“Agreed,” said Tanzir with a heavy sigh. He looked at the tents around them, and Kylon knew the emir wondered how many of his men would lie die tomorrow. “I shall have the siege catapults brought forward. Not loaded with Hellfire, though. One miss and we could kill a thousand people in the Anshani Quarter. No, we’ll target the catapults on the watch towers and try to disable them. Perhaps we can clear a corridor of approach for our men to reach the walls.”
“Tomorrow,” said the Emissary in her quiet voice.
They all looked at her. Unease flickered through Kylon. As much as he disliked and mistrusted oracles, he had to admit that the Emissary had been helpful. Her advice had inspired the tactic that Kylon had used to defeat Rhataban, and without that he might not have been able to overcome the Master Alchemist. And yet he could never forget how the Surge had warned him about the nagataaru but had said nothing of the danger coming for Thalastre and their unborn daughter.
“Emissary?” said Sulaman, raising his eyebrows.
“Callatas will complete the Apotheosis tomorrow,” said the Emissary. “You know I speak the truth, Prince Kutal Sulaman Tarshahzon.”
“Yes,” said Sulaman. “My own vision suggests it as well.”
“What do you see?” said Kylon. He supposed that Sulaman was a sort of oracle, but Kylon found that he trusted the Prince more. Perhaps it was because Sulaman had exposed himself to such danger for so many years, coordinating a resistance to Callatas from under the Grand Master’s very nose. Perhaps it was because he had seen Sulaman fight, using his supernatural vision to dodge the scimitars and chain whips of the Immortals, and Kylon found it easier to trust a man once he’d gone into battle alongside him.
“Chaos,” said Sulaman in a soft voice.
“Chaos?” said Kylon.
“All paths end tomorrow,” said Sulaman, shaking his head and touching his temple as if he was dizzy. “All destinies converge tomorrow. All things will be decided tomorrow. Beyond that…I see nothing. No possibilities. Or all possibilities.”
“The Prince speaks the truth,” said the Emissary. “The point of convergence he sees is the possibility of the completion of the Apotheosis. If he is not stopped, Callatas will complete the Apotheosis sometime tomorrow, and all of Istarinmul and the rest of the world shall die.”
Silence answered her for a moment.
“Well,” said Strabane. “Suppose we’ll just have to cut off Callatas’s damned fool head first.”
“Wisely spoken, headman,” said Nasser. “Let us trust to the cunning of the spies within the city, and to the valor and the steel of our men.”
“Agreed,” said Tanzir. “The Prince has made his wishes known. Let us be about our work, then.”
The captains and emirs dispersed to their various commands, and Kylon watched them go. At the moment, there was nothing he needed to do, and he felt fatigue dragging at him. He had been awake all night, and the fight against the horsemen had further sapped his stamina. Some rest would be welcome, especially if the fate of the world would be decided tomorrow.
He felt the Emissary’s gaze upon him and turned as she limped towards him.
“I suppose,” said Kylon, “you have some more prophecies for me?”
“If you wish to hear them,” said the Emissary.
Kylon sighed, and at last nodded.
“Tomorrow the Apotheosis may come,” said the Emissary, “but tomorrow you will certainly face the Huntress again.”
Kylon said nothing.
“She will come for me?” said Kylon at last.
“Yes,” said the Emissary, “but not in the way you think. She hunts for the Balarigar.”
“Then Caina will be here,” said Kylon, feeling a stirring of hope for the first time in a long while. “Except…”
“You understand,” murmured the Emissary. “The Huntress comes for the Balarigar, and the Huntress will kill her…”
“No,” said Kylon, his sword hand balling into a fist.
“Unless you stop her,” said the Emissary. “Unless you sacrifice yourself to save her, the Huntress will kill the Balarigar, and the Apotheosis will kill the rest of us.”
Chapter 14: Chariots of Storm
Caina scrambled backward, the harsh crimson glow of the Hellfire filling her vision.
Other facts flashed across her brain.
