by John Marco
It was death.
5
The worst part about crossing a desert isn’t the heat. It’s not the way the flies eat your skin or the fear of running out of water, either. The problem is how small it makes you feel. Anyone who’s done it knows what I mean. Once you’ve traveled for just a few hours, you look back and see nothing. And when you look ahead you see nothing, and you keep looking and looking and there’s nothing. There’s just sand and dunes and the horizon. There’s a fever that sets in when all you see is desert. If a man isn’t careful, it can madden him.
I had made the crossing more than once, and wasn’t afraid for myself. I knew how to guard against the desert’s bewitchments. We had our mounts and our mules loaded with everything we’d need, and I had my map. Still, I worried about Cricket. All that first day I watched her for signs of trouble, careful to measure the look in her eyes. We were just two people, infinitely small with an ocean of sand around us and nowhere to turn if trouble arose.
But Cricket was better than her word. She rode without complaint, quietly studying the dunes on the horizon, glancing up occasionally to marvel at the sun. She drank only sparingly and only when I said so, and she quickly adopted the habit of desert people of not speaking too often, a way of saving both strength and body moisture. I knew as I watched her that I’d made the right choice.
Our journey, though, would be a long one, because I had mapped out a route that looped south beneath Ganjor, avoiding it entirely. Almost everyone who came through the desert did so through Ganjor, especially if they were from the continent. We could have rested there for days, refreshed our animals and gotten new supplies, but only if I wasn’t recognized. King Baralosus might have given me Zephyr as a peace offering, but I doubted he’d be happy to see me.
So we rode south for one day then another and spent our nights beneath the stars. I took watch at night, afraid a rass might find us, and in the morning slept for just an hour. “Tomorrow night we’ll sleep somewhere special,” I promised Cricket.
“Where?” she insisted. She had taken off the cape of rass skin, deciding wisely to wear it only at night. Now we both wore clothing from the continent-good, plain shirts and trousers instead of gakas. We did, however, cover our heads with hoods. Cricket’s hood swallowed most of her face, but her eyes danced excitedly as she looked at me.
“A spring,” I told her. “A Seeker from Norvor told me about it. Said he came across this way himself. He told me right where to find it.”
“You sure he wasn’t lying, Lukien? No one from Norvor goes around Ganjor. . unless they’re criminals or something.”
“Norvor’s full of criminals,” I said, not really caring. Mostly the shanties around Jador were filled with decent folks, but some shady types had come across the desert, too. “No reason for him to lie. I know the desert well enough. What he described sounded right to me.”
“We’ll make it there by tomorrow night? You’re sure?”
“Tomorrow night we’ll be sleeping under palm trees, slurping up fruit. That sound all right to you?”
Cricket’s face turned dreamy. “Sure does. You know what I’m gonna do? I’m going to soak my feet in that spring.”
“We’ll take our time there, dawdle a bit the next morning. Can’t say we’re in a real hurry.”
As soon as I said it, I was sorry. Cricket grimaced and faced forward again. She was in a hurry. I didn’t apologize because there was no sense to it. We just kept on riding.
* * *
We did find the oasis the next day, right where the Norvan said it would be. By the time we reached it, dusk was settling over the desert. The wearying journey showed on Cricket’s face now, but when she saw the spring-surrounded by trees and grasses and tucked against a shading ridge-she beamed.
“Please, please, tell me that’s not a mirage, Lukien,” she said, and charged toward it on her pony. I let her go, laughing, understanding her almost delirious happiness. The Desert of Tears was blessed with very few spots like this one, a greenish island in an ocean of sand. Fruit hung heavily off the ancient trees, trees so worn and weather-beaten their roots erupted from the soil. I heard insects chirping in the grasses, felt a coolness strike my face. My parched mouth longed for water.
“Can I drink?” called Cricket. She quickly dismounted and eyed the spring, bubbling up into a river that stretched out into the desert, where it died.
