His duty fulfilled, Trell walked back to Gendaia to retrieve his waterskins and was soon bent over the wide sandstone pool refilling the leather bags along with two score other visitors. It was strange to be standing there, he reflected while the cool, crystalline water bubbled around his hands, when every time prior he’d been traveling with Graeme or Ware. Now his only friends were dead and he walked alone. It seemed a bitter irony that men with families who loved them were taken from this world, while he, the orphan, was left to go on.
No, not an orphan, he remembered. I have a brother…but does he mourn me? Or was I cast out in shame?
A shadow befell him, and Trell glanced up to see four Khaz’im standing over him in their black ghoutras and baggy desert pants, broad red sashes at their waists. Seeing them, Trell slowly straightened from the well. “Sa’laam,” he greeted with a bow. Peace. For the ghost of a moment, he feared he must have genuflected out of sequence to Jai’Gar, but then the Khaz’im were bowing in return.
“Sa’laam, Ama-Kai’alil,” the leader replied.
Peace, Man of the Tides. Trell hadn’t heard himself called the simple name in many years. He replied in the desert tongue, “How may I serve the Khaz’im?”
The leader said, “We of the Khaz’im have a message for the Emir. If it please him, the tribe of Libaya al’Ama-Khazaaz supports his quest to purge the sacred mountains of the blasphemous Nadoriin. He need only send for us; we are eager to serve.”
Trell nodded and replied with a solemn bow, “I will let it be known.”
The exchange concluded, they turned and departed. Trell watched them go with a little frown, Jaya’s words echoing in mind. ‘…There are reasons for wars, and then there are reasons for wars…’ For a great many people, this war was about preserving sacred ground, but he also now knew that Jaya was in a position to learn secrets that would never filter down to the common ear. He wondered what motives could be driving the war if indeed it wasn’t about protecting the honored shrines.
Letting out his breath heavily, Trell turned back to his task, only to be hailed once again.
“Forgive me, sir. A word if I may?”
Trell straightened again to find three women dressed in caramel-hued burkhas, just their eyes visible between the folds of cloth; one pair dark, the other two aqua-blue. The silk hems of azure-blue gowns fluttered delicately beneath their tan burkhas. Color on a woman outside of her home was forbidden among the desert tribes, thus he surmised that they were not Akkadian-born.
He nodded to each of the women and then turned his gaze inquiringly back to the first. “Sa’laam,” she said, using the traditional address of peace. She continued in the desert tongue, “Forgive our intrusion, but we noticed you made only the first genuflection at the spring just now. Could it be that you are not Converted?”
Trell noticed her accent immediately. It was neither Nadori, nor Agasi, nor even the usual slurring inflection from those who Converted from the common tongue. It was something else, something decidedly…foreign. Another curiosity. Wondering what she wanted with him, he answered, “It is so, madam.”
The other two women let out collective sighs of relief, and the first smiled and murmured under her breath, “Mother be praised.” To Trell, she then said, “We have lingered here for three days in the hopes of finding a guide through the mountains. You are the first we have come upon who is not Converted.”
Trell’s gaze narrowed as he regarded her. “The Converted know the mountains as well as anyone, madam. Have you some prejudice against them?”
She exchanged a look with her two companions, whereupon the shortest of the three, the one whose dark eyes seemed the most fearful, replied, “It is just the opposite, good sir. It is they who may hold ill feelings towards us. You see, we are from Tal’Shira.”
Trell arched brows. He believed she at least was, for her accent confirmed it so, but he couldn’t help wondering where the other two women actually hailed from.
It was rare to find women unattended in the Bashir’Khazaaz, and even stranger to find foreign-born women there at all—especially ones who also spoke the desert tongue. But surely these ladies had not crossed miles of war-plagued desert by themselves. “How is it you are traveling alone?” he asked the first woman with the strange accent, trying for another chance to place it. “Where is your escort?”
“We travel alone,” she told him, and there was an emotion in her tone that he couldn’t quite place.
