UW02. Plains of Sand and Steel

by Alisha Klapheke

  “Fuming? What is she angry about?” Seren kept her voice down as they passed two converging canals. Water splashed under the cover of the tents, sounding like a crowd whispering.

  “That you didn’t kill the king. That you’re keeping prisoners alive. You shouldn’t trouble yourself with what one mercenary thinks but—”

  “But there could be more who share her anger. And now Varol is here to happily take on disgruntled warriors to fight me.”

  “Exactly.”

  “I’ll have to execute the king eventually. I can’t say I’ll be very mournful about it. But I have to wait and see what makes the most sense strategically. There could be uses for him that we haven’t yet thought of. Kaptan Rashiel agrees.”

  “Maybe you could listen to what Ona has to say? Maybe it’ll give you some insight on possible outcomes?”

  “I agree.”

  Lucca’s watched the road, eyes wary, his body close to hers. Nothing in his face said he judged her incompetent. He simply stood by her and helped when she seemed to need it most. Her heart glowed warmer and warmer as they walked on.

  “I thank the Holy Fire I met you, Lucca.”

  He blinked, then smiled. “I hope you don’t regret that after all this is through. I should probably stay away from you completely, considering.”

  “Don’t you dare. Anyone who tries to take you from my side will suffer severe consequences.”

  Lucca’s eyes shone. “Your wishes are my wishes, Kyros Seren.”

  “Is that a Silvanian saying?”

  “It’s a Lucca and Ona saying. Ona always follows it with As long as yours don’t war with mine.”

  “Yes. That sounds like her.”

  Seren hoped she could help Ona understand the need to be careful with their prisoners and not act rashly. Ona would be the worst kind of enemy. Seren would have to make time to listen to her, to explain too. But that would have to wait until she had a firm grip on what this siege looked like. Seren wanted to see the battlefield with her own eyes.

  Qadira’s father, leader of Clan Azjorr stopped near Seren, bowed low, and raised a palm—more than necessary for a casual public appearance. “Kyros Seren, we support you in full.”

  Qadira herself, and her younger sister and mother, joined him. They bowed too, but Qadira sneered, giving Seren a pretty clear picture of what she really thought about this unplanned display of support.

  “I appreciate your words, Azjorr,” Seren said to the chieftain, nodding to both husband and wife.

  The wife smiled sadly. “Kyros Seren, we are your people.”

  “Please,” the chieftain said. “Please claim your place.”

  An ore master, possibly one Adem had been whispering with lately, came around the corner. He walked behind them, not even noticing Seren’s presence.

  Lucca tensed.

  Seren turned to the family. “Please be careful.”

  Qadira twisted to see who Seren was looking at before Seren and her retinue continued on.

  So Azjorr would support her against Varol. But to keep her place, she’d have to think up a way to win against the coming siege to prove she was meant to be the Empire’s kyros, its protector and caretaker, its leader blessed by the Fire. If only she could figure out what the Fire had shown her. What had those cloud-like objects been? She needed to talk to some engineers or inventors. She needed fresh ideas from afar.

  Something Seren couldn’t name gnawed at her as they started through the market and toward the front gates. Something was wrong. Very wrong.

  The merchants weren’t shouting about their spices, bags, or shoes. A snaggletoothed boy and twin girls each carried a ball around the bubbling shallows of the canals that branched away from the sacred bowl and pool. Normally, they’d be kicking them, racing to see who could get their ball to the city walls first. Even with the mourning, children were children. The animals were acting strange too. Camels, donkeys, and goats munched and shuffled too quietly, subdued.

  She stopped. Turning to Erol, a cold sweat rose along her back. “The tent is raised, isn’t it?”

  A weathered scout coated in dirt and wrinkles ran up and bowed hurriedly. “My kyros. You must see this.” Three more scouts, young like Seren, came up behind the more experienced man. They looked like they’d seen ghosts. Or thought they’d soon be ghosts themselves.

  Rushing toward the front gates, Lucca nimble beside her, passing wide-eyed faces and too-quiet rows of black-striped tents, Seren said one prayer, a thousand prayers.

