Prophecy's Promise (Prophecy of the Edges Book 1)

by Lauren Amundson

  Kadir pursed his lips, and then said recklessly, “Fine, Councilwoman Adara Zayad will receive all Drahwan Dehdarad’s titles.”

  “Deal struck. I’ll go. But I need help.” I turned to Desha and the Mitanni. “Who is coming with me?”

  Chapter 33

  The winter wind had grown angry. It nibbled against my nose and fingers, but since only Council members could enter the building and Desha wanted both Kadir and me to witness the proceedings, we convened in the Plaza outside the Council building. Words tumbled from the crowd as the Mitanni jostled to be heard.

  “The Promise is going, with or without our help.”

  “The mountains are doomed either way. Should we not do our part?”

  “This is not our battle.”

  Desha stood up and the crowd went silent. “Maybe the Empire wants our city defenseless,” she declared.

  “Do you doubt what my grandmother’s has Foretold?” Rcanian demanded.

  “No, child,” Kirta said. “She is scared.”

  “I am nothing of the sort!” Desha proclaimed.

  “We are all scared. It is nothing to be ashamed of,” Kirta said.

  “The Promise was exactly that, a Promise, not a Guarantee,” Desha pointed out. “What if she fails? What then?”

  Vasani walked forward; a purple cap obscured her fire-colored hair. “Hailey is meant to save the world, not the mountains. We could lose ourselves in this tidal wave of cultures. We cannot risk that. I would rather that The Edges destroy the mountains than see our children grow up in a world where they are at risk of being pulled from their heritage.” A roar of approval ripped through the crowd.

  “We cannot react from a place of fear, nor from a place of totality,” Rcanian spoke up. “Everyone of age must have a say.”

  Desha clenched her fists, but acquiesced. “Ring the bell. Gather the People.”

  Rcanian nodded and solemnly walked to a large bell in the center of the plaza. He lifted the mallet that laid on the ground below it, striking the bell three times. “It has been done.”

  While we waited the half hour required to allow the People who wished to vote to gather outside the Council, Kirta explained the tradition to us. The People would gather. Desha as the leader would present the question, and then all those in the Council would have the opportunity to speak. After they finished, all those present would cast a vote. This had only been done a half dozen times through their history. The last time had been to discuss Krineem, another runaway bride.

  Desha floated above the crowd. “My People,” her voice bellowed, amplified by the Mist, “we face a question of greater importance than the Mitanni have faced before. The Promise, who has been living among us, must begin her journey. But she needs help. This I ask you: have we already done our duty by sheltering her or should we send a delegation past the Empire, past our Slice, to another world to assist her?”

  Kirta floated up to Desha. “What I have Foretold did not clarify all the tangle of possibilities that stretch before us. But it is certain that The Edges will destroy us faster than the Empire ever could. If the Promise does not succeed, we will all be dead before three months have passed.”

  Esden was next. “I agree with the Grandmother. If the Promise does not succeed, then we will die. But I do not understand how that should concern the Mitanni. We thrive because we do not bother ourselves with the problems of those outside our borders. If we go forward, we will lose that part of our identity. We may never be the same again. Isn’t that the same as being dead?” A large cheer went throughout the crowd. Vasani and several other younger members of the Council joined Esden stating similar thoughts.

  I wondered what was written on the wish lanterns. Wishes for Sara Heather to be born on her own Slice? Wishes for her to be Mitanni?

  Finally, Rcanian floated up to the center of the crowd. “My People, you all know my initial hesitation around bringing in the Empirites. Had it been my choice, we would have brought in the Promise and cast those from the Empire back into the mountains. I’ve come to change my mind about one of the Empirites in particular.” A nervous giggle ran through the crowd. “But that is because I’ve come to know Adara Zayad. I’ve come to understand the why Danue fell in love with Krineem. Their cost was too high, but their choice was pure and good. We are part of a larger world, and we must do our part to help. Otherwise, Azabin will destroy the Mitanni. I will not sit idly by and wait for that to happen. I want to fight.”

  We waited many long moments to see if any other Council members would throw in their words, but no one else floated toward them. Then, Kirta spoke. “It is not our Way, but I request that the Promise come speak.”

