by Rosie Scott
“Ahh, you will be handy to have around, friend,” he mused, taking a container from me as I handed it back to him. As I filled more of them, he asked, “You are also a healer, are you not?”
“I am. So is Cerin.” I nodded toward the necromancer who stood beside me.
“Thank the gods. I have injured in here who are still clinging to life.”
I heard the murmuring of soldiers from our army coming from the west to start digging the prince and his men out. I felt relief, for I knew we could save Hasani and what few soldiers he had left with him. Though many had brought shovels, we did not have enough of the tools to ensure all could work. We decided to work in shifts, making sure the sand on the other side of the building keeping the prince and his soldiers trapped would continually be dug out.
Hasani and his soldiers set about continuing to dig from inside the building, so my friends and I finally left the small hole in the ground. I checked out the other side, where many of the soldiers were digging through sand, just to see how bad the situation looked. The northern side of the building was as high as a small hill, the sand piled above what once had been the building's roof. Over where Hasani had claimed the doorway was, there was a slope of sand that was seemingly never ending.
We left the soldiers hard at work and went off to camp for the night. Though the men were not free quite yet, there was little I could do without a shovel, and I'd already helped all I could by refilling their water supplies. The soldiers who had come to dig had brought some food with them, which Hasani and his men took gratefully. I could do nothing more to help until the morning, so I fell asleep easily that night.
I awoke later than usual the next morning, for the soldiers had switched out some hours before, and they had left my companions and I to sleep. We were not planning on traveling today, unless Hasani and his group were freed, so we were able to sleep until our bodies woke alone.
I sat up in the tent, the action waking Cerin, who stirred beside me. The necromancer opened his silver eyes, watching me as he slowly woke.
“You okay?” He questioned, noticing my alertness.
I was quiet a moment. Because our tent was closed, all I could see was the light which filtered in through its canvas. It was bright out today, but not as bright as usual. “Do you feel that?” I asked him, remaining still.
Cerin hesitated, before he began to sit up as well. “It's going to storm,” he mused, sensing the energy in the air as much as I. We were both mages, after all. We knew how to tell the differences of energy in the air. This morning, the air was ripe with it. Knowing the storms were different in Nahara, I wondered if we would face another sandstorm today, because I could not imagine anything resembling a thunderstorm happening here naturally.
“Yes,” I finally replied, my voice a murmur. “A storm is coming.” I reached out, taking his hand and lying it over the bed mat so he could feel the protests of the earth beneath us. “So is something else.”
Cerin wasted no time beginning to pull his armor on over his clothes, and I did so as well. Outside of the tent, I could hear a distant rumbling. I was uncertain as to whether it was from a storm or a beast, but I didn't hesitate to find out. On the other side of the thick canvas, soldiers were murmuring amongst themselves, their voices edged in anxiety.
Cerin and I emerged from the tent minutes later, finding the camp beneath a thick blanket of nervousness. I looked off to Jaalam, uncertain of what I would find. For now, I only saw soldiers coming to and from the lost city, carrying supplies, among other things. There appeared to be an abundance of soldiers walking around today. Perhaps the diggers had broken through to Hasani during the night.
Nyx jogged toward us from Jaalam, even as Cerin and I were on our way. “You're up,” she breathed, slightly fatigued.
“Have you been digging?” I asked her.
“Yes. We broke through less than an hour ago. Hasani is out, and so are some of his men.” Nyx grimaced. “Hasani will not leave until his men are healed. He won't leave them behind.”
“I assumed as such,” I replied briskly, continuing my walk toward the site. Nyx followed beside me. “Why does that bother you?”
“Normally it wouldn't, but the soldiers are starting to freak out. They say a storm is coming.” Nyx pointed off to the east, where the skies were darkening. Above the sandstone wall holding back the beastlands, I could see the flickering of distant lightning, the skies so full of energy that they showed the abundance off in displays of pride.
“Do the storms also cause that tremor in the earth?” I asked her.
“Ha!” Nyx laughed, though she sounded nervous. “No. You noticed that, did you?”
“Of course.”
