Advent of Ruin (The Qaehl Cycle Book 1)

by Allene Lowrey

  Bahadur nodded. He slid his back up the wall he crouched against, and as he rose his knees cracked loudly. He grimaced, not because it hurt but because of the noise. So did Feroze.

  “Make sure he’s disposed of, Feroze.” Scholar Aseem’s voice was calm, as though the presence of a spy was only a minor irritant.

  “I see him, sir.” He mouthed the word go, and raised his crossbow. Bahadur nodded and took off running, and only moments later he heard the characteristic sound of a bolt being loosed even as it sliced across his shoulder. Feroze cursed from where he still stood and loosed another one, which clattered off the wall even as Bahadur rounded the first turning on the way back. He heard footsteps pursuing him. Turn by turn he ran through the maze, reasonably certain Feroze wouldn’t try to kill him so long as the Scholar wasn’t watching. The throb in his shoulder warned against being too sure of that.

  Trouble began in earnest, then, with a rumbling noise under his feet that vibrated up through his bones. A tremor? Here? Now? …Fravardin’s voice: “You weren’t perchance thinking of the giant crack in the wall of the Shrine? Pay it no mind… the crack was probably caused by a tremor” …Jaleh, now: “You say there was a bas-relief of a trident across one wall, and it was cracked? …That’s troublesome, although it might go a ways to explain” the tchraja. He’s released more monsters. Bahadur ran faster. It didn’t matter if Feroze would kill him or not. It didn’t matter if he retook his position on watch that night. It might be better if he didn’t. The only thing that mattered was getting this information back to Jaleh. She had to stop her research. Scholar Aseem hadn’t seen him; it would be less suspicious if he returned to his post and finished the mission. Feroze had seen him, though. Feroze, who might tell Scholar Aseem who the spy was. Would Aseem be willing to interrogate the man? He didn’t know. Probably. Would the monsters appear here? Surely the scholar wouldn’t risk it if unleashing the seal would get him killed, too. It wasn’t often that expeditions like this just went missing. Not often. If he left tonight, there would be no question who the spy was. If he didn’t leave tonight, he would spend the rest of the mission looking over his shoulder, wondering where the “unfortunate accident” would come from.

  There was the lamplight from the excavation! That was the hard part dealt with. Can Scholar Aseem open the door from the inside? …Wait, what am I thinking? Leave a man to starve to death in a cave, with no way out? No, never. Sand was shaking down from the ceiling in the excavation room; he might not have to do that to them. Bahadur stopped long enough to replace the lamp in its bracket. For the moment, at any rate, all he heard was the pounding of blood in his ears and the rumbling from the earth below. Maybe that meant he had time to give them the slip between the buildings.

  “Shoot him!”

  So much for that idea. He looked over his shoulder; both Feroze and the scholar were standing in the entryway to the labyrinth. So much for not being recognized, too. Feroze leveled the crossbow at him and he ran again. There was no way he would survive if he stayed now; he had to get this information to Jaleh.

  Bahadur ducked and wove between the buildings as best he could, even disappearing inside one that had not yet been cleared of dung beetles. But even once they passed it by he did not dare assume he’d lost them. He made a dash for the entrance and was relieved to find himself under the moonlight without hearing from them again. The shadows between the unearthed buildings in the pit welcomed him, and he began moving carefully and quietly back toward the ladders, his horse, and the comparative safety of the road. Amna would have her work cut out for her; this was going to be a long, difficult ride.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  There was no longer room to practice the dance at even the largest of the campsites they found. In some places she couldn’t even tell where the trail Ravi followed was, and in others the passes he led them through were so narrow they had to dismount and lead the camels. Even then sometimes they could only barely squeeze through. The rockier the terrain became, the more nervous she grew.

  The Bar’shetr Vasengu had followed them. Even in this terrain, when she looked over her shoulder she could see the tell-tale plume of dust from their movement.