  I had not tried to self-levitate before, but I could see how the People were doing it. I tried to replicate the pattern as best I could. I felt the threads of the Mist lock beneath my feet and hoist me up. I slipped a stitch and my right foot slammed into the ground.

  “She’s like a toddler taking her first steps!” someone from the crowd shouted, and many others laughed, but I restarted the weaving, and floated toward the sky, eventually settling near Rcanian and Kirta.

  “Some of you know my story and some of you do not. I was once like you. As a Scholar, I lived apart from the world, focusing on my studies. When I was told that I had to leave the Keep, I was so angry. I wondered why I had to make the sacrifices asked of me. I was not afraid of change; I just didn’t want it.

  “Esden is right. This choice will change you, but that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. I never would have believed that leaving the Keep could bring anything except trouble. Don’t get me wrong. It’s brought plenty of that. But it’s brought so much more. I’ve found friends.” I smiled down at Bahlym and Adara. “And I found myself, my true self. I don’t know what will be waiting for me on my Slice. All I know is that I need help. I don’t trust the Empire, either, and that’s why I need you. I need the Mitanni to stand with me.”

  Desha floated higher above the members of the Council who had spoken. “Yes, we shall send a delegation forth with the Promise.” She pointed to her right. “Or no, we shall remain separated from the Slices.” She pointed to her left.

  Sparks of blue, purple, pink, and green shot from the crowd below. Many sparks settled to Desha’s left, but far more settled to her right.

  “The People have spoken!” Desha shouted. “On the morrow, we will set forth a delegation to help the Promise save our mountains by saving our world.”

  Chapter 34

  Directly overhead, the winter sun beat down upon the city. The pink stone buildings glistened like embers. Was this the last time I would walk through the mountain city? It had only been ten weeks, but it felt like a lifetime.

  I’d come to the city with only the clothes on my back and Shezdon’s book in my hands. I had nothing to take with me, only people to leave behind. “Yammin, thank you. When the world is put back together, you can look westward and know that it was all due to your teaching.”

  With tearful eyes, he hugged me.

  “I’m glad you came to the mountains,” Namje said, solemnly. “I hope you’ve learned something.”

  “I think I’ve learned more than you realize,” I said.

  “Do you really have to leave?” Embe pouted. Her initial reaction to me three months ago completely forgotten. She clung to me. “People who leave the mountains never come back.”

  Desha walked in the door. “That can’t be true, small one. I’m going with her, and I’ll be back.”

  Embe released me and eyed Desha suspiciously. “Mamma. Don’t leave,” the girl pleaded.

  “Don’t be a baby,” Namje chided.

  I left the family to their good-byes and waited for Desha in the street. Adara and Bahlym were already waiting for me. As difficult as leaving Gryshelm City was for me, it must be infinitely worse for Desha and the others. At least I’d been outside the city and knew that leaving was an option, not one that I’d wanted, but an option nonetheless.

  “It will
take forever to travel by horse to our Edge,” Adara said.

  “We flew half way here, and it still took about three days to ride the remainder of the trip,” a soldier said.

  “Longer than you think,” I said. “We are going significantly further north than Empire City. We are going all the way to the Northern Pointe.”

  “Where the east and west edges of our Slice meet?” Adara gasped and I nodded.

  “It’s supposed to be very weak up there,” I told her.

  “We’ll have to take a hovercraft. There’s no other way,” said Kadir.

  “Shall I call for one?” the solider asked.

  “I think that’s a fantastic way to make anxious People overreact in a very violent way. Let’s wait for Desha,” I said.

  And so we waited.

  The wait wasn’t long, maybe an hour, but it felt like forever. While we waited, I poured over the book. I had probably gathered about everything from it that I was going to, but reading and re-reading the instructions that weren’t ripped out at least gave me something to do.

  As Desha approached, Kadir called out, “Desha, I’ll call forth the hovercraft.”

  “Absolutely not!” Desha’s voice boomed. The air around her sparkled with threads of Mist. “You will not desecrate my city with that tainted Mist.”

  “Okay. Let’s try a compromise,” I said. “Desha, at which radius will the Mist-Challenged devices cause desecration?” It was all I could do to keep sarcasm from my voice.

