Two men release their quarrels.
“Wait for him, damn it! Wait for him!”
The ehrekh charges as I order the sails reefed. The ship slows, but the nine running from the ehrekh are losing strength while the desert spirit gains ground.
Inexplicably, the ehrekh halts near the rahib’s fallen man. From the puddle of peppercorns littering the desert floor it snatches a wooden case, which had apparently been stowed inside the peppercorn barrel. A golden powder leaks from within to float like so much dandelion seed on the wind. The ehrekh sniffs it and throws it to the ground in a renewed rage.
Our ship slows to a crawl, and the first of the staggering survivors reach the hull and are pulled up by waiting arms. The ehrekh bears down.
“Open sails, men!” I scream. “Ride the sand, or we die this day!”
We pull the rest of the survivors to safety, including Jalaad and Uhammad. The fat rahib is the last to make it aboard as the ship takes speed. Too slow. Too slow!
The ehrekh charges forward, but our speed is gaining.
Then it slows. I think it is giving up the chase, but it opens its maw and bellows at the ship.
Something strikes me full on. The wind is knocked from my lungs. The hull groans and the mainmast releases a sharp crack. I pause, sure the mast will split and come falling down upon us, but praise to the gods above, it holds.
We crest the dune and make for the tiny silhouette of The Crying Gull several miles ahead. The rest of the caravan has been reduced to little more than a flock of black triangles against the indigo sky. As we gain on them, I find myself unable to be angry at Kaliil for not helping—all I can feel is relief—but through the emotion I realize what the presence of the ehrekh might mean.
The ehrekh are solitary spirits, rarely seen, but King Sulamin the Betrayer has two under his yoke which he uses to control the caravan trade. Was it one of his ehrekh that attacked us? The possibility of crossing the path of one by chance seems unlikely. And there is the golden spice hidden within the peppercorn barrel. The ehrekh became enraged after smelling it. King Sulamin worked hard at eradicating competition for a few select spices; perhaps the spice had been one of those.
There is yet another possibility. Stories are told of the ehrekh being sent by the kings of Harrahd as crude yet effective assassins. My fear grows that Sulamin has found me at last. Six years ago, mere minutes before Huad, the rightful king, was murdered by agents of Sulamin, I was asked to gather men and spirit the queen away. I thought surely it would be only days, perhaps weeks, before peace was restored in Harrahd, but Sulamin was ruthless in securing his position, and soon there was no one to challenge his claim to the throne.
No one but the queen.
But if Sulamin had found me, the ehrekh would have been bent on my destruction, would it not? It had seemed too intent on the rahib, and so I had to wonder if he had angered King Sulamin in some way.
Many questions with few enough answers. But I intend to find some of them when we land again.
Uhammad coughed, puffing red sand into his nose. He pushed himself off the desert floor as Muulthasa’s memories—like the scent of juniper in autumn—faded with great reluctance.
Jalaad appeared before him with an urn of water. “I thought you were dying.”
Based on the position of the sun and his aching bones, Uhammad guessed that nearly four hours had passed. “Then why didn’t you come save me?”
“You looked so peaceful.” Jalaad’s exaggerated smile was not in the least bit comforting. “What did you learn?”
“What have I learned?” Uhammad wiped the back of his hand across his wet mouth and beard. In truth, he hated reliving that experience, in part from the fear it rekindled, but mostly from the shame. What he had done to Muulthasa... “I have learned that I have made poor choices in life, Jalaad.”
Jalaad put on a sarcastic smile. “This is news?”
Uhammad frowned and shouldered his way past.
They took to the ship and headed for the nearest caravanserai, the same one Kaliil had taken them to those many years ago. Near sunset, Riisi’s sharp eyes spotted the sails of a warship. Immediately they dropped down a dune and rode the gutters like pirates, hoping they had gone unnoticed. It seemed that luck was with them, for when they pulled beneath an escarpment of rust-colored rock, they saw nothing along the horizon.