“Yeah, so...we have problems. We should be heading off, like...now.” Nyx glanced back toward the camp nervously. “Did you notice the hyenas? They are revved for battle. They sense the beast.”
“If we are dealing with Mantus, Hasani has fought it before,” Cerin commented. “He'll know its strengths and weaknesses.”
“What weaknesses, Cerin?” I retorted, anxiously. “He and his men have been trapped for a full moon. If anything, Mantus knows our weaknesses. Sand. Being swallowed by it.” I looked around us. “And we are surrounded by it.”
“I am searching for optimism, Kai,” the necromancer admitted, humbly.
The three of us made it to the dig site, where I finally saw Hasani outside of it, standing in all of his glory. He was tall for a human, at around six feet, and his light blue eyes were refreshed. Perhaps the food and water we'd given him the previous night had helped to rejuvenate him. Attached to his muscular left arm was a black buckler, outlined in red and gold much like the soldier had told us, and his left hand held a bundle of long, metal javelins which sharpened to shiny points. Hanging from a sheath at his side was a beautiful ax with a curved black blade, which was sharpened to a hooked point. Along the sharpened edge of the weapon, the steel was nicked and discolored to silver, proving Hasani often saw battle.
The prince glanced up toward us as we approached. “Kai...I am glad you are awake. My soldiers need healing. I have not moved the injured, for fear of making them worse.”
I nodded toward the eastern skies. “Do we have time to heal them before it comes?”
“If not, then they will be healed after it is defeated,” he mused. “I will not leave my men.”
“I admire that, Hasani,” I said, stopping beside the tall man, even as Cerin ducked into the doorway the soldiers had dug through during the night. I figured he would begin healing them. “But you have to acknowledge that if Mantus comes back, we could all die out here. Not just a handful of the injured, but all of us.”
Hasani looked to me, his eyes trying to figure me out. “Are you suggesting we leave them?”
“No. I just want to make sure you know what we're getting into.”
“I know it better than you,” the prince stated. “I know what we're up against, but I'm telling you, I will not leave my men here to die.”
“Very well,” I said, the words floating out between my lips on an exhale. “Then follow me, and tell me what to expect as I heal them.”
I headed into the building with the prince on my heels. The stiff air within the long lost building stunk of decay, blood, and human excrement. I tried not to let it bother me, breathing shallowly through my lips to avoid the smell. It appeared as if this had been the top level of a two or three story building, and the sands had swallowed it so fully it was now sitting level with the desert. I realized the doorway we'd come through had once led out to a balcony. Inside, injured soldiers were lying against the walls, between piles of sand which had slipped through cracks and windows. Cerin was in the midst of healing one of them along the far wall, so I dipped to the nearest injured and began to do the same.
“What do you wish to know?” Hasani asked, standing just behind me as I healed the first soldier.
“Everything you learned during your fight with Mantus. Its weaknesses and str
engths.”
The prince laughed dryly. “I learned nothing during the fight which I did not already know, my friend. The bastard does not leave the sands. None of my men or I were able to get a hit in, because he never came out from underground.”
I moved onto the next soldier, frustrated. Not only were Hasani's words disheartening, but the soldiers here had been injured for weeks. Though my healing helped to accelerate the closing of their wounds, they would also need more rest. If Hasani was unwilling to leave Jaalam without his men, we would need to be here for at least another night.
“What tactics, then, were you going to use?” I questioned him.
“I ran out of them,” Hasani replied. “I told the arbalests to find higher ground and shoot the beast, but what few bolts did go through the sands didn't slow it, and we weren't sure if they even hit. All of my lancers and infantry could not get hits in, for they were swallowed by the sands if they got too close. Mantus is fast. The hyenas can barely keep up with him as it is.”
“Hasani, for the love of the gods, give me some good news,” I muttered, moving on to yet another soldier.
The prince chuckled heartily, as if we weren't in a dire situation. “I can tell you that by the intensity of the tremors beneath our feet, Mantus will show today, and the gods have blessed you with a storm. Given you are a mage, there has never been a better time to face the beast.”
