by Lucy Tempest
I struggled to my feet as the portal burned through the air, yawning wider to bare the spinning spiral of wind, noise and light within. It expanded with every heartbeat, eating up more of the room, an image taking form inside it, a horizon obscured by a sandstorm.
Abruptly, it reversed its spin, creating a powerful suction that started sliding me across the floor. I was as helpless to resist its pull as a leaf in a cyclone.
Suddenly, something grabbed my ankle. I looked behind me and Cyrus’s green eyes slammed into mine, groggy and alarmed.
I kicked my leg, trying to shake his hand off. “Let go, Cyrus—let go!”
He only held on tighter and the suction started dragging him along with me.
I screamed for him to let go one more time before I was catapulted from the serene silence of the palace into the raging sandstorm.
Chapter Thirteen
I tried to open my eyes when the ground below me moved.
They felt full of burning sand, the pain traveling back in a headache bad enough to split my brain in half. My whole body throbbed like one massive bruise.
There was one good thing in this mass of misery—my bed. It was firm yet resilient and it moved again, as if to accommodate me, reminding me of the magical beds in the palace. But it felt even better beneath my aching body.
Another reason I could barely open my eyes was because everything was washed out by the unrelenting brightness of a merciless sun.
Once my eyes adjusted, I realized it wasn’t the brightness making it hard to see. There was nothing to see. Nothing but an ocean of sand, with no sign of life in sight.
The deserts I’d seen in Cahraman always had some scattered flora, some scurrying fauna. Here, there was absolutely nothing. Just sand, and more sand.
Awareness hit me full-force, burning the drowsiness from my body, forcing my head up—and bringing me nose-to-nose with Cyrus.
He was my bed.
Sitting on his elbows below me, he was half-awake, sand drenching his body and hair. His face was scrunched in a frown, not just from the sun, but also from the bruise that engulfed the top right side of his face.
And it all crashed down on me.
He’d tried to save me. After he’d discovered I’d been lying to him from day one. If he’d let go of me, he could have saved himself. He hadn’t.
This was a disaster, in every sense of the word.
He’d learned the truth, but not from me. I’d put off telling him so many time, I’d lost my chance to come clean, had been exposed instead. And because I’d hidden the truth, and failed to act as I should have, we’d ended up tossed into Nariman’s Land of No Return.
There was nothing I could say to ameliorate his crushing disillusion or this harrowing situation. So I said just that—nothing.
He sat up, making me scramble off him, groaned as he pitched forwards and dropped his head in his hands. He, too, said nothing.
There was nothing I could do now but endure his deserved anger.
When he finally moved, he showed me none. He got up, dusted the sand off, stepped around me, and started walking away, leaving me alone with my turmoil and the dunes.
But I wanted him angry! Anger would have given me a chance to explain, to grovel for forgiveness—anything. This non-reaction—this was the worst reaction I could have imagined. Like I wasn’t worth a word or a glance. Like I wasn’t even there.
Flailing inside and out, I pushed myself up to take in the appalling sight surrounding us.
Nariman had been honest for once. Whatever or wherever this place was, there was no coming back from it.
And for the first time since the early months after my mother died, I gave in, completely, cried freely and terribly, wishing the wracking sobs would tear me up inside and just end me.
I’d tried to fight the guilt, to push it away so it wouldn’t cripple me. Now I let it roar in.
My existence meant nothing. Nothing but suffering and destruction. My life had only brought devastation to so many others. My mother, Bonnie and Mr. Fairborn, Cora and Cherine and Ayman, the whole of Cahraman—now Cyrus. Cyrus who would have become the best king the Folkshore had known, the most incredible human being I’d known, would perish in this unending wasteland. His precious life would end, his limitless potential would be snuffed—all because of me.
I didn’t know how long I stood there, just that my eyes dried up, my body stopped yielding shudders and dust caked my face. But the storm of misery, like everything in life, had passed. And with it, the overwhelming self-pity.
I wouldn’t add the insult of wallowing in it to the injuries I’d already inflicted on him. I wouldn’t sit here and play the victim and wait for death. The least I owed him was to act with his same dignity.
Even if he rightfully wanted nothing to do with me, I was the only one around. Whatever we faced, however the end came, we would do it together.
He was at the top of a gently sloping dune, his back to me, surveying the endlessness. There was no outward evidence of what went through his mind. I could only imagine the worst. But there was no comfort I could offer him and he wouldn’t want it from me if I could.
What I could do was my part. I’d explore another direction.
I trudged up another dune. Once at the top, I could see the desert spreading down before me to the horizon. Empty. Truly lifeless.
Suppressing a shudder as the sun started to heat my body beyond comfort, I looked down at my ring. It had never answered wishes for material things. No matter how desperate our situation was, it wouldn’t bring me water or food or shelter, but—
My heart rammed the bottom of my throat. Was that—was that—something out there?
In this nothingness, anything stood out like a mountain would in a busy landscape. But it hadn’t been there a moment ago. Wasn’t it too early for hallucinations? Or was it a mirage? Or was the previous emptiness the illusion that had been hiding this?
