She fixed Steorf with a hard look.
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“The creature had more than one opportunity to kill Fannah or me, but it didn’t. There wasn’t a single time that thing used lethal force against us, but the same cannot be said for you.
“Ciredor sent that thing,” she concluded. “Obviously, he views you as the greatest threat, perhaps because of your sorcery.”
Steorf lowered his eyes.
“Yes,” he said sarcastically, “my all-powerful abilities.”
“Maybe there’s something in this”—she held up some of the parchments—“that he didn’t want us to find out. We’ll never know for certain, but I do know he wanted you eliminated. If he didn’t have our exact location, he knew enough. He wanted me to bring Fannah to him,” she said, disgusted. “He couldn’t even be bothered to take her himself.”
“So?” Steorf asked.
“So,” Tazi replied with a steely resolve, “nothing has changed. Like I said before, let’s bring this to him, and let’s end it once and for all.”
“The Trade Way?” Steorf asked.
“Fannah?”
The blind woman turned her head from Tazi to Steorf and included them both in her white stare.
“I think it is best. As I told you, the stones were constructed with powerful magic imbued in them. The desert worms cannot penetrate them, in case Ciredor tries to send any others. I think that the walking dunes would have the same difficulty as the worms.
“Of course,” she added, “it leads directly to the minarets we seek …”
“And Ciredor,” Steorf finished.
“Then that’s the way,” Tazi said. “We will strike at the heart.”
She rose to her feet, as did Fannah.
The women reached, in unison, for Steorf. He tried to swat their hands away.
“If you’re getting cranky,” Tazi teased, “then you must be feeling a little better.
“Save your strength,” she said seriously, disregarding his efforts to stand unaided.
She got him to his feet and pulled his left arm over her shoulder.
“Please,” she asked him, as much with her soft, green eyes than with her voice.
“I never seem to be able to say no to you,” he said, and for the first time in the history of their relationship, Steorf actually smiled at her.
“Which way?” Tazi turned to Fannah, all businesslike again.
“I am a little disorientated,” the blind woman admitted. “Which way is the sun setting?”
Tazi and Steorf turned to find the burning orb and were suddenly very aware of a growing gloom.
Finally, Tazi said, “I believe it is toward your left.”
“What’s wrong?” Fannah asked but then answered her own question. “It has cooled off, but it’s too soon. We’re not at sunset yet.”
Tazi scanned the horizon where the sun should have been and saw only a ghost of an outline. The star was obscured by a swirling haze, ever darkening. In the distance, Tazi heard a faint howl.
“There’s something to the west,” she announced.
Fannah stood perfectly still, with her head to the side, like a bird listening for a predator.
“Sandstorm,” she whispered. “Tazi,”—she turned toward her friend—“we have got to hurry now. Time is almost up. We should be able to reach Ciredor’s minarets before the storm falls on us.”
Without any further preamble, Fannah took Tazi’s arm and started to pull her two companions toward the west.
As she had told them, the Trade Way was not far.
The three came across what must have been a magnificent road at one point in its history. It was wide enough to accommodate three fully packed carts. Time and the desert, however, had taken its toll. Huge chunks of the pavement were broken, and sharp pieces stabbed up from the ground. A few sinkholes had erupted, and the threesome had to carefully maneuver their way around the gaping pits of sand and rubble. Not far from where they stood, though, Tazi and Steorf could see the twin minarets.
“This path is huge,” Steorf marveled.
Tazi noticed he was trying not to place all his weight on her, but she tugged slightly on his arm.
“It’s all right,” she told him.
He looked at her, and in the fading light she could see that his gray eyes were clouded with pain and there were deep smudges under them.
“You need your strength, too,” he reminded her. To Fannah, he remarked, “It looks like you could ride six abreast on this road.”
“During the Way’s halcyon days, I understand it was a marvelous route.”
To their left, Tazi and Steorf could see that the swirling sands were getting closer and closer. What surprised Tazi was the amount of sound the storm generated even at a distance. For the most part, the desert had been a deadly, but silent enemy.
Not any longer, Tazi thought.
“The storm is nearly upon us,” Fannah remarked, her sharp ears missing nothing.
“We’ve got to get to the towers,” Steorf said, “as quickly as we can.”
Tazi watched how rapidly the darkness grew.
“We’ve run out of time,” she declared, and the maelstrom engulfed them.
CHAPTER 16
THE MINARETS
“Where are you?” Tazi screamed.
She, Steorf, and Fannah were on the Trade Way for only a short time when the sandstorm from the west reached them. At first Tazi thought it wasn’t too bad. The sun hadn’t set yet, and with the three of them side by side, Tazi didn’t understand Fannah’s extreme concern. It was not comfortable, by any stretch of the imagination, but it wasn’t that bad, and the towers weren’t that far away.
We can do this, she thought.
“I think we’ll be all right,” she told Fannah, raising her voice over the wind.
Fannah shook her head in disagreement.
“This is just the edge of the storm,” she said. “It’s only going to get worse.”