I turned to glare at the prince. “Mantus will show today?”
Hasani nodded. “Soon.”
I stood from the soldier's side, and looked to Cerin, who was still in the midst of healing. “Cerin! Keep healing until I call you!”
The necromancer waved me off, understanding.
Hasani followed me back out into the ghostly streets of Jaalam. “You are leaving the injured?” He inquired.
“I have left them to Cerin,” I retorted, spinning to face him. “If Mantus will be here today, we need to get the soldiers ready now to avoid more from being injured.”
The prince's gaze softened as he realized I was right. “Let us be off, then,” he agreed, hurrying forward toward our camp.
Once at the camp, we told the soldiers to prepare for battle. Nyx had come back to camp during my previous healing, and was helping the others collect weapons and armor to prepare. Anto, Jakan, and Theron were all fully dressed and prepared. The soldiers that had dug late into the night awoke to both the happiness of finding Hasani in the camp with them and the anxiety of facing a beast which had never been bested.
The army followed us toward Jaalam. The dark skies slowly crept closer to us from the east, and with them, came the thick, dusty clouds of an oncoming sandstorm. It looked like a wall was simply closing in on us.
“I will put the arbalests on the roofs,” Hasani commented, motioning toward the hills of sand nearby.
“No,” I argued, pointing off to the south, where the sharp inclines of the Dhahab Canyons rose in rocky walls, keeping the coast out of sight. “We'll put them on the cliffs. We have seen what Mantus can do to the land here. They will be killed with one wave of the sands.”
Hasani nodded, liking my idea, and turned to the army behind us. All in all, including the soldiers of his who were able to fight, we had maybe one hundred and twenty of them. “Arbalests! We need you along the cliff of the canyons! Leave the hyenas to the rest of us. Quickly!”
Theron and Jakan both eyed me from the side, where my companions stood, separated from the army. Both had access to range, so I knew they sought my input.
“Theron, go with them,” I told the ranger. “Shoot until you run out of arrows.”
“Aye.” With a pat on my shoulder, Theron said, “Good luck, Kai.” With a wave to the others, he went to catch up to the soldiers.
“I'd like to stay with Anto,” Jakan said, before I could request anything of him.
I nodded. “That's fine. Your crossbow is not meant for such a distance, anyway.” I looked off over the rest of the soldiers, consisting of both lancers and infantry. There were enough hyenas for the rest of them. Directing my question to Hasani, I asked, “The infantry...they can fight while mounted?”
“Yes. It is not ideal, but...” the prince's eyes were on the soldiers as well, thinking through tactics.
“This whole situation is not ideal,” I murmured, before raising my voice to speak to the army. “The rest of you! Mount your hyenas, and prepare for orders. I want lancers separated from infantry.” Turning to my own companions, I said, “That includes you all.”
“I won't be able to hit a damn thing while mounted with my daggers, Kai,” Nyx argued.
“I don't care, Nyx. I'd rather you be alive and have to run from the thing than get one hit in and be dead.”
The Alderi shrugged, seeing my point.
“You'll figure it out. You always do,” I reasoned. “Hasani—you need to be mounted as well. It is better to outrun it. Bring two hyenas with you to Jaalam; one for me, and one for Cerin. Wait for us within the buildings, where Mantus has less chance of killing you.”
The prince grinned at me, seemingly amused by my ability to give him orders. “Will do, friend. Why not ride the hyenas out there yourselves?”
“Because we have little time,” I replied, hurrying off toward Jaalam, “And I will start this fight on foot.”
I heard Hasani shouting out orders behind me as I hurried off toward the lost city. To my right, I saw the first arbalests begin to form along the cliff of the canyon, having hurried up the incline which was farther east. The cliff overlooked both Jaalam and most of the desert surrounding it, and was too high to be affected by the moving sands. I figured the canyons had formed thousands of years ago; if Mantus hadn't destroyed them by now, chances were low he would today.
