Sea Born (Chaos and Retribution Book 3)

by Eric T Knight

  “Just a small demonstration?” Firehair asked.

  “Okay, I’ll do it,” Karliss said. He’d said he would after all. He leaned over and scooped up a handful of cold ashes. He held his hand out in front of him, the ashes lying on his open palm. Nergui scooted closer, his eyes lighting up in anticipation.

  Karliss directed a tiny breath of wind into the ashes, causing them to swirl around on his palm, but keeping them contained in a tight area. He added more wind and the swirling ashes rose up, becoming a miniature whirlwind. He kept adding and directing, tightly focusing the power he was feeding into it. The whirlwind grew taller, all the while staying narrow, only about an inch across. Soon the whirlwind reached twenty or thirty feet into the night sky.

  He pointed at it with the forefinger of his other hand and the whirlwind rose up off his palm. It moved and hovered over the dying fire. He pointed down and the whirlwind dipped until it was barely touching the fire. Sparks from the fire were sucked into the whirlwind, rising up throughout its length. The resulting effect was quite impressive, a column of blazing sparks rising dozens of feet into the sky. Appreciative sounds came from those Sertithians who were still awake.

  Karliss released the wind and the whirlwind dissipated instantly. He turned back toward Firehair.

  “That was quite impressive,” Firehair said, giving him an appraising look. “Among the most impressive things I have seen in my travels, to be sure.”

  “You said you were going to tell me what you know about Kasai,” Karliss said.

  “So I did. Kasai is one of three creatures called the Guardians. Long ago they were the protectors of Melekath’s Children, which I suppose is why they’re called the Guardians. Kasai is also known as the Eye. The other two Guardians are Tharn, the Fist, and Gulagh, also known as the Voice. Gulagh and Tharn haven’t been seen since the end of the war. Kasai rules the city of Fanethrin, but he’s been quiet for years, hasn’t been seen outside his city at all. The fact that he’s making inroads into the steppes can’t be good. He must be up to something.”

  “He’s looking for the key,” Karliss said.

  Firehair gave him a sharp look. “What key is that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “How do you know he’s looking for it, then?”

  “He told me.”

  Firehair’s eyes fairly bugged out of his head. “He told you?”

  “I touched the bone staff. It took me to an underground cavern where I spied on Kasai.”

  “You spied on Kasai,” Firehair said. “Young man, I don’t know if you’re brave or just foolish. Do you have any idea how dangerous he is?”

  “More than you think. He knew I was coming. He showed me his new warriors. That’s when he told me about the key. He said once he gets the key, he’s going to rule this world, and those he once served will serve him.”

  “He’s going to rule the world, is he? And here I was hoping he’d learned his lesson after the beating he took at Guardians Watch. Rome and Quyloc are going to want to hear this. Any idea where this key might be?”

  “No.”

  “It’s late and we’re starting early tomorrow, but I want to talk to you some more about this, Tlacti. I have a proposition for you as well.”

  “A proposition? About what?”

  He waved off Karliss’ words and stood up. “Like I said, later.”

  ╬ ╬ ╬

  The next day dawned windy. All day long the wind blew hard. The wind was warm for that time of the year, almost hot at times, and the steppes, already dry because of how little snow had fallen during the winter, quickly gave up much of their remaining moisture to the wind. Clouds of dust blew across the rolling plains. The Sertithians wrapped their janus tightly around their faces to keep out as much of the blowing dust as possible. Firehair and the men working for him jammed their hats down tightly and wrapped cloths around their faces. Yaks and horses walked with their heads down, eyes closed to mere slits.

  Worst of all, the wind came from the west. The people of Spotted Elk Clan exchanged uneasy looks, knowing that a west wind meant Erlik Khan and that meant trouble would accompany it sooner or later. The only question was what form it would take.

  Making camp was difficult. The yurts were hard to set up in the wind and only the Sertithians’ long experience with dealing with wind made it possible at all. Even so, more than one yurt suddenly got away from those who were setting it up and had to be chased down before it disappeared into the growing murk.

