by Ginn Hale
Thirty years ago he would have ripped the earth open and torn the sky with hurricane winds. His desperation would have been all that mattered, but the land had already endured too much for his volatile needs. There were farms and villages between him and the northern rift. People and animals would be killed if he indulged his desire to reach Kyle at any cost.
Instead he concentrated on the highest winds, drawing a strong cold current down. Gusts of sleet and ice swept down, tearing nearby tree branches and freezing fragile spring buds at John’s feet. John pulled the frigid wind around himself. An excited shudder passed through the hilt of the yasi’halaun as the brutal force of the wind wrapped around John and lifted him high into the overcast sky.
Water vapor condensed to ice and clung to his skin and hair. Frost traced delicate filigrees across the grooved, black blade of the yasi’halaun. The air grew thin and John’s lungs burned for oxygen. Still he rode the current higher, farther above the populated lands into heights where his passage would do little harm.
As he soared up through the frigid white masses of clouds, memories of Ravishan and the dank corridors of Umbhra’ibaye came to him in flashes. A swathe of dark storm clouds whirled around from him. Lightning crackled over him. Angry winds lashed the sky, rising from John’s agitation. In his hands, the yasi’halaun arced up to catch bolts of the wild electricity. John sensed its pleasure at the surging force of the rising storm.
John forced himself to calm down. He drove his fear for Kyle back and concentrated on the braiding currents of the turbulent skies. He reached out and soothed the storm, as he might have pacified a tahldi. In turn, the icy currents calmed. John swept over miles of rolling country. The rugged hills slowly gave way to meadows and then to terraced farmlands. Farther north, deep fissures stretched from the jagged edge of the chasm.
Fertile soil eroded to charred gray sands. The ground beneath John felt brittle as old bones. The wastes at the edge of the chasm always put John on edge. The air here felt thin and scarred. The ground seemed to shudder, as if terrified by the memory of his touch.
He found Saimura at the northmost point of the chasm. His clothes and hair were coated with gray sand. He spat deadly curses over the stones at his feet and then hurled them out into the crashing sea. Where the cursed stones fell, the waters hissed and steamed.
Saimura seemed to take no notice when John approached. He stared intently out across the vast mists to the distant outline of the ruins of Rathal’pesha.
He gripped another stone and growled out harsh Eastern curses. John caught his arm before he could throw it. Saimura swung around, a snarl on his dirty face and his fist raised to strike. The moment his eyes focused on John all the strength seemed to drain from him. His fist dropped to his side. The half-finished curse stone fell to the ground. Saimura stared at John with wide, red-rimmed eyes and then he slumped forward against John’s chest. He buried his face in John’s coat and held onto him with a desperate grip. Saimura’s body shook with silent sobs.
John wrapped his arms around Saimura. He bowed his head down against the top of Saimura’s head. For a few minutes they simply stood there embracing silently, both mourning Ji.
When Saimura finally spoke, his voice was ragged.
“She knew,” he said. “She had to have known what would happen and she did it anyway. Why didn’t she tell me—” Saimura’s voice broke.
“I don’t know,” John whispered. He ran his hand over the back of Saimura’s head as if he were comforting a child.
“I can’t find Kyle,” Saimura said. “I looked, but I can’t…I’m so sorry, Jahn.”
John had expected as much, and yet his stomach still clenched as though he had been punched. He had known better and yet he had still secretly hoped that Kyle would be here with Saimura.
“I’ll find him,” John said.
“He went after Fikiri.” Saimura pulled back a little from John. His expression was hard and stark. “If he’s alive, then he has to be out there on the island.”
“I know,” John said.
“Are you going after him?” Saimura took another step back from John, studying him.
“I have to,” John said.
“The last time—” Saimura began.
“I won’t let that happen again,” John said firmly.
Saimura scowled down at the jagged cliff of the chasm. He said, “Are you sure?”
John glared at the darkening clouds above him. Of course he wasn’t sure. He had no idea what would happen.
“I have to go,” John said.
“Are you taking the yasi’halaun as well?”