She saw dark, twisted shapes scrambling down the craggy face of the hill. Nearly forty undead baboons scrambled towards them, clinging to the hillside like insects. Likely the nagataaru had realized Caina and the others had burned their way past the undead warriors in the entry hall and had sent reinforcements. She saw Morgant stepping back from a destroyed baboon, blades in hand, saw Annarah starting another spell, white fire burning up and down her bronze staff.
But the glow of the boiling Hellfire gushing from the cracked amphora held most of her attention.
“Run!” she shouted. “Right now! Run!”
Annarah and Morgant took one look at the bubbling puddle and sprinted towards the ancient road that cut through the heart of the dead jungle. Caina whirled and dashed after them, running as fast as she could.
There was a sound like a sudden, sharp inhalation of breath.
A titanic roaring sound filled Caina’s ears. A gale of hot wind shot past her, and suddenly she was tumbling through the air, arms and legs flailing. She tucked her shoulder as she hit the ground, rolling to absorb her momentum as she tumbled along the road. At last, she slammed into the stone pedestal of one of the sphinx statues lining the road and came to a bone-jarring halt, grunting in pain.
Sheer panic forced her to ignore the pain and scramble to her feet.
“Annarah?” she said. “Morgant?”
“Here,” said Morgant, kneeling next to Annarah as he helped her to stand.
Caina looked towards the hill, expecting to see the undead baboons in pursuit.
Instead, she saw a raging column of crimson fire shooting thirty yards into the air. The heat hammered against her face, even though the column was already shrinking. Hellfire was potent, but it burned out quickly.
But the fire had spread.
The destruction of the Conjurant Bloodcrystal had done more than kill the trees and ferns and other plants. It had withered them, drying them out and leaving only dead husks in its wake.
Dead husks that were incredibly flammable.
Already a dozen yards of jungle burned. Worse, the dead trees and leaves disintegrated as they caught fire. The wind was coming from the east, blowing the burning leaves and embers to the west, igniting more of the dead jungle as it went.
Caina was watching the birth of a firestorm.
“The beach,” said Annarah, her pyrikon folding back to her wrist. “We’ve got to get to the beach before we burn.”
“Run!” said Caina again.
“Obviously!” said Morgant, and they sprinted down the uneven, ancient road, past the rows of silent sphinxes upon their stone pedestals. The last time Caina and the others had passed through the jungle, it had been silent but alive, looming on either side of the road like walls of green. Now the jungle was withered and dead, and instead of silence, she heard the growing roar of the fire.
She risked a glance over her shoulder, her shadow-cloak streaming behind her. The fire had risen behind them like a tidal wave. It was racing through the jungle, and as the wind drove the fire, it expanded faster and faster, racing through the jungle like horsemen through a host of fleeing enemies. The fire would burn itself out quickly, but for a few moments, Pyramid Isle would become an inferno, killing anyone caught in the jungle.
Like Caina and Annarah and Morgant.
Caina ran faster, her breath sawing at her throat and chest.
“Ahead!” barked Morgant.
Caina looked to the left just as the undead warriors burst from the crumbling trees, the spells upon their bronze helmets blazing to her valikarion sight. She cursed and yanked the valikon from its scabbard at her belt, not slowing, and swept the wea
pon before her in a two-handed swing as the blade erupted with white fire. One of the undead warriors was lining up a blow on her, khopesh sword drawn back, but Caina’s momentum played to her advantage. The valikon crunched through the undead warrior’s spine in a flash of white fire, and the warrior collapsed in a heap of bones and glittering bronze armor.
A second warrior whipped its khopesh at her head, and Caina snapped the valikon up in a parry. The force of the impact sent her stumbling back, and Caina tried to catch her balance, the undead warrior stalking after her.
A shaft of white fire drilled into the undead warrior, knocking it back. Annarah stood a few yards behind Caina, pyrikon shifted into staff form, silver hair dancing around her head in the hot, stinging wind. A second burst of white fire hit the undead warrior, the purple fire and shadow in its eyes sputtering as its nagataaru struggled against the power of the Words of Lore. Caina seized the opening and stabbed, driving her sword into the gap below the warrior’s arm. Again the blade pulsed with white fire, destroying the nagataaru and unraveling the necromantic spells upon it, and Caina wrenched the blade free with a grunt.
