The broad courtyard stretched below and away, covering the track of flatlands that edged up to the base of the mountain Lanthas. The open air space was huge, big enough to hold more than twenty thousand people standing, and it was already almost half full.
In the weeks leading up to our anniversary celebrations today, the Order of the Sun Returners had painstakingly laid gemstones in the courtyard to represent the constellations as they would appear in the sky tonight. By evening, as sunset approached, the courtyard would be full, and the formal ceremonies would begin. But it was early yet, and amidst all of the foot traffic, some of the jeweled constellations were still visible, mosaics of polished onyx, gleaming agate, and glitters of lapis spiraling through the brickwork of the courtyard grounds.
My eyes found the Two Sisters, The Hunter’s Son, and The Cup of Gods in the constellations. We’ve only just arrived to Eaiph, I thought, and already the citizens of Manderlas walk among the stars. I smiled, then let my eyes wander away from precious gems, looking without aim or purpose, following the currents of human life below me.
Enterprising food vendors had set up impromptu stalls in every corner of the courtyard. Their hawking shouts soared above the din of conversation and laughter, rising with the scent of roasted lamb and cedar resin. A flicker of sunlight flashed on metal, and I saw a small group of people moving through the crowd; young men of the Bronze Guard, walking tall and proud in their role as peacekeepers, greaves and gauntlets polished to a mirror sheen. A cluster of young girls with bright streaks of gold painted across the fine chocolate skin of their bare arms leaned close to each other, whispering, smiling, laughing as the guards strutted past.
I heard laughter behind me, and turned around to regard the clerics in their ceremonial regalia. The council of clerics was a microcosm of the challenges we’d faced to come this far. More than three dozen Kkadie and Sagain, each one of them representing his or her own god, members of a diverse and often conflicted pantheon. The remarkable progress of the past five years had been punctuated in equal measure by awkward fumbles and cautious breakthroughs.
Now, here they were, bantering, debating, making peace. Retainers moved through the crowd of clerics carrying trays of goat’s cheese, dates, and cured meat, and jugs of honeyed wine, ensuring everyone’s needs were attended to.
I glanced at Socha. He stood near the door, dour and quiet. Socha was smart and unafraid to speak his mind, and I valued him deeply for those traits, but in these moments, his greatest attribute was his fierce silence. He did not need to say anything. His mere presence was enough to keep calm and order, to make those who trusted him feel safe.
I understood not for the first time why Adjet had fallen in love with him.
My eyes found her on the other side of the rostrum. Her radiant beauty was dappled with sun through the grape leaves. The cleric Ofir was hanging on something she said, grinning like a teenage boy. It seems even a high priest of the Kkad is not above flirting, I thought, laughing inwardly. Then Socha came to stand at their side, and placed his hands on his pregnant wife’s rounded belly. She was nearing full-term, and the child could come any day now.
The first child to be born of two worlds.
I was tempted to cross the pavilion and tease them, but after all the suffering we had wrought unwilling on the people of this world, it gave me hope to see that peace and joy were still possible. Ofir leaned close, whispering something to them, grinning even wider. Whatever he said made Adjet laugh, a bright, silver chime.
My eyes welled with tears. For one precious moment, like a bolt through my heart, her laughter gave me back everything we had lost, the days before all of this, when all we had was each other, the seven of us and our shipheart. Now, we were rulers and stewards of Manderlas, the greatest city of Eaiph. Even in my gratitude for that, I grieved for all we had given up.
But we were whole again, and today, on the equinox of ascension, we celebrated the return of the sun to the long summer. I turned away from them, leaning on the railing above the courtyard while I composed myself.
“An auspicious day, great magus,” said a voice to my left. I turned, and there was Volda, looking up at me, tall ribboned hat perched on her head, hint of a smile in her warm, sharp eyes.
I wiped a tear from the corner of my eye. “You always seem to find me when I’m crying, priestess.”