John frowned at the long, steely blade. He wanted to return it to Kyle. He wanted to lay it in his hands. That had been the only thought in his head when he had taken it, but now he realized how foolish it would be to bring something so powerful into Loshai’s realm.
“No,” John said. “I just didn’t know what to do with it.” He thought suddenly that Ji would have known. She would have told him gruffly that he was a fool and then pushed her soft face against his hand. She would have leaned against him and allowed him to stroke her golden hide until he calmed down.
“I could take it back to Greenhills. Ji’s wards…” Saimura’s jaw clenched and for a moment he seemed unable to speak. He closed his eyes and went on, “Her wards are still burning. They should disguise the yasi’halaun’s power for a time.” Suddenly tears rolled down Saimura’s cheeks. “I never thought I would see her wards burn out…never.”
“Neither did I,” John said. He could feel hot tears filling his own eyes. Ji would have been annoyed to see them both standing here crying like this. She would have expected them to have more strength, more composure, especially here at the edge of the northern rift.
John wiped his eyes. He took a deep, calming breath of the cold, brackish ocean air. A familiar sensation tingled through him. It was faint, little more than a whisper across his skin, and yet John knew it. It was Kyle. John turned and scanned the sky. He gazed past the dark outline of the ruins. Something flickered through the heavy mists. For a moment John imagined the Gray Space would suddenly open and Kyle’s presence would pour out over him.
Instead, the silhouette of a long, spidery creature emerged from the banks of clouds. It was another of Laurie’s hungry bones. White expanses of cloth stretched between its limbs and caught the wind like sails. It soared up on the ocean air currents and circled above John and Saimura.
John still felt the faintest sensation of Kyle from within the hungry bones. He felt it the way he felt Ravishan’s presence in those skeletal remains. Kyle wasn’t hidden in the Gray Space. Something of him—his blood or a bone—was inside the hungry bones.
Fury surged through John. He gripped the wind with a motion of his hand and slammed the hungry bones to the ground. Ribs and thighbones shattered, but the creature didn’t die. They never died so easily. The hungry bones rose up from the ashen ground. A wild howling emanated from it like a scream of rage.
John swung the yasi’halaun up and charged the creature. The yasi’halaun hummed with electric excitement. As John slashed it through iron cables that bound the hungry bones’ spine, tongues of white light arced from the blade. The light danced over the bones, searing them black and splintering the spells carved into them. The enraged cry of the hungry bones became a shriek of terror. John thrust the yasi’halaun through another knot of iron cables.
The yasi’halaun drank in the power of Laurie’s spells as well as the lives trapped in the hungry bones. John felt the force of it overflow into him. Hot energy surged up from the hilt of the yasi’halaun and jolted through John’s body. John pulled more power into himself. The hungry bones burned to ash and spread on the wind.
At last the only things remaining were charred cables and a tiny silver box, which rested in the gray sand only a few feet from where John stood.
A whisper of Kyle’s presence rose up from the little box like the lingering scent of a perfume.
J
ohn felt suddenly terrified of what might be in that box. He couldn’t bring himself to pick it up and at the same time he couldn’t look away from it.
Saimura strode to John’s side. He frowned at the silver box, then knelt down and inspected it. John wanted to look away as Saimura flipped the latch open, but instead he found himself staring into the tarnished compartment. There was a small black message stone and a severed finger. A stain of dry blood pooled out from the finger and covered the inside of the box like corrosion.
Saimura’s hands shook. The box almost fell. John moved quickly. He took the box from Saimura and gently touched the cold flesh of the finger. It was Kyle’s. There was no question of that. He would have known even if he hadn’t recognized the white scar that cut across the first two knuckles. Just touching the finger, he felt Kyle’s presence rock through him.
Saimura took the message stone and clenched his fist around it. He closed his eyes, brow knit with concentration.
“If you want to see the rest of him while he’s still alive, then you will bring the yasi’halaun to me.” Saimura opened his eyes. “It’s from Loshai.”
