The preparations complete, Cahil took up a pair of long-nosed pliers and a bright, shining steel scalpel. “I cut the scar open. I apply the elixir. We wait and then we do it a second time. That’s one session.” He spoke with dispassion, as if he were inured to the pain he was about to inflict, but it was belied by the boyish grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. “If you know how I healed Gallan, you know it took five months and hundreds of applications before his leg was regrown. With your tongue, I’m guessing we’ll need three weeks, two sessions a day.”
Ihsan’s breath came raw and ragged through his nostrils. The feeling that he was about to be choked kept gnawing at him. Spit gathered in torrents, forcing him to swallow over and over.
“Ready?” Cahil asked.
Ihsan made a noise that any sane man would have trouble interpreting as affirmation, but Cahil, taking it as such, immediately pinched the remains of Ihsan’s severed tongue with his pliers and dipped the scalpel into the gaping maw of Ihsan’s mouth.
Ihsan felt something tug at his tongue. It felt like a thread buried within it had just been tugged free. Then a bright white line of searing pain flared to life. Cahil had been right. Ihsan struggled. His whole body spasmed. Tears slid down his face to his temples. Sweat tickled his scalp. The pain rose higher and higher, and Ihsan moaned, tasting blood at the back of his throat, smelling it.
“Still yourself or I’ll spill the elixir.”
It took a mighty force of will, but Ihsan managed it. As soon as he had, Cahil stuffed cotton gauze inside his mouth, pressing hard to stanch the flow. After removing the cotton, he used a bulbed pipette to drip some of the softly glowing elixir into Ihsan’s mouth. Ihsan felt all five drops. Cahil paused, waiting for the elixir to take effect. And it did. Ihsan could feel it numbing the incision already. The pain fell steadily until it felt like he’d taken a swallow of hot tea and mildly burnt his tongue on it.
“Ready for the second?” Cahil asked.
Ihsan wasn’t, but he made the same useless noise he’d made earlier and Cahil set to. The pain was more intense this time. Even so, Ihsan stilled himself, knowing that the sooner he did, the sooner Cahil would apply the elixir. But Cahil still waited. Ihsan had known Cahil would revel in his pain, but he hadn’t imagined how impotent it would make him feel. Being strapped to a table already made him feel powerless; having Cahil wallow in his misery made him feel doubly so.
Finally Cahil pressed the gauze to the wound and applied the elixir. The slow dwindling of his pain felt like the sun setting as it faded to a dull ache that flared to life any time Ihsan was foolish enough to move his tongue. It was disheartening knowing this was but the first step up the mountain of pain to come. But at least it’s started. If this works, it will all have been worth it.
Cahil unstrapped him, then set about a meticulous cleaning of his instruments. “I hope this works,” Cahil said as Ihsan headed toward the stairs leading up.
Ihsan stopped halfway up. You do?
“For your sake, not mine.” Using a bit of clean cotton dipped in alcohol, he rubbed the scalpel. “I meant what I said. If this doesn’t work, I don’t see why we would have any need of you.”
You’ve become less subtle in your old age, Cahil.
Cahil actually laughed. “The time for subtlety has passed, Ihsan. Husamettín may be upset with me for it, but I tell you this. If you can’t wake Zeheb from his stupor”—he held up the scalpel—“the next thing this goes over is your throat.”
I’m rather attached to the smile I have, Ihsan replied. I hardly need another.
Cahil laughed again, and Ihsan headed up to the deck.
The days melded into one another, Cahil applying his cure, Ihsan recovering. Even with the elixirs Ihsan was exhausted each night. It felt as if he slept right up until the next session. He could hardly eat for the pain and started to lose weight. After a week of consuming little more than broth, water, and the araq he was allowed before each session, it felt as if he were competing with Zeheb to look most like a bag of bones.
But the cure was working. The morning after the first session, Ihsan could already tell the stump of his tongue had grown slightly. After a week, nearly half of its missing length had been restored.
Cahil had been right, though. He was going through the elixirs at an alarming rate. They’d used four of them already. The fifth wasn’t going to be enough.