  Two large men, steel blinking at their sashes, appeared on the path. Dust rose around them like dark wings.

  Seren stopped, turned, then rounded a corner, her men with her and the scouts trailing.

  “Are they following us?” she asked Hossam. Her heart stuttered, then began to beat too quickly.

  Cansu looked over his shoulder as they hurried on, heading down a different route. “I think so, my lady. Do you want me to go after them?”

  “No. Just…stay alert.”

  Hossam nodded and said something quiet to the scouts.

  Those two…they had to be Varol’s men. Or Adem’s. Only the Fire knew what their plans were. To watch her? Or to do something more sinister? This was her life now. Dodging attacks and telling lies.

  AT THE TOP of the walls, Seren stared out at the plains and the hammadas behind them. The ground spreading from the city outward weren’t dusty and brown anymore. The earth was silver and white and red and gold with more Invaders than sand in the Emptiness.

  She gripped the smooth stone to keep from falling. Lucca, the scouts, and her guards grew very still.

  In the midst of the warriors, a white tent displayed the Invaders’ silent message loud and clear.

  “What does the tent mean, Kyros?” Cansu asked.

  Seren was fairly certain he knew. He just didn’t want to believe the tales. He was hoping she had a better answer than what he feared. What they all feared.

  “If Akhayma surrenders today, all will be spared. Tomorrow, the tent will be red, and next, black. The stakes will rise with each day. They have committed to this siege. There’s no scaring them off now.”

  Groups of Invaders pounded their shields with fists, the low thumping echoing up and over the stone barrier. The sound echoed the panicked beating of Seren’s heart.

  “But you won’t surrender, will you, Kyros?” Erol’s voice was sharp as a dagger’s edge.

  “No. And I’ll be thrown into the vast sands of the Emptiness before I let Varol or Adem do it either.” She knew what came with surrender. Father had told her those stories too. Mother had never made any songs about those terrible, serious talks. “I’d rather us all die fighting than live to become Invader playthings. Surrendering to an Invader is far, far worse than any death.”

  18

  SEREN

  After sending Erol and Cansu to look around and listen for information about Varol and Adem’s movements or public statements, Seren, Lucca, and Hossam headed to the guest tent.

  “It’ll be quiet there,” she said. “I need to pray.”

  Inside, Seren paused at the Fire and passed her palm over the orange and blue light, Lucca standing beside her with hands clasped in front of him and Hossam near the door. Seren tried to let go of her worry and stress, to trust in the Flame and the calm solidness of Lucca nearby. She’d hoped to have some space, away from the main tent and everyone else, and this was perfect. The Fire had shown her something earlier and she needed to know what it was and how it could help. The Flames wouldn’t have bothered with a vision if it wasn’t important. Besides, she didn’t have any other ideas on how to deal with the siege and Varol and all.

  Spreading her palms wide over the flickering tongues, she pushed that urge to flee or scream or crumble aside firmly. She closed her eyes and eased into the feel of the Holy Fire, the heat running fingertips over her skin. A gray night washed over the darkness behind her eyelids. There were those clouds again. The odd shapes faded, then she saw tiny black
puffs of smoke, then a blink of white light in the vision.

  Her eyes flashed open. “Black powder?”

  Lucca frowned. “Like the easterners use in their cannon?”

  Seren twirled her wool scrap around her finger. “We’ve never used it here because the Invaders don’t have access to it. I suppose Akhayma’s never needed it.”

  “How would we use black powder anyway? You don’t have any cannon, do you?”

  “No. But I don’t think the Fire was showing me that anyway.” She pressed her fingers against her temples. “Why can’t I see it clearly?”

  “Would it help to tell me what you think you see?”

  His kind eyes warmed her middle. “There are these ivory…clouds. But I’m not sure they’re clouds. They’re rounded, floating. I…I don’t know. Somehow they’re connected to the powder. The black puffs came from the bottoms of them, or were around them. I can’t see it. I can’t.” She pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes, an itch building inside her chest. “I can’t.”