“If it smells right, drink it,” I answered, watching her as I led Zephyr and the mules into the shade of the ridge. Cricket knelt down near the spring and cupped her hands full of water. She took one sniff and smiled.
“I don’t smell anything. That’s good, right?”
“Right,” I said and dropped down from Zephyr’s back. The water was just as the Norvan described it-clear as rain. Cricket poured it into her mouth, then splashed her whole face with it. Then she looked deep into the bubbling pool.
“There’s no end to it!” she crowed. “We can have as much as we want!”
I led Zephyr and the mules toward the water. “Get your mount. A squire always waters his horse first.”
Cricket looked chastened. “Sorry.” She got up quickly and retrieved her pony, letting it drink with the other animals. “There’s a lot to being a squire.”
“You’ll learn it,” I said. “Now, though. . we rest.”
* * *
It was easy to lose track of time at the oasis. We unburdened the animals, rolled out our sleeping blankets to flatten the tall grass, and soaked our feet in the spring water. Cricket was careful to pay attention to the mounts, making sure they were settled and comfortable. She even went through our supplies to give me an accounting of what we brought with us. But when she came to the case carrying my bronze armor, she paused.
I watched her as I leaned back, opening a fruit with my dagger. The leather case had traveled with me from Liiria to Norvor and then to Jador. It contained the only precious things I owned, save for the Sword of Angels. The case wasn’t locked, and I could tell Cricket wanted to look inside.
“Go on,” I told her. “You’re my squire. You should check it from time to time.”
Cricket knelt over the case like it was a treasure chest. As she opened it, the bronze armor reflected yellow on her face. Unlike my sword, there was nothing magical about my armor. Still, people who saw it always got a strange look in their eyes, like they were seeing something priceless. I pried open my fruit and drank its sweet nectar.
“Here,” I said, offering her the bigger half. “Sit with me and talk.”
Cricket softly closed the case. “Will you wear it when we get to Akyre?” she asked. “You should. You should announce to everyone that a hero has come.”
Her adoration made me uncomfortable. “That armor’s for fighting, not for showing off. I’ll wear it if I need to. Otherwise it stays in the box.”
“Oh, there’ll be fighting,” she said. She scraped her top teeth over the fruit meat. Her brown eyes darted up toward the moon.
“What makes you so certain?”
“’Cause we’re heading to the Bitter Kingdoms.”
“Are you remembering something, Cricket?”
She shook her head. “Nothing new. I just know it, is all. Trouble made me lose my memory. That I know for sure.”
I didn’t know much about the Bitter Kingdoms back then, but I knew Cricket was right. They were little kingdoms, ruled-if you could call it that-by blood-soaked barons. Mostly folks just passed on through the Bitter Kingdoms on their way east for spices. That made the Bitter Kingdoms poor, and that made them covetous. Cricket was lucky to have escaped.
“Tell me what you do remember,” I said.
“What? Nothing’s changed.”
“They found you wandering around Akyre, Borlis and the others. You were alone. Starving, they said.”
“I remember,” said Cricket sharply. “Before that’s the problem.”
For a long moment I didn’t say anything. I hoped the peace of the night would loos
en her tongue and maybe her memory too. “Look at that moon. You ever see one so big? They say the heat here makes it look like that, all pink and shimmery. I like to watch it.”
I stared at the moon, and Cricket stared too. Then she let out a big, relaxing sigh.
“What will we do when we get to Akyre, Lukien?” she asked. “How are we going to find out about me?”
“I’m not really sure,” I told her honestly. “Look around. See if you recognize anyone, or anyone recognizes you. Ask some questions. First we have to find out what’s going on in Akyre. The things I hear don’t make me happy.”
Cricket nodded, because she knew the stories too. War stories, mostly. Atrocities and all the things that come with war. Cricket gazed blankly at the moon.
“Cricket. .” I said it softly. “How do you know your name’s Cricket? How can you remember that, if you can’t remember anything else?”