I rubbed my eyes, painful friction forcing moisture to wet them, and focused again.
There were silhouettes stacked against the horizon. They seem to taper to an abrupt end as if at the edge of a cliff.
It was a city!
Hope rattled my soul as I staggered around and ran down, shouting, “CYRUS!”
Against all expectation, he didn’t ignore me. He spun around and strode towards me. He looked how I felt, completely haggard. His hair was lifeless, a greyness tingeing the golden skin further marred by the bruise, and darkness shadowing his eyes. The split on his bottom lip had reopened, and the slash through his brow had lost its scab, had bled again, and was on its way to scarring.
When he’d been masquerading as a servant, he’d still been unable to hide his regal demeanor. Then he’d let himself be the prince he’d been born to be, and his refinement and chivalry had been apparent in his every move, glance and stance. But in both personas, his balance of assurance and awareness had made him confident without arrogance and clever without condescension. And always, everything he was had emanated from his eyes.
Now I saw nothing. Neither Cyrus nor Cyaxares were within reach anymore. It was as if both vibrant personas had been turned off, leaving nothing but an empty facade.
He slowed down as I met him halfway, gaze not directly aimed at me, a picture of forced ease with hollow-eyed patience, waiting for me to explain my outburst.
“Cyrus…” I started, reaching out a hand.
His empty gaze panned down to my fingers, a quiet warning not to come any closer. He’d responded to my call out of duty, nothing more.
I withdrew my hand, stuttered, pitchy and stuffy from weeping, “I-I saw something in the distance, looks like a city. Just hoping it’s not some mirage or trick.”
Without a word, he jogged where I’d been. I struggled to follow him.
Throat tight, I asked, “How far do you think it really is?”
He shrugged, hands in his pockets.
“We should head there before we get too thirsty,” I suggested, ang
ling for a real response. “Maybe we’ll find someone to help us?”
A nod was all he gave me before walking down the dune.
In tense silence, at least on my side, we walked towards the settlement.
The sun burned my every inch of exposed skin and heated my insides with every arduous step on the sand. I streamed sweat as I struggled to match’s Cyrus’s pace, while he seemed unbothered. He was either more used to the heat, or made of tougher stuff, or both. It seemed it didn’t matter I was Almaskhami by blood, when I’d spent my life on an island where the hottest days were considered balmy in Cahraman. Nature was losing out against nurture. It seemed even nature worked against me, my black hair absorbing the most sunlight, frying my brain. It was only a matter of time before I succumbed to sunstroke.
As if he’d heard me, Cyrus took off his cloak and handed it to me. Without looking at me. When I started to protest, he just dropped it and walked on. I could argue for him to take it back. I knew there’d be no response. He was being himself, the chivalrous desert prince who would show anyone weaker than him kindness. Even an enemy. Even me.
I picked it up and put it on.
It didn’t help for long. The desert was getting hotter as we descended towards the city. I began to lose sense of time, of self as I trudged behind him, starting to believe it was receding,
I’d already been weakened by two months of exertion, hunger and misery. The past couple of days with two near-death experiences and the desperate attempt to bring Nariman down had further eaten through my reserves.
I again wish-begged my ring to heal me as it once had, to at least renew my strength until we reached the city. The stone remained dull and inert, my wish going unanswered.
The eerie city looked as far as ever when I finally collapsed over the scorching dunes.
Chapter Fourteen
The room was drenched in glaring white light that turned everyone into blurred wraiths.
I was standing in line waiting to be tested, and the table where the judges sat stretched endlessly. A dark-haired woman approached me and there was nothing in her face but blue-grey eyes. It was how I remembered my mother, the vague image all that remained of her.
She was saying something I didn’t understand. A word that had a sound I could barely discern let alone pronounce. I thought I’d heard it before, but I couldn’t place it.
I wanted to ask her what I’d spent years going crazy wondering about. Had she died a quick and painless death or suffered on her way out of this world? And what had pulled her away from our home and ended her life that fateful night?
But I didn’t ask, since there could be one answer now. It had been Nariman.
I now had new questions for my mother. Why had she never warned me about Nariman, or taught me magic so I could defend myself if and when she found me? But she’d just taken me as far away as she could, lived looking over her shoulder, isolating herself and me, to save me from Nariman’s intentions. I only hoped she’d died believing she had.
She raised her voice but it only grew fainter as she faded, still shouting. Sadness submerged me as she disappeared. The first one who’d loved me, and whose life I’d also inadvertently ruined.
If only I’d been able to hug her and tell her everything was fine. That her efforts hadn’t failed and her death hadn’t been in vain.
But it had been. Nariman had found me, used me, and she might have killed me.
Suddenly, something clamped my back, hooked my legs and my whole body was aloft as blessed darkness dragged me down into oblivion.
I gratefully sank.
I resurfaced in darkness. A different kind. Another thing was different. My position.
I was upside down.
But I wasn’t dead. The way I felt, I wished I were, but no such luck. Instead, I was dangling off Cyrus’s shoulder. My arms were swaying with each of his hard strides, around a head covered in his hood and pressed to his sweat-drenched back.