  Ravi didn’t help matters any; he had drawn in on himself since they left the village of the Bar’shetr. He was probably worried, too, but that didn’t do anything to ease her mind. He also hadn’t said anything one way or the other about his pitaji comment. As much as she wanted to believe he’d forgotten about it, that was unlikely.

  They went on like this through the foothills for four days, and the mountains to their east grew more and more forbidding. Red sandstone pillars rose up in clusters, some of them stretching for miles with nothing but short, scraggly brush growing at their bases. They were rained on twice, and Ravi twitched the entire storm and for hours afterward, expecting flash floods that never came.

  Chandi spotted the formation on the fourth day of increasing silence. It was a huge sandstone pillar with a broad base and a narrow top, and arches had been carved away by the wind to shape the cat’s legs and tail. From above, rainwater had conspired with wind to create the shape of the cat’s head and the rough outline of a person in loose clothing on its back.

  “Ravi.”

  “Hmm?” From what she could see, he was looking for a way through the next impassable-looking stretch of their so-called trail.

  “I see it.”

  “Where?”

  She pointed. The formation was east by southeast from where they stood.

  He looked, shading his eyes with his hand. “Why so it is. All right; that makes this easier. Help me get them turned around.” His voice was quiet, almost husky. He must be really worried – about their plan, or possibly about their tail. Even so, it was telling that turning the camels around would be easier than getting them through whatever it was he saw ahead of them. To the right the hill sloped steeply upward, but the camels should still be able to walk on it through the scrub. The downslope on the left might have been passable for a goat or a monkey, but not much else. As Ravi turned his camel onto the upslope she saw what the problem was. The only apparent path forward from where they were was only inches wide. What was he even looking for there? We would have had to go around even if I hadn’t seen the landmark. She turned Rohana up after him and took hold of the lead line of the one behind her. The others should follow with little trouble now.

  “So, Ravi?”

  “Mmm?” Leading the camels through the turn he was more present than he had been, somehow.

  “Do you think it’ll work?”

  “Of course it will! Why else did we come all this way?” He sounded confident, at any rate.

  “I hope so.” She wished she could seem as certain, but between his “might work” back in Sararaq and the story Raghu told them she was uneasy. If it does nothing… well, if it does nothing we’re no worse off than where we started. But what if it doesn’t work the way we expect? Chandi shifted in her saddle, and Rohana grumbled. She glanced up: there was no sign of their tail today, and that realization only made her unease swell. Once they had circled around behind their last camel, Ravi led them back down the curve of the hill they had been climbing. He turned eastward into the last valley they had passed, the most likely place for their trailhead.

  “We want to keep that formation always ahead of us, Chandi. This could get more difficult from here on out.” As if they hadn’t had enough problems already.

  “I understand.” Maybe soon they’d find a real trail, even if it was nothing more than an animal track. “So does your map say how long between the rock and the spring?”

  “I’m afraid not. I don’t expect it will be very far, though, or these mountains would be better known.” He had a good point, there. She had certainly never heard of a range of mountains out here, and if they were big they would be well-known and surely she would have heard of them – from a merchant at Carnival, if not from someone at the Conclave.

  The valley wound between the
slopes of pillars and hills in the general direction of the rock formation. Long after the sun dipped behind the peaks and plunged them into a strange, shadowy time that was no longer afternoon but not yet twilight they stopped. They had not reached the valley’s end. As the light faded Chandi realized there would be room to practice by the fire that night. Abruptly she realized she was humming a tune she hadn’t heard since their caravan had arrived at Q’uungerab, when her mother had sung it in the bazaar. It was fitting, she thought, watching the sun set, so she allowed herself to sing it. Ravi looked over his shoulder, and she thought, if she looked closely in the shadows, his eyebrows greeted his hairline. It had been several days since she had ventured any music at all. To be fair, he hadn’t asked for any, either.

  “Feeling anxious tonight, then?”

  She nodded.

