“We need to know how he became so powerful,” Iyasu said.
“Do you really?” Jevad opened his eyes and slowly sat up with a wince. “But then, I suppose that is what you do, isn’t it, seer? You study. You watch. You peer beneath the skin. Well, perhaps it’s time to turn the tables.”
The warrior flashed out of the pit and snatched Iyasu from Azrael’s side, and in the time it took her to blink and see another dozen faces crying out in their final moments, Jevad had Iyasu pinned against a stone pillar with his fingers digging into the young seer’s neck.
“No! Stop!” She reached toward him but did not move. “Don’t kill him!”
“Kill my hostage? Not yet. He’ll live long enough to see me escape, at least. But once I’m gone, I cannot guarantee his survival. In fact, quite the opposite.”
“Samira!” Azrael looked up at the djinn cleric still standing atop her own pillar a short distance away, surrounded by grim soldiers.
“I’m here,” the cleric replied.
“Iyasu…” The angel gazed into his eyes. He tried to speak but the hand on his throat choked off his words, and so all he could do was nod and close his eyes.
Everyone moved at once. Jevad began to fade into a blur of red silk and dark sand, with the white robes of the Arrahim flying from his bloody fist. Samira vanished from her perch in a burst of dust and a swirl of black robes. And Azrael raised her wings and flew.
She flew forward, straight into the red blur of the djinn warlord and caught his throat in her hand, slamming him to a sudden halt that released a shockwave that rippled through the earth and roared through the air like a thundercrack. Iyasu was ripped free from his captor by the force of the impact and his body tumbled through the air to smash into a boulder, where he crumpled and fell to the ground. But Azrael barely saw the blood begin to trickle across his face before Samira appeared at his side, wrapped her arms around him, and vanished again.
He’s safe now.
The Angel of Death held the djinn warrior in her hand, dangling from his neck. But he did not struggle, or gasp, or even grab her arm. He smiled.
“How can a djinn have the power of an angel?” she asked.
He said nothing.
She smashed his head against the rocky ground and raised him up again. A dozen dying faces cried out in her heart, and she felt a gasp of relief that none of them were Iyasu. “Tell me!”
He said nothing.
Again, she slammed his body against the ground, and against a boulder, and through a crooked pillar of ancient desert rock. The dead and dying men and women continued to flow through her, sobbing and shrieking and silent. “Tell me!”
He bared his teeth and hissed, “We took it.”
And he vanished.
“NO!” Azrael screamed at her empty hands and whirled in search of her prey, but he was gone, gone completely, and no trace of his strange spirit remained in the Pillars of Abari. And instead of the djinn warrior, she saw the dirty, sweaty, confused faces of the legion, wave upon wave of men dressed for war, armed for war, marching out across the desert to kill, to slaughter, to butcher.
She stood tall and cried out to them, “Go back to your homes. Go back where you belong. Throw down your weapons and live in peace, and never kill again. Never!”
The crowd trembled and murmured, and a voice called back from the multitude, “Who are you?”
She curled her hands into fists, and then opened them wide as she spread her magnificent black wings and leapt into the air high above them for the second time and shouted, “I am Azrael, the Angel of Death!”
The sound of falling steel shrieked over the hot wind as thousands of swords and spears crashed down upon the sandy rocks at their feet. Some of the men stood transfixed as though turned to stone themselves, and some turned and ran, and still others dropped to their knees and pressed their faces to the earth.
But the faces of the dying continued to stream through her, and the pain of watching them for the familiar features of the young seer grew too great. Azrael folded her wings and streaked across the sky westward. The wagons and horses, the poisoned soldiers, the wounded company, and the jagged walls of the desert itself all passed in a blur of light and shadow.
There, there they are!
She saw the people and horses, instantly recognizing the shapes of Faris and Jengo, and the djinn spirit of Samira and the holy power in Veneka as the healer bent over a still figure. Azrael landed on running feet as her wings vanished and she fell to her knees at the seer’s side. Veneka leaned back, taking her hands away, and Azrael scooped the slender body up and pressed it tightly to her chest as she closed her eyes.
The faces of the dead marched on, their voices soft and garbled, their souls raging and grieving. So many faces. Dark and light, smooth and wrinkled, bare and bearded.
But none of them were his.
“I’m here,” she whispered.
“So am I,” he whispered back.
Chapter 27
Iyasu
The young seer sat at the top of the palace steps, gazing out over the roofs of Tagal as the sun rose directly in front of him, forcing him to squint at the bright glare spreading across the sky and shining on the calm surface of the Leyen River.
Four days. Four days without Jevad. Four days without war. Four days of peace.
A pair of lazy feet chuffed and shuffled across the stone floor toward him, and he smiled. “Good morning, Zerai.”
“Morning.” The falconer sat down with a thump and proceeded to gnaw on a piece of lamb.
“Up all night again?”
“Faris is very good at celebrating.”
“Well, he has a good reason to.”
“Yes, but how long will it last?”
Iyasu glanced back over his shoulder to look down the long shadowy corridor of the palace. “Well, as long as Jevad doesn’t come back, I think it will last a very long time. Faris is a perfectly decent person and he will be a perfectly decent king. Thanks to you, I think.”