For long minutes, I could do nothing but flop over him with all the volition of a sack of potatoes. I needed him to put me back on my feet. There was no telling how long he’d been soldiering on with me weighing him down like that. I also couldn’t bear the thought that he was still suffering because of me. Even now he hated me.
I’d barely cared when I’d thought I was dead. But losing his love? This killed me. This was my real punishment.
The terrain grew more treacherous beneath us, too soft then too hard, making his path one of sways and stumbles that rocked me like a pendulum. I patted him on the back, letting him know I was awake. He stiffened beneath my body, slowed down for a moment, before resuming his pace. I tried to speak, but I had no voice. It didn’t seem he was about to put me down.
Telling myself I might slow him down more if he did, I struggled to remove the hood, to see where we were. I’d almost succeeded when he knocked it back in place as he bounced me off his shoulder, only to cradle me in his arms.
I found myself looking up at his powerful neck and jaw and my heart spilled all its beats as I inwardly begged for one moment of eye contact. I got none.
Resigned to my new emotional exile from him, I tore my filling eyes away.
The sun had veered towards the horizon and the hellish heat had somewhat subsided, and I got a clear view of what spread below us.
A sprawling city that appeared to have been broken in half by the staff of a wrathful god.
From this elevation, I could see elaborate temple roofs on top of flaring columns peeping above a wall that stretched along the city border, a smaller version of what used to enclose Sunstone. The city seemed to end abruptly at that cliff I’d thought I’d seen from afar. The edge of the cliff was the jagged ends destroyed edifices hanging over an abyss that felt like the very edge of the world.
Massive clouds of steam rolled up from beyond it and trailed towards us, like the breath of a volcano god. Mixing with the heat that baked expanses of sand into brown glass, it felt like breathing in acid vapors.
The city was real. But it might as well have been a mirage. Whatever help we needed, we weren’t going to get it here.
There was no one here.
It seemed there hadn’t been anyone in this silent city for a thousand years—
“Cyrus…” I croaked as the realization hit me. “This place…it’s the Silent City—”
“—of Alabasta,” he completed for me.
Of course, he must know of it. The city’s tale was the first story in The Anthology of the Dunes, written by the adventurer Esfandiar of Gypsum. He’d gone to investigate the remains of a city unearthed by a sandstorm where a cat goddess was worshipped and theorized it was Alabasta, a fabled center of a great civilization that had fallen abruptly when half of its land plummeted into the sea.
Even after I’d learned that magic existed, I’d still thought the anthology was just stories. Fantasies populated with magical lands, genies in bottles and giant bird-like creatures that rescued secret princes and guarded paths to treasures or destinies.
But now I knew ghouls and genies existed, why not fabled cities uncharted on any map?
This one would be at least a shelter, until we figured out what to do next.
We were now on level ground, and as Cyrus neared the open gates, I could see weathered basalt colossi of cat-headed women forming a massive entry passage. From among them, I could see deeper into the city, as the smell of brine wafted up with the wisps of wind that barely moved sand to coat the uneven cobblestone and seashell-embedded roads.
But just as his foot crossed the gates, the ground rumbled.
My ring suddenly started flashing a red light so intense it surpassed the glare of the sun. Thinking it was working again, I wished it made me feel better—but nothing happened.
Ignoring the rumbling, because there was nothing else to do, Cyrus started walking in and a thunderous roar followed, reverberating in my heavy bones and almost uprooting my heart.
Before his foot could land over the threshol
d, the ground beneath crumbled, the ancient cobblestones and cement breaking apart like a clay plate hit by a hammer, scattering into the hollow darkness below.
Chapter Fifteen
Cyrus stumbled back before we followed the crumbling ground into the bottomless pit.
I clung harder onto him, my thoughts streaking.
Cherine had told me of Duzakh, the Cahramani concept of hell, an endless tunnel filled with demons, where the souls of the damned were tortured forever. Some regions in Ericura believed in gateways to hell, holes in the ground that swallowed souls and gushed out fire.
Whatever I was looking at could be either or some other hellish place.
The crater was over twenty-feet across, the mouth of a vertical tunnel that seemed to go down for miles, ending in a fire-bright glow, echoing with hair-raising churning.
Next heartbeat, the literally earthshaking force sent Cyrus stumbling further back as it tore more sand and stone apart. The noises yawned to ear-splitting levels as the jaws of jagged earth widened and a blur of giant wings burst out.
There was no time to react, and no place to flee. Cyrus could only remain rooted, arms clamped harder around me as the creature towered over us, wings spread, a giant merge between a falcon and a lion.
With the forelegs of the vulture and the hind legs of the feline, the claws on both ends were massive and sharp enough to shred rocks. With a chest covered in alternating silver and bronze plumage, its beak and pointy-ear feathers were bright gold. But nothing gleamed brighter and hotter than its frightful, wrathful eyes.
I couldn’t count how many times I’d seen that beast since I’d been dragged to Cahraman. In statues around the palace, mosaics on floors, engravings on walls, illustrations in storybooks and a dozen other ways. I’d thought it another artistic creation of someone’s imagination, until Ayman had told me one had saved him.