In the hundred wagons trailing behind their soldiers were some of the spoils of the wars they had instigated during their quest to grow the kingdom: gold, precious gems, fine pottery, wines, weapons, and slaves, all gifts for the kings of the Empire.
Ysa had not looked kindly upon any of it, especially the women and children now destined for a wretched life of servitude thousands of leagues from their birthplace; the two of them had had enough arguments about the matter on their way back from the Arals for her to make her position perfectly clear to Rafael. Still, he knew the plundered goods would go some way toward appeasing the wrath of the older king.
If it means less war and death in the future, then so be it.
A wide path stretched through the camp to the outpost’s towering gates. Rafael studied the tents on either side as they galloped up the corridor, his irate thoughts concerning his uncle temporarily forgotten.
‘They are here!’ Ysa shouted.
He followed her excited gaze. Occupying the western portion of the camp, visible in the light of flaming torches, were several hundred tents bearing the colors of Larsaa and Urim, the cities under their direct rule.
He looked around and registered the tents of Larraak, Lagaesh and Marii, the principalities of his siblings and cousins. ‘It seems the others have arrived as well.’
Ysa frowned. ‘No, not everyone. I do not see the colors of Issin.’
Their troop commanders directed their soldiers to set up camp beside the other regiments while they carried on ahead. The thick bronze doors guarding Nawaar opened ponderously upon their approach and they slowed their steeds as they entered the shadows of the fortified towers flanking the entrance. Rafael dismounted outside the main barracks and handed the reins of his horse to an attendant.
‘Where is the first general and the other princes and princesses?’ he asked a captain as Ysa alighted from her stallion.
‘They dine in the main hall, Commander,’ the soldier replied with a bow. He smiled at Ysa. ‘The first general will be pleased to see you, Princess.’
‘Is my husband well?’ said Ysa, a trace of anxiety modulating her voice.
The captain hesitated. ‘As well as can be expected, Princess. The first general and Princess Navia arrived only a quarter day before you.’
Ysa clenched her jaw. ‘Thank you.’
She headed briskly into Nawaar’s main fort tower, Rafael on her heels. Raucous laughter greeted them when they entered the banquet hall moments later. Seated at the long table dominating the room and picking over the remains of a meal were Tobias, Navia, Jared, Hosanna, Malachi, and Phebe.
‘So I said to Navia, “Let the poor man kiss your hand at least. He has evidently fallen under your spell and will gladly grant you every city and town in Saraostas without a fight if you so command him,”’ Tobias recounted with a grin.
Navia frowned. ‘Very funny, cousin.’
Malachi studied the green-eyed, blonde woman seated beside him. ‘My dear, do I need to worry about the number of men who appear to have been bewitched by you on your latest travels? Will a horde of them be waiting for us when we return to Larraak, eager to challenge me for your hand?’
‘Not you as well, husband,’ Navia grumbled, as the others chuckled. ‘Like I said before, the king of Laothal was likely concussed from the blow he received to the head. Besides, I do not see Tobias offering his fingers to every pair of lips that wish to press against them.’
‘That is because he knows what is good for his health,’ said Ysa tartly.
Tobias’s face brightened when he spotted them by the doors. He rose and crossed the chamber with a faint limp. Ysa met him halfway and responded to his passionate kiss with an ardor that drew a groan from Jared.
‘Please, some of us have not seen our mates for months,’ moaned Crovir’s second son.
Rafael ignored him and embraced Phebe just as heatedly when she ran into his arms.
‘It is good to see you, wife,’ he whispered against her lips when he finally released her mouth.
Her eyes glimmered beneath him, full of desire and heated promise. ‘It is good to see you too, husband.’
‘I cannot believe I am saying this, but I actually really miss my filthy-mouthed spouse right now,’ Hosanna said acerbically at the table.
Tobias grinned as he headed back to his seat, a flushed Ysa at his side. ‘I am sure the second general is waiting for you just as keenly, cousin.’
