He looked out now on death.
The land was dead and the death it had died had been a tortured one. Flat and barren, the earth was white as bone. Huge cracks spread across its surface, mouths gaping open in thirst for the rain that would never fall. Not far from where he lay, Mathew could see a heap of black, broken rock, and near that a pool of water. This was no oasis, however. Nothing grew near that pool. Steam rose from its surface, the water bubbled and churned and boiled.
The sun had just lifted into the eastern sky. Mathew could see, from where he lay, the tip of a red, fiery ball appearing over the horizon. Yet already the heat was building, radiating up from the parched ground. There was a gritty taste in his mouth and he suffered from a terrible thirst. Mathew ran his tongue across his lips. Salt. Now he knew why the land was this strange, glaring white. It was covered with salt.
His strength gave out. Mathew’s hand fell limp at his side, the curtain hid the vision. No wonder they had to be gone before afternoon. Nothing could live in this desert in the noonday sun. Yet the man had spoken of ships. Mathew feebly shook his head, hoping to clear it. He must be hallucinating, imagining things. Or perhaps he meant camels, the young wizard thought weakly. Weren’t they sometimes called the ships of the desert?
But where would they go? Mathew had seen nothing in that pickedclean corpse of a world. And his thirst was growing unbearable. Cruel eyes or not, he was desperate for water. Just as his parched lips shaped the word and he tried to force sound from his dry throat, Kiber thrust aside the curtains of the litter. He held a waterskin in his hand.
“Drink!” he commanded, glowering sternly at Mathew, perhaps remembering the days in the slave caravan when he’d caught the young wizard refusing to eat.
Mathew had no intention of refusing water. By a supreme effort he raised his arms, grasped the neck of the girba, aimed a stream of the warm, stale liquid into his mouth and drank thirstily. Some splashed on his neck and face, cooling him. All too soon, Kiber snatched the waterskin away and disappeared. Mathew heard the goum’s boots crunching on the saltcovered ground and, in a few moments, a throaty murmur, probably Zohra.
Mathew lay back on the litter. The water gave him strength; he seemed to feel it spreading energy through his body. He longed to sit up and his hand itched to draw the curtains aside. But to do so was to risk attracting the attention of the man with the cruel eyes to himself.
Thrusting his hand into the folds of the woman’s clothing, Mathew touched the crystal globe containing the fish. It was cold and smooth against his hot skin. He was suddenly possessed by a desperate desire to examine the fish, to see if they were all right. Fear stopped him. The slaver might chance to look inside and Mathew did not want to seem to be paying too much attention to the magical globe. He wondered what the man had meant by the curious statement, “The city guards do not search the bodies of the dead.”
The smothering sensation increased, that and an almost overwhelming urge to move his body. Finally Mathew sat up and was almost immediately seized with a sudden dizziness. Starbursts exploded before his eyes. Weakly, he propped himself up on his arm and, hanging his head, waited until his vision cleared and the terrible lightheaded feeling passed. Cautiously pushing aside the curtain a crack, he peered out, further examining his surroundings. The litter, he discovered, was sitting on stilts about four feet off the floor of the salt flats. Keeping a wary eye out for the slave trader, Mathew looked to the front of the litter and blinked in astonishment.
Before him stretched a vast body of water—wide as an ocean—its deep blue color like nothing he had ever seen before. A cool breeze, blowing off the sea, drifted in a whisper past his face, and he thankfully gulped in the fresh air.
The slave trader stood at the water’s edge, facing out into it. Lifting his arms above his head, he cried in a loud voice, “It is I, Auda ibn Jad! In the name of Zhakrin, I command you. Send my ship!”
So he had meant ships! But what sea could this be? It didn’t look like the Hurn. No waves crashed against the shore. It wasn’t the greenish color of the ocean he had crossed. The water lapped gently about the feet of the slave trader, Auda ibn Jad (it was the first time Mathew recalled ever hearing the man’s name). Staring intently out into the sea in the same direction as ibn Jad, Mathew thought he could detect a shadow on the horizon—a dark cloud in an otherwise cloudless sky.
Turning abruptly, the slave trader caught Mathew staring out of the curtains.
“Ah, Blossom! You are enjoying the fresh air.”
Mathew did not answer. He could not speak a word. The cold eyes had snatched out all the wits in his head, leaving behind nothing but empty fear.
“Come, Blossom. Stand up. That will help get the blood circulating again. I need you.”
Walking over to Mathew, ibn Jad reached out his slender hand and grasped hold of the young wizard’s right arm. The man’s touch was as cold and unfeeling as his eyes and Mathew shivered in the hot sun.
Rising to his feet, he thought at first he was going to faint. His knees gave way, the sunbursts flared again in his vision. Falling back, he caught hold of one of the supports of the litter’s roof with his hand and hung onto it grimly; Auda propping him up. The slave trader gave Mathew a few moments to recover, then dragged the groggy wizard across the sand to another litter. Mathew knew who lay inside, just as he knew the question he was going to be asked. Shoving aside the curtains of the palanquin, ibn Jad pushed Mathew forward.