  Sunset was an orange diffuse glow in the west. The Sertithians were trying to eat a meager evening meal when someone pointed to the west and shouted. Everyone turned to look.

  A wall of blowing sand was racing across the steppes toward them, blotting out the sunset as it came. It was bigger and fiercer looking than any sandstorm Karliss had ever seen, and he’d seen some bad enough that exposed skin was blistered and raw from the blowing sand. Bad enough that people caught out in the open died.

  People began racing to take down the yurts before the sandstorm hit. No matter how well anchored, no yurt could survive a sandstorm this big. Other people began pulling the wagons into a semi-circle, trying to provide a measure of shelter from the storm.

  Karliss stared at the storm and wondered how he had missed all sign of it in the morning ritual. The bone tile with the wind carved on it had fallen face up, but there’d been no other tiles nearby and that should have indicated no more than normal winds.

  Which meant this was no normal sandstorm. Was Erlik Khan behind it? Was Kasai?

  He started to go help with preparations, when an idea came to him. He didn’t know if he could do it. He didn’t know if he had the strength. But he had to try.

  He ran to his wagon and got the new krysala he’d been working on out of the box under the seat. He wasn’t sure it could handle what he was about to channel through it. It might simply break into a hundred pieces. But if it did, he’d rather destroy the new one than the one that had been handed down from tlacti to tlacti for generations.

  He climbed up onto one of the wagons as near to the center of the camp as he could get. He heard someone yell his name, but when he turned he couldn’t tell who it was. The day was getting dark quickly. The leading edge of the sandstorm was almost on them.

  Karliss pulled his janu down from his mouth. Instantly the skin on his face began to burn from the blowing sand. Sand blew into his mouth and throat, making it hard to breathe. He held the krysala up to his mouth and whistled through it, channeling power through it. The krysala began to glow softly with a blue light. He whistled louder, summoning more and more wind power and sending it through the object. Its glow became bright enough that people noticed and turned to see what he was doing.

  Pulling the janu back up over his face, he threw the krysala up into the air. The wind tried to bat it away, and it took a great effort on his part to make it stay in place, twenty feet or so overhead. At first nothing happened and he began to think that the krysala wouldn’t work after all, that he would have to risk the old one. But he kept turning it slowly, changing its position relative to the blowing wind.

  All at once he got the position right. The wind blew across the grooves and through the holes carved into it. A loud wailing sound came from it, rising and falling with the gusting wind. It was almost music, though music of an alien nature that made people shudder even as they instinctively drew closer to it. With the added power from the high winds, the krysala began to glow so brightly people had to shield their eyes from it. It was a blue star against the black wall of the encroaching sandstorm, now only a few hundred paces away and coming toward them faster than a galloping horse.

  Now came the hard part, the part Karliss was most worried about. He would have to take hold of the power coming through the krysala and shape it. He’d never tried to control so much power before. There was so much that it had become visible to the clans people, a wide swath of blue light streaming out from the krysala and dissipating to the east. He shot a
look at the oncoming sandstorm and winced. He would only have one shot. Once the storm hit, he would no longer be able to stay up on the wagon. Doubtless he would also lose his hold on the new krysala. It would be destroyed or blown away and lost.

  He reached out and began gathering up the blue light. It wasn’t easy to do. There was so much of it. It was like trying to stand in a flooding river without being swept away. The power scraped over him inside, abrading some essential part of him. It hurt. He felt as if he was about to be blown away like a leaf in the wind.

  He got a small fraction of the power under control, then some more. As he did so he discovered that he was stronger than he’d realized. The efforts of the past year were paying off. He was no longer a child, playing with the wind. He was a powerful tlacti, controlling the wind, making it answer to him.

  Strengthening his grip on the wind’s power, he dragged it back, over the camp. The blue light was now a large, roughly circular patch overhead. Sand was now blowing so hard he could barely see, but he didn’t really need to. He could feel the power he held with his will, knew exactly how far it extended. Biting his lip in concentration, he bent the light downward. As the blue glow spread toward the ground, the sandstorm, like a vicious predator about to be deprived of its prey, redoubled its efforts. The wagon rocked beneath Karliss, and he had to crouch and hold onto the side to keep from being blown off of it.

