“They say she has earned her name, hee-hee,” chortled the second grim sister.
“Aye,” chuckled the third, glancing quickly at her hunched siblings. “So she has, so she has.”
“And she has gained pride,” interjected the first, nodding with approval. “Vanity, vanity; she is no longer afraid.”
They laughed again in their strange way, but this time Sharon did not draw back. They were right, she knew. She did have pride now, a belief in herself that had not been there before. Zadek had instilled it, the saya had stubbornly forced it out, and Tariq’s trust had reinforced it.
The witch in the middle leaned over the boiling vat, unperturbed by the hot steam rising. “Is this so, Samarkand princess? Have you earned that which you were intended to earn?”
There was a brief broken silence, when Carolyn said, “She has, old hags. The name belongs to her; no other may claim the right to take it away.”
The witches nodded with satisfaction. Snow, gusted by a sudden wind, began to swirl all around. The middle sister rubbed her bony hands one over the other, warming them in the lifting steam.
“They call her ‘Panther,’” said the second sister with glee, “‘Little Panther of the Night.’ They claim she has shown great courage, hee-hee, as befits she who bears the Mark.”
“And she has spilled their blood, hee-hee,” cackled the third. “Vile blood, they say; the blood of her enemies, they say.” All three exulted with chuckles.
Sharon rubbed at her arms, still cold despite the flames that hissed and popped before her. Both she and the saya had been summoned here this night, commanded to ride alone to the forest, with only the cold winter’s wind as escort; but for what purpose, the saya had not told her, merely that the hour had come and Sharon was now ready to stand before them again. She had been bewildered by this, thinking she’d seen the last of these hags, having successfully passed their tests the last time. Now, though, it seemed there would be more.
“No Kazir shall ever again call her ‘outsider,’” Carolyn said. “She has earned her due among us.”
The lessons had been well learned, Sharon knew, as the witches listened gravely to the low voice of the saya. Since the night at Green Pool oasis when she had taken her first life, all had changed. Now she had been accepted, trained as one of the Kazirs’ own, and sworn to the defeat of their common enemy. Roskovitch the Bear, the scalp-locked barbarian from Rus, had spoken before Tariq and the Stronghold elders in her favor; he, the man who had frightened her so that first day. The judges had listened in stony silence to his testimony and to Zadek’s as well. She who bore the strange Mark that still she had yet to fully comprehend had been bestowed with her name among them, and Tariq had been the first to proclaim it. Even the saya had been forced to acknowledge her right to use it, and now she wore it like a badge, sworn to these Kazirs out of desperation, sharing with them the common hatred of the conquerors of Samarkand, determined not to let the usurpers gain their footing on the Steppes, the last bastion of freedom against the invading hordes.
“Rats’ claws and the teats of a goat,” rasped the witches in unison. “Spine of a monkey and testes of a lizard!” The witch in the center peered closely at Sharon. “Do you know why you have been brought here tonight?”
Sharon shook her head. “Only that the saya said it was your command.”
The hag sprinkled a vial of colored powder into the cauldron, and the boiling liquid hissed and burst into fire, ocher fingers of flames raiding the sky. Protectively Sharon put a hand against her face, pulling back at the sight. The witches laughed loudly and mockingly. Images, mere shadows to Sharon and the saya, appeared within the swelling fire. All three hags stared into it deeply, lifting their arms, wrinkled flesh clinging to bone. The wind around them picked up violently, almost lifting Sharon and Carolyn off their feet. And the witches chanted together, clouded by smoke and fire that writhed like serpents from the black iron cauldron. Faces gaunt, lips devoid of color, Sharon and Carolyn looked on in amazement. What their hosts were seeing within the fire was clearly not meant for their own eyes, eyes of mortals, but whatever it was, it was a dark vision indeed, for even the three hags seemed visibly shaken by the unfolding predictions. The flames grew so intense, so enormous, that the two women were forced to step back and shy away their eyes.
