6: Broken Fortress

by Ginn Hale

  Compared to the perfect order of the kahlirash’im, the untried gaun’im’s armies presented an undisciplined, chaotic force. They had obviously been thrown together to create the illusion of a vast, unified military—as if ages of rivalries could be miraculously forgotten in a few days. Kahlil had lived with Bousim rashan’im. He knew how strongly they disdained the Lisam riders. Naye’ro rashan’im constantly brawled with those from Du’yura. Such animosities were common among the gaun’im’s rashan’im.

  It reassured Kahlil to discover, at a glance, a weakness to exploit.

  Their sheer numbers certainly constituted a genuine threat, but they did not present him with a vision of doom.

  The enemies hidden within the northern mist were different. Kahlil had only glimpsed their power in the fear that gripped the people of Vundomu, in Jath’ibaye’s troubled silences, and in the constant flashes of white bones that hunted him in his dreams. None of which offered him anything real to observe, beyond one brief clash with Fikiri. He could not assess the strength or weakness of shadows moving through distant mists.

  Ji’s low voice murmured Eastern words that Kahlil didn’t recognize. She paused every few feet and scraped her claws against the flagstones surrounding the kahlirash courtyard. Each time she dragged her claws against a stone, a soft pulse shuddered through the stones at Kahlil’s feet. Beside him, Ji staggered but then steadied herself and moved to the next flagstone.

  The dark red blood staining her paws and claws was Jath’ibaye’s. No other blood could offer her more power. Though Kahlil had found the amount Jath’ibaye had readily sacrificed disconcerting.

  From the stones behind Ji, thin trails of steam rose like vapor rising from dry ice. The blood burned and bubbled, revealing incantations that must have been carved there years before. Kahlil could feel the difference in the air of the courtyard. It was tighter, almost acrid in his lungs. His tension increased as the sensations of open air and cool wind faded from the courtyard and its resemblance to those dark chambers where Dayyid had confined and beaten him grew.

  Ji finished the last stone, creating a wall around the grounds. Fikiri would have to leave the Gray Space if he wanted to cross the barrier and enter the courtyard. Outside of the Gray Space he would be vulnerable. The ritual was obviously a powerful defense, but it demanded immense effort and a god’s blood just to secure a few yards. It also grew weaker the larger the area it was used to protect. This courtyard was probably the limit. But at least Pesha would be safe during their practices.

  Ji limped to Kahlil’s side and lay down at his feet as if she were dying. She smelled of blood and sweat. “It’s done,” she said quietly.

  Kahlil crouched down beside her. “Are you all right?”

  “I’ll be better in a while,” Ji answered. “What about you?”

  “Me? I’m fine.” Kahlil arched a brow. “Why do you ask?”

  “I just wanted to hear you say so,” Ji replied.

  “I’m very good.” Without thinking, Kahlil reached out to stroke Ji’s shoulder as if she were a familiar pet. He stopped himself, horrified at his gaffe. Ji glanced up at him and laughed.

  “Go ahead,” Ji said. “It’s one of the few advantages of this body. It’s easier for people to give and receive affection from an animal. A woman as old as I am living in her natural body would never be fortunate enough to be touched and hugged as often as I am.”

  Kahlil gently petted Ji’s shoulders and back. Her hair was coarse and shedding. He could feel her bones just under her thin skin. She felt too frail to even be alive. She closed her eyes, but Kahlil could tell from her breathing that she wasn’t asleep.

  “How old are you, Ji?”

  “Oh, I’ve probably stayed in this worn out body too long. Sixty years is a long time for dog-flesh to last, even with a witch wearing it.” Her tone struck Kahlil as fond, as though she were speaking of a favorite dress and not her own body. Ji’s tail flopped softly against the flagstones. “I suppose I should change, but I’ve grown so familiar with this body…I love being able to smell so much.”

  Kahlil scratched behind her ears and Ji leaned into his hand.

  “Saimura wants me to take a human body again,” she confided. “But I can’t bring myself to steal another woman’s flesh. Not even a criminal’s. I remember too well how I suffered when mine was stripped from me.”

  “That must have been long ago.” Even when he’d still been a child, Ji Shir’korud, the demoness in animal flesh, had been famous in the heights of Rathal’pesha.