  With a final effort of will, Karliss brought the umbrella of light down to the ground. The wind died out. The shield shivered as the full force of the sandstorm struck it, but it held.

  In the sudden silence, Nergui’s voice could be plainly heard: “See?” he said to Firehair. “I told you he’s the greatest tlacti ever.”

  ╬ ╬ ╬

  The sandstorm blew itself out around midnight. The next morning there was a haziness in the air from all the dust that still lingered, but there wasn’t a breath of wind. All around the perimeter of the camp were tall drifts of sand. On the windward side they were taller than a man. The Sertithians had to dig their way through the new dunes to leave their camp.

  “I’m sure glad all that sand stayed out here,” Batu said, grunting as he helped shovel sand. Even on the lee side the drifts were waist high. “We’d all be buried otherwise.”

  “Do you think Kasai was behind that storm?” Hulagu asked Karliss. Hulagu was streaked with sweat and a thick layer of dust was stuck to his face.

  “I don’t know,” Karliss replied. “I hope not, but there’s no way to know what he is really capable of.”

  Firehair came walking up. “I wanted to thank you again for what you did.” He looked at the drifts of sand and shuddered. “I don’t know if my men and I would have survived that storm if we’d been caught out in it.”

  “I’m glad I could help.”

  “I’d like to give you a token of my appreciation,” Firehair continued. “Something to show you how grateful I am not to be buried in sand this morning. What do you want? You can pick anything from my stores.”

  Karliss thought about it for a moment. “How about a new pair of boots?”

  Firehair looked at his feet. “I think I have boots in your size.”

  “Not for me.” Karliss pointed at Hulagu. “For my friend.”

  “Your friend has awfully big feet, but I’ll see what I can do.” He scratched his beard. “About that proposition I mentioned earlier.”

  “You want to talk about it now?”

  “I want to throw it out there and let you think about it. Come with me and let’s go find your terl. He’ll want to hear this too.”

  Karliss followed Firehair over to where the terl was saddling his horse.

  “If I could have one minute of your time,” Firehair said. “I have a proposition for you.”

  Dashin looked from Firehair to Karliss and then back to the trader. “Our tlacti is not for trade,” he said stiffly.

  “After seeing what he is capable of, I don’t blame you,” Firehair said with a smile. “But hear me out. Anyway, I don’t want to buy him. I want to borrow him.”

  “Borrow?” Karliss asked. “For what?”

  “For the king of Qarath.”

  “Why does the king want our tlacti?” Dashin asked suspiciously.

  “Maybe I’m not explaining this right,” Firehair said. “Let me back up to the beginning. Before I left Qarath, Quyloc, Macht Rome’s chancellor, called me into his office. He said that while I was traveling in your lands I should keep my eyes open for someone young, maybe even a child, who showed unusual abilities with the wind. Knowing of your wind shamans, he thought it possible the one he has been looking for could be found here.”

  “Why?” the terl asked, crossing his arms.

  “Naturally I asked that too. I was told that there is a great war coming, and the only chance we have of winning lies with three young people gifted with unusual abilities. I believe one of them is Karliss.”

  Karliss was already shaking his head. “No. There’s no way. I can’t leave here while Kasai threatens my people.”

  Firehair said, “If Quyloc is right, the coming war threatens your people too. It threatens everyone.”

  “Maybe Kasai is the threat he spoke of,” the terl said.

  “I don’t know,” Firehair replied. “Maybe. Let me finish my proposition and leave you something else to think about. Quyloc told me I could offer you a significant reward for coming to talk to him. Just for talking. No commitment.”

  “What sort of reward?”

  “A wagon load of good steel weapons. Milled lumber, more than enough to repair your damaged wagons and replace the ones you’ve lost. Food too. Grain, rice, whatever you want.”