  “Their very existence desecrates the mountains,” Vasani spat. “These bugs insist upon using it.”

  “Well, it’s the only way we can reach the pole in a reasonable amount of time.” I felt like I was instructing my class of first-year Weavers again and they’d gotten in a fight. “What about the base of the mountain?”

  “That will take two hours to walk!” Kadir complained.

  “Can the Mitanni carry Kadir, Adara, Bahlym, and me?”

  After some additional grumbling and whining, all of which reminded me of Embe, we’d selected Mitanni to carry the four of us and zoomed off toward the hovercrafts. Rcanian, of course, carried Adara, which was fine, until we arrived at the hovercrafts. Merehan Dehdarad stood outside peering skyward. Yammin, who carried me, landed a beat before Rcanian and Adara.

  Merehan immediately raced to Adara. “All is forgiven, my dear!” he declared, embracing her.

  Rcanian punched him.

  One hundred Mitanni pulled skeins of Mist to themselves as the Empirites powered up their Mist-Channeled devices.

  “Okay,” I stepped between Rcanian and Merehan. “Adara, you are a Councilwoman, please dissolve your betrothal.”

  Merehan grasped Adara’s wrist and she gasped in pain. “It’s not that simple,” he growled. “We have a contract.”

  “Everyone, stand down!” I yelled before Rcanian could do anything stupid. “And Merehan let go of Councilwoman Zayad.” When no one moved, I turned to the leaders. “Kadir and Desha, control your people.”

  “Merehan, release the girl,” Kadir snapped. “We don’t have time.”

  “She’s mine.”

  “She belongs to herself,” Rcanian growled.

  “Merehan Rhamden Dehdarad, I have given an order.” Kadir’s ominous tone warned that the third demand would not be with words.

  “Harlot!” Merehan spat as he pushed Adara away.

  “We are not getting on those monstrosities,” Desha declared, glaring at the hovercrafts. “The Empirites showed their true colors in less than a heartbeat.”

  “It was Rcanian who first punched Merehan,” I pointed out.

  “We call it testosterone,” Bahlym said, dryly.

  Kadir pointed to Desha. “And we call that estrogen. You are being emotional and unreasonable, woman. Get your people on the hovercrafts. We must go.”

  Desha hovered a foot above the ground. Whether it was to look intimidating or because she was so livid that she didn’t realize, was anyone’s guess. “You will not order me about.”

  “And you will dissolve Adara’s betrothal,” Rcanian demanded.

  “Is this what you call cooperation?” Bahlym asked the crowd. His calm voice carried, although he did not yell. Perhaps that is what caused all eyes to snap in his direction. “We will all literally die in a few months. Every moment we spend in this futile argument is another moment in which Azabin grows stronger and our world grows weaker. Can we please fight about this after we’ve removed the first edge and the danger is somewhat abated?”

  It was Kadir who spoke first. “Admiral Bahlym Ahgren Zayad, I grant you the leadership of this mission. As your superior, I will cede as only an advisor when it comes to uniting the Mitanni with the Empire in this matter. Will that help us collaborate with the Mitanni?”

  Bahlym bowed to the general. If his promotion from Commander to Admiral pleased him, it did not show. “General Kadir Zirban, as my first duty in uniting the Empire and the Mitanni against Azabin, I request that Adara Mhegae Zayad be released from her betrothal. The Mitanni will be delighted to see that Krineem and Daune’s plight is not recreated.”

  “I do not agree!” Merehan declared. “No one has this authority except me. As Adara Mhegae Zayad is mine. I order her killed.”

  “No, Merehan,” Kadir stepped forward. “I will order you killed if you do not release your claim and I will let… the girl do it.”

  Merehan blanched. “She couldn’t.”

  “Oh, I think she could.” Kadir smirked his greasy smile.

  While I appreciated his change of attitude, I’d seen crickets with more genuineness. When I’d first met Kadir, Bahlym had called him an opportunist. There’d never been a truer description. “Everyone who agrees to fly under Admiral Bahlym Ahgren Zayad’s command and acknowledges Merehan’s betrothal annulled, board the hovercrafts now. Everyone who does not. It’s a long walk back to the Empire.”