“Me?”
“You and Veneka. I know she healed him. I’m so sorry that I never realized… I just thought it was the pain of his size, not a pain in his bones. I can’t imagine how that’s shaped his heart over the years. And that little stunt you pulled in the canyon helped him more than you know. Fighting monsters, saving children, getting him to trust his own body, his own strength. He’s healing, inside and out. I think he’ll do just fine now.”
“And he has Jengo.”
Iyasu grinned. “Yes, he has Jengo.”
“And you?”
The seer sighed. “No.”
“Really? You could do a lot of good here, now. Make a perfect city, a perfect kingdom. Peace and prosperity. You could build giant libraries, or whatever it is you like.”
Iyasu laughed. “Why would I like libraries?”
“I don’t know. You just seem the type.”
“No, libraries are boring. Nothing to look at but writing. I’m a seer, you know. I like to see things. Interesting things. New things.”
“So is that what you plan to do now? See new things?”
“More or less.” He paused. “I’m going for a bit of a walk. Out there.” He waved vaguely at the horizon.
“Just to see it all?”
“Not just. I mean, look at what we did here. Just the handful of us. We stopped a war. We saved all these people.”
“Well, you did. I wasn’t there at the end.”
“You were there when I didn’t die. That’s close enough.”
They laughed.
The falconer sniffed. “So that’s it then? You’re going to wander all the roads, see all the sights, and solve all the problems in the world? God… that’s going to take days, isn’t it?”
Iyasu laughed again. “Two weeks at least.”
“No, but seriously. What are you doing?”
“Just like you said. Walk all the roads. Solve all the problems. Well, I say all, but maybe not all. I really made a mess of th
ings here, trying to help a king, trying to rule a country. I’m not ready for this. I’m seventeen years old, who thought I was ready for this?” He grinned. “Maybe someday, but not yet. But out there in the world? Regular people, regular problems, one at a time. That I think I can do.”
“Well, maybe. But you might want to bring a sword or a falcon with you. Things can get a little rough out there in the world, especially in places with regular problems.”
“I know. But I have something better than a sword. I have her.” He nodded to their right, indicating the dark figure pacing along the roof of the temple in the distance.
“Really? You and… her?” Zerai winced. “Is that allowed?”
“Love? Yes. Love is allowed.”
“Even the sort of love with no clothes on?”
Iyasu smiled and blushed. “Yes. Just no children, apparently. That’s the rule. And it’s one I can live with. I think that if I ever feel the need to have a child, I’ll probably find one in need of me right about the same time. Don’t you think?”
“Could be.”
“Speaking of which, how are things? Did you talk to Veneka?”
“I did. It was good. Turns out, she’s just afraid that we’d be terrible parents on account of us both being miserable crazy orphans who grew up in demon-infested wastelands.”
“Oh, is that all?”
Zerai grinned. “I think we can work through that one.”
“I hope so.”
“Hm. It’s good to see you smile. When you showed up in Rumaya that day, with the catoblepas, I thought everything good inside you had died. You were so… bleak. Broken. Gray. You weren’t you, not the you I remembered, anyway. But here you are now. Maybe she brought you back to life. The Angel of Death. Good for her. Good for both of you.”
Iyasu smiled as he watched Azrael walking in the bright morning light. There was a tiny dance in her feet, a lightness in the way she moved, and the sight of it kept the corners of his mouth curled up.
She’s seen what I’ve seen, and more.
She’s felt what I’ve felt, and more.
And we’re going to save the world.
Together.
“Did you hear about Talia?” Zerai asked.
“I did.” Iyasu shrugged. “I hope it works out for her.”
Samira had taken one look at the pregnant woman carrying not just Bashir’s child but Bashir’s soul as well, and announced that she would be taking her back to Odashena with her, and if anyone in the djinn city objected to the breach of custom, they would have to answer to the Tevadim herself.
“Did she ever say what happened to her sister?”
“No, she didn’t say.” Iyasu sighed.
She didn’t have to.
“I still think we should be paying a little more attention to the whole miracle business there. Souls jumping bodies. Half-djinn babies. How is that not important?”
“It’s very important. It helped me to figure out what Darius was. What Jevad was. But I think we should just count ourselves fortunate to have witnessed something so special in the middle of our little… disaster. And if there is some other significance to Talia, or her child, then we will figure it out when we come to it.”
“Really?”
“Really. I mean, Hamza Bashir lived some terribly tragic, romantic, sad life that we know nothing about. Who’s to say his story wasn’t the point of it all, and we weren’t just a few people who showed up at the end of his tale to help him along? To make his peace, to see his lost love one last time, to bring his child into the world.”
“Well, that’s my point,” Zerai said. “We should be keeping an eye on that child.”
Iyasu laughed. “We will. Samira will, at least for now. We’ll figure out the rest later.”
“Later.” The falconer shrugged. “Fair enough.”
They chatted on for a few more minutes, making each other laugh and saying absolutely nothing more about what had happened over the last few days. Eventually Zerai went back inside, and left the seer to watch the Angel of Death walk alone with the warm air playing through her long black hair.