Their nerves were strained with the knowledge that Sulamin’s men hadn’t given up. Jalaad argued for sailing past the caravanserai, but Riisi had excellent eyes, and Sulamin’s ship probably hadn’t spotted them. Besides, Uhammad explained, they needed as much information about Muulthasa’s northward path as they could get.
They reached the caravanserai late into the night. Uhammad found the master and paid him his landing fee, feeling exposed in the minutes it took to do so. After kneeling in their dhoba and taking another dose of the glittering spice, Uhammad calmed himself and focused on his memories of that night, shamed at the mere thought of them. This is my penance, he told himself, to live my betrayal through Muulthasa’s eyes.
With the silver moon bright and the entire caravan fearful of the ehrekh’s chase, we continue on through the night until we reach the first caravanserai. It is small, and we normally would have sailed past, but the caravan leader, Sytaatha, has called a halt.
Less than five minutes after grounding the ships, Kaliil calls me to accompany him. We enter the caravanserai’s largest dhoba, where a healthy fire sends a trail of smoke through a hole in the thatched roof.
With their guardmasters hugging the wall, the seven other caravan masters stand behind Sytaatha, watching soberly. They look like a tribunal of the gods, spread in an arc and wearing gold-threaded kaftans and silk turbans and jeweled shoes. Every one of them wears a dour face. I want to scream at them for refusing to help us—what is a caravan for if not mutual protection?—but Kaliil bows and yanks my arm when he realizes I haven’t followed suit.
“We have already spoken, Kaliil,” proclaims Sytaatha.
“It was pure chance,” Kaliil says as he stands and raises his hands in a defensive gesture. “It could have been any one of us.”
“But it wasn’t any one of us. It was you.”
“The ehrekh are mischievous spirits. They are toying with us. What else could it be?” His last words are spoken weakly, as if even he hears the foolishness in them.
“Whatever the reason,” Sytaatha continues, “King Sulamin has marked you. You will not join us. You will take the eastern passes or you will wait a half-day here while we continue in the morning—I leave it up to you—but if we so much as see your sails on the horizon, we will turn and destroy you.”
“Come, now. Let’s be reasonable. We can question the rahib. It must have been him the ehrekh was after, not my spices. What would an ehrekh want of such things?”
“The rahib or you, it no longer matters. Your foolish guardmaster wounded the ehrekh. It will come for vengeance now, no matter what its initial purpose.”
Kaliil glances my way shamefacedly. “I could leave them both here.”
My face reddens. How I yearn to ask the gods to wither his skin and dry his bones, but I stifle my vengeful thoughts, for one never knows when the gods will come calling, asking for their favors to be returned.
Sytaatha stares, waiting for Kaliil to accept his fate.
As sure as autumn streams dry, Kaliil’s face loses its fight. “I paid money to join you.”
“And I should keep it,” Sytaatha replies, “for it will most likely litter the sand of the ehrekh’s lair. But here.” He sends a small leather bag jingling through the air. It thumps with a fortuneless clink at Kaliil’s feet. “Never let it be said Sytaatha is unfair.” And with that they leave.
My fear over this turn of events is just beginning to rise when we hear the ehrekh’s cry spread across the desert—a long harroon, unlike anything I’ve ever heard, and at the center of it a thumping, growling undertone.
A violent shiver gallops up my frame
.
Kaliil stares at me wide-eyed, as if I could protect him. “Call everyone,” he tells me. “Now.”
I refuse to move, for there is something we must have out. “Did you have fyndrenna aboard that ship?”
Confusion twists Kaliil’s face. “Muulthasa, if I could afford fyndrenna, do you think I’d still be skimming the sands with miserable curs like you?”
“Answer the question, Kaliil.”
His face turns hard. “I told you to find the men.”
At most times I allow Kaliil’s bullying to go unchallenged, but in this he will not win. I wait for his answer.
The life seems to drain from his shoulders. “No, Muulthasa. It was galangal. Nothing more.”
I stare into his eyes, measuring his words. “Galangal...”
“Nothing more.”
Kaliil may be telling the truth. Galangal is the least of the spices Sulamin has control over, and it carries the least punishment if caught. Plus, fyndrenna is the most expensive spice the desert has ever known. A man like Kaliil would have difficulty obtaining a few drams of the stuff, much less an entire case.