“Of course,” John replied. He could feel black storm clouds rolling up from his rage. High above the ruins of Rathal’pesha lightning cracked and split the sky.
“It has to be a trap,” Saimura said. “You bring her the yasi’halaun and she’ll kill you with it.”
“I know.” John stared down at Kyle’s severed finger. It should never have come to this. He should have stopped Laurie years ago, before Ji could be killed, before Kyle could be taken from him.
“We should get back to Greenhills before she can send more hungry bones.” Saimura reached out and took the silver box from John’s hands. John turned toward the edge of the cliff. He felt the cold sea far below crashing against the walls of stone. John stepped to the edge. Icy winds rushed up to embrace him.
“Jahn, it’s a trap!” Saimura shouted over the roar of the wind. “She wants this!”
“I know,” John said. But it didn’t matter. John understood now how Ji could have known that she would die out on the wastes and still have gone. It was something that had needed to be done, no matter what the consequences were. She couldn’t have refused to destroy the hungry bones any more than John could sacrifice Kyle. Knowing that it could cost him his life meant nothing.
John stepped off the edge of the cliff and the wind rushed in around him. John’s own rage lent the currents strength and they lifted him high into the black storm that descended over the ruins of Rathal’pesha.
Chapter One Hundred and Five
Kahlil watched Parthenon slink across the room and hunch over the corpse splayed out on the marble floor. Parthenon’s sharp vertebrae rippled against the bright copper wires holding it together as it lowered its bulk down over the sprawled body. The hungry bones ripped through the dead boy’s limbs, plunging long talons into his chest and drinking in the remains of his blood.
The fathi still clouded Kahlil’s thoughts with a strange happiness. But even that couldn’t completely suppress his horror at seeing Parthenon feed. All around him broken and burned corpses writhed against the restraints that held them to the walls. Droplets of condensation dribbled down from the wires overhead and splattered against Kahlil’s naked skin. High in the shadows of the ceiling, a pale form clambered over the burned remains of the issusha’im. More water splashed down.
The hollow, black eyes of a skull peered down at him. It snapped its jaws as if its teeth were chattering. Kahlil almost found the thought amusing. But the fathi’s effects were fading and suddenly the clacking teeth seemed menacing.
The dull ache in Kahlil’s left hand flared to an intense pain. A wave of sickness washed through him as he remembered Loshai forcing the dull blades of her shears through his finger. The last of the fathi seemed to clear from his mind and he suddenly realized that his hand was still bleeding. Slick, warm blood pooled in his aching palm.
On the ceiling, a weirdly piecemeal skeletal body slowly rose up from beneath the chattering skull. One of its arms was cracked and awkwardly wrapped with copper wires. Its hands were far too large and several of the fingers were missing. Its ribs curved at wildly different angles and many of them seemed to have been collected from animals. What Kahlil could see of the leg bones looked scorched and the pelvis had been chipped to jagged angles. Wards and spells had been gouged and scraped into all of the bones but the skull. That was delicately etched with the holy incantations of an issusha.
The creature gripped the wires hanging from the ceiling and slowly began to descend towards Kahlil. Out of instinct, Kahlil flexed his hand up to open the Gray Space. A flare of agony shot through him as the spells on his restraints flared over his arms. He gasped and cursed his reflexes. So long as the doors were closed, the wards in the room sealed the Gray Space from his reach. No matter how quickly he acted, he couldn’t escape.
The skeletal creature dangled only a few feet from Kahlil’s face. Its skull and arms looked childlike compared to its long, sharp hands. It reached out and touched Kahlil’s cheek.
“You is not dead,” it whispered with the voice of a little girl. Its fingers caressed the side of Kahlil’s face gently. “You is alive.”
Kahlil stared at the tiny skull and suddenly realized that he recognized her voice.
“Rousma?” Kahlil asked in a whisper.
She clambered down from the wire and crouched on Kahlil’s chest. Her bones were cold and felt almost insubstantial as they pressed against Kahlil’s bare skin.
