D & D - Red Sands

by Tonya R. Carter

  Where is Countess Liantha? said a voice in her ear, the voice of an invisible Frolder.

  Jadira made weak sounds. The unseen hand lifted a fraction. "In the tent of her brother!" she said in a loud whisper. Her eyes shifted to where Uramettu lay. "Please don't hurt me!"

  "Silence! Don't insult an old intriguer with faked pleas for mercy." His voice was quite low but coming from just beside her left ear. "Stand up. Remember, the knife I carry can kill, though it can't be seen."

  Jadira started to cough, but the sharp tip of the knife blade dug into her back, and the cough froze in her throat. "If she awakens, I will kill you both," Frolder said. They left the tent, leaving Uramettu undisturbed.

  The sun was down. A mild wind from the west blew moist sea air over the tent city. Pairs of Maridantan soldiers patrolled the camp. They nodded politely to Jadira and passed her by. Breath tickled her ear. She resisted an urge to scratch.

  Tedwin's tent was easy to find. Taller and finer than the rest, it was lit from within by oil lamps. Jadira walked up to the entrance. Two guards crossed pikes in front of her.

  "Who goes there?" said the right-hand guard. A prick in her back warned her.

  "Jadira sed Ifrimiya, to see Count ledwin."

  "On what matter?"

  "I-I have news of his sheriff, Sir Frolder."

  "Wait here." The guard on the left ducked under the hanging flap. He soon returned with Roldof, Tedwin's massive bodyguard.

  "He will take you to his lordship," said the soldier.

  "Thank you," said Jadira.

  "He can't talk," said the soldier on the right. "His tongue was cut out years ago."

  Roldof stepped back and swept a tree-sized arm ahead for Jadira. She stepped under it and went in.

  A flute trilled softly from deeper in the tent. The oily smell of lamps contrasted with a strong scent of roses. Two priestly figures in red, swinging censers, passed them muttering benedictions.

  "Are they preparing the countess for her trip to the underworld?" asked Jadira. Roldof nodded his wide head. Up close, Jadira could see his bare arms and lower legs were streaked with dozens of battle scars.

  She thought for a moment that Frolder might have gone until his far-off voice buzzed in her ear again: "Tell the count you must speak to him alone."

  "He won't agree to that."

  "Do it or—"

  Jadira twisted out of his grasp. A searing pain in her chest bent her double, but she saw a deep gash suddenly open in Roldof s neck. As blood spilled from the gaping wound, the giant sank heavily to the ground. He toppled forward on his face, falling through the split gauze curtains.

  A phantom hand twisted itself in her long hair and Jadira couldn't smother a gasp as her head was yanked back. Frolder hauled her through the curtains.

  Frolder released her. The cloth-walled room was set as a chapel. Jadira saw that Liantha lay on her bier, draped in white. Only her perfect face showed through an oval opening in the shroud. Jadira was stunned by the serenity of that face. What a pity, a sorry wasteful pity!

  "What is the meaning of this? Roldof?" said Tedwin. He was bare-headed, and Jadira could better see the resemblance between brother and sister. Had Tedwin been straighter and taller, he would have been as handsome as Liantha was beautiful.

  "The sheriff," she blurted. "He is here."

  Frolder flashed into sight. The short sword in his hand was red with Roldofs blood.

  "Two of my favorite people, together for the last time," said Frolder. Madness darkened his words.

  "My humblest apologies, Count," said Jadira. "He forced me here at sword point. He has killed your man."

  "What will you do, Frolder?" asked Tedwin.

  "You mean, besides kill you? I have come to see Liantha one last time."

  "The murderer wishes to admire his victim."

  Frolder cut the air with his sword. Jadira flinched, but Tedwin stood unmoved. "I did not murder her! She was my beloved—her life was sacred," Frolder said.

  "Yet there she lies dead. Who humiliated her? Whose blade did she fall on? The Faziri said it was yours. Do you deny it?"

  The tormented sheriff turned to the bier. "May the gods forgive me. I cannot deny it. After hearing of my plans, she lost her reason. She—she called to me to embrace her, and when I did ..." He left the tale unfinished.