When at last the fire had dimmed, Sharon looked up; she was trembling, gaping at the wet pools of melted snow almost covering the entire clearing. Her heart was banging like a drum up into her throat, and her feet felt rooted to the earth when the witches beckoned her alone to come forward.
Sharon took a few uneasy steps and then kneeled, head lowered.
“Evil times are upon the Steppes,” whispered the witches throatily. “The shadows of death grow long and deep; a turbulent ocean of blood pours from the sky, seeping poisonously into the soil and spoiling it forever.” Silence, all-pervasive, ensued, then: “Lift your head, daughter of Samarkand, so that you may see.”
Bravely Sharon tilted her face to peer into the bubbling cauldron. She blinked her eyes, denying her own vision, but there it was, so lifelike before her that she could almost reach out and touch it: the shaded image of a face, twisted, vile, hideously ugly, with a black gaping hole where once an eye had rested.
“The khan!” she gasped breathlessly.
“Aye, ’tis Kabul, the mortal enemy of your peoples, whose insane hatred cannot be quenched without the blood of the Kazirs.”
Sharon was shaking all over; her eyes were glued to the dark image that crept closer with the blowing smoke. The one-eyed barbarian stared back at her, seeming to recognize, her, and she stilled a scream.
“Yes, he can see you,” sang the witches. “He has been called from the depths of his fitful sleep, his mind burning with the memory of the thing you have done to him. And his armies march, daily gathering in strength, a vise upon the Steppes and the desert, slowly closing in until all he seeks is within his grasp.”
Sharon was sweating; she shook her head violently. “No! Never! He’ll be stopped! He must be stopped!”
The laughter of the witches was a terrible bell in her ears, drowning out sanity. “The Kazirs are doomed,” they chanted. “The world to the west is doomed —”
Sharon arched herself backward, hands to her ears, still denying the truth of the vision. “No! No! It must not be! It must not be!” But, before her widened eyes, she saw the lands burning with fires greater than those that had swept Samarkand. There was the screaming of children, the anguished cries of their mothers unheeded as they were butchered like sheep while she helplessly looked on.
“Who is to stop them?” sang the witches. “Who is to stop them?”
Sharon was moaning upon the ground. “The Kazirs will stop them! Tariq will stop them!”
This time the laughter was painful, a spiteful wail just like the cry of the loon, like the call of nightthings, squeezing her mind until she could no longer think.
“Who will stop them?” sang the witches anew. “Who? Who?”
“I … I don’t know.”
The laughter became even louder, a vicious roar penetrating her soul. She thrust her hands forward, palms up. “Stop! Stop!”
Cackle followed malevolent cackle. “Summer and winter, winter and summer! She bears the Mark and has earned her name! You must fight the fight,” came the rasping voices in unison. “You must win the battle.”
Pleading, crying, shaking her head, refusing to hear what they were telling her, Sharon called, “How? How can I be the one? How can I stop the destruction?”
The tallest of the witches rose to her full height, no longer bent and twisted. A thin hand shot out from her sleeve, fingertips throwing what looked and felt like a bolt of lightning. The flash scorched the earth at Sharon’s bended knees. Charred, damp soil smoldering around her, she cried out with the sudden burning that filled her body. Again the lightning struck, hot, white, singing at the hem of her aba.
“The Gift,” hissed the witche
s, “she must have the Gift!” Their hands lifted in the frosty air, drawing strange and incomprehensible designs.
“Like the plague they have come, and so they have taken root …” A bolt of blazing green fire whipped past Sharon’s head and smashed into a tree behind. Bark ignited like tinder, and billows of porous black smoke swirled in the wind. “And they must be plucked from the very earth!”
The ground began to shake, and Sharon fell forward, her hands digging into the dirt. The stricken tree seemed to dance, its branches alight, twisting and reeling, its trunk swaying this way and that while the eerie fires dizzily spun, finger flames groping for the stars.
“On the wings of a bat, so shall she come!” sang the hags. “Locusts to darken the sky, plagues to counter plagues!”
“Come, princess of Samarkand,” demanded the eldest, “come and receive what is rightfully yours.”