  “Don’t knock yourself over the head about it. You can only do what you can do. Maybe if you try not to think about it, it’ll become clear. That happens with me sometimes. When I focus on something else, the problem untangles in my head. Ignore me if I sound like an idiot. I don’t know anything about your Fire or running a war.”

  She couldn’t help but smile. “I’d never ignore you. Even if you weren’t a trained mercenary who does indeed know a lot about war, about fighting.”

  “War isn’t simply fighting and you know it.”

  “But some of the elements are the same.”

  “How did you learn so much about war, Kyros?” Lucca asked as they walked out of the guest tent and into the last of the day. The orange-red orb bled into strips of clouds like bandages.

  “I read all of the military scrolls and books I could get my hands on. My father, the former High-General, encouraged it. We used to talk until late at night, boring Mother to death. When she’d had enough, she poked fun at our serious talk with little songs she made up.” A smile drifted over Seren’s mouth. If only they were here… “But I still have so much to learn. I don’t know why the Fire has chosen me.”

  “Because of your humility. You’re willing to learn and try new things, risking your reputation. I’ve seen nobles whose egos hogged all the acreage in their big heads.”

  “I probably need more confidence.”

  “You have enough to get the job done, Kyros. Listen, if it pleases you, I’ll find Ona and try to talk to her again.”

  “That would be helpful, thank you. I need to question prisoners.”

  A shudder jarred her, shaking off the warm feeling of talking with Lucca. Somehow fighting in a battle was less horrible than doing damage to captured enemies.

  Lucca almost took her arm to steady her, then he glanced at Hossam and stopped himself. She wished he wouldn’t hold himself back. “I can come with you, my lady,” he said quietly, words full of respect.

  “No. I’ll be…” She couldn’t say fine. Killing and torture and questioning was the furthest thing from fine. “I can handle it.”

  He gave her a nod before heading away.

  She started toward the back gate, under black-winged swallows that dove and spun to catch their prey. Seren’s feet knew the way to go and it was a good thing because her mind was occupied with strange pale shapes and blasts of black powder. Someday, she hoped, there wouldn’t be as many terrible duties and frightening visions. But today was full of them. She found that invisible armor for her heart and set out to bleed information from her enemies.

  “THE KING—has he been placed in the larger cell away from his men?” Seren walked under the back gate’s arch, Hossam at her right, adjusting his sash and brushing dirt from his uniform.

  Erol and Cansu came out of the gate’s shadow and into the moonlight. They’d been listening and learning all they could about Varol’s movements, his orders, and how Adem was playing into them.

  Seren paused, a hand going to her chest. When had she gone from doing everything she could to protect them and keep them out of danger to using them to spy on the men who could have them killed with a word?

  “Yes, Kyros Seren,” Hossam said, worry etched in the wrinkles around his big eyes.

  Seren started walking again. She had to keep going. There was no way to keep these wonderful, loyal guards safe anymore. No one was safe anymore.

  “What did you learn, Cansu, Erol?” she asked. “I’m fine, Hossam.” She smiled at him to soften her curt words.

  Erol and Cansu bowed their heads as they worked to keep up with her increasing pace moving into the training area.

  “An ore master and several guildmasters met with High General Varol in his tent, my lady.” Erol’s jaw tensed. “Two scouts reported to him as well. Not the men who came to us. Those two are in the barracks, resting. They are loyal, it seems. Also, those loyal scouts told us High General Varol entered Akhayma through an abandoned mine. Hearing about the newly accessible mine, the scouts used it to watch the Invaders fall into their siege camp. Looking through an opening in the shaft, the scouts counted the Invader troops.”

  “Adem cleared the mine for Varol.” Seren rubbed her lip, talking to herself.

  Cansu looked at the sandy path in front of them, his voice taut. “The Invaders number at 40,000.”

  An invisible knife touched Seren’s throat and she halted again, just for a breath, before continuing on. She’d seen them. She’d known there were a great many. But 40,000. How could they fight that many without losing every man, woman, and child in the city?