Rafael studied the gash on the back of Tobias’s calf in the light cast by the roaring flames in the hearth. ‘How did you get that?’
Tobias followed his gaze and grimaced. ‘My horse bolted when we came across a venomous snake earlier today.’ He sighed at Rafael’s expression. ‘Do not worry. The snake was unharmed. I, on the other hand, looked quite the fool when I almost slipped off my saddle.’
‘Here, let me heal it.’
Tobias shook his head. ‘It is quite alright, cousin. It will be gone in a matter of days.’
‘Do not be stubborn,’ Rafael countered gruffly.
‘Yes, husband,’ said Ysa. ‘Let him see to your wound.’
Tobias hesitated before nodding, a tired expression suddenly washing across his face.
It was not until later that night, after Rafael had used the powers he had been gifted to mend the wounds his siblings and cousins had incurred during their recent battles, when the wine had flowed plentifully and they had had their fill of food, that they finally addressed the unspoken matters that troubled them.
‘Has anyone heard from Mila?’ said Jared.
He stared into his tumbler, a frown on his face.
‘No,’ Tobias replied. ‘I sent a messenger to Hathor before we left Mehrgar. He has still not returned.’
‘The folly of the king knows no end, it seems,’ murmured Phebe. ‘There is nothing beyond the Nahal River but the Great West Desert. Why he would send her there is incomprehensible.’
‘Do you really think so, cousin?’ said Jared.
A troubled expression dawned on Phebe’s face. Rafael narrowed his eyes, the worrying thoughts and feelings that had plagued him during his and Ysa’s four-month-long crusade surging through him once more.
‘It is clear to me why our father sent Mila to the far side of the borders of our Empire,’ Jared continued in a harsh tone. ‘It was simply to punish her. That he paired all of us but her speaks volumes.’ He looked around the table. ‘He sent Hosanna and I to the cities on the West Sea, Malachi and you,’ he inclined his head at Phebe, ‘to Dara and Ugarit, Rafael and Ysa to the north, and Tobias and Navia to the east. Only Mila was dispatched on her own, into the most hostile of the lands that surround our kingdom. And with less than half the number of men we were assigned, no less.’
Silence fell upon the chamber.
‘Had she not openly challenged our uncle, none of this would have happened,’ Malachi said quietly.
Hosanna glared at him. ‘Say what you will, brother, but the words Mila spoke that day in the throne room were true. To dispose of the governor of Hazaara in the callous manner the king ordered, when the circumstances I had reported to him were so dire, would have been truly barbaric.’ She paused and glanced at Jared. ‘It would also have unnerved the other human states and cities under our rule and led to further uprisings. I am sure both Mila and Jared thought of this fact when they chose to spare Governor Nazul.’
Malachi smiled faintly. ‘I am not saying she was wrong, sister. It is just that our cousin has a way of ruffling the feathers of the older king in a manner that none of us can quite match. I think we have all noted the tension between father and daughter over the years.’
Tobias slowly drummed his fingers on the table, his eyes thoughtful.
‘She scares him,’ he said gruffly.
Phebe inhaled sharply. ‘What?’
Rafael blinked in surprise. ‘Why do you say that?’
Tobias stilled his fingers.
‘Because he is my father and she is my sister,’ he r
eplied simply, his gaze locked on Rafael’s face. ‘I have known both of them for hundreds of years. And I have seen Mila on the battlefield on countless occasions. Baruch and I have spoken of the matter many times to the kings. There is no doubt in our minds that she should be leading our armies.’
‘I concur,’ Ysa murmured.
‘So do I,’ said Hosanna.
A bitter smile twisted Jared’s lips. ‘Our little Mila has grown into the most formidable warrior in our lands.’
‘Would you have drawn your sword?’ said Malachi after a while, a focused look on his normally placid face.
Jared gazed at him impassively in the tense lull that followed.
‘Probably,’ he finally replied. ‘One thing I am certain of. I will not be used as a pawn in the games my father wishes to indulge in.’
‘Nor will I,’ said Tobias, his face hardening.