She laughed at that, warm and friendly.
“It truly is a great day,” I said, “and the bright heart of Soth Ra graces us with a taste of the summer to come.”
“Be thankful you’re not required to wear this,” she said, touching her hat. “Some among us believe that the spirit who suffers most is lifted up in the eyes of the gods. I hope that’s true. On days like this, I wonder if the old traditions weren’t designed for just that purpose, to make an old woman curse the weight of her station.”
I laughed. “You’re not so old as that, priestess,” I said. “And maybe soon we will even have the power to make you young again.”
I thought that would make her laugh, or smile at least, but she frowned instead, and the warmth left her face.
“Priestess?” I said.
“I am sorry, great magus. I mean no insult. You have brought us many wondrous gifts, and the greatest among them in my reckoning is peace amongst our peoples.
“But the gift you call longlife troubles me. I have seen many a man die for the chance to have his name inscribed in the annals, and I have lifted those annals in my hand only to have them crumble into dust. Thirst for immortality is a poison in the heart of men.”
I shook my head. “Even we cannot cross that chasm. Longlife, yes, but not immortality.”
“And does a man who lives longer fear death any less? Or does he fear it more?” She gave me a hard, searching stare.
“I have walked from the springs of youth into the desert of old age,” she said, “and I have found in that desert a harsh, stark beauty. Not the beauty of youth, which comes freely and is wasted carelessly, but a beauty that is earned with every step.”
I bowed low to her. “You give me much to think on, priestess. And the peace you claim as our gift could not have been won without you. My deepest thanks.”
She bowed in return, then turned away from me to rejoin the other clerics.
As she walked away from me, I found Sid, Cordar and Neka standing together. Cordar saw me looking and gestured with his hands, moving them in an arc like the rising and setting of the sun.
The moment was approaching.
I nodded to him, then stood tall, raised my voice, and addressed the gathered clerics. “Greetings,” I said. Those closest to me went quiet first, and the silence passed through the group like a wave.
“Today is a day of endings and new beginnings. The close of one year and the rising of the next. The return of the long sun.”
There were nods and murmurs of assent.
“This city - our city - is a new beginning. It was founded on the belief that we can rise above our differences. If you doubt that, you only have to look into the courtyard to see the peace we have all worked so hard to build.”
A scattering of ayes and quiet cheers.
“Soth Ra sits above the peak of Lanthas. In a few minutes, she will fall behind the mountain, and when she does, the formal ceremonies will begin. Before that happens, I want to take this time to recognize what each of you, as members of the council of clerics, have helped us accomplish. You are the spiritual leaders of our new world, and the people of Manderlas have taken their cues from you. That is no small responsibility, but you have shouldered the burden with grace and humility, and I am grateful to each of you.
“We all are,” I said, gesturing to my fellow crew members. “So as we take stock of this moment in our collective history, I hope that each of you also recognizes the…”
The ground shook. An instant later, a roar filled my ears. I stumbled forward, falling to my hands and knees. People were screaming. I lifted my head. Many of the clerics wer
e on the ground, like me. Others were standing, pointing, crying out. The air was choked with dust. I stood up. My legs trembled. I turned around. A billowing cloud of smoke curled up from the courtyard below us.
* * *
“Pausha!” Socha was beside me.
“Get the clerics to safety,” I said in a hoarse voice. “They must not leave the ziggurat.”
“Yes, pausha.” His face was grim, but he swung into action.
I ran across the pavilion, gesturing for the rest of the crew to follow me. I was the tallest, and everyone except Sid, with his bionetic legs whirring right behind me, struggled to keep up.
“Reacher,” I shouted, as I entered our private command center at the heart of the ziggurat. “What in the name of the Scions happened down there?”
“There was an explosion,” he said, his voice ringing throughout the room. “There is nothing in the Celestial Courtyard that is combustible, so I can only surmise that it was a planned attack.”
Sid and I looked at each other in shock.