She shrugged. “How do you know your name’s Lukien? I just do is all. I haven’t forgotten how to talk or walk either. It’s just some things I can’t remember. Sometimes it’s on the tip of my tongue and I can’t get it out. .” She closed her eyes and grumbled, “It makes me crazy! I try to remember. I have dreams sometimes and can’t remember them.”
“Don’t force it. You have to come at this thing from the side, not head on. It’ll all fall in place eventually. Maybe when we get to Akyre.”
Cricket put down the fruit and drew her rass skin cape around her shoulders. She looked tired but restless too, like she wanted to keep talking.
“There’s one thing I remember,” she said. Her eyes narrowed as she focused on the memory. “A waterfall. Maybe a river, but I think it’s a waterfall. I can see myself there.”
“In Akyre?” I asked.
She closed her eyes completely. “Yes. Definitely Akyre. I can see it, kind of.”
“What else do you see? Are you alone?”
“I’m. .”
She struggled, holding her breath. And then she opened her eyes and looked at me.
“Can we go there, Lukien?”
“Where? You don’t even know if it’s a river or a waterfall.”
“We can find it. Akyre’s not a big country. We could ask around. We could do that, right?”
She was fixated suddenly, and I didn’t understand it. “Sure,” I told her. “We could do that.”
Like a charm, the promise calmed her. She leaned back against the ridge. “Now it’s your turn,” she said. “Tell me something you remember.”
“You’re an imp. It’s late. I don’t feel like talking.”
“Ah, you’re always making excuses. You have as many secrets as I do, Lukien.” Cricket smiled at me. “I just want to know about you, that’s all. Not just the stories everybody says about you. Not just how you lost your eye. Before that.”
“Oh. When I was your age, you mean.”
Her brown eyes blinked at me. I couldn’t escape. So I settled back and told her what life was like for me before becoming “the Bronze Knight.” I told her about growing up in the streets of Liiria, about how I lived by breaking into stores to keep warm at night and by stealing food. My mother had died before I was old enough to have memories of her. But when it came time to tell Cricket about my father, I had to stop. What could I say about a man who left me to fend for myself? Who one day decided that life was too tough for him?
“There’s only one way a man should leave his family,” I said finally. “By dying.”
Cricket looked baffled. “He just left you? Out there on the street?”
I couldn’t look at her. I stared at the moon. “Right.”
“Didn’t you wonder what happened to him? Didn’t you try to find him?”
“You mean beg? You can’t beg someone to love you, Cricket. I decided it was easier to hate him. Now. .” I stood up and brushed the sand from my trousers. “It’s late and I’m tired. More next time, all right?”
As I walked toward my bedroll, Cricket said, “Lukien? You think I’ll ever be able to remember stuff like that?”
All of a sudden she sounded like a little girl. And I was the closest thing she had to a father.
“Yes, I do,” I told her. “When you’re in a stronger, safer place, you’ll be able to remember. That’s why I’m here. So we can find that place together.”
6
Malator had been strangely quiet since we left Jador. For the first two days I felt him hovering just out of reach, like a child peeking around a corner. Within the sword I could feel his presence, stoic but solid, but by our fifth day I could barely sense him at all. He had stopped speaking to me entirely, and when I touched the sword it was almost like a normal blade at my side.
Perhaps I had been hard on Malator, and perhaps his silence was just childish payback, but I was determined that he should be my servant now and not the other way around. Akari are kind and generous with their powers, but they aren’t angels, and they aren’t selfless. They see the world from a mountain peak none of us can ever reach, but there’s one thing they forget-they need us, we poor humans. I intended to remind Malator of that.
Our fifth day in the desert was blazing hot. By noon the sun felt like fire on our hoods. The sand, which was everywhere now, blinded us as we tried to look ahead. We had already skirted south of Ganjor, making good progress east. Maybe two more days of riding and we’d be out of the desert. That alone was enough to give us confidence. With the sun mighty on our backs, I let Cricket drink her fill from our canteens. Head down, I rode without thinking.