‘I fear the time to choose sides may very soon be upon us,’ Navia muttered.
They all looked at her, Rafael frowning at her pale face. ‘Why do you say that, sister?’
Navia stared into the fire, her gaze unfocused. ‘Because I see darkness in our future. A darkness that will swallow our kingdom for hundreds, if not thousands, of years to come.’
Part Two: Defiance
Chapter Fourteen
Mila stood on the edge of the pit, acrid fumes filling her lungs as she gazed at the burnt corpses crowding the hastily dug graveyard below.
They had spotted the smoke from half a league away, a day after passing the outpost of Kis. Urging her exhausted army toward the location of the blaze, Mila knew what she would find when they reached it. Judging from her soldiers’ expressions, so did they.
This was the third village they had come upon since they entered the Empire’s immediate domain, four months after leaving Uryl on a campaign to expand the kingdom’s western territories. Four months during which Mila and her army of eight hundred men crossed the Nahal River and ventured into the Great West Desert, only to find the scattered remains of a long-dead civilization and the few nomadic tribes who had adopted the rocky plateaus, mountains, and seas of sand dunes as their home.
There was little to conquer in such a barren landscape, as Mila had long suspected before she left the capital. The bitterness that had been her constant companion since her father assigned her the futile mission only grew with each man she lost to the unforgiving, scorched lands they had been dispatched to. It was thanks to her survival skills and the wit of her troop commanders and captains that they did not suffer more than a dozen deaths during their campaign, even after a violent sandstorm decimated half their supplies. Only on one occasion, when nearly two Half Moons had passed without her being able to locate food or water for her soldiers, did she trade weapons with a desert tribe in exchange for sustenance.
The act shocked her commanders, who had expected her to storm the settlement and claim the goods. Mila had considered doing just that for a fleeting moment. But the faces of the people of Hazaara had risen in her mind and the words Governor Nazul had spoken had resonated in her ears as she gazed upon the peaceful commune they had stumbled upon.
Enough. I will not shed more blood for that monster than is strictly necessary.
Her relief upon finally reaching the Empire over a day ago was quickly mitigated by the devastating scenes she and her army soon came across. At first, Mila thought their kingdom was under attack, so fierce was the destruction inflicted upon the villages and so terrible the injuries sustained by the corpses she examined. But when they reached the outpost of Nawaar and found no news of an invasion, Mila’s suspicions were finally confirmed.
It was the Empire’s soldiers who had brutally murdered their own people, on the orders of King Crovir. When Mila questioned the battalion leader of Nawaar as to the reasons why, he evaded her gaze and murmured something about unpaid tithes.
Anger had filled her then, anger that turned to a red haze of fury when she was told Kronos had been in charge of the mass slaughters, and that the villages that had been annihilated were home to many of her men.
Mila turned from the pit and met the bitter stares of several soldiers. She opened her mouth, hesitated, and closed her lips soundlessly. There was nothing she could say to alleviate their outrage at what had happened to their families in their absence.
She gritted her teeth, marched through the silent crowd, and vaulted onto Buros. Abu descended from the skies and landed on her shoulder, his demeanor unusually restrained, as if he sensed her unease.
‘What do we do now, Red Queen?’ said one of her commanders in a leaden voice.
Mila glanced at the dark spirals rising from the pit before wheeling the stallion around. ‘We go home.’
Eleaza drew her bow and narrowed her eyes at the far side of the arena. She exhaled and released the arrow. It sailed through the air at an impossible speed and thudded dead center into the target, feathered tail vibrating to a slow stop.
‘Well done, Princess.’
Eleaza grinned and looked up at the man beside her.
Aäron, the captain her mother had charged with her training, smiled back and ruffled her hair gently. Excited clapping rose behind them.
She turned to the boy who stood beaming on the steps that enclosed the arena. ‘Did you see, Emet?’
‘Yes! Yes, I did!’ gushed the boy.