It was all Sharon could do to lift herself and dare approach the hissing cauldron. From the corner of her eye, she could see Carolyn behind her recoiling in terror. The green fire was crackling everywhere around the saya, burning to cinders everything in its wake, yet not touching her, leaving her alone, a prisoner inside the walls of flame.
The third sister put her hand directly into the boiling liquid. Unscathed, she brought out a dazzling blue-hot knife. The blade glowed in the light, its razor-sharp edges glimmering hotly. “Kneel!” cried the hag, and Sharon, shuddering, complied.
Hands yanked at her long, flowing hair, jerking her head back so that her tear-filled eyes were forced to stare up toward the stars. She felt the heat of the blade drawing close, smoking, hissing, felt the edge slice through her hair. The smell of burning hair filled her nostrils; chestnut locks, fanned by the wind, blew high above her head, sizzling as they swam upon the breeze, flaring like small torches until they burned out and disappeared.
Sharon screamed out as the edge of the knife lightly pressed against the back of her neck, its searing heat scalding her flesh. “The Gift!” cooed the witches. “She has received the Gift!”
The ground was quivering once more, an earthquake rocking the clearing in the forest with unleashed fury.
Sharon no longer could tell what was going on around her; she fell upon the earth and in a mixture of shame and fear hid her face, not daring to glance up while the three sisters exultantly began to dance in a circle around her. They were whirling now, chanting, eyes staring but unseeing, feet hardly touching the ground but pattering softly as they weaved in and out, hands beating a slow, forceful rhythm.
Sharon let air trickle out of her strained lungs. There was a terrible tightness around her head. She touched her scalp and abruptly pulled her fingertips away from the heat, feeling as though her whole head was afire.
Then it stopped, suddenly and inexplicably; the pain was gone, the ground no longer shook, the green flames, only moments ago swirling about her like the fires of hell, vanished totally. Stars brightly flickered once again, and the rustling of wind among the branches remained the only sound.
“It is done,” said the eldest witch hoarsely. “Cover her.”
The saya, breathless and still afraid, ran forward and kneeled beside the panting princess. She drew a dark scarf from her robe and wrapped it about Sharon’s head, pinning the two loose ends at the nape of her neck.
“Go,” hissed the witches. “Go and do what must be done.”
Sharon struggled to regain her feet as fiercely as she was struggling to regain her senses. Was it all over, truly all finished? The hags had bestowed upon her the Gift, whatever it was; yet she didn’t feel any different, could not explain the meaning of any of the things they had done to her.
Filling her lungs with frigid air, she blew a steady stream of white smoke between her lips as she exhaled. The three sisters, standing behind their cauldron once again, glared at her with cats’ eyes, faces impossible to distinguish behind the shadows of their cowls.
“We have helped you all we can,” said one tersely.
“And the Gift?” whispered the shaken saya.
A hand punned to the scorched black earth at their feet: The burning knife was still there, only now it had changed form; in its stead, clinging to the sodden soil, lay a coiled, snakelike hulk of metal. Sharon bent down and picked it up; it felt heavy, weighted, dead. She stared at it, seeing that its head, when held away from the shadows, seemed to resemble that of a cobra. Two small holes for eyes had been burned into it, and a slit across the bottom seemed to hide the tip of a pitch-forked tongue. Yellow scales ran its length to the pointed tip of its tail.
“Take it; carry it always,” rasped the eldest. “But, be warned: Only the one who bears the Mark may use it, and then only for a single time.”
“How … how will I know when that time has come?” asked Sharon.
The witch grinned toothlessly. “Only you may decide, Little Panther, only you may decide.” She lifted her gaze toward the velvet sky. “When the hour of need arrives, call upon its power, and the secrets of this forest shall do your bidding.”
“I shall not misuse it, old hag,” Sharon promised, tucking it safely away beneath her belt.
The witches nodded. “Return to your Stronghold, Samarkand princess. The son of Shoaib has need of you; the Kazirs have need of you.”