The woman beside her, who had not yet spoken, answered hesitantly, “We are not without our gifts.”
“Will you help us?” asked the Nadori woman in a wavering voice. “We are…quite desperate.”
“We will pay you generously for your effort,” said the first.
Trell frowned as he regarded all three of them. “Where is it you’re heading?”
“To Sakkalaah,” the Nadori replied. “But we need help gathering supplies for the trek through the gorge…and perhaps securing some guards who can be trusted?”
Trell crossed his arms. Sakkalaah was half a week’s journey along a dangerous road—there might not be thieves in the Bashir’Khazaaz, but they were plentiful on the roads in and out of it. It was no wonder the women desired his aid if Sakkalaah was their destination. Coincidentally, the oasis city was a planned stop for him on his way to the Free Cities, but he was hesitant to commit himself to their service. “And from Sakkalaah, madam?” he inquired guardedly. “Where then do you head?”
“To Duan’Bai,” answered the dark-eyed Nadori.
Now Trell was truly shocked. He could only imagine the reception they would get, these three tribeless women, as they rode unaccompanied beneath the sanctified walls of Duan’Bai. “Madam,” he said seriously, “forgive me, but you will not be welcome there.”
She nodded solemnly. “And yet, that is our road.”
Trell frowned as he gazed into three pairs of beautiful eyes, two as clear as spring water, the other dark as night. Instinct told him there was more to this story, but the question was, did it matter? They were foreign women in a friendless kingdom, and he felt that he must aid them, much against his better judgment.
Sundragons, zanthyrs, Whisper Lords, and now…what? What race of women travels alone into a hostile kingdom fraught with war, bandits, and marauding soldiers? He seemed destined to meet a representative of every known race upon this quest; was it coincidence, or the hand of a higher power?
Follow the water, Trell of the Tides…
He could almost hear Naiadithine’s whispered blessing, if it was a blessing at all. He looked to the spring of Jai’Gar, its waters glittering in the strong afternoon light. Was the water—was Naiadithine—leading him still?
The women were watching him anxiously from between the rectangular slit in their hoods. Their hopes now rested on him, their next breath hinging on his reply. He retrieved his waterskins and capped them. “As it happens,” he said, still not quite believing the words were leaving his mouth, “I am headed for Sakkalaah.”
All three women visibly deflated with relief, and the Nadori threw her arms around his neck, exclaiming, “Oh, thank you!” Then she backed away looking embarrassed.
The first woman said, “I am Fhionna, and this is my sister Aishlinn,” and she indicated the second woman with eyes so like her own. “And this is—”
“Lily,” said the Nadori girl.
“Well met, my ladies,” Trell replied. “They call me Trell of the Tides.”
He carried his waterskins back to Gendaia and replaced them among his packs. The women followed. “What supplies will you need?” he asked them while tending to his own things.
“Everything,” answered Fhionna. “Our things were lost in a storm three days ago.”
Trell turned her a look over his shoulder. “Horses too?”
“Everything,” Fhionna repeated.
Trell arched a brow curiously, but he didn’t challenge her tale. He took up Gendaia’s reins and led the women through the crowded bazaa
r acquiring what things they would need for the journey to Sakkalaah. He also spoke to the Khaz’im, inquiring about four men who could be trusted.
While the Khaz’im spread the word for new guards for the women, Trell found and purchased a large tent for them and a smaller one for himself. He acquired four desert horses from a Maudin, whose tribe was renowned for its fine-bred stock. Next he purchased additional waterskins, a variety of foodstuffs, bed rolls and blankets, and a camel to carry it all. When Fhionna protested the smelly animal, Trell explained that while a mule would do fine through the gorge to Sakkalaah, it would not survive the trek overland to Duan’Bai, where a man could walk for days and encounter neither water nor shelter nor another living soul.
They were readying to depart when a Khaz’im arrived with four stone-faced men in tow. He said to Trell by way of introduction, “They are Khurds.”