The elderly woman weaving on the steps behind him raised a stick and tapped him gently on the bottom without looking away from her loom.
‘Princess,’ she corrected.
‘Yes I did, Princess!’ said Emet.
Eleaza made a face.
‘Does he have to call me that?’ she asked the boy’s grandmother.
It was Aäron who replied. ‘If your father were to hear him do otherwise, it would result in another beating.’
Guilt filled Eleaza as she stared at the scabs on Emet’s calves.
‘Father was wrong to do that,’ she mumbled, recalling her cries of protest at the time and how her brother Kaleb had to physically restrain her so she would not run to Emet’s assistance.
‘It is the duty of a daughter to follow the commands of her father, Princess,’ said Aäron.
Eleaza thought about this for a moment. ‘Even if it would make me unhappy to obey such orders?’
Aäron hesitated. ‘Yes, even then.’
Eleaza chewed her lip. ‘What if the thing he tasked me with was wrong?’
Aäron blinked. ‘You are more like your mother than I thought.’
Emet’s grandmother let out a low chuckle.
Eleaza smiled uncertainly at the fair-haired captain. ‘Have you always done what your father commanded you to do, Aäron?’
A strange expression flashed in the blue eyes above her.
Aäron looked up and studied the training grounds with a faint smile. ‘No, not quite.’
Eleaza was opening her mouth to ask another question when a disturbance at the entrance of the arena distracted her. She turned and spotted a figure flanked by soldiers in the shadows of the tunnel. A moment later, a woman stepped out into the sunlight bathing the grounds.
Elation flooded Eleaza. ‘Mama!’
She dropped the bow and ran as fast as her legs could carry her to the woman crossing the arena, only to falter as she drew close. A sliver of anxiety darted through her when she registered her mother’s strangely blank face.
Undaunted, she jumped and was relieved when Mila caught her mid-air. Eleaza buried her face in her neck and breathed her mother’s familiar scent. To her surprise, Mila cradled the back of her head and dropped a kiss on her hair, her lips lingering on her head for a long moment.
‘It is good to see you, daughter.’
Eleaza drew back and gazed worriedly into her mother’s eyes. Behind the usual inscrutable expression, she sensed a storm of emotions threatening to break through.
She raised a hand to Mila’s cheek. ‘Are you well, Mama?’
Mila blinked. There was a noise behind them. Sh
e turned, her arms stiffening around Eleaza.
Kronos entered the arena and headed toward them.
‘You should have sent a messenger,’ he called out with a smile as he approached. ‘I would have met you outside Niibru had I known you were coming.’
Mila slowly lowered Eleaza to the ground. ‘Go to Aäron.’
Eleaza hesitated.
‘Go, child,’ Mila ordered in a hard voice.
Eleaza nodded shakily and rushed to where Aäron stood. The altercation began immediately. She stopped beside the captain and grabbed his hand, staring apprehensively to where her mother and father exchanged heated words in low voices.
‘Do not touch me!’ Mila shouted a moment later, raising an arm to block Kronos’s hand as he reached for her shoulder.
Eleaza startled and felt Aäron’s fingers twitch around her own. Emet cowered behind his grandmother on the steps to their left. At the entrance of the arena, the soldiers glanced at each other, faces pale.
Tears filled Eleaza’s eyes as she stared at her mother. She had never before seen the look clouding her beautiful features. It spoke of rage and disappointment and something else. Something she could not name.
‘Aäron?’ Eleaza whispered in a trembling voice.
The captain squeezed her hand. ‘It is alright, child.’
Eleaza looked up at him then and registered the intense light in his eyes with confusion. His expression she could read.
It was full of hope.
Chapter Fifteen
‘Again!’
Mila raised her daggers and glared at the man opposite her, air leaving her lungs in slow, steady pants. His blue eyes narrowed below his sweat-slicked hair, the fair locks dark under the late-day sun. He clenched his jaw and braced himself, his twin blades flush against his forearms and his stance firm. Mila ignored their avid audience and attacked again, her mind focused on the fight before her.
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