Sharon turned to the saya, looking at Carolyn with humility. “The Hundred Years of Solitude are done,” she said, holding her ground firmly in an open display of her courage before them all. “I shall not turn away from the people of the Steppes, from those who have taken me in, given me both shelter and home. Their enemies are my enemies. Let the khan send whatever armies he will, my vow shall be kept.” She clasped Carolyn’s shoulder and gazed deeply into the saya’s haunting eyes. “Samarkand is fallen, but, while breath remains in my body, the Steppes and the Kazirs shall remain free. From this day forward let the word be spread” — and here she lowered her hand and clenched the coiled metal snake — “that one day we will regain all that has been lost.”
Chapter Twenty-One
The dancer appeared from behind the swaying curtains, illuminated by the soft glow from the ebbing brazier. She was a perfect specimen of Asian beauty, olive-skinned, coal-black hair long and flowing, a fitting crown to complete her exquisite body. Both sensuality and passion flittered across her delicate face, slanted eyes flashing with amusement, heaving breasts straining against the thin veil of silk that covered her flesh. Kabul, one arm fondling the hips of the Persian slave beside him on the divan, smacked his lips hungrily and stared with lust while the dancer drew closer.
The music began, and the dancer moved tauntingly nearer, arms lightly hanging at her side while her fingertips caressed the firm curve of her belly. She was young, the great khan realized — fifteen, sixteen, no more — and her bold, provocative movements stirred his blood and quickened his heartbeat. He forgot about the woman at his side as he reached for the goblet of wine, spilling some over his beard and chest while he gulped it down, never once letting his eyes stray from the exotic girl.
A mild spring breeze was pushing through the opened windows, setting the curtains to swaying in perfect time, it seemed, with the music. The drum quickened its beat, the dancer cavorting more wildly, more seductively. Kabul wiped his mouth with his hand, then reached out to grab the girl. The dancer laughed and slowly spun away, just out of reach. The khan would have scowled had she not held his attention so completely. As the flute’s notes picked up in savage staccato, the slave girl raised her hands and unpinned the small clasp at the back of her neck. The scanty dress tumbled to her feet, exposing her naked form, glistening with beads of perspiration, thighs rounded and firm, hips and belly swaying to the drums while the bells on her toes and fingers jangled lustily.
Kabul pushed away the Persian, who, falling to the carpeted floor, scooped up her own garments and scurried from the chamber, an unconcealed jealousy burning in her violet eyes. The young slave girl was aware of this; she laughed at the sight and flung her full attenti
on back to the waiting khan. Kabul felt his body tense with desire and expectation when the dancer cupped her breasts, teasingly offering them, nipples ripe and red, mere inches from his face. The great khan of the Huns chuckled greedily, thinking of the long hours of the night ahead and how much this dancing virgin was going to please him. Then, as the music reached its crescendo, she floated lithely about him, like a summer flower, wild and free, innocently displaying her charms, not daring to conceal the full extent of her shapely form.
She flung a kerchief at him; Kabul reached out and grabbed it, his mirth rising. Whoever had chosen this girl for him tonight had done a good job of it. Whichever son, he must be well rewarded for finding one so delicate yet so provocative here in this infernal dusty city of Samarkand.
The drone of the music ended abruptly; the dancer knelt at his sandaled feet, head bowed, mouth panting, hair tossed wildly over and below her breasts. Her hands touched the golden inseam of his dark robe, awaiting his pleasure. Kabul leaned forward and tilted her face toward him. She stared up into his scarred face, not even wincing at the ugly folds of deadened skin around his eye patch.
“What is your name, girl?” he asked, voice low and shaking, giving away his urgent desire to possess her.
A gong sounded from the outer chamber before she could reply. Kabul shot his gaze in the direction of the bronzed door, angrily sitting up and wondering who would dare to disturb him now, at this moment of pleasure.
Osklath and his youngest brother, Frizul, a near duplicate of the eldest son, stepped smartly into the room and bowed. Both were dressed in battle armor, ringlets in their chain mail jingling, knives and swords dangling from their belted waists.
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