  “Yes, long ago. Though time changes when you become an issusha,” she replied. “I turned fiftythe summer the Eastern kingdom fell into the sea and I felt ancient then. I don’t know how long the Payshmura kept my bones at Umbhra’ibaye after that. I saw kingdoms rise and fall, histories play out, and then alter, and run their course again. I couldn’t say how long I remained imprisoned before your mother took pity on me and freed me.” Ji sighed. “She was quite brave, you know. Though, impulsive as well. You take after her.”

  “I don’t remember much about either of my parents,” Kahlil admitted. What he could remember he did not like to think about. Ji seemed to recognize as much and let the subject rest.

  Kahlil studied the north horizon. A luminous glow lit the pale sky, as if a second sun hung in the north. He thought he saw a flicker of lightning jump through the walls of clouds and mist.

  “Ji, do you know anything about the forces in the north?” Kahlil asked.

  She opened her dark eyes. “What has Jath’ibaye told you?”

  “Just that he’s worried. And that he doesn’t want me going there.”

  “Well, it is worrying and you shouldn’t go there,” Ji told him. “Out past the edge of the chasm, there is an island where the monastery of Rathal’pesha once stood. You died there.” Ji paused, studying Kahlil. The last time she had told him of his death he’d fled. Now Kahlil merely waited for her to continue.

  “That island is where Fikiri and his Lady make their home.” Ji shifted a little under Kahlil’s hand and he realized that she wanted him to scratch lower on her skinny back. Kahlil complied.

  “When Jath’ibaye destroyed the northlands, he crushed the Black Tower and Umbhra’ibaye as well. Do you know how?” Ji asked.

  “No, I don’t remember that.”

  “All three of the great Payshmura centers were linked,” Ji said. “There was an open gateway connecting them. Jath’ibaye collapsed that gateway, pulling all three into one ruin. The priests, nuns, acolytes, servants, animals, all living flesh died. But one of the issusha’im survived intact.”

  Kahlil suddenly thought of his sister. His hands went still on Ji’s hide. There was such a slim chance that his sister, of all the issusha’im, would have survived. He knew it was foolish to even hope. Still, he couldn’t keep from asking, “Do you know what her name was?”

  “Loshai,” Ji whispered. “But we do not speak her name too often for fear of summoning her.”

  “Oh,” Kahlil said. He hardly took the name in. It was not his sister’s. It wasn’t Rousma. Kahlil closed his eyes and tried to lay memories of her back to rest as they had been before that momentary flash of hope.

  “I don’t know if you can imagine what it was like after the northlands fell,” Ji went on. “Storms of ash and mud, then week after week of earth tremors, mudslides, and always rain. Even with the stores of food at Vundomu, hundreds of people starved. And Jath’ibaye was nowhere to be found.

  “At last the land calmed enough for me to go and search for him. I found him out where the Greenhills are now. He was half buried in stone and mud. After I dug him out, he hardly seemed alive. He didn’t notice food or warmth, not even pain. He was emaciated and unresponsive. He wanted to be left to die. But of course he couldn’t die and I couldn’t afford to leave him.

  “By that time the Bousim family had already sent word to us that we should surrender Vundomu to their forces. They had an army marching towards us. We were all half starved an
d sick from fouled water supplies. We needed Jath’ibaye if we were to stand against the Bousim.

  “And that was when Loshai arrived, looking for Jath’ibaye. She knew him. She railed at him, shouting and cursing him in a language I had never heard. At last that seemed to rouse him. They both returned to Vundomu with me and the Bousim forces were defeated in less than a week. After that Jath’ibaye dedicated himself to protecting Vundomu and to healing the lands.

  “For a while that seemed to be Loshai’s wish as well. But then she began visiting the island in the north. Sometimes she returned with Payshmura books, ancient scrolls, even cursed relics. She was not interested in what I could teach her. She wanted Payshmura teachings about raising the Great Gate, creating issusha’im, and altering the past. I heard her arguing with Jath’ibaye more and more. After three years it seemed to be all they ever did in each other’s company.”

  “What did they fight about?” Kahlil asked.