The laconic statement yet told Trell much. The Khurds were the largest of the seventeen recognized tribes—so large, in fact, that outsiders often used the one tribal name to describe all desert folk. But recognized members of any of the tribes made the men fully trustworthy, as they would be held accountable to the tribe for any wrongs committed. The Khaz’im continued, “For a hundred denar apiece, they will make the journey to Sakkalaah, but not beyond to the pale lands. It is the last threshold.”
“I understand,” Trell replied. Sakkalaah was the westernmost city in the Akkad. Beyond its borders lay the Assifiyah mountains and the boundaries of Xanthe, and the Khurds would not walk those lands. He had not told the Khaz’im about the women’s intent to travel to Duan’Bai. It was best that they kept such knowledge to themselves for the time being. The men’s price was high but fair; it was a dangerous road.
The Khaz’im departed, and Trell nodded to the four new guards. “Sa’laam,” he greeted.
“Sa’laam, Ama-Kai’alil,” they returned in unison.
Trell walked over to the waiting women and explained, “They require a hundred denar apiece.” If the women didn’t have it, he was prepared to cover the cost—after all, he carried a fortune in Agasi silver and could do with some guards himself. The women nodded, however, and Fhionna replied, “You believe this is a fair price, Trell of the Tides?”
“Indeed, madam. For what you are asking.”
“Then we shall pay all of you at once—” and she reached for her coin.
He stilled her hand with his own. “You shall pay them when we reach Sakkalaah,” he told her in a low voice, “and me nothing at all.”
Her eyes went wide. “But surely, you—”
Trell shook his head. “I cannot accept anything from you in good conscience.”
Lily gave him a look of wonder. “Truly, Fortune must bless you for such generosity, Trell of the Tides.”
But Aishlinn shook her head. “No,” she disagreed softly, peering at Trell with a thoughtful gaze. “He cannot accept our coin, but it is not generosity that drives him…though I think honor does.”
Trell nodded silently to her. Indeed, she was correct. Honor bound him to help these women because of their grave need, and more so since they followed his own path, but he felt he would be compromising his allegiance to the Emir if he accepted their coin for it, as if somehow that would constitute contracting for the enemy.
Fhionna and Lily gave Aishlinn a curious look, one they then turned back upon Trell, but he only motioned for them to mount up and himself did the same.
Thus did they depart.
The sky was darkening dangerously and the wind picking up as the group made their way west with two guards leading on horseback, followed by Trell riding Gendaia, then the women, and then the last two guards and the camel named Sherba. They didn’t get far, but they didn’t need to, only far enough beyond the bazaar that its noise was drowned by the high ridges of the gorge—the Bashir’Khazaaz only shut down when there was nothing left to sell; even the coming storm would only drive the merchants inside their tents until the worst of the winds died down.
They were following a dry riverbed to the ominous rumble of approaching thunder when one of the leading guards, named Kamil, pulled his horse alongside Trell’s. “Sayid says a campsite is just ahead,” Kamil reported in the desert tongue, indicating the other guard with a nod of his turbaned head. “You can see the site there, halfway to the canyon rim.”
Trell sighted down Kamil’s pointing finger to a flat outcropping a few hundred paces up the side of the steep incline. “Thank Sayid for his effort,” he said. “We will stay there for the night.”
Kamil put heel to his horse and cantered ahead. Trell turned to the ladies, who were riding just behind him, and reported, “We’ve found a campsite where we can stay the night. It is just ahead, halfway up the canyon. A good site, from the looks of it.”
Lily followed his gaze, but her brow furrowed upon spotting the site. “What is wrong with this spot?” she inquired, indicating the flat expanse where their horses walked. “Why must we labor up so steep a hill with all of our belongings when could just camp here?”
“This canyon was carved by a river, milady,” Trell replied. “To spend the night here would mean our death with the storm that approaches.”
The women looked somewhat disturbed to hear this, perhaps because they’d have likely made that mistake had it been up to them to decide.
Lily offered then, “We are indeed blessed to have you as our guide, Trell of the Tides.”