  “Can’t really say I blame you.” She could hear him smile, but it was tremulous. He was putting on a brave face for her, she was sure. “We’re nearly there, after all, and you’ve got a big performance coming up. I’m sure you’ll do fine.”

  “Thanks. Do you know that one?”

  “I’m afraid not. The tune is very pretty, though. Was it originally from Old Kaehr?”

  “How could you tell?”

  “The syllables are a little awkward, so it jars the ear. I don’t think that would be the case if it was composed in Trade.”

  “A lot of the songs we perform in public are older than Trade… Shall we make camp? I’d like a good practice session tonight.”

  Ravi reined in and looked around. “This should be a good spot. I wouldn’t want to try finding the trailhead until morning, anyway. Cush!”

  She had to stop herself from shivering, and it had nothing to do with the heat melting out of the desert and everything to do with the idea of taking a mountain path in the dark. Ravi was sensible, most of the time. Most of the time.

  Their campfire danced merrily that night, stirred by a cool breeze swirling down from the mountains proper, and if they ate the same meal they had every night since Rodsfahan at least it was filling. After they ate Ravi clapped out a beat for her as she danced, slowly at first with a simple warm-up sequence. The dance she practiced looked stiff and unnatural, she was certain, because it had been days since she had the room for this. Three times she ran through it, start to finish, and each a little more fluid than the last. Finally it feels like I’m getting a handle on this. And I have room to move around; I can’t very well just leave the night at practicing the ritual.

  “Pick it up a bit, Ravi. I’m going to have a bit of fun. Do you know The Lay of Jamshid?”

  He nodded.

  “Will you sing?”

  Oh, it was good to dance, no matter how exhausted or saddle-sore she might be. With only Ravi’s wavery tenor and the beat he kept with his hands she danced with abandon. Even her hair swung freely, almost wild, as she improvised a dance.

  At the end of the final repeat of the final chorus she stood looking into the crackling flames while she caught her breath. Ravi was staring at her like she was some priceless work of art; it was strange to realize she was used to that as she flopped down in the circle of light. Now that she knew him better, it was more the look of a proud papa than a kidnapper. Really, she should have known he’d offer to adopt her like he had hinted at. Only, she was Chèin’ii, and always would be. Besides, after that incident with the slavers, she wasn’t sure he was quite stable.

  “Once you’ve cooled down a little we should get some sleep. We can’t rest just yet.”

  “I know. But it’s a nice night, and we haven’t had many chances lately to take it easy of an evening… I should look at your shoulder.” In truth it was all but healed – I think – but she was no sran and it could still get infected – I think. She moved over to their gear to get the salve from her bags.

  “If you insist.”

  “I do, and if Basu were here he’d scold me for not doing it every night.”

  “If Basu were here, he’d do it himself, but that hasn’t been possible.”

  “I know. Now take off your tunic and let me look.”

  Ravi rolled his eyes even as he shrugged out of his leather coat. He didn’t actually mind, she was sure – after all, what could be more familial – but he liked to make a show of complaining about it. He shivered, and she saw gooseflesh.

  “Try to be quick about it. That wind is cold.”

  “It’s not so bad. Just have a little patience.” She was already unwrapping the bandage around his left shoulder. The skin was pink and new, and there would be quite an impressive scar in short order, but it was the half-healed muscle tissue underneath that she was minding. The salve was nearly gone; she didn’t know if it only worked on the skin or not, but it certainly couldn’t hurt to keep using it. Right?

  The salve was cool and smooth under her fingers, and spread easily over the last wound remaining from Ravi’s mad fight. For a man her father’s age he had very good skin and not a lot of muscle, and most of the cuts had been too small to scar. You wouldn’t know he’d been hurt, now, until he tried to lift something heavy. She’d seen him testing it as they rode during the day.

  “How is it feeling?”

  “Better. I have most of my range of motion back.”

  “Good. We must be doing something right, then. I’m going to retie it now.”

  “Thank you.” Ravi leaned his weight back on his right arm. “I must be a trial to deal with sometimes.”