  “I couldn’t say. But I do know that Loshai had been deeply wronged, as were all the women who were forced to become issusha’im.” Ji sighed heavily. “There is always the temptation, once you have seen what the issusha’im see, to reach back and somehow save yourself. It is nearly impossible not to think of altering history for your own sake. Other lives, joyful existences, haunt your dreams and drive you nearly mad because you know they aren’t just whimsy, not just fantasy. They are the lives the Payshmura stole, the histories they destroyed. Everything you dream of could have been real once.” Ji paused and lowered her head.

  Kahlil understood what it was to be haunted by another life. He wondered what lost histories haunted Ji. But he didn’t ask. It seemed too personal.

  “I don’t know if that was what drove Loshai. But I remember her screaming a word at Jath’ibaye with such loss and anger that he could say nothing in response. He looked like he had been shot. I’ve thought about the word since then, but I’ve never been able to decide what it meant.”

  “What was it?” Kahlil asked.

  “Bill,” Ji said quietly. “It’s a small word, but it meant something important to Loshai. And to Jath’ibaye as well. After that last argument, Loshai went out to the north island and did not return. A few months later the first of the hungry bones arose and after that Fikiri began killing and stealing our children.”

  “Where was Fikiri before then?” Kahlil asked.

  “Who knows? None of us had seen him earlier. He was probably hiding on the island. From what I’ve heard, he and Loshai knew each other before she was taken to Umbhra’ibaye. Jath’ibaye hated him, but I don’t think Loshai ever did.”

  “I never liked him,” Kahlil commented, but he wasn’t thinking about that. He was remembering the countless souls trapped in the white sands at the chasm’s edge. “Why would they create hungry bones?”

  “Because she is making issusha’im. Not all attempts succeed. Some only create hungry bones.”

  “But—” Kahlil began, but then he remembered Fikiri’s promises of a gateway to Nayeshi. If Loshai were really creating a new gateway, then she would need issusha’im to control the moment in history that her gateway opened into.

  “We’ve never managed to infiltrate the island. The hungry bones guard it too well,” Ji told him. “But we all know there is little use for issusha’im unless one is reconstructing the Great Gate.”

  “Yes.” With all the remnants of the Payshmura holy places that littered her island, there was a good chance that she could build a Great Gate. It would depend greatly on the kind of power she could wield.

  “Loshai,” he said the name quietly. It was familiar, as Fikiri’s name had been when Kahlil had first heard it.

  “You knew her?” Ji asked.

  “When I was a youth,” Kahlil said, frowning. Distant memories washed over him. The image of a slender woman came to him. Her hair was long and white blonde; her eyes were large and blue like John’s. And then he remembered her dressed in weasel skins. Snow swirled around her as she carefully fed twigs into a cooking fire. Her thin husband, Bill, leaned against a bare tree fighting for breath. And John had been there as well. He had said she was his sister.

  But Kahlil knew she wasn’t. She was his childhood friend, Laurie. She had been the one to give John the nickname of Toffee. She had been with John the day he intercepted the golden key. She was the witch whose powers had stirred even in Nayeshi’s atmosphere.

  “Loshai was one of Fikiri’s mother’s attendants,” Kahlil said at last. “Bill was called Behr. He was her husband. He was murdered, I think. I don’t remember exactly, but it led to the Payshmura discovering that she had witches’ blood.”

  “And then they made her an issusha,” Ji stated sadly. Kahlil felt a shudder creep down her spine.

  “I think so.”

  “She must have been with child,” Ji said. “Otherwise they would have burned her.”

  “I don’t know…I guess so.” Sentimental warmth lingered in Kahlil’s memories of Loshai and Behr. He couldn’t help but feel sympathy for all that Loshai must have lost and endured. But he also knew that he had to crush those feelings. If Loshai had rebuilt the Great Gate to return her to her past in Nayeshi, then she would need an immense source of power to awaken it. She would need to feed the stones with a god’s blood and bones. She would need to kill Jath’ibaye.

  “And Jath’ibaye knows all this?” Kahlil asked.

  Ji nodded.

  It was getting too cold and dark to stay outside. Kahlil stood up. Ji watched him. After a slow yawn, she drew herself up to her feet.