  “It is quite a price,” the terl said.

  “I’m not going,” Karliss repeated. The terl held up his hand for silence.

  “Karliss is right. We need him here. If this foreign king wants to speak with him so much, he will need to come here.”

  Firehair nodded. “I expected you to say that. Still, I said I would try.” He patted dust off his hat and put it back on. “Keep it in mind, though.”

  After he walked away, the terl looked at Karliss. “We could use these things he offers. They would help us greatly. I wish there was some way I could send you with him.”

  “If we could defeat Kasai, then I could go speak with this king,” Karliss said.

  The terl gave him a sharp look. “You sound like a man with an idea.”

  “It may be nothing…” Karliss said.

  “Still, I would hear it.”

  “The wind spirits once told me that they are kin to Kasai.”

  The terl nodded. “I remember you saying that.”

  “The word of power allows me to control a spirit. But what if there are other words? If there is one for the spirits, why not one for those they are kin to as well? What if there is one that would allow me control over Kasai?”

  The terl’s eyes flashed. “It makes sense. If such a thing exists, it might give us the weapon we need to defeat this demon. But where will you find this other word?”

  “I don’t know yet,” Karliss admitted. “I need to find out where the tablet is that the word I have was copied from. There’s nothing about where the tablet is or where it came from in the scrolls. I’m hoping that one of the other tlacti knows, maybe Qara. I’ll ask her when we get to the Gathering.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Spotted Elk Clan arrived at the Gathering a day late. As the wagon train rumbled into the broad, shallow valley where the Gathering was held, Karliss looked at the sprawling camp and realized they were not the only ones who were late. From what he could see, two other clans were late also. Though the clans camped close together for the Gathering, still each individual clan’s camp retained its own borders. He could count only eight other clans already gathered.

  Spotted Elk Clan rolled down to their usual spot near the shallow stream that flowed through the valley. Once his yurt was set up, Karliss told his friends that he needed to g
o speak to Qara.

  “We’ll come with you,” Hulagu said.

  “Who is she?” Batu asked.

  “She’s the oldest of the tlactis,” Karliss replied. “I want to ask her where the word of power came from.”

  He set off for the camp of Striped Badger Clan, his friends flanking him.

  “Is it me, or are things a lot quieter this year?” Batu asked after a few minutes.

  “Maybe it’s just us who are quieter,” Hulagu said. “Things have changed a lot in the last year.”

  “You can say that again,” Batu said sadly. “A year ago we were stealing progis, not a care in the world. Now look at us.”

  “I feel it too,” Hulagu said. “I miss the days when the most I had to worry about was whether we were going to get caught and get into trouble. Remember that time when Karliss said it would be fun to release a skunk in the middle of the terls’ meeting?”

  “I can still remember them running out of there like they were on fire,” Batu said, smiling. “I bet they’re still talking about it.”

  They continued reminiscing as they walked and Karliss felt a great sadness slip over him. Those times were gone and they would never return. He missed them fiercely. What he wouldn’t give to go back and relive one day from the past.

  The yellow flag with the badger embroidered on it flapping above the terl’s yurt told them they’d reached Striped Badger Clan’s camp. With all the arcane symbols painted on it, the tlacti’s yurt was easy to find,. But when they approached it a young warrior intercepted them.

  “She is sleeping,” he said. “Come back later.”

  “I am tlacti for Spotted Elk Clan,” Karliss told him. “I need to speak with her. It’s important.”

  The young man was unmoved. “Come back later.”

  They were about to walk away when a voice came from inside the yurt. “Let him pass.”

  The young warrior stepped aside. “Wait out here,” Karliss told his friends. He opened the door flap and entered the yurt. There were two braziers burning and it was unpleasantly hot and stuffy inside. Dried herbs had been put on the braziers and the air was filled with pungent smoke. Hanging from the ceiling were a number of strange objects, bleached animal skulls, desiccated lizards, the foot of a lish badger. It was dim and hard to see and Karliss banged into a couple of them while crossing the yurt.