“You are blessed to have Kamil and Sayid, madam,” Trell corrected, “and Radiq and Ammar. I serve only as facilitator.”
The startled expressions on their faces showed him that this was not how they’d considered him, but it was the only capacity in which he was prepared to serve.
The first droplets of rain had begun to fall by the time they made camp. The men rushed to set up the women’s tent, and thereafter the ladies waited inside while the men picketed the horses and Sherba beneath a protective tarp and erected their own smaller cadirs, one-man tents of oiled wool just large enough for a bedroll.
The women were sitting close together when Trell ducked through the multilayered flaps that sealed the tent from the storm. They’d traded their burkhas for desert gowns not unlike Jaya’s in design. The sisters wore identical gowns in a variegated sea-blue, and Lily wore a gown of the deepest green. It was the first Trell had seen of their faces, however, and he drew up short.
The Nadori was almond-skinned and younger than he’d thought—surely not a day past ten and six, while the sisters were…older, but nearly ethereal in their beauty. Fhionna’s honey-brown hair framed her slim shoulders like a cloak, her waves held back from her lovely features by a cap of firestones; while fair Aishlinn’s angular features reminded him of a fragile bird. He would never have known them sisters if not for the identical color and shape of their eyes.
The ladies looked equally startled by his mud-drenched appearance. “What happened to you?” Aishlinn asked.
“The storm, milady,” Trell answered. He set down the bundle he’d been carrying and went to his own packs to find a cloth to wipe his face. “This is the desert. It rains mud.” He splashed some water from his waterskin onto the cloth and began the systematic procedure of cleaning up—over the years, he’d learned to do it with as little as a single goblet of water and one piece of cloth a foot square.
Without thought to current company, Trell tore off his muddy tunic and received a harmony of feminine laughter for his effort. He looked up to find Lily and Aishlinn whispering with bright eyes, while the lovely Fhionna watched him with a smile of admiration. “I beg your pardons,” Trell said, feeling foolish for not remembering his protocol around highborn ladies. “While the rain persists, I fear there is nowhere else for me to clean up. Might I use this corner of your tent?”
“Of course, Trell of the Tides,” Fhionna replied, eyeing him in so arousing a way that she stirred warmth into his loins. “Your company is welcome.”
While Trell began wiping down his chest and arms with his b
it of cloth, Fhionna joined her two companions in whispering. He glanced their way occasionally, only to find three sets of eyes regarding him over a myriad of hands concealing whispers and laughter.
After several extended moments of this, in which Trell managed somewhat nervous smiles in response to their whispers, Fhionna rose and approached him.
Trell regarded her openly. Her large aqua eyes were framed by chocolate lashes, and her heart-shaped face captured him with its perfection, with a goddess’s smile and lips as full and sweet as a blood-kissed rose. Her body was sleek yet curvaceous, and her long legs made him think only of how they would feel firmly secured around his hips. Quite unexpectedly, Trell found himself confessing breathlessly, “Milady, I don’t believe you can be human.”
Fhionna laughed, and the sound was music to his ears. “You are quite right, Trell of the Tides,” she murmured. Then she gave him a little pout that was nearly irresistible, making him long to taste of her lips. “But why have you stopped?” she inquired with a single finger caught between her perfect teeth.
Trell looked down at his bared chest, cleaned now of mud, and then to his lower half, which was still awaiting ministration, though the throbbing warmth between his legs ached for ministrations of a different variety. He lifted grey eyes back to her, the others’ presence all but forgotten in the thrall of Fhionna’s aqua gaze. “To move further at this juncture might be dangerous, milady,” he answered breathlessly.
She came closer and trailed a hand down the line of his muscular chest. “For me?” she whispered. “Or for you?”
Aishlinn suddenly appeared beside her sister. “Fhionna, you must stop this,” she scolded in a hushed voice. “It is unseemly to take advantage of Trell when he offers us his service so selflessly!”
Cephrael's Hand: A Pattern of Shadow & Light Book One Page 33