“Did he just say there was an attack?” Adjet said, breathless, as she and the others came into the chamber
I nodded. “Sid and Xayes, work with Reacher to get eyes in the sky. We need as much information as quickly as possible.”
“Right,” Sid said.
“Adjet and Xander, you’ll stay here with the council. We must keep them calm, and we must not let them leave. I trust your judgment to handle this as you see fit, but we need them to work with us in whatever comes.”
“Okay, pausha,” Xander said. Adjet nodded.
“Neka and Cord, you’re with me.”
The three of us ran to one of the hidden lifts we’d built that let us move privately and quickly between each level of the citadel. We glided down to the ground level in tense silence. The door slid open, and we made our way out into the courtyard.
Chaos.
The ground was blackened and charred, and the air was thick with smoke and dust. People were wailing and screaming. Dark crimson blood stained the ground. I saw a severed arm. I turned away, instinctively, only to find myself looking down at a shepherd and his dead goat. The goat’s head was gone, and the shepherd’s clothes had been torn, blood everywhere. I knelt down to check his pulse, but there was nothing. His eyes were open, vacant, staring up at the sky.
A man stumbled past us, holding a child in his arms. I watched them disappear into a cloud of dust.
Neka stood above me as I knelt next to the shepherd’s corpse. “Where’s Cord?” she said, worry in her voice.
I looked around. “There,” I said, catching him as he ran ahead of us, receding into the haze.
She was off, sprinting towards him.
“Neka!” I shouted, leaping up and running after her.
We heard them before we saw them. A group of people, shouting, angry, afraid. As we got closer, I saw Cordar pushing through the crowd towards a man who stood in the middle of the huddle. His enhanced bionetic hearing must have led him straight to their shouting.
The man in the center was holding his arm up in the air. He had an object in his hand. It glinted for a moment, then turned blinding white. I stopped in my tracks, covering my eyes with my arm. A moment later, the shockwave hit, knocking me flat. A torrent of sound washed over me.
28 Goodbye, My Friend
“He just blinked.” A man’s familiar voice.
“Orenpausha? Can you hear me?” Another familiar voice. A woman’s.
“Adjet? Where? What is this?” I tried to sit up, saw Adjet and Xander standing over me.
“Easy. Easy now.” Adjet put her hand on my shoulder. Her other hand rested on her pregnant belly. “You’re in the ziggurat, and you’re safe. There was a second explosion. You’re going to be okay, but the shockwave rattled you hard.”
“Cordar? And Neka? Where are they?”
Adjet and Xander looked at each other but said nothing.
“Tell me, damn it.” I raised my voice. “Tell me what happened.”
“Pausha,” Adjet whispered, her voice raspy. “Cordar… Cordar is dead. And a lot of other people with him.”
“Oh no. Please no. What about-”
“She’s alive,” Xander said. “But the wounds are bad. She is more fragile than you. Most of her burns are minor, but the force of the explosion knocked her into a nearby vendor’s stall. She is banged up. And her face-” He could not finish the sentence.
I pushed Adjet’s hand away. “I need to see them,” I said, swinging my legs over the edge of the bed. “I need to see them both.”
“Pausha-”
“Now,” I said, interrupting her.
“Okay,” she said. “Lean on us. We will take you there.”
* * *
We interred Cordar’s remains inside a small capsule and launched it on a trajectory towards Soth Ra. There was not much left of his body, but we sent what we had. A symbolic return to the crucible where all life is born.
Neka had returned to consciousness by then, and she asked me to carry her to the ceremony. The left side of her face had been ravaged and burnt, and bruises and lacerations covered her body, but I didn’t question her need to be at this. She and Cordar had been through so much together, had become so close. This loss hit her more than any of us.
She winced when I lifted her, but she rested the right side of her face against my chest, and let out a long sigh. I stroked my hand over her hair. “I am so sorry, Neka,” I said.