With the sun fully risen, Iyasu stood and went back inside the palace, took up his scarred and battered staff, and found Zerai and Veneka. There were hugs and promises to visit, and worried looks, and he smiled and said what they needed to hear, and then he left them alone in their room. A few minutes later he found Faris and Jengo sitting with a pair of young soldiers and an old priest playing dice, and he repeated the ritual with them, hugging and promising and smiling until he felt it was safe to leave without causing offense. And he left.
He found Azrael by the fountain in front of the temple, waiting for him.
“Ready?” she asked.
He nodded and took her hand, and they began walking up the main thoroughfare toward the southern gate. They left the city of Tagal without being stopped or questioned or even seen, and passed through the deserted neighborhood outside the wall to the sounds of hippos bellowing in the Leyen off to their left.
They managed to walk all morning through the dust and sun and wind before seeing anyone. And then there they were, three men in the ramshackle remains of professional armor, bits of bronze here and there on their chests and arms, notched short swords and short spears in their hands. And all of their eyes were fixed on the young man and the dark lady at his side.
The three bandits stepped out into the road, barring the way.
Iyasu raised his empty hand. “Good morning. Thank you for getting up to greet us, but there’s no need. We’re not stopping.”
The bandits started forward, walking with grim purpose in their blank and angry eyes.
Iyasu cast his piercing gaze over them and saw all the signs he needed. Their injuries, their unfamiliarity with their weapons, the signs of what their old professions had been before they were reduced to this. He called out to the one on his left, “Your knee isn’t going to heal properly on its own. But if you let me wrap it and treat it, it should be all right.”
A strange look passed over the man’s face.
Iyasu called out to the man on the right, “The fishing on the Leyen has been particularly bad this year, I know. But farther up where the rivers meet, you’ll find much better catches. I can show you where they are.”
The man on the right hesitated and glanced at his fellows.
Iyasu called out to the man in the center, “Your father died trying to save this country. He loved this country. He believed in its greatness. I don’t think he would want to see you doing this. I think he would want to see you protecting it, as he did.”
The man in the center stopped dead, and the other two stopped beside him. They were only a few paces away now, but the tips of their weapons were drooping toward the ground.
“What are you? Some sort of priest?” the man in the center asked.
“A cleric.” Iyasu nodded.
“You don’t know us!”
“I do, a little.” He pointed at the man on the left. “He wrenched his knee last night, rather badly I should say. Not so badly that he can’t walk on it now, but badly enough to make him clench his jaw and favor the other leg. But it needs to be bound.” He indicated the man on the right, saying, “He has the calluses of a fisherman, there on his fingers. Good with nets, I’m sure, very good. And everyone knows the Leyen’s been fished dry by Darius these last few months to feed his army. But I do know some better places to the south.”
“So you have sharp eyes. So what? What about my father?” The man in the center glared at him. “How do you know about him?”
“Because I worked with him in the palace. I knew him, the minister of engineering. And I was there when he died. When Darius killed him. But not before the day when he pointed out his son to me, a certain foreman on one of the crews working on the west wall. And I never forget a face.” Iyasu swallowed the memory of the minister away and managed a brief smile. “Never.”
The man in the center wavered, regripping his sword.
“So what? So he’s dead, so you knew him. It doesn’t mean anything.” And he started forward again.
“Please don’t,” Iyasu said. “I don’t want you to get hurt.”
The man raised his sword.
A blast of wind hurled the man off his feet and flung him backward down the road past the other two men, who ignored him completely and stared at the woman. Iyasu looked over and saw the magnificent black wings spread out behind a wondrous heavenly creature, and as the wings faded she lost that otherworldly majesty like the fading of the last day’s light, and became, quite simply, the most beautiful woman in the world.
She is, too. So beautiful. I wonder if that would mean anything to her, if I were to tell her. It seems sort of petty, sort of superficial.
He smiled.
I’ll tell her anyway.
Iyasu strode forward and shook hands with the two stunned men. He took the weapons from their hands and tossed them aside, and gently encouraged the two of them to begin walking south along the road with them. He paused again to help the third man up, disarm him, and add him to their number.
And again he took the hand of the Angel of Death, and he started whistling one of Edris’s songs as they strode along together.
“That’s a pretty song,” Azrael said.
“You’re a pretty girl,” Iyasu said.
She looked at him. “Why would you say that?”
“No reason at all. Except because it’s true.” He grinned at her. “I’m a seer, you know. I’ve seen a lot of faces, and yours is definitely my favorite.”
“And yours is mine.” She smiled back at him and squeezed his hand. “Now, let’s go see the world.”
About the Author
Joseph Robert Lewis enjoys creating worlds in which history, mythology, and fantasy collide in new and exciting ways. He also likes writing about heroines that his daughters can respect and admire, characters who blaze their own paths with bright minds and unbreakable spirits.
Joe was born in Annapolis and went to the University of Maryland to study ancient novels, morality plays, and Viking poetry. Outside of the world of fiction, he works with a lot of smart people to write and publish books about technology, software, politics, economics, and history.
War of the Magi: Azrael's Wrath (Book 2) Page 30