“If everyone is listening, we will begin,” Olumi said.
Jabari saw Deto trying to stifle a laugh. He felt such a sudden pang of missing Gavi that he winced. He tried to shrug it off, but there was a faint sting of betrayal in there. Don’t be silly, he told himself. Gavi would never betray us.
“Long, long ago, back when there was no Maween, no Workers, no desert, no continent, all the people were one. Nenyi took care of them all, and they took care of each other. They didn’t know one another well between the distant lands, but Nenyi helped to unite them. The Uncreated One gave them lifework: the dancers to dance, the gatherers to gather, the warriors to train and grow great strength, the worshipers to offer devotion. He sang to the singers (that was us, the beginnings of the Maweel), to teach them his songs. He offered knowledge of the earth and of gathering, how to care for the vulnerable beings, to respect the ancient ones, to placate the hard earth. He was everywhere and nowhere.
And then Mugunta came. We don’t know where Mugunta came from, or if he was always there. Some think he came from another place, from the spilled future of pain. When Mugunta came, we were vulnerable to his lies.”
“You keep saying ‘we.’ Were you alive for all of this?” Brigid asked.
There was a shocked silence.
“Daughter of weavers, I said long, long ago. This is before recorded history.”
Brigid turned bright red. “I skipped over a lot in school,” she said. “I just wanted to weave. Sorry.”
Jabari turned to catch a glimpse of Olumi staring at the back of Brigid’s head with horror in his eyes. He recovered himself and continued.
“As I was saying, when Mugunta came, the poison came. Mugunta lived in one place, spilling all his evil and greed into the land around him, and that land became the Great Waste. When Nenyi saw how dangerous this poison was, saw people falling into the Great Waste, he picked it up and threw it, far, far, across the ocean, under the earth. But still we feel it, and poison seeps up from the Great Waste. Some people gave themselves to the poison. It was then that the emperor took over the land from across the continent, making the languages one, it was then that the priests began to worship Mugunta in the shapes of the four goddesses. The warrior line became tainted, as one of their kings drank the power of the evil one. The World Whisperer was born to care for the earth and sing so the songs would not be forgotten. Nenyi retreated, because he could not work in the same way, with poison thick in the air. He began to work through the World Whisperer, coaxing life back into the people through the one who could heal, who taught the old songs.
“As time went on, though, the people grew more separate even as they moved closer together. The singers isolated themselves, staying close to Nenyi, and the World Whisperer cared for them. They found a fertile land and named it Maween. The warriors were much divided. Many among them looked into the old ways and found Nenyi’s footsteps everywhere. They longed for strength, as in the olden days, and so became separate and kept to deserts and tents, so they could focus on strength and not become blinded by the acquisition of things or places. Their homelessness made them vulnerable, and the Gariah, who came from the first warrior ever to betray Nenyi, attacked them again and again. The land was filled with contradiction and strife. The nomadic warriors became the Karee, ever trying to be free of the evil of the Desert King. And the dancers moved to the plains to make their dances easier. Many of the dancers were captured and poisoned, and these ones became the Workers. The ones who remained free were few in number, like the Karee. But they continued to dance, and they dance their steps all along the plains, to this day. They are the Hadem, the ones we are going to visit now.”
There was a thick silence. Jabari felt as though he couldn’t breathe. He had never heard it all laid out like this in a story. How had it happened that the World Whisperer only protected the Maweel? He felt creaky stirrings in his heart that were not comfortable.
“And my people?” Deto asked. “We are not warriors, or singers, or dancers. What are we?”
Jabari thought of the one time he had glimpsed a large group of people who looked like Deto, high in the mountains in the north. His father had taken him and Gavi on a long trek that included a visit to the people of the mountains. Light brown skin, eyes that crinkled to lines when they smiled, wide cheekbones, long limbs.
“Your people were the worshipers, with flowers and bells, honoring the Shaper without ceasing. Now some worshipers remain, but they are a gentle people, caught often by the Desert King, and their children are enslaved by him. Many have retreated out of his reach, far away in the mountains, in the ice and snow. Many have turned to worship the mountains and have forgotten the Shaper.”
Deto looked at Olumi for a long moment. Jabari realized then that they had stopped walking and were standing in a loose group.
“Let’s get some water from that stream, at least,” he said, “if we’re going to stand around like a bunch of slack-jawed priests.”
They all burst out laughing. “What?” Ivy asked. “What under Nenyi’s skies, Jabari?”
“It was all getting a little too serious.”
One touch from Isika purified the water so they could drink it.
“Such a good trick you have,” Jabari said.
“I could have called us a stream,” she replied, raising her eyebrows at him.
He pretended to swoon. “Don’t look at me like that,” he said.
She smiled and turned away.
“Can we take a rest?” Olumi asked. “Remember, I’m an old librarian.”
So they lay back in the needles of the Hoona trees that lined the stream, and Jabari stared up at the blue patches of sky he could see, acutely aware of Isika near him. If he stretched, he could touch her elbow. He didn’t.
“How come Nenyi made us all different? And separated us by the way we look?” Deto asked. “Didn’t she want us to blend together? To know each other well?”