Do you have more? Ihsan signed to Cahil as they entered the second week of his treatment.
Cahil had barked a laugh. “No, Ihsan, and I wouldn’t give you any if I did.”
Husamettín said he didn’t have any either, and Ihsan believed him. If he’d had any and didn’t want to give them up, he’d just say so and be done with it. The man was inflexible, but he was never one to bother lying in order to spare feelings.
It left Ihsan in a bind. He had more elixirs, but not of the sort Cahil and Husamettín would be expecting him to have. They weren’t the ones Azad had made before his death at the hands of Çeda’s mother, Ahyanesh, but the ones Nayyan had concocted at his direction, elixirs that mimicked them, elixirs he and Nayyan had hidden from everyone while planning their conquest of Sharakhai.
It would be dangerous admitting that he had them, but he had no choice. It was either that or leave and try the treatment on his own, and the moment he did that, he’d lose his chance at lifting Zeheb’s curse, at finding Nalamae and of saving Sharakhai. Leave, and there would be no getting back into Cahil’s good graces.
“What are these?” Cahil asked when Ihsan gave him six new vials.
Elixirs I gave up the last of my wealth for, a concoction from the hill witches of Kundhun.
Cahil opened one and smelled it, then wrinkled his nose at the pungent odor. “And you want me to use them on your tongue?”
Ihsan nodded. The less said the better.
But there was no hiding their true nature when they worked. As they entered the third week, and the new elixirs worked as well as the old, Cahil grew suspicious.
“We come all this way,” he said by the fire one night, “hundreds of leagues from Sharakhai, and you find elixirs we would all have killed for.”
Zeheb sat cross-legged near the fire, burbling softly. Yndris was silent but, judging from the look on her face, was prepared to doubt anything that came from Ihsan’s rapidly flashing hands.
Husamettín’s dour expression looked all the more dour for the mark of the traitor on his forehead. “Well,” he said, “what of it? How did you manage to come by this miraculous cure?”
Like each of us, Ihsan signed, I’d been searching for replacements to Azad’s elixirs since the day he died.
“And you waited until you were exiled into the desert to look into it?”
The rumor came to me only recently, and led to Ganahil. For obvious reasons, I trusted no one to find the truth of it for me. I had to go myself, but there were always things to attend to in Sharakhai.
Husamettín used a stick to poke at the fire, sending sparks flying like constellations in the moonless sky. “Why didn’t you share the rumor with us?”
I daresay none of you bothered to share every rumor you heard with me. And thank the gods! We’d never have got anywhere. It made no sense to share it until I’d learned whether it could truly heal.
“And what good fortune,” Yndris said. “Just when you need it most, a cure has arrived.”
Just so, Ihsan replied evenly, refusing to rise to the bait.
“And now that you’ve found them,” she pressed, “I’m sure you’re willing to share whatever remains.”
Ihsan bowed his head theatrically. Two will likely remain once Cahil is done. I gladly offer them to this happy coalition.
Husamettín leaned back from the fire to look at Ihsan squarely in the face. “And your tongue?”
What of it?
Husamettín made a sour face.
“Can you use it? Has your power returned?”
Over the past several days, he’d tried to speak. It was painful, but the sounds were coming closer and closer to real words. He signed, It’s coming slowly, while at the same time speaking the words. All that came out was a tangle of vowels and sibilants.
Cahil gave Ihsan that hangman’s stare of his. He’d suspected from the beginning that this wasn’t about Zeheb or saving the city, but about Ihsan’s most basic desire: to restore his power. He’d be only too glad to see Ihsan fail—indeed, he’d be glad to follow through on the promise he’d made to Ihsan in the hold: “If this doesn’t work, I don’t see why we would have any need of you.” But just then, Ihsan kept his silence.
What Ihsan refused to admit was that he’d tried several times already to command Zeheb. “Wake,” he’d tried to say when the others were away, but it had come out like walk, and nothing had happened.
As the days passed, Ihsan’s tongue healed more, and his words came more clearly. His tongue still felt leaden, though, with no power to speak of, and Ihsan started to wonder if his ability to command had been lost for good when Surrahdi had cut out his tongue.