“I is calling you,” Rousma whispered through her chattering teeth. “I is calling you day after day to come and take me away, so I can runs and sniffs. But you never comes. Never, never. You just lays there, like you never comes at all. Like you is gone forever.” Her voice was thin and frightened.
Kahlil wished his arms were free so he could hold her, so that he could carry her away from here. For a flickering moment he remembered her weight against his back as he ran from the burning ruins of Umhbra’ibaye. He had saved her once and then failed her.
“I’m sorry, Rousma. I didn’t know you were here. I would have come sooner if I had known.”
“You is always here, laying down quiet,” Rousma replied, through her chattering teeth. “I whispers to you all nights long.”
Kahlil recalled the dreams that had haunted him since he’d arrived in Vundomu: white bones moving among ruins and a voice calling him by his old name. He’d heard her but hadn’t understood.
“I didn’t know it was you,” Kahlil said. The pain in his hand throbbed as if it were embodying his guilt. All this time she had been here, calling to him, and he had never come for her.
Again, Rousma’s cold finger bones stroked his cheek. Slowly, she lifted one of her hands from Kahlil’s face and started to reach for his bloody hand. Her fingers trembled against the copper wires holding them together. Suddenly she pulled her arm back against the jutting bones of her ribs.
“I gets so hungry and cold. So hungry. You can’t even know how hungry.” She bowed her head, so that Kahlil couldn’t see the dark hollows of her eyes.
Just past Rousma, Kahlil caught a glimpse of Parthenon rolling in the dead boy’s open carcass, soaking in brilliant swathes of blood and he realized why she had begun to reach for his bloody hand. It hadn’t been out of compassion. She was hungry and his fresh blood had drawn her. Kahlil knew his expression had to be a mix of shock and fear.
“I won’t hurts you, Ravishan,” Rousma murmured. “Not never, never.”
“No,” Kahlil said to himself as much as her. “I know you wouldn’t.” She might look like one of the hungry bones, but she was still his sister. Even cold and starving, she restrained herself.
“Rousma,” Kahlil said her name gently and she hesitatingly lifted her hollow eyes. “Can you get these restraints open?”
Rousma bowed her head.
“I tries once before when they brought in the first little boys.” Rousma held up h
er awkward, oversized hands. “Spells burns off my fingers and makes me have to scavenge in the wet places. These was a boy’s once, but I made them mine.”
He had to take Rousma and get out of here. But he couldn’t even get out of these restraints. Kahlil closed his eyes against a wave of dizzy exhaustion that washed over him. Almost instinctually he summoned the thought of Jath’ibaye to hold up against his own helplessness. Jath’ibaye could have ripped these restraints aside easily. In all likelihood he was on his way now—Loshai would have assured that—racing on storm winds as he had decades ago when he’d come to save Vundomu.
But this wasn’t Vundomu. It was a trap, just like the one Fikiri had used to lure Jath’ibaye into Umbhra’ibaye.
Kahlil couldn’t remember dying that day. He only dimly recalled the shock of pain and seeing a look of utter desolation on Jahn’s face. But he knew that Basawar had nearly been ended then.
He couldn’t allow Jath’ibaye to fall into another trap. No matter how tired and helpless he felt, he had to find a way to fight free of this place before Loshai could lure Jath’ibaye here.
“The door.” Kahlil realized suddenly. “If you can get the door open I could get us both out of here.”
Just as the words came out of his mouth, Kahlil noticed that the chamber had gone strangely silent. The sounds of bones cracking and flesh tearing under Parthenon’s hungry assault had stopped. Kahlil felt Rousma tense against his chest. He opened his eyes and saw Parthenon charging towards him.
Rousma bounded off Kahlil’s chest as Parthenon swung out one of its huge legs to swat her aside. Parthenon went after her. Rousma scampered up the far wall and leaped to a low-hanging wire. Parthenon reared up onto its massive hind legs and slammed its long talons against Rousma’s thin body. Rousma let out a terrible high-pitched shriek as Parthenon’s blow sent her hurtling back towards Kahlil. She hit the marble floor hard and Kahlil heard her ribs snap.