“The books say that it was out of her pleasure in making things, and that she intended us to blend, truly, like dye colors in the water, dancing and changing each other. Until Mugunta came, no one had thought to be angry about differences, or hate because of them.”
“What I want to know,” Isika said, “is how under Nenyi’s skies people became Workers from dancers? Workers don’t dance. I can’t imagine them dancing! They would look like puppets if they tried to move their arms and legs to dance.”
They all laughed. Jabari smiled to hear Isika joking about the Workers. She had been serious about them for a long time.
Olumi sighed, though. “It is strange how people become poisoned, how they turn dance into rigid rules, strength into slaving and killing.”
“Some people say,” Abbas started, speaking for the first time since Olumi had started his story, “that there is a strain of warrior still true to Nenyi inside the city of the Gariah. I don’t know if I believe it. I have been to the Desert City, and I didn’t see anyone who seemed true to Nenyi.”
“Maybe they are in hiding,” Ben said.
“If there were warriors true to Nenyi in that city, they would have to be in hiding.”
“Right under the king’s nose. That would be amazing,” Isika said.
And Jabari thought of his dream of the man with the gold cord, and wished, simply because of the wonder in her voice, that it was true.
Chapter 14
The arrow made everything sharper for Aria. The wide, dry waves of the desert, the pounding of her heart, her breath in her ears. She could feel Gavi beside her acutely, hear his short breaths and little sighs. He didn’t give her distance anymore and she had stopped fighting him.
Sometimes, if she was feeling particularly powerful, she shot him a triumphant look. He had thought she couldn’t do this. He had been so wrong. His only reaction to her looks was to hand her the flask of water, over and over again. It was getting so boring. All he cared about was water, rest, the food he thought she should eat. She tried to ignore him.
; Aria’s father was calling her, and she was going to him. She finally knew what she needed to do and the knowledge filled her with power. It hummed under her skin, even while she slept.
Even if Gavi was getting boring, Aria had to admit that she would be lonely if he wasn’t there, so she let him walk with her.
He would only walk in the early hours of the morning and the late afternoon and evening, saying something about the sun being too hot. It was weak of him, but she allowed it. And though she felt so much power coursing through her that she didn’t need to eat, she permitted him to catch food for her. There was a river of power within her. Often, she barely slept before she felt the arrow picking her back up, setting her on her path.
“I’m so glad the healers weren’t able to take the arrow out,” she confided on one of those nights, as Gavi, yawning, scrambled to catch up with her, hauling both their packs. “I never realized it was in me for a purpose. Imagine—we thought it was sent to hurt me. We were so wrong, Gavi, so deceived.”
His face twisted with some emotion. She couldn’t read it.
“It’s just good that I’ve finally stopped fighting it. And I’m glad it found me and not Isika.” She shook her head. “That would have been a tragedy. She’s always gotten everything she wanted. It would be horrible if she had the arrow too.”
“Can you speak more clearly?” Gavi asked. “I’m having trouble hearing you. Are you speaking words?”
She stared at him. “Poor Gavi, the sun must be getting to you.”
He stared at her for a moment, then handed her the water flask. She tried to brush it away, but he insisted, so she took a small sip, missing her mouth at first and wiping at her face as water cascaded down her chin. Her hands were shaking with power.
“It’s okay, little bird,” Gavi said, gently touching her shoulder. “It’s going to be okay. We’re going to find someone in the Desert City who can help.”
His eyes were rimmed in red, with deep shadows under them. His hand on her shoulder made her feel weak and shaky, questioning her own power, so she shook it off. For a moment she wondered whether he was just slowing her down. Should she leave him? Shake him off for real? But then she remembered that he had been a friend of hers once.
“Perhaps there are healing tents in the Desert City,” she said to him. “And you can take a rest there, get better after the journey. I’ll ask them to treat you nicely.”
He stared at her as though he couldn’t understand her. Oh, he was really not doing well. She picked up the pace.
They saw a smudge in the distance and Gavi looked at it for a long moment before saying, “I think that’s a village, Aria. Maybe we should stop in and ask them about the king and what he’s been up to lately.”
“He’ll tell me if I ask him,” she said, smiling up at Gavi. “Don’t worry.”
There was a familiar rush of air, and the mad bird was back. Aria scowled at him and kept walking, but Gavi made a strange, choked sound and stopped walking.
“Now you are ready to talk?” the bird asked.
“Don’t talk to him, Gavi. He’s a betrayer,” Aria shouted over her shoulder without slowing her pace.
The bird stared at her, then whistled.
“What did she say?” he asked Gavi.
“I don’t know. She’s been doing this for a couple of days. She talks and talks, but I don’t understand the words, and she seems to think she’s speaking normally.”
Aria broke into a run. She didn’t need their nonsense.
“What’s she doing now?” the bird asked behind her.
“I don’t know. I think she believes she’s moving quickly, but we are barely getting anywhere.”
“That could be good. Jabari is on his way.”
Gavi heaved a huge sigh that turned into a sob. “I’m so glad. What do I do, Keethior? This is beyond me.”