I nod, satisfied, and go to find the men. When I return, Kaliil is questioning the rahib near the fire.
“Then why were you leaving Ilinnon so quickly?” Kaliil asks him.
“My reasons are my own.”
“Not when I’ve lost a ship they’re not!”
“It has nothing to do with an ehrekh, I can assure you.”
Kaliil stalks back and forth. Azadeh, her face still masked by her blood-crusted veil, holds her child to her hip and looks upon the exchange with keen interest.
The rahib removes a necklace with a sizable emerald from his neck. He holds it out to Kaliil. “And when we reach Harrahd, a thousand shepis more.”
Kaliil hesitates, perhaps for the benefit of his audience, and then accepts the offered necklace. “Fifteen hundred,” he says.
“Done,” replies the rahib, who walks away immediately, apparently not willing to tempt fate any longer.
The harroon of the ehrekh comes again, and the child begins to cry. As Azadeh turns to leave, she looks straight at me, that look of fear still in her eyes. A memory sparks suddenly within me, something about her piercing green eyes. But like a silhouette standing too far from the firelight, it is unclear, insubstantial.
I retire to a room above the tavern with my men and try to find sleep, but the memory of the woman’s eyes and the sound of the ehrekh’s call haunt me sleepless.
As morning approaches, I find three of the men preparing to leave. To my shock, both of my companions from my days in Harrahd—Jalaad and Uhammad—are among them.
“We do not sail until after midday,” I tell them, knowing their true purpose.
Jalaad, ever bold, steps forward. But to my surprise, he hides his eyes as he speaks. “I saw it rip three men limb from limb in the blink of an eye.”
“We must stand together, Jalaad, now more than ever.”
“Stand, hide, run... It will all end the same.”
Jalaad leaves, but stout Uhammad pauses in the doorway, his face a study in shame.
“Uhammad, please.”
He shakes his head slowly. I have never felt so alone as I do now, staring into a mirror of my own emotions, and I realize with a sudden clarity that no words or coin will be enough to convince them to stay.
“Where will you go?” I ask.
“Sanandira,” he says. “We head for Sanandira.”
And with that he leaves.
Six more have abandoned us by the time we pull anchor.
Uhammad opened his eyes to darkness. The fyndrenna had been disorienting the first time—but this time he felt like he was under an opium haze. His breath rose and fell, as slow as the tides. The stern words of the ancient farseer echoed in his mind. Use it once, she’d said, and you need worry but little. Twice in the same week, be prepared for muddied senses and a slow awakening. Thrice, and you’d best say your prayers before it touches your eyes.
He might be dying, for the effect refused to ebb, but finally, minutes later, his breathing returned to normal.
Nearby, the embers of the fire in the center of the dhoba glowed fitfully. Uhammad shifted closer and poured himself a cup of lime tea from the now-cold pot. Jalaad, sleeping beneath a thin blanket, woke at the sound and stared at Uhammad with guilty eyes, the expression echoing Uhammad’s own feelings.
“Did Muulthasa curse our names?” Jalaad asked as he stoked the embers into a meager flame.
Uhammad sipped his tea. It was difficult, now that the pull of the fyndrenna was gone, to sort his own memories and emotions from those of Muulthasa. “I don’t think he blamed us for leaving. I think a part of him was glad we were escaping his fate.”
Jalaad stared into the fire. “Then he was a fool, or he was lying to himself. A man in his right mind would see us for what we were.”
“And what were we?”
Jalaad paused. “Do I have to say it?”
No, Uhammad thought, you don’t. We were cowards then and we’re cowards now. It would have been easier if Muulthasa had been less understanding. It would have felt more proper if he’d been furious. I would have been, Uhammad told himself.
A call, soft but clear in the desert night, sounded in the distance. It brought back memories of the ehrekh, how primal it had been, how vengeful. This felt ... apropos somehow, as if Uhammad’s craven attempt to escape it had only been postponed these eight years and the chase could now resume.