As they moved forward slowly, following the track of the Trade Way, the wind picked up as Fannah had warned, and Tazi started to revise her opinion. She and Steorf had to squint to keep the scathing grains out of their eyes. Tazi was certain she was losing layers of skin to the blasts of sand that only got stronger. The three had no choice but to hang onto each other, and at one point a wild gust tore Steorf’s sack off his shoulders and tossed it behind them.
Tazi turned to follow its tumbling course, one hand shielding her eyes.
“I’ll get it,” she yelled to Steorf.
Part of her still hoped the writings contained some clue of how to destroy Ciredor, and she didn’t want to lose their last weapon against him.
“Forget it,” Steorf replied.
Fannah simply shouted, “No!”
Nevertheless, Tazi broke from their grip and trotted after the sack, which turned end over end just out of her reach.
The wind pushed Tazi to the left, as though a giant hand shoved her, and she had to compensate for that as she ran. The sack, however, blew farther away. Eventually, as the sun started toward the horizon, Tazi lost sight of it. She slowed down and realized that Ciredor’s writings were lost to the desert storm.
And so was she.
Tazi turned around and could only see growing darkness.
She shouted for her friends, but the wind had reached such a frenzied pitch, Tazi couldn’t even hear her own voice. She cupped her hands around her mouth and tried again, but there was only the scream of the storm. She stood and swayed as the winds buffeted her body.
Curling her hands around her eyes, she desperately searched for any sign of Steorf and Fannah, but she saw nothing but ever-changing patterns of sand. It was dizzying. There was no end to the desert, no sky, and no ground below. There were only howls. She felt as though she was back within the gate. Her heart was pounding, and Tazi could taste her fear.
That won’t do me any good, she told herself sternly. Fannah and Steorf need me.
Without budging an inch, Tazi tried hard to calm herself.
I’m sure I didn’t go that far, and as soon as I gave up on the sack I turned sharply around. If I’m right, she reasoned, then I need only to keep walking in a straight line and I’ll get back to Fannah and Steorf.
But if I’m wrong, she thought, I’ll walk off into the storm.
With that in mind, Tazi started the tricky march back.
The wind continued to push her from side to side, so she tried walking as best she could heel to toe to keep a straight course. She dropped to her knees once and tried to see if she could still feel the paved Way, but the wind and the sand made it impossible for her to tell. She gave up on that and went back to her original plan.
Time lost all meaning to her, and Tazi knew she was close to panicking. It had taken her too long on the way back and she was certain she should have found her friends by now.
She stopped and tried to scan the distance. Having very nearly given in to despair, she thought she heard something just above the whine of the wind.
“Steorf!” she screamed back and listened.
The faint sound grew a little louder, and she cried out, “Keep calling!”
Tazi was certain it was her friends. She lowered her head against the gusts that buffeted her and walked like someone drunk, with great, staggering strides. She looked ahead, and two shadowy shapes remained constant while everything around them was chaos. Tazi marched harder and nearly collapsed into her friends’ waiting arms. The three clung to each other for a moment.
“What were you thinking?” Steorf finally shouted into her face.
“Ciredor’s book,” she started to explain. “I had to try to retrieve it.”
“Let the winds have it,” he told her. “We could have lost you.”
“Not a chance!” she shouted back, a crooked grin fixed on her face.
“We can’t let go of each other,” Fannah cried. “Not even for a second or all will be lost.”
“How are we going to find the towers now?” Steorf asked.
Tazi was momentarily worried as well. She realized they were traveling blind in the storm—and there was her answer.
“Fannah, you’re going to have to lead us the rest of the way,” she cried.
In the near darkness of sunset, Tazi wasn’t sure but thought Fannah nodded to her.
“Hold on,” she told Steorf and Tazi.
The three leaned into the wind and lumbered forward. Tazi kept a tight grip on Steorf and Fannah. To her, the disorientation only grew worse the darker it got. There was no frame of reference anywhere, and Tazi turned over all responsibility to Fannah, hoping that her blind friend’s sense of touch and hearing, much sharper than either hers or Steorf’s would guide them through. Lost in a situation where she was simply passing through time, odd thoughts fluttered through Tazi’s mind. Strangely enough, she couldn’t seem to get a fable out of her mind.
When she was very young, her father had once told her a story of children lost in the woods. As a grown woman, Tazi could see the story for what it was—a cautionary tale meant to scare her into sensibility—but when she first heard the account, Tazi had wept uncontrollably, leaving her father very flustered with a teary three year old.
As Tazi recalled, her mother had been the only one who could console her by telling her that a guardian spirit looked out for all lost children. In the midst of the storm, Tazi smiled as she followed her spirit to safety.
“Can you see anything?” Steorf yelled to her, jarring her from her reverie.
“Nothing yet,” Tazi called back to him. “But if anyone is going to be able to find this, it’s Fannah.”
“I hope so,” he called out and clutched tighter to her arm.
Undaunted by the raging storm, Tazi watched how Fannah never hesitated in their course. She wanted to ask her just how she was guiding them but decided the fewer distractions Fannah had, the better off they’d all be.
The swirling grains and incessant howling were almost nauseating to Tazi. She tried closing her eyes, but it only made matters worse.