Once in Jaalam, I scrambled to the roof of a building along its eastern edges, sands rolling down the dunes beneath my boots. The storm was coming. The wall of sand and wind was audible, now, the skies groaning as if the heavens themselves were the beasts that wished to fight. Streaks of lightning continued to light up in patches of the thick gray clouds above, the purple light flashing brightly against the granules within the sandstorm.
Ahead of me, between the storm and I, were the hundreds of corpses Cerin had arisen yesterday, lying in heaps of decomposition and mismatched bones where he had dispelled them. I tried to estimate how many there were. Three hundred, maybe four hundred? Either way, we had one hundred and twenty living soldiers, and all who would be within the path of Mantus would be mounted. Perhaps the beast would focus instead on the dead, which we had at our repeated disposal.
I heard a creaking, ripping sound that rumbled through the air, and the vibrations beneath my feet intensified. My eyes scanned the horizon, and I saw the heaps of rubble at the broken section of the eastern wall tremble in the distance, before more cracks and crumbles met my ear, the sandstone of the rubble breaking down further. Then, with my heart pounding against my ribs, I noticed the sands sink lower past the rubble, heaps of the granules rising on either side, as if the sands were water which was rippling outward with little resistance. Clouds of dust rose in its wake, the trail of sinking granules approaching Jaalam at a startlingly fast rate. Though the storm was nearly upon us and had been building all morning, the beast in the sands was determined to race it.
“Cerin!” I screamed, thrusting both arms out to my sides as the swirling, shuffling sands of the storm blocked out the sun, leaving the lost city of Jaalam cast in shadow, at the mercy of the elements. In both hands, I built water energy.
“Kai!” Cerin was screaming it, because saying it at any lower of a volume would make his voice lost to the wind.
I turned, risking a moment to see the necromancer rushing toward me from the building he'd been healing within. I said nothing as he raced up the hill of sand to arrive on the roof beside me, and his eyes found the sinking sands of the beast, the trail of which was already halfway to us from the wall. Even closer, however, was the storm.
The storm alone coul
d kill us, but we needed to take the chance. This one was much larger than the sandstorm that greeted us as soon as we'd entered Nahara, and within seconds, Cerin and I would be blasted by winds that would steal our breaths.
The necromancer could no longer hear me as I screamed directions, but he understood why I'd called him. Beneath two palms, he built up death energy, his eyes focused on the hundreds of corpses on the ground below before they closed, the sands finally reaching us.
I held my breath. In both of my hands, the water spells trembled with immense power, threatening to explode if I did not release them. The underground rumbling from Mantus's approach was so loud now that it rivaled the storm, and with my eyes closed, I was mistaken in believing that the whole of Arrayis was breaking apart into pieces.
Finally, I raised both hands to the sky, releasing the two eager spells and preparing for battle.
Twenty-one
Rain began to spill from the skies, the water thickening the falling sands of the oncoming storm and making it land in heavy splats on our skin. I heard Cerin's death energy sizzle as he released it, before I could hear it no more. Once again, I built water energy within my palms, forcing the storm to succumb to my will. Though my eyes were still closed protectively against the sands, I could hear Mantus's rumbling breach the border of Jaalam, and then, I heard the sounds of soldiers screaming, rushing into battle.
I finally trusted the weather enough to open my eyes, though I quickly regretted it. This storm was much thicker than the first, and its winds still raged, though not nearly as strong as before. I continued to let the energy build in my palms, taming the storm for my own gains, until the winds were finally suppressed enough to allow us to see and breathe. I released the second pair of water spells, before bending over at the waist, urgently trying to wash my eyes free of the sand which had infiltrated them before.
The rains soon doubled in strength, and I finally stood back up, looking out into the desert. The sands were darkening and thickening from being drenched, and the beast was slowing. Though that's not why I had picked water for my element to combat Mantus, it was a nice added benefit. For now, Cerin and I breathed heavily on the rooftop, even as hundreds of the dead shambled past us from where the necromancer had risen them. I could not hope to fight Mantus beneath the sands. As I watched the lancers charge forth on their hyenas, only for the animals to dodge the crumbling wet sands before the lances could attempt to find the beast, I realized none of us could.