“Stay with her. The poison has reached her heart. I think it would have killed her already, but he wants her, so he’s keeping her alive. Isika is with the Karee, searching for a cure. But we could still lose her. You will have to prepare yourself for that.”
“What will happen if we lose her?”
“If she doesn’t die in the desert? She will turn, son of Andar, as others have before her.”
“Never. I won’t allow it.”
“You’re not looking so good yourself.”
“Well, what else would you imagine? I’ve been walking in the desert for weeks.”
Gavi and the bird weren’t nearly as far in the distance as Aria had hoped as she tried to lose them. She could still hear them quite clearly, going on and on about who knew what. But what was that, up ahead?
“Gavi,” she said. “What is that?”
“Aria? Keethior, did you hear her?”
After a moment, Gavi and the bird were beside her. She pointed, and Gavi let out a slow breath.
“It looks like a dromed and a cart,” Gavi said.
She smiled. “My ride is here.”
As the cart drew up, Gavi felt his muscles tensing. He wanted to be far from here, but there was no way he could leave Aria. The driver of the cart wore a long white robe. He jumped down from the cart and bowed to Aria, pressing his face into the ground. Keethior squawked and flew away, leaving Gavi glaring at the empty sky. What could he do? Stay with Aria, the Othra had said. Okay, Gavi would stay with her. But who was this man and why was he bowing to Aria?
Aria swayed and Gavi reached out to grasp her elbow. The sand, stretching in every direction, radiated heat. Gavi’s eyes longed for a bit of green.
“I am here to take you to your father’s palace,” the driver said, not meeting their eyes.
Aria smiled a beatific smile. It would have been more convincing if her eyes weren’t half closed and her head wasn’t drooping like a cut flower on its stalk. Gavi felt himself raging again, as he had many times already, over a man who would do this to his own daughter. He had never been a violent person, but he hoped that he would have the chance to kill the Desert King.
“Nenyi, forgive me,” he whispered, “but I hate him.”
He knew that Ikajo was only using Aria to get to Isika. The king had said as much last year when he was trying to burn Isika out. But Aria didn’t believe him when he tried to tell her. How could any man do this to his daughter? He ground his teeth. He was in far over his head, and he didn’t know if either of them would get out of this alive.
The white robed man rose and held out a hand to Aria. She took it without even a glance at Gavi and the man helped her into the cart. Gavi’s heart sank.
“And me?” Gavi asked. “I need to go with her.”
The man looked at Gavi. He didn’t look like a bad person. His eyes were wide and gentle, though proud. He looked like a cross between Abbas and Andar, both in looks and expression.
“This cart has room for one passenger and one driver,” the man said. “But you are welcome to follow.”
“Aria,” Gavi said, knowing it was no use. “We’re doing fine on our own. Don’t go with him.”
She smiled at him through half-open eyes and said nothing. The driver turned the cart to face the road and rapped the dromed to get it to walk. Very well, Gavi would follow. He could walk fast and all those trips with Jabari would allow him to run, if he needed to. Maybe it was better for Aria to ride. She needed good food, water, shelter, healers. The dromed fell into a lumbering trot and Gavi began to run silently behind the cart as it rattled along the road.
The man took breaks at various wells, and Gavi was thankful, because he needed the breaks. He was exhausted, but he didn’t begrudge the swift pace of the cart. He grew increasingly worried about Aria, who seemed almost half asleep now. They drove through villages deeper in the desert than Gavi had ever been. The villagers emerged from their houses and bowed their faces to the ground as Aria passed by. Gavi tried to look invisible as he jogged after the cart. This went okay for a while, until they came to something that was more like a town, and along the road a big man
stuck his staff out to trip Gavi.
Taken unawares, Gavi tumbled face first onto the hard track of the road.
“What’s this?” the man sneered. “A runaway Worker slave?”
Gavi put his hand to his face and pulled it away to stare at the blood that had come from his split lip. He felt shock as he realized what he looked like. He was used to being one of the Maweel—not just one of the Maweel, but the son of the first and second elders—and he hadn’t considered how he would appear to the Gariah. He had vaguely wondered whether they would be suspicious of a young Maweel man in their city. Of course, he looked like a Worker, and unwashed and exhausted, he looked like a slave.
He got to his feet, only to be knocked down again by the man’s fist to his face. Gavi tucked his knees up to his chest and raised a hand to protect his head, holding his bleeding nose. He needed to get back to Aria.
“I serve her,” he said, gesturing to the cart still making its way along the road.
The man laughed in a harsh voice. “Sure you do. You serve the princess.”
Gavi felt despair, but then he heard her voice, ringing out, more clear than it had been in weeks.
“Leave him alone! He is with me.”
The man looked up, startled, and bowed suddenly with his face against the sandy hard earth. Gavi looked up to see Aria standing in the cart, holding her thin arms out.
“Come, Gavi,” she said imperiously, “there is room for you in this cart after all. I need you with me.”
Gavi stood up and brushed himself off, picking up his pack and using his ser to stop the bleeding from his nose and mouth. He didn’t meet the eyes of any of the silent people who watched the interaction. Alone and afraid, he still felt a surprising lift in his heart, a foolish and hopeful thought. Aria had helped him. There was still a little of her left in there. All was not lost.
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