  Jadira was sidling over toward Roldof. The giant carried a dagger in his belt. It was not much smaller than Frolder's sword, and if she could get it—

  "You've lost, Frolder, lost everything. Killing me now won't bring Liantha back, or gain you control of Mari-danta. The Faziris are gone, and in a few notches of the candle, Marix of Dosen will return with the seal of Nar-sia. The conclave will take place. The alliance will happen."

  Frolder began to laugh. "Do you think I care for cities or empires anymore?" he said. "I hate you, Tedwin. I hate your ugly, twisted leg and black clothes and the cold-blooded wits you live by. To kill you will be the last pleasure in my life."

  Jadira snatched the dagger from Roldof s belt. Frolder saw her movement. He didn't try to attack her; he simply replaced the silver charm in his mouth and became invisible.

  "My lord, beware! He can slay you though you cannot see him!" Jadira cried.

  "Give me the dagger!"

  She tossed it to him. "Defend your back!"

  So saying, Jadira dashed out. There was only one way to deal with Frolder, only one weapon that needed no eyes.

  At the entrance to the tent, she ran into Uramettu arguing with the guards. The efreet bow was in her hand. "Let her through!" Jadira cried. "Uramettu, the bow!"

  The Fedushite woman tossed the efreet's gift over the crossed pikes. As Jadira turned to run, she heard the guards exclaim in terror. A panther's roar resounded through the tent.

  Jadira stepped over the fallen Roldof. Tedwin was on the ground, his back to the bier. Long slashes showed through his velvet robe, and the count bled from a dozen minor wounds. Frolder was toying with him, murdering him as slowly as his madness would allow.

  Jadira nocked the arrow. Tedwin raised his hand to her. His eyes widened as she took deliberate aim on him.

  "Larsa, I know you not, but guide my aim!" she said.

  The efreet arrow leaped off the string. Tedwin threw up a hand to ward off the shot, but the arrow veered away. It curved around, farther, farther, until Jadira had to throw herself down to avoid being hit. The arrow circled the tent once before turning in. It stopped suddenly in midair. The arrowhead and a span of the shaft disappeared.

  Frolder appeared, blood and the charm falling from his lips. The arrow was in his heart.

  "My lord," said Jadira. "Speak if you can!"

  "I live," the count gasped, "thanks to you. I thought—in the last you had thrown in with Frolder and—meant to kill me."

  "No, lord. This bow has a peculiar way of working. It hits what you don't aim at." Tedwin struggled to his feet. He and Jadira leaned on each other.

  Uramettu in panther form bounded into the room. Tedwin's eyes grew large. He raised the dagger, but Jadira stayed his hand. "No, my lord. This one is Uramettu."

  "The black woman? Extraordinary." Tedwin straightened. His cool detachment returned. "You know, you really are a remarkable company," he said. "What does the fat priest do?"

  Tantuffa by the Sea

  The finding of Prince Lydon's sea! was the simplest thing Marix had done in a year and a day. "It was right where we put it," he said. "The pile of stones hadn't even been disturbed." He set a moldy leather bag before his friends and Count Tedwin, then backed away, deferring to the count.

  "No, you do it. It was your quest, not mine," Tedwin said. Marix peeled back the rotten hide. The heavy seal, twice as big as Marix's fist, gleamed dully. The Narsian coat of arms was intact.

  When the moon had shown its face once more, Jadira and her friends were all safely ensconced in the palace of Lord Hurgold, master of Tantuffa. The conclave of the Five Cities took place as planned, and the machinations of
the sultan were finally exposed. The five lords exchanged vows of closest cooperation. Treaties were signed, blood bonds made, toasts drunk. And when news of the alliance returned home, great celebrations reigned in the Five Cities for days on end. All the Faziri ambassadors were recalled in disgrace, and the sultan's grand design to dominate the Five Cities was set back. But the corridors of the palace in Omerabad were soon alive with new strategems, new plots.

  Wounds healed in flesh and bone but not in the heart. Count Tedwin returned to Maridanta, darker in his soul and harder in his mind. Liantha had been more precious to him than his own life, and with her gone, his joy was gone forever.

  Jadira and Marix were joined in marriage. The clerics of the western gods would not sanctify a union between a nobleman and a nomad, so the couple turned to the new word, the way of Agma. Tamakh performed the rites. Uramettu stood by Jadira, and Nabul played the part of Marix's father. ("Fernald always was a thief," Lord Hurgold was heard to quip about the groom's true father). Elperex carried the gilded headbands through the streets and placed them on the couple's heads.