They both held utterly still, waiting for another, closer call, but the night remained silent. It was then that Uhammad realized Riisi was not in the dhoba with them. “Where’s Riisi?”
Jalaad looked about, a confused expression pinching his long face.
Uhammad rushed out into the chill night air, sure the ehrekh had stolen Riisi away and was now trumpeting its victory from afar. He and Jalaad wove through the caravanserai’s sprinkling of dhobas, calling Riisi’s name, but it wasn’t until they moved beyond them that Uhammad spotted him standing atop a dune, silhouetted by the light of the golden moon, Tulathan.
“Let me talk to him,” Uhammad said.
Jalaad nodded with a slightly pained look in his eye. Riisi had always been closer to Uhammad, and it still hurt Jalaad to face that.
Uhammad trudged through the sand to the top of the dune. He remained silent, wanting simply to share the star-filled sky with Riisi for a time. The tips of the dunes were brushed with gold, as if Tulathan were a flower that had shed its pollen on the desert below.
“You remember the calls, don’t you?” Uhammad asked after a time.
Riisi didn’t reply.
“Don’t worry. They roam the desert, and they call from time to time.”
It’s chasing us, Riisi signed.
“Don’t be foolish,” Uhammad said, though the words were only for Riisi’s benefit. “Why would it be chasing us?”
The same question was asked when it attacked the first time.
“There are a thousand reasons why Kaliil’s ships might have been chased, the fyndrenna not the least of them.”
Riisi exhaled noisily. And here we are again with the King’s spice.
Uhammad could not deny his logic.
And then there’s me.
“Had that been its purpose, the ehrekh would have beaten down the walls of Sanandira long ago to find you.”
But the words didn’t sit right, and Uhammad wondered if Riisi was telling him everything he knew, everything he remembered of those days before reaching Sanandira.
Do you think it’s one of King Sulamin’s?
“It may very well be.”
Odd, don’t you think? They’ve been missing since I found you in Sanandira, and now here they are again.
Indeed. The ehrekh had been notably missing from the desert for years. The timing was conspicuous in that their disappearance coincided with Kaliil’s fateful voyage eight years ago, but like Riisi’s past, Uhammad had never be
en able to fit together all the puzzle pieces to understand why.
“Come,” he said. “The desert seems unwilling to grant any insights this night.”
Uhammad guided Riisi back to the dhoba, and they all slept, though fitfully. It seemed like ages before the sun rose. Thankfully the ehrekh’s call was heard no more, and so it was with lighter hearts that they left the caravanserai and traveled north. Uhammad followed the path he’d gleaned from Muulthasa’s memories, for there was no other choice.
Three days later they found an abandoned caravanserai. But this time, when Uhammad prepared the fyndrenna, he felt exposed, as if touching the past was drawing the ehrekh’s attention. Foolish, he told himself, but he still couldn’t rid himself of the notion.
Best to get it done quickly then. He focused on Muulthasa and powdered the fyndrenna into his eyes.
We have neither heard nor seen sign of the ehrekh since leaving the caravanserai three days ago. Perhaps the gods toy with me on my final voyage home, for my mind is resolute—no matter what dangers might present themselves in Harrahd, I will return home. Or if my Alenha has fled back to our village, I will search for her there.
I pray that King Sulamin has given up on a trifle like me for spiriting away his cousin, Queen Rossanal, six years ago. And if he hasn’t... Then at least I will see Alenha for one more day.
Kaliil sells another portion of his mace below his cost to make room aboard for the rahib and his men. Azadeh and her son—gods know why he allows them to stay—are bunking in my cabin, though Azadeh never sleeps when I’m in the room, only when I’m on deck, and avoids me completely otherwise. Even when we ration out food, she asks Wahid, who has taken a liking to her, to fetch it for her.
I haven’t been able to unravel the remembrance she sparked, but I no longer care. We are six days from Sanandira, ten from Harrahd, and by the grace of all that’s holy, I will find Alenha and be done with this life forever.
Lest Our Passage Be Forgotten & Other Stories Page 41