  Overhead, darkening clouds hovered over the training field, the walls housing the iron ore mines beyond, and the hammadas in the far distance. 40,000 warriors. Akhayma was boxed in, trapped, surrounded and Seren couldn’t see a way out.

  Cells lined the slope leading away from the training fields. Torches flickered like dying stars, lighting the grounds unevenly and throwing yellow and white beams against the shadows. Seren waved the prison guard forward and the man slipped a mint leaf from his pocket into his mouth, bowing as he hurried. His plum-shaped face was familiar. Ah. Meric had used the man twice to interpret for captured Invader scouts during her first days as his wife. That felt like lifetimes ago.

  Hossam took a prisoner from the crowded cells. Perspiration wet the captured man’s light brown hair. It clung to his face as Hossam shoved the man’s cheek against a stone block. One visible eye turned to look from Seren to Hossam to the interpreter.

  “Give me your best guess on what your army will do next.” Seren gave the interpreter a minute to do his job. “And we can kill you and be done with it. I’ve no desire to cause you additional pain.”

  The prisoner spat at her slippers.

  Sick with this duty, Seren stepped back, holding her kaftan away, and shook her head.

  “Take another finger then,” she said quietly.

  Erol raised his yatagan over the stone block as Hossam forced the prisoner’s hand into position. Seren’s stomach clenched. But this was war, and she’d cut a thousand fingers to save her people from what her family had endured.

  The finger came off with a horrid thunk and a soul-ripping shriek not unlike the screams the Invaders released when they killed—full of pain and drive both. Cold sweat beaded on Seren’s forehead and upper lip. She bent to look the prisoner in the face.

  “Now, will you talk to me?”

  He spat on her cheek.

  Raising herself up and taking Cansu’s offered square of linen, she pronounced the man’s sentence. “Run him through, quickly for his courage, but properly for his crimes against our people.”

  Hossam laid the body in the growing pile they’d haul outside the walls tonight.

  The guards brought a new prisoner to the block. An unseen hand pushed Seren closer. This Invader was wiry like Haris—one of the fighters who’d taken to trailing Lucca and Ona—but a much fairer version, with pale eyes and unusually short
hair. His fellows called out what sounded like encouragement in their language from behind the cell bars. This one was liked. Could that be what was drawing her to him?

  “Will we see the same fate come to you, soldier?” Seren asked. She quieted to let the interpreter do his job.

  On his knees, the wiry Invader stared ahead at nothing.

  “What job did you do for your king?” she asked and the interpreter spoke quickly.

  The Invader turned to the interpreter, then to Seren, surprise and caution twisting his mouth and eyes. “Sword. Shield. Like most.”

  His eyes said something entirely different. “No.” She pointed to his face. “I see intelligence there. A man like your king would see it too. Surely he had more use for you than merely raw fighting. Do you really want to continue supporting that dog of a king only to lose your life?”

  “Could I ever have a full life here?” the Invader asked.

  When the interpreter finished speaking, Hossam almost dropped his hold on the man.

  “Yes…you could,” Seren said.

  Cansu and Erol traded a look. She gave them one that snapped them back to attention, almost confident for once.

  “If you can give me a solid idea about your army’s probable next move and aid me with fresh strategies to counter,” she said, “you could live in the tented city as a rich man for as long as the Holy Fire wills it.”

  “I’m an engineer.”

  “One who makes gears?”

  “Yes. And systems. Mechanisms. I don’t know if that translates…”

  “I understand. Like ways to move water or waste.”

  “Exactly.”

  Seren wound the green wool at her sash around a finger and paced. The prisoners behind the engineer had gone quiet.

  “What about…black powder?” she asked quietly.

  The interpreter stopped, his face wrinkled in confusion. Seren cupped her hands together, then quickly fanned her fingers and spread her arms wide. The engineer’s eyes opened wider.

  He nodded slowly, swallowing. “But,” he said through the interpreter, “you must promise I stay here after. If we create something together.”