Three weeks into the grueling process of healing, Cahil declared his efforts complete. And Ihsan agreed. His tongue was as healed as it was going to get. “The rest is up to the fates,” Cahil said.
That night, Ihsan sat on the sand beside the campfire and faced Zeheb. The others were there, watching. “Wake,” Ihsan said to him. It sounded wrong, as if he were a mute trying to speak, but it was intelligible enough.
More important was Ihsan’s intent. In the past, he’d always been able to tell when his power flowed. Sitting there by the campfire, he tried, he really did, but he couldn’t tell if it was working or not. In a pure miracle, he felt the well of power inside him again, but it felt inaccessible. None of it was flowing through to Zeheb.
“Wake, Zeheb,” Ihsan repeated slowly. “Control the whispers. Suppress them as you once did.”
Zeheb stared intently into the flames, giving no indication he’d heard Ihsan’s words. Ihsan tried for nearly an hour, but when Zeheb began mumbling softly to himself, Ihsan knew he’d lost him.
We’ll try again tomorrow, Ihsan signed, refusing to speak. His tongue hurt terribly.
Husamettín’s face was unreadable. Yndris had already given up and gone to sleep. Cahil was standing nearby, cleaning his fingernails with a gleaming knife, staring at Ihsan with an expression of naked eagerness.
Ihsan woke early the next morning. Zeheb, as he often did, had slept beside the fire. He was sitting up, staring into the dead coals as if he might scry his way out of madness.
“Wake, Zeheb. Suppress the whispers.”
Again the tickle of power. Again the cold assurance that it wasn’t working, that the walls of Zeheb’s insanity were still impenetrable.
“Follow the path,” Zeheb suddenly said. “Sail deeper, deeper into the desert.”
He was echoing the words of another. Ihsan didn’t really care who. The fact that he was doing it meant he was lost in them and likely wouldn’t be able to hear Ihsan’s words. And even if Zeheb could hear him, there was the possibility that he’d sunk so deeply into madness he would never properly recover from it, silenced whispers or not.
“Shut them out, Zeheb. Return to us. Return to yourself.”
“Sail north,” Zeheb replied. “Sail north, north, north.”
Soon the others were up and Ihsan lost his chance to speak with Zeheb alone. He tried again throughout the day. But Zeheb only smiled as if he’d been wandering in the desert and had just stumbled upon his favorite meal. Near nightfall Ihsan saw Cahil speaking softly with Husamettín. When they saw Ihsan watching, the conversation abruptly ended, and the two walked away from camp together.
“We want the Blue Journals,” Husamettín said when they returned.
Ihsan stared at them both, knowing that this was the beginning of the end. If he refused, Cahil would likely torture him for the information before killing him. And if he told them, they might kill him anyway. At best he’d have until they had the journals in hand. After that, they would surely give him back to the desert.
In days past he might have given in to Husamettín’s demand. He might have bided his time to find a way out of this. But he was certain that if they took the time to return to the journals’ hiding place, they would fail in their mission. They’d lose their chance to find Nalamae, and then they’d lose Sharakhai itself.
“They’re safe,” Ihsan said carefully, hating how unintelligible he sounded. It made him feel small.
Yndris came to the fire and stood behind Ihsan. Nearby, Zeheb was babbling again.
“This has all been fruitless,” Husamettín said plainly. “I need assurances that the path we’re following is the one Yusam saw in his visions.”
“And I’ve given you assurances.” Ihsan couldn’t help but cringe as he spoke. He paused to let the pain pass. When he spoke again, it was at a slower, more manageable pace. “Returning would take weeks of sailing. The return to Sharakhai even longer. I don’t know that we have the time.”
Husamettín’s jaw worked. “You should have brought the journals with you, Ihsan.”
“Well, I didn’t. And now here we are.” It was a challenge, plain and simple, a call of their bluff.
Husamettín stood and placed his hand on his sword. “Where are the journals?”