Morgant whirled between three of the undead warriors, weapons flashing. The three warriors fought in a coordinated fashion, slashing their khopesh swords, but Morgant stayed ahead of them. His black dagger kept flicking out, slashing into the bronze cuirasses of his foes, and a moment later he had stored up enough heat to use the dagger’s power. A snap of his wrist drove the blade into the skull of an undead warrior, and he released its stored heat. The warrior went up in flames, and Morgant danced back, the remaining two warriors pursuing him.
Caina stepped behind the warrior on her left and stabbed it in the back. The valikon pulsed with white fire, and the warrior disintegrated. A blast of white light caught the final warrior as Annarah unleashed her power, and Morgant finished it off with a chop of his crimson scimitar.
“Good timing,” said Annarah.
Caina hoped her mouth to answer, and the heat washed over her.
The fire had almost reached them. The hill to the east had vanished beneath the roaring curtain of flame. Cinders and smoke filled the air, and Caina stumbled back, starting to cough.
“Go!” said Morgant, grabbing Caina’s and Annarah’s shoulders and spinning them around.
Caina nodded her thanks, still coughing, and together the three of them ran as fast as they could manage. The roar of the fire grew louder and louder, the heat more and more intense. Caina felt her head starting to swim, her vision blurring. If this continued for too much longer, she was going to pass out. Or the smoke would asphyxiate them. Or she would simply be cooked alive. She had seen people burned to death before, several times, and it was not a pleasant way to die.
It was strange – of all the different ways that she could have died on Pyramid Isle, she hadn’t thought that burning to death would be one of them.
The heat closed around her.
Then, all of a sudden, the beach spread out before them, the vast blue expanse of the Alqaarin Sea rippling away to the horizon. The air was hot and wet and dank, but compared to the heat within the jungle, it was like a drink of cool wine.
“Gods!” croaked Caina. “Keep going. The wind’s coming this way.” The ruins of the ancient Maatish dock squatted at the edge of the water, worn from the centuries, and to her immense relief Caina saw their boat still secured against the wall. “Closer to the water. Harder to burn.”
They ran across the expanse of beach, stumbling to a halt against the wall of the ruined dock, breathing hard. Caina blinked the stinging sweat from her eyes. Annarah looked just as ragged and tired and as sooty as Caina felt, the sweat leaving tracks through the ashes upon her face. Morgant, to her mild annoyance, was not sweating at all, though soot darkened his gaunt features.
“Gods,” muttered Caina, reaching into her pack and pulling out her water bottle. She was grateful they had possessed the foresight to refill them before venturing into the Tomb, and she finished it off with three quick gulps. “Gods. Let’s never, ever do that again.”
She looked back at the jungle.
Fire mantled Pyramid Isle from one end to another. A harsh crimson glow covered the island, and huge plumes of black smoke stabbed upward into the afternoon sky. The smoke had to be visible for miles. It looked like some vision of hell, a place where the souls of the wicked were tormented for all eternity.
“I do not think any of the nagataaru will follow us,” said Annarah. “They could not traverse the jungle without burning.”
“No,” said Caina.
“I suppose,” said Morgant, “we cannot make jokes about all the buildings you have torched now.”
Caina blinked more sweat from her eyes. “What?”
“Considering that you just burned down an entire island,” said Morgant.
“I didn’t burn down the island,” said Caina. “I just burned down the forest. Gods. Considering we ought to be dead, you can mock me for it all you wish.”
She walked past the boat and to the ancient stone quay that jutted into the sea, shading her eyes from the sun as she looked west. A new fear rolled through her. They had escaped the Tomb of Kharnaces and the nagataaru, but they might well be stranded here. If the destruction of the Conjurant Bloodcrystal had frightened off Murat and his crew, or if the firestorm sweeping across the island had convinced the corsairs to flee…
No. There, just at the horizon, she spotted the familiar sleek outline of an Alqaarin corsair ship.
Murat had kept his word.