  “It’s not so bad. You’re almost like an uncle these days.”

  He winced.

  “Did it pinch?”

  “No, it’s fine.” There was that husky note again.

  “All right… Okay, all set. It’s looking pretty good, I think.”

  Ravi nodded, and wasted no time pulling his tunic back on. She noticed he winced again as he tugged it over his head.

  “You should probably call it a night, Chandi. Go on, get some sleep. I’ll be in shortly.”

  As she ducked into the tent it seemed like he was settling around the fire, and she couldn’t tell if it was the fire or the stars that drew his eye. She hoped he didn’t waste the whole night worrying.

  * * *

  When Chandi rose the next morning she stepped out into a world still covered in shadow despite the bright clear blue of the sky. Ravi was tending the camels, and last night’s fire was reduced to no more than a few glowing embers. She had slept, she was sure, but she did not feel at all rested, and today would be another day of hard riding. She thought she should feel some sort of anticipation – they were almost at their goal, after all – but if she was honest with herself all she really felt was fatigue on top of stiffness from muscles that were no longer used to dancing.

  “Shall I build up the fire a bit and toast some asath?” They had managed to save a few wafers after their soaking, but if they ran out before they could resupply Chandi wouldn’t complain. Toasting made them slightly more palatable, at least, and warm food sounded better than a handful of nuts and dried fig as they rode.

  “Go ahead, as long as you can do it quickly. I want us heading up the trail before the heat of the day.”

  She gathered up a few of the twigs that had been on the edges last night and were only half-burned and lay them over the still-warm core of the fire pit before she knelt down to blow a gentle stream of air over the glowing remnants. The dark silhouette in one of the coals brought to mind the silhouette of Ravi’s face as he stared into the fire the night before while she tended to his bandages. His face was closing itself off again, he was closing himself off, like it had been on the road to Sararaq. He must be as worried as she was, as nervous, to be so pensive. She blinked as a spark jumped toward her eye; it flickered and floated away inches from her face, but it was enough to startle her back to the moment. The twigs had caught; it was time to add a few larger pieces, and then for breakfast.

  Toasting asath over an open flame was trickier than it sounded, especially if you wanted to avoid bu
rning yourself. She nearly managed, and was proud of herself for not dropping the bread when flame licked her fingers. It was a near thing, the second time, but it didn’t fall, and within ten minutes of when the fire crackled back to life they at least had warm bread to go with their nuts and figs. If they’d had even a little honey, the asath would have been better. At least toasting brought out the flavor of the grains. Somehow, she would have expected Ravi to have learned to cook for himself on the road, but he made do with the simplest of trail foods. As for her, she dearly missed the thick, spicy stews of the caravan and Pari’s dumplings.

  “Here you go, Ravi.”

  “Thanks.” He took the proffered wafer and held it in his mouth to finish securing one of the packs before he bit down. “Ready to ride again today?”

  “Don’t have much choice in the matter, do I?” She said it lightly; she had chosen to come along, knowing it would be a long trip like this. Complaining would be foolish.

  “Hah! I suppose not. …You’re not regretting the trip, are you?”

  “Of course not. We’re going to save the world. Just… the adventure never quite turns out the way the stories lead you to believe.”

  “That’s because the stories leave out all the boring parts. People wouldn’t pay attention to a quiet week in the desert, would they?”

  “No, certainly not. Instead, the hero would be fighting their way past bandits and wild animals and who knows what other manner of creature every step of the way. I am familiar with the concept, Ravi.” She crunched into her own wafer and followed it immediately with a bite of fig. It helped, a little. Even as they ate they began stamping the fire back out and scattering dust over the ashes. No sense leaving the possibility of a brush fire behind them.

  The valley narrowed almost imperceptibly as they moved along, until at one point around midmorning Chandi blinked and realized it had closed in around them. They also seemed to be climbing, if slowly. At least they were unlikely to end up in a ravine right away. The scrub brush was getting thicker on the ground, too, which was always a welcome sign.