Beside them, Zeheb’s whisperings were becoming stronger, as they sometimes did when trouble brewed around him. “On, on. Hurry now.”
Cahil glanced at him, then stood, one hand on his god-given war hammer.
Ihsan lifted himself up, his hands in the air. “I only need time with Zeheb. A few more days.”
In a flash of movement, Husamettín drew his shamshir. Cahil followed suit, as did Yndris.
“We’ve no more time to give you,” Husamettín said. “As you say, there is much to tend to. Now give me the location of the journals, or I’ll give you back to the desert here and now.”
“I won’t give them to you. Now stop this before—”
Husamettín advanced.
“Stop!” Ihsan said as he retreated. He tried to pour power into the command, but it had no effect. Husamettín drew his great shamshir back with both hands.
But the swing never came, for just then, Zeheb spoke. “Yes, yes, beyond the cutter. They’re standing around the fire.”
Husamettín turned and peered into the night. “Prepare yourselves!” he shouted, and sprinted away from the fire, into the darkness. “The enemy has found us!”
No sooner had he said it than a streak of orange light arced through the air toward them. The sound of breaking pottery came, followed by a burst of flame that spewed over the main deck of The Wayward Miller. Orange and yellow flames billowed upward, catching the mainmast boom and the sail tucked away on top of it. A moment later another firepot struck the foredeck.
Shapes resolved from the darkness. Warriors, many of them bearing the leaf-shaped shields of Kundhun, swept in like a murder of crows. A dozen of them, then two dozen.
“Stop!” Ihsan called, trying with all his soul to pour power into his voice. But it barely rose above the ring of steel, above Husamettín and Cahil and Yndris pitting their weapons against wooden clubs and khopeshes of the Kundhuni warriors.
A wave of warriors swept past the others and ran toward Ihsan and the fire. They were the mercenaries, Ihsan realized, the same ones who’d been guarding Zeheb and his family.
Ihsan backed away, drawing his knife as if it would help him to fend off the tall warriors. “Stop!” he called again.
But they kept coming. He sprinted for the ship. The fire on the deck had spread, but if Ihsan could make the gangplank, he’d have some hope of reducing the number of warriors he had to face. They anticipated him, though, and cut him off with their long,
loping strides.
The fire on the ship spread as Ihsan swiped at the nearest warrior. The warrior easily blocked him and brought his club down in a fearsome blow that Ihsan barely managed to fend off. The blow was blunted but still crashed against his head and sent him reeling. He fell to the ground and rolled, narrowly avoiding the head of the club as it thudded down in a spray of sand.
Above him, the warrior released a bone-chilling war cry and raised his club high. Hands raised, Ihsan made a pathetic attempt at shielding himself. There would be no stopping the blow. Not this time.
“Halt!” he shouted at the top of his lungs, putting all of himself into that single word, that single command.
And by the gods, he felt the dam burst. Raw power poured through him. The warrior stopped, still gripping the weapon tightly. He stared at Ihsan, terror coming on him, his breath ragged gasps. He watched as Ihsan stood. As Ihsan cut his throat.
The blood, nearly black in the darkness, flowed down his bare chest. The warrior’s eyes dimmed and he fell with a thud to the sand. The warrior’s three companions stood stock still as well and Ihsan dispatched them in the same way, then rushed to where Husamettín, Cahil, and Yndris were locked in battle. The three of them, just like the small host of Kundhuni warriors who surrounded them, were still as statues. Ihsan had been indiscriminate in his command, and they’d been caught up in it too.
The fire played over their faces as they watched him, Yndris with outright fear, Cahil with contempt, Husamettín with cold calculation, as if, even then, he wondered what Ihsan’s choice would be, and what he, Husamettín, could do about it.
As if you have any choice in the matter.
Ihsan would be lying if he said he didn’t consider ridding himself of all three of them—he could go to Sharakhai with Zeheb alone—but it was a fleeting thought, there and gone in a moment. He’d come here to save his home from the threat bearing down on it, and he would see that done. At least this episode had shown he could control the other Kings if need be, which might come in very handy one day.
When Jackals Storm the Walls Page 19