere in the older boy’s robes, and I don’t want to think about where.

  The other men give a cheer when they see me, Thivan most of all. “I bet Thivan fifty draki you’d never come down here,” Gorvan says loudly.

  I force a laugh I do not feel. “Then you are a fool, Gorvan, for when would you collect?”

  Everyone roars with laughter at that, Gorvan most of all. “Come, my kai! Share couzi with us!”

  I still can’t see the woman’s hand. “I don’t drink couzi, Gorvan, and I came to watch pillow dancers, not smell your fetid breath.”