  “Why doesn’t he destroy the island?” Kahlil asked.

  “He says he can’t,” Ji replied.

  “Of course he can.” Kahlil scowled at the absurdity of that idea. “There is nothing in this world that he cannot destroy if he wishes.”

  Ji shifted, letting out a slight groan as she resettled herself. “But if he doesn’t wish it, then the power may not come to him.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She was his friend,” Ji said. “She gave him something to live for when he had nothing else. Even now, when he knows that he must destroy her or she will keep killing our children, that friendship still lives deep within him. It won’t allow him to destroy the island.”

  “Someone should just tell him to do it,” Kahlil said.

  “We have. He’s tried.” Ji shook her head. “It’s not so simple.”

  “But it is,” Kahlil replied. “He’s the Rifter. He is Destruction Embodied—”

  “No,” Ji interrupted Kahlil, before he could launch into a recitation of the hundreds of names of the Rifter. “He is Jath’ibaye.”

  “Yes, but—”

  Ji snapped her yellow teeth, startling Kahlil into silence. “No matter how powerful he might be, he’s still a human being. He has already accepted responsibility for thousands of lives. If he can’t bring himself to murder a friend, then I am willing to accept that. I would not force him to be responsible for that death as well.”

  Kahlil almost snapped out an aggravated response, but then he stopped himself. Only days before, he had admired Jath’ibaye for never losing his humanity despite his power. Surely it was that very same trait which Kahlil now found so exasperating.

  He knew that he wouldn’t want Jath’ibaye to become the kind of man who easily murdered a friend. He took a deep breath of the cold air and released it. The living heat of his breath formed a pale wisp against the dark sky.

  “Jath’ibaye can’t do it, but I could,” Kahlil said. He glanced to Ji. “That’s why everyone here is so relieved that I’m going to kill Fikiri. You’re all hoping I’ll take out Loshai as well.”

  “We’re counting on it.”

  “If that’s what I have to do, then that’s what I’ll do.” Kahlil shrugged. But he wondered how Jath’ibaye would respond. Would he be sickened or relieved after Kahlil had killed Loshai? Jath’ibaye probably didn’t know himself. He probably dreaded finding out. Perhaps that was why he insisted that Kah
lil remain here in Vundomu instead of leaving to hunt Fikiri down.

  “We should get back to Jath’ibaye’s holdings before he comes to find us,” Ji said.

  Kahlil glanced to the barracks just in time to see Jath’ibaye striding toward them across the courtyard.

  “Too late,” Kahlil replied.

  Ji squinted across the courtyard. Kahlil noticed that her tail began to wag just slightly at the sight of Jath’ibaye. He wondered if she knew that she was doing it.

  Even in the dark, Jath’ibaye walked straight to them, never missing his footing. Kahlil enjoyed watching Jath’ibaye move. He seemed so at ease in his physical prowess. Despite his size, he hardly left prints in the soft earth.

  “I thought I’d come and see what was taking the two of you so long,” Jath’ibaye said.

  “We were just about to leave,” Kahlil replied. Briefly, he caught Jath’ibaye’s hand. Their fingers touched and parted.

  “I’ll walk you back up then,” Jath’ibaye said.

  “Do you know what Eriki’yu has planned for dinner?” Ji asked. “I hope not dog. I never feel right eating dog.”

  “It was fish this afternoon,” Jath’ibaye replied. He clearly hadn’t paid much attention to the dinner preparations.

  “Fish might be worth the walk,” Ji said. “Buttered bird would definitely be worth it, but there aren’t too many birds this time of year. Not big juicy ones. Fish, though…I don’t know.”

  “Shall I carry you?” Jath’ibaye offered.

  Kahlil saw Ji’s teeth flash, but he wasn’t sure if it was meant to be a smile or threat. Ji’s expressions and gestures were an odd blur of both animal and human. He recalled that his sister had become deeply animalistic when she had worn that same body. He supposed that living in the flesh of a dog had to have an effect on Ji as well, especially after so many years.

  Jath’ibaye understood Ji. He knelt and picked her up. She relaxed against him. Her head hung over his shoulder. Her paws curled in against his chest. In Jath’ibaye’s arms, she looked like a strange, exhausted child.