Maybe she can feel the pavement under her sandals, Tazi guessed, or maybe she’s marching in the original direction we started in, since this tempest can’t disorient her in the same way it does us.
Her curiosity got the better of her, and she tried to get Fannah’s attention.
“Fannah,” she called, and bumped into Steorf.
The mage had stopped walking.
“What happened?” she asked him.
“Look there,” he replied, pointing ahead.
Barely discernable in the twilight was a large shape looming in the growing darkness.
“The east minaret,” Fannah announced.
Tazi swallowed hard.
“You did it,” she called to Fannah.
The three marched side by side up to the entrance. So close to the edifice, Tazi was able to make out some details, despite her reduced vision. The tower was about forty feet tall, as Fannah had said. Tazi reached out and brushed her hand against the surface, feeling stone and brick.
“I think we can let go of each other as long as we’re touching the building,” she told Steorf and Fannah. “But no one step away alone, understand? We need to find the entrance.”
She laid both her hands on the wall and leaned her head against it, desperately needing the feeling of stability the minaret offered to stop her churning stomach.
When she felt better, Tazi joined Steorf and Fannah as they each slid around the building, feeling for a door.
Fannah called out, “It’s over here!”
Steorf and Tazi felt their way over to her.
“We’re lucky,” Fannah shouted. “The doors aren’t buried too deeply.”
The three fell to their knees and used their hands and arms to rake away what little sand had piled up around the doors. When it was mostly cleared, Tazi tried to pull the doors open, but they refused to budge.
“I think they’re locked,” she called to her friends.
The wind was picking up in intensity.
Here’s a test worthy of a lockpick, she thought, in the dark, in a storm, with that monster on the loose.
Before she could pull out the tools she had stashed inside her vest, Steorf asked, “Are you sure they’re locked?”
“In this storm,” Tazi admitted, “I’m not sure of a damn thing.”
“Let me try something,” he yelled.
Tazi placed her hand on his arm.
“Are you sure?” she asked but didn’t hear his response.
When Steorf placed his hands on the latches, there was a flash of green so bright it pierced the gloom like a beacon. Steorf was knocked off of his feet as the doors swung open. Tazi knelt down to help him get up.
“Are you all right?” she shouted into his face.
She could see that Steorf was groggy.
“Fannah,” she called to her other friend, “grab his arm.”
They half dragged Steorf through the doors. Tazi lowered him to the ground, and both she and Fannah fought to close the tower doors, now flapping in the storm. They managed to pull them shut, and the scream of the storm was halved in intensity.
“Dark,” Tazi shouted and realized how unnecessarily loud she was.
She checked on Steorf.
“You opened them,” she told the dazed mage. “I don’t think I would’ve been able to.”
“Ciredor’s wards …” he whispered, tired from his efforts.
“You and Fannah stay here. I’ll go to the top,” she told him.
He grabbed her hand and said, “I don’t think he’s here. I think he simply didn’t need anything in this tower, or didn’t want anything disturbed. But be careful anyway.”
“You know me,” she warned him with a wink.
“There should be a brazier at the top,” Fannah reminded her. “The stories say that if we get both the minarets’ braziers lit, the two towers will be protected from the elements.”
“And maybe if Ciredor isn’t here,” Tazi mused, “we can use that shield to keep him out and destroy his gift. If he can’t cast his spell on this special night in this special location, maybe everything will be ruined. Stay here.”
Tazi got up and looked around for a torch in the dark, dusty tower. She spotted one along one of the walls and pried it loose. While she felt inside her vest for her chunk of flint, Steorf pointed a finger at the torch and it burst into flames. She graced him with a quick smile, transferred the torch to her left hand, and drew out her sword with her right.
The tower wasn’t very wide, and she found the stairs soon enough, passing by a row of very old armaments. She debated about rummaging through the swords and pikes that were lined up against the wall but decided to stay with her blade. After years of training, it was like an extension of her arm.
She started up the steps.
Tazi walked along the outer edge of the stairs out of habit. That was the section of planking Cale had taught her years ago that always had the least chance of creaking, though it would take sharp ears to hear anything with the storm raging outside. The steps were divided in sections of ten, turning at right angles. In the center was an opening that ran the whole height of the tower. If she leaned to the side, Tazi could look up and down the length of the stairway. One wrong step could bring someone crashing down very quickly.
“ ‘My life is like a broken stair, winding round a ruined tower, and leading nowhere,’ ” she whispered—a phrase from an old taproom love song she had heard once.
She stopped at the first level and peered at the floor. There was nothing other than a series of bunks that lined the walls. Tazi reasoned that at least one garrison must have been housed there long before.
Between them and the spheres of protection, Tazi noted, travelers would have had it easy.
I wonder what happened to cause this to fall apart? she asked herself.
She made herself a mental note to ask Fannah about it all when they got back to Calimport.
There’s that certainty again, she caught herself thinking. Do I really believe we’re going to make it, or is it simply because I cannot conceive of death?
The third level was devoid of anything, and Tazi cautiously approached the fourth level. She was careful but had had a sneaking suspicion the whole march up that she wouldn’t find anything.
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