  The moon turned twice more. Uramettu took to haunting the docks, seeking a ship south to Tijit. From there overland to Fedush was two hundred leagues, most of it easy travel on the Zanti River.

  Tamakh expressed an interest in going with her. Nabul teased him about being in love, but the priest avowed his need to wander and spread the word of Agma. A few days more, and Nabul began to speak of traveling, too. Caravans formed in Tijit daily for the Brazen Ring and Zimora. Nabul said he could be in Fazir picking pockets before the corn was ripe.

  "I can't believe this," Jadira said when the six were together on the north portico of the palace. "After all we've done as one, you want to leave us?"

  "This country is not mine," Uramettu said. "Though you are my beloved sister, I yearn for the grasslands. The ionging grows stronger every day."

  "My feet itch also," said Tamakh. "These Tantuffans are pleasant folk; they listen to my teaching, nod and smile. But there's a priest on every corner in the marketplace, and no one believes anything they hear."

  "How do you know the Fedushites will heed you any better?" asked Marix.

  "I don't. The grace comes from the doing."

  Jadira spread her hands. "Nabul, you're the sanest man present, as you have oft said. Why don't you stay? There must be rich pickings in Tantuffa."

  "So you would think! The merchants here fairly bulge with gold, but I can't get at it. These western barbarians wear these vile trouser things, the pockets of which are tightly buttoned! How's a thief supposed to make a living here?"

  "I will not leave you," said Elperex. "Tantuffa is a good city. Children give me fruit just to talk to them." Jadira smiled at the 'strelli fondly.

  "It's very hard to think of life day to day without you," Jadira said to the others.

  "Change is the inevitable course of things," Tamakh observed.

  Uramettu brightened. "Why don't you come with us?" she said. "I can show you many wonders betwixt here and Fedush. Strange ruins in Tijit, cities along the Zanti, the wild beasts of the endless savannah—"

  "Alas, I cannot go," Jadira said. "Marix's duty requires him to fulfill his pledge of service to Lord Hurgold. And in light of his lordship's many favors to us, it would be ungrateful of us to run away."

  Silence. Nabul spoke at last: "How long is this indenture?"

  "Three years."

  "Ronta would forget me in that time," Uramettu said.

  She stood, and the others did likewise. "Though it weighs on my heart, it must be said; we companions must part." Jadira held out her hands. Uramettu clasped them. Tamakh and Nabul embraced Marix, and the thief chucked Elperex under his pointed chin.

  "Remember what I taught you, monkey," he said.

  Tamakh and Jadira faced each other. "Holy One, if all clerics were as kind and wise as you, the world would be a better place," she said.

  "I am simply a humble servant of my god. It is easy to be kind in the company of such good people." He winked at Nabul. "And even easier to be wise."

  "Haw!"

  "Will you come back some day?" asked Jadira.

  "If I have feet to walk on, I'll see you again, daughter of Ifrim." On an impulse, she threw her arms around Tamakh and hugged him fiercely. With a gasp that was only slightly exaggerated, he freed himself and said, "bu have the grasp of a wrestler." She had to smile. "Farewell, my dear child."

  "Farewell, Tamakh."

  Nabul balked at being too heartfelt in his good-byes. He stammered a farewell and hastily retreated. He and Uramettu and Tamakh went to the steps leading off the portico. Jadira watched them gradually disappear behind the white marble wall. When they were gone, she started for the colonnade, to see them once more. Marix held her arm and stopped her.

  "It hurts enough," he said. "Let them go."

  Night, and the moon rose out of the eastern plains. Jadira, freshly bathed and robed in white linen, stood on the balcony outside their suite of rooms in Lord Hurgold's palace. She had taken to wearing Tantuffan-style clothes, but she still wore a scarf over her hair.

  The city and harbor were spread out beneath her. The view was dotted with yellow lanterns fixed to the bobbing masts of ships and the twinkling lights of the city. Through the tang of the sea air, Jadira felt—or did she imagine it?—the heat of her homeland. Turning, she looked for something that could not be seen—the hot, windswept dunes of the Red Sands.