“Oh, thank the Divine,” said Annarah from behind her. Caina heard the rasp of wood on sand and stone as Morgant and Annarah dragged the boat towards the water. “Murat is still here.”
“Aye,” said Caina. “Let’s get off this island and onto the Sandstorm before he changes his mind. The sooner we get to Istarinmul, the better.”
They wrestled the boat into the water and climbed aboard. Annarah slumped against the prow, exhausted. Caina wanted to rest, but someone needed to row the boat, and both she and Morgant were stronger than Annarah, and neither one of them had ingested a vial of Elixir Restorata recently. Morgant took the starboard oar, Caina the port, and together they rowed out towards the Sandstorm, the boat bucking with the waves. Caina wondered what she would tell Murat, and decided that she did not care. Instead, she focused on the rhythm of the oars, making sure she kept time with Morgant…
A spike of pain exploded through her head.
Annarah gasped as well, her green eyes going wide, and sat up straighter.
“What?” said Morgant, looking around. “What is it?”
“I…I don’t know,” said Caina, blinking as the pain faded. It did not vanish entirely, but instead became a steady throbbing pressure inside her head, seeming to come from the west…
No, not the west. From the northwest.
The direction of Istarinmul.
As Caina looked in that direction, she saw a flickering gray light, a light visible only to her valikarion senses. If she closed her eyes, she could still see the gray glow.
“Annarah,” said Caina. “Is that…”
“An aura,” said Annarah, her eyes falling half-closed as she gestured and cast a spell. “A spell, a mighty spell.”
“It’s the Apotheosis, isn’t it?” said Caina. “Callatas has started casting the Apotheosis.”
“I fear so,” said Annarah.
For a moment Caina said nothing, fighting through the growing fear and despair. They were too late. Even at best possible speed, it would take them at least six days to reach Istarinmul. How long did Callatas need to finish the Apotheosis? Caina didn’t know, but as she looked at the distant aura of potent sorcery, she guessed he would need only a few days.
Was Kylon there? Had the rebels managed to defeat Erghulan Amirasku’s army? Or maybe the Grand Wazir had crushed the rebels and driven them south into the Vale of Fallen Stars. Maybe Kylon had fallen in that battle. Maybe he had been dead for days, and Caina would nev
er find out what had happened to him.
She let out a shuddering breath.
No, not yet. She would not give in yet. Perhaps their efforts were doomed, but she would not yield. Perhaps she would be defeated, but she would not lie down and die.
“Come on,” said Caina, adjusting her grip on the oar. “Let’s get back to Murat.”
“I do want to see his expression when he realizes that we’re still alive,” said Morgant.
Caina laughed. “I wanted to see my own expression when I realized we were still alive.”
“Your jaw was hanging open,” said Morgant. “It is just as well we killed all the insects on the island, else something would have built a hive on your tongue…”
The jokes did little to distract her from the darkness in her mind. The effort of rowing was more effective, and soon Caina could think of nothing but her aching shoulders and her sore arms. Yet stroke by stroke the Sandstorm drew closer, and soon Caina saw the individual corsairs moving about the deck. She wondered how Murat had kept his crew occupied during the days of waiting. Maybe the light show from the Conjurant Bloodcrystal and the firestorm had been entertainment enough.
Shouts came from the deck, and the corsairs threw down a pair of heavy ropes. Morgant and Caina steered the boat towards the Sandstorm until it bumped against the ship’s hull. They secured the ropes, and the corsairs began drawing the boat up to the deck. A score of corsairs stood ready, watching them. Caina wondered if Murat had decided to kill them, and then realized the corsairs were staring at them with surprise.
“If it makes you feel better,” said Caina, swinging off the boat and onto the deck, “I’m surprised that we’re still alive, too.”
A rumble of laughter went up from the corsairs. Morgant helped Annarah down to the deck. She wobbled a little before catching her balance.
“Where’s the captain?” said Caina. “We need to talk.”
“The captain is here,” said a familiar deep voice, speaking Istarish with a jagged Alqaarin accent, “and he has questions.”
Ghost in the Winds (Ghost Exile #9) Page 18