“Lukien?”
Cricket’s voice took me out of my daydream.
“Look at that,” she said, pointing north. A caravan of drowa riders were heading east as well, their path slowly crossing our own. They were still far away, but I knew they had seen us; the gait of their hairy mounts slowed a little.
“Ganjeese,” I said.
Cricket’s voice rose. “Really? How do you know that?”
“First, because no one else would be traveling east. And look how they ride-like an arrowhead, you see?”
“Uh huh.”
“They ride like that to keep the rass away,” I said. “It doesn’t work.”
We had gone all this way without seeing another soul. We were practically knocking on the door of the Bitter Kingdoms. And now Ganjeese. My hand went fast to my sword.
“Malator? You still here?”
I don’t know why I doubted it, because Malator barreled into my mind.
Company?
“Maybe trouble, maybe not,” I said. Cricket looked at me, but she knew who I was talking to. “We can’t avoid them.”
“They’re coming this way,” said Cricket.
“Hospitality of the desert. They’ll ask if we need anything, maybe try to trade.”
“But they’re gonna know we’re from Jador.”
“No way to hide it. Keep riding,” I said, “and don’t be afraid.”
As we closed the distance I could see their expensive looking clothes, the kind of colored silks and dyed skins the wealthy of the city wore. There were four men, with a big, well-fed fellow leading them. He rode at the tip of the arrow, bouncing on his drowa with a scimitar strapped across his chest. A jet mustache glistened against his dark face. When we were finally close enough, he raised his hand in greeting.
“Aman da Vala,” he called.
The words mean ‘Vala watches us.’ Even Cricket understood, but as a girl she wasn’t supposed to return the greeting. I lifted my own hand and called back the response.
“Vala kabar shahan.”
‘The great god Vala blesses us,’ I said, and didn’t believe a word of it. I brought my horse abreast with Cricket’s pony. The big man puzzled over my accent, looking at our clothes.
“North,” he said. “You come from Ganjor?”
“From Jador,” I answered and pulled back my hood.
All of them-the big man and the younger ones behind him-fixed on my eye patch. The big man’s hand twitched li
ke he might go for his weapon.
“A one-eyed man from Jador,” he said, effortlessly using my own language. Instead of reaching for his scimitar he twirled his oiled mustache. “You are like I see when I have dreams of you, Bronze Knight of Liiria.”
We’d all stopped dead in front of each other, and no one moved an inch closer. “Do you know me, azizi?” I asked, using the Ganjeese word for friend. Cricket was so quiet next to me that I thought she’d stopped breathing.
“The desert is too hot for games,” said the big man. “I am Sariyah of Ganjor, and these are my sons. .” He gestured to the others. “And you are Lukien of Liiria. How many sons do you see, please?”
His question startled me. “I see three sons.”
Sariyah nodded. “You see three sons. You do not see a fourth son because my fourth son is dead. Killed by Jadori.”
Sariyah looked at me without flinching. I tried to read his face but couldn’t.
“Your son was a warrior for Baralosus,” I guessed. “A lot of men died that day. Many azizi. Many Jadori.”
Sariyah leaned over and spat into the sand to his right. “Baralosus is a pig.”
“We agree.” Quickly I offered him honors. “The warriors of Ganjor were brave that day. I am told they died like heroes. In Jador we grieve all your sons.”
Sariyah’s dark face softened. He turned to his sons and ordered them to reveal their faces, a sign of respect. All shared their father’s sharp, handsome nose, especially the youngest one, who looked barely Cricket’s age.
“Many in Ganjor blame you for that battle, Shalafein,” said Sariyah. He wasn’t at all afraid, though he clearly knew my reputation. “But I am wiser.”
“I was far away from that battle,” I said.
“And now you are far from Jador again.”
He looked inquisitive, too polite to ask directly what was on his mind.
“We go east,” I told him. I turned to Cricket. “It’s all right. Show yourself.”