  Marix returned from watch duty with the garrison. He was weary and dirty, and longed for nothing so much as a cool drink and quiet sleep. He unbuckled bis breastplate and greaves, letting them clank on the floor. Jadira drew aside the balcony curtain and beckoned him to join her.

  "I did not think to find you awake," he said. "It is late."

  They kissed. "I wanted to see you."

  They stood together on the balcony, staring at the harbor. "I know what you're thinking," said Marix.

  "Have we been married that long?"

  "It hardly requires years of experience to realize you are thinking of our friends."

  "They leave on the evening tide."

  "Do you wish you were with them?"

  She turned his chin until they were eye to eye. "I might wish that we were with them," she said. "But where you are is where I shall be."

  "bu mean your feet aren't aching to tread the Red Sands again?"

  He had her there. Jadira looked away. "I am Sudiin of Sudiin. Since the day Mitaali formed the nomads from the sweat of his brow and the dust of his hands, my people have wandered from place to place. A western husband and dresses of fine linen cannot erase the heritage of ages past."

  "Nor would I ask you to cease being the one I love," he said. "Three years is not so long. Who knows? There may be expeditions Lord Hurgold will want to send us on, since we are such accomplished travelers."

  The brass door knocker boomed hollowly inside the suite. Marix sighed. "That's probably Corporal Golloy, seeking to wear down my resolve. I had to put him on report tonight for taking a bribe from a tavernkeeper." The knocker boomed again.

  "All right, I'm coming," Marix called. Jadira followed him inside. When Marix lifted the bolt and opened the door, there stood Nabul.

  "I've not seen mouths gape so wide since I stole two carp from the fish market," he said. "May I enter?"

  "Enter, enter. Why are you here?"

  "Oh, well, it was this way: I was on my way to the quay where our ship was tied, when I passed this Sivo-nian merchant whose purse jingled so sweetly . . . anyway, I followed him for eight blocks, but he entered a guarded banking house before I could cut his purse string." Nabul pushed a toe into the carpet. "So I missed the boat."

  "Poor fellow! Have a draft of wine. It will soothe you," Jadira said.

  Marix led Nabul to the sitting room. No sooner were they through the curtains than there came a steady metallic tapping at the door. Jadira opened it, and Tamakh was there, the iron key from the Omerabad dungeon poised
in his hand.

  "Ah! Jadira! I hope I did not wake you," he said.

  "No, not at all. Ah, don't misunderstand me, Holy One, but shouldn't you be at sea right now?" she asked.

  "Indeed, that is just where I meant to be, but as I mounted the gangplank onto the ship, this key, in which Agma manifested his divine presence, grew hot in the folds of my garment. I knew this was an omen from the god not to proceed on the voyage."

  "So it was Agma who called you back?"

  "Just so, just so."

  "Then you had better come in and commune with this deity of yours. He must have important work for you here," she said. Tamakh bowed and crossed the threshold. Jadira smilingly directed him to the sitting room.

  Elperex flew in and landed on the balcony railing. "Jadira!" he called. "You would never guess who I saw on the western steps of the palace!"

  She said, "Uramettu." The 'strelli's excited expression froze in amazement.

  "You have the second sight," he said.

  "Sometimes. Go to the sitting room and tell Marix." Elperex hopped down and waddled across the polished floor to the curtained archway.

  Jadira waited. Before long, three solid raps sounded on the suite door. She counted silently to five and opened the door. "Come in, Uramettu."

  The black woman waited sheepishly outside. "You were told I was coming," she said.

  "Elperex spied you on the steps."

  "The little fellow does see much from on high."

  Jadira put out her hand and pulled Uramettu in. "There is a reason why I came back," the black woman said. "A very good reason."

  "I'm sure of it," said Jadira.

  "It was the hunting life that called me home, and I listened, for it is in my blood. It was not for want of affection that I decided to leave."

  "I know."

  Uramettu lifted her long arms high. "And there I was on the deck of our ship. Nabul never boarded, and Tamakh begged off before the mooring was cleared. I thought, these men found reasons to stay; cannot I? So I said to the first mate, 'Do you hunt game?' And he answered, 'The brushland around Tantuffa hold many wild boar, aurochs, and lions.' 'Then put me ashore,' 1 said, 'for if I stay on this ship, I am leaving home, not returning to it.' I rode back to the quay in the pilot's skiff, and here I am."