She turned her eyes up to look at me. “I know,” she said, tired and drawn. “I am too.”
When we reached the courtyard, she made me set her on her feet. She tottered next to me, using my arm to steady her, and nodded at the others. It was just the six of us and Reacher. The capsule was already mounted for launch. I walked Neka over to it, and she touched her hand to its surface. Then she looked up at the darkening sky.
“My dearest friend,” she said. “My love. My heart. I will miss you.” She tried to say more, but she was crying now. Tears streamed down her cheeks. She shook her head, cursing. She took a deep breath, touched her hands to her heart, her lips, the spot between her eyes. Then she placed both palms back on the capsule, bowing her head.
When she was finished, she stepped away, leaning back on me. Each of us took our turn to step up to the capsule and say goodbye. When we were done, we bowed our heads, and Siddart’s voice echoed in the courtyard around us.
“The light of awareness penetrates the darkness. Every conscious being comes from that light, and every being returns to it. We send your body back, Cordar, stung by the knowledge that death is inevitable, but comforted by the truth that the light is eternal.”
We lifted our heads. Reacher ignited the thrusters beneath the capsule. It streaked up into the sky. We watched until it was too high to see, until all that was left was a trail of condensation marking its wake, an arc of powder, curling through the night.
29 Battles
Two days after the explosions that took Cordar from us, and more than three hundred other people along with him, I watched Ghisanyo’s son Deshanyo pacing in a slow circle in his palatial bedchamber. His long hair was tied up in a bun behind his head, and he was wearing a simple linen gown that hung down to his ankles. It was open at the neck and chest, and a gold talisman hung shining against the smooth, dark skin of his upper torso. His mouth was moving, but if he was speaking out loud, it was too quiet for our surveillance.
There were two people in his bed, a man and a woman, both naked, both beautiful. The woman whispered something to the man and the man laughed. He climbed from bed, standing up, unselfconscious.
“Come back to bed, Desh,” he said, “Let us help you forget what troubles you.” Desh ignored him. The man shrugged his shoulders and sighed, then climbed back into the massive bed, disappearing under the sheets with the woman.
There was a knock on the door.
Desh stopped in his tracks. His head shot up. He made a hissing sound, and gestured to the couple in t
he bed to be silent. He went to the door, and slid open a small portal. “Yes?” he asked, his voice harsh with impatience.
I expanded my view to take in both the bed chamber and the hallway. A guard stood outside the door.
“Prelate Deshanyo,” the man said, bowing and averting his eyes. “I bring urgent news.”
“What is it? Speak, boy,” he said with the authority of one who is used to the subservience of others.
“My lord, I… I am sorry to intrude, but his beneficence Torto Tusp, high priest and hierophant of the-”
“I know who the old desert snake is, Ur-Tesa,” Desh said, cutting the nervous guard off. “You can skip the formalities. What does he want from me?”
“He sent me… he summons you.”
Desh raised his eyebrows. “He summons me, does he?” He opened the door. “Come inside. Quickly now.”
The guard stepped in. He looked terrified.
“And who else knows of this?”
“He sent me here directly to you, and advised me not to tell anyone else.”
“You were wise to listen to him, Ur-Tesa. Here,” he said, pointing to the floor just inside the door. “Stand here and keep watch. Make sure no one else comes through while I get dressed. When I’m ready, I will need you to tell me everything.”
As he said this, Desh glanced almost imperceptibly towards the bed. Then he turned his back and knelt down to a large chest on the floor at the edge of the room. The guard, in turn, made it a point to face the door to give Desh privacy.
While Desh rummaged through the wardrobe, the naked man slipped from the bed, and crept up behind the guard. In a fluid, athletic motion, he wrapped his arm around Ur-Tesa’s neck, pulling him to the floor. He fell down hard on his tailbone, and the naked man closed his arm tighter around his neck, pinning his head in a vicious hold with his other arm. After a few moments, he stopped struggling and went limp.
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