  Bahlym snapped to action, splitting the Mitanni and Empirites between the hovercrafts. Of course, on the two Mitanni's hovercraft, the flight crews were Empirites. Six hovercrafts, with fifty passengers, and ten crew. Three hundred and fifty would have been a small force if we were not Weavers but this was nearly as many Weavers in all of Gryshelm. It would be interesting to see their reaction. I wondered how everyone would react when they learned that not only did another civilization exist on the other side of Gryshelm’s Edge, but that there were a total of five Edges and that we were just one of six Slices. It still seemed far-fetched to me and I’d been living on this side of Gryshelm’s Edge for months. I hoped that the sheer number of Weavers would be enough to convince them of the truth.

  By the time everyone was settled on hovercrafts and ready to take off, it was mid-afternoon. We chased the sun westward, but as fast as we flew, the sun was faster. It disappeared behind Gryshelm’s Edge. The last rays of light beckoned us onward, but twilight eventually descended. I wrung my hands, fretting whether I could make a hole in Gryshelm’s Edge large enough—and hold it open long enough—for the six hovercrafts to pass through. Apprehensively, I flipped through the book hoping for more clues on working with The Edges and for clues as to the exact location of the cistea’a. The book mentioned nothing about how to pull a part of The Edges apart, only that it was possible. For the cistea’a’s location, it cryptically mentioned about where the eastern edge meets the western, but nothing specific. I wondered if the cistea’a’s location and the weakness of The Edges were related, but the book didn’t mention anything concretely either way.

  Finally, we’d reach the pole. “We need to descend. I think that I need to feel the ground,” I announced.

  At my words, the pilot jerked in surprise, eyes wide, uncertain of what to do. Rcanian reiterated my command through gritted teeth, perhaps more annoyed than I. He knew how the Empire treated women, but he seemed to be as annoyed as I had been when I first met them. I was past annoyance at this point. I couldn’t understand how Adara could have grown up in such an environment. I smirked thinking about
what Meena would do if any of these idiots tried to treat her like a mindless little doll.

  “What?” Rcanian asked.

  “Just picturing how this is all going to work out.”

  “Well, at least you are smiling.”

  “You have no idea.”

  The hovercrafts began their decent. The moment we touched ground, I felt the cistea’a summoning me. Not like The Edges’ harsh, hungering desire. It sang promises of refuge, promises of joy.

  Snow pelted my face, but did not obscure my vision. It wouldn’t have mattered. My feet knew where to walk. And then I Foretold it, a carved wooden pedestal with a purple cube on top of it. The almost translucent pink Mist barrier surrounding the pedestal reminded me of the shield that Arwan had used the day I met her; the day she saved Altis and me from the Weavers posed as bandits in forest. There was no snow inside the barrier. I stepped through, and truth be told, I felt a little disappointed when, as my fingers grasped the purple cubical cistea’a, nothing happened.

  I shivered as the wind raked through my sweater. Turning around, I realized that a small gathering of people pooled outside the hovercrafts, observing me. With the cistea’a clutched to my side, I approached Gryshelm’s Edge. The burning hatred simmered softer here, muted in comparison to the other part of Gryshelm’s Edge that I’d seen. This was definitely a weak spot, but could I really pull it apart?

  “Okay… who is brave?” I called out.

  At first, no one spoke, but after a moment, Kirta did. “Child, I Foretold a battle. We have to get through this Edge in order for that battle to happen. Therefore, we will get through. The Mitanni will go first.”

  Surprisingly, the Empirites did not complain.

  I reached out toward Gryshelm’s Edge with my Mist. At the poles, all the Edges met. I could feel all six slices and the five edges that separated them. I wondered what the other Slices were like and if I would survive to find out. I concentrated on Gryshelm’s Edge, the one that separated my Slice from this one. I could feel the radiating energy of the broken Mist, the Mist that had tainted me. I pushed back against it in very much the same way I had been pushing back against the Mist repeatedly since that day at River’s End. I pushed it down, pushed it back. Slowly, it separated. I let it go, and it oozed back into place like molasses.