“The charm the bearded devil wears around his neck? Did you make it? Are you the sorceress who laid the enchantment upon him?”
We plan and work for years to chart our life’s course, and then sometimes one instant, one word will irrevocably alter our destiny.
“Yes,” said Mathew in a barely audible whisper.
He could not have told the conscious reasoning behind his lie. He had the distinct feeling it was motivated by fear; he did not want to appear completely defenseless and helpless in the eyes of this man. He knew, too, that if he answered no, ibn Jad would simply question Zohra, and he would not believe either of them if both denied it.
“I made. . . the charm,” Mathew said hoarsely.
“A fine piece of work, Blossom. How do you break the spell?”
“By taking it from around his neck. He will immediately begin to come out of the enchantment.” That was a guess, but Mathew felt fairly certain it was a good one. Generally, that was how charms such as this one worked. There wouldn’t have been any reason for Meryem to have created a delayed effect.
“Break it,” commanded ibn Jad.
“Yes, Effendi,” Mathew mumbled.
Leaning over Khardan, the young wizard stretched forth a trembling hand and took hold of the silken ribbon from which hung the softly glowing silver shield. Mathew noticed, as he did so, the unusual armor in which Khardan had been dressed. It was made of metal—black and shining. A strange design was inset into the breastplate—a snake whose writhing body had been cut into several pieces. It was a gruesome device, and Mathew found himself staring at it, unmoving, his hand poised in midair above Khardan’s neck.
“Go on!” grated ibn Jad, standing over him. “Why do you delay?”
Starting, Mathew wrenched his gaze from the grotesque armor and fixed it on the silver shield. Cupping his hand beneath the talisman, he closed his fingers over it gingerly, as though fearing it would be hot to the touch. The silver metal felt warm, but only from the heat of Khardan’s body. Clasping the shield, Mathew gave the ribbon a sharp tug. It snapped. The charm came off in Mathew’s hand. Almost instantly the metallic glow began to fade. Khardan moved his head, groaning.
“Give that to me.”
Wordlessly, Mathew handed ibn Jad the charm.
The man studied it carefully. “A delicate bit of craftsmanship.” He glanced from the charm to Mathew to Khardan. “You must care about him very much.”
“I do,” Mathew said softly, keeping his eyes lowered.
“A pity,” said Auda ibn
Jad coolly.
Mathew looked up in alarm, but at that moment, movement seen out of the corner of his eye distracted him.
Zohra, stumbling with faltering footsteps but managing to walk nonetheless, was approaching their group. Mathew saw the set of her jaw, the fire in the black eyes, and tried to call out, to speak, to warn her, but the words caught in his dry throat. Seeing his fixed gaze, the slave trader turned.
The wind from the sea was rising. Small waves were washing up on the shore now. Behind Zohra, Mathew saw the cloud on the horizon growing larger and darker.
The wind whipped Zohra’s veil from her face. She caught hold of it and covered her nose and mouth. Coming to stand before Auda ibn Jad, she drew herself weakly to her full height, regarding him with flashing black eyes.
“I am Zohra, Princess of the Hrana. I do not know where I am or why you have brought me here, dog of a kafir! But I insist that you take me back!”
Chapter 2
An angry shout from Kiber, who was lashing out at one of his own men with his camel stick, attracted Auda’s attention, and he did not immediately answer Zohra’s demand. Kiber was busy supervising the unloading of several djemel, baggage camels. Under their leader’s direction, the goums and the slaves placed the wooden boxes, rattan baskets, and other items in the sand near the water’s edge. It was the mishandling of several large, carved ivory jars with sealed lids that brought down Kiber’s wrath on his goum. The slaves were not allowed to touch these jars, Mathew noted. Several handpicked goums were lowering the jars from the djemel to the sand with extreme care and caution, treating them with almost reverential respect. When one of the goums nearly dropped his end of the jar. Kiber was on him in a flash, and ibn Jad frowned darkly.
Mathew wondered what could be in the jars—possibly some rare incense or perfume. Whatever it was, it was heavy. It took two of Kiber’s strongest goums to lift a jar by its ivory handles and stagger across the sand to place it with the other merchandise stacked along the shoreline.
The men carrying the jars passed quite close to where Mathew stood in the hot sun near Khardan’s litter. The young wizard would have liked to have examined the jars more closely, for he thought he detected magical runes among the other designs carved on the sides, and his skin prickled with a tingle of fear and curiosity when he observed that the lid was decorated with the carved body of a severed snake—the same device that appeared on Khardan’s black armor. But Mathew did not have time to investigate or even give more than a moment’s passing thought to the ivory jars. His attention was focused on Zohra, and he stared at the woman with mingled anger, frustration, fear, and admiration.
She must be as bewildered and confused as I am, Mathew thought. No, more so, because he at least knew the slave trader and knew why Auda ibn Jad wanted him—the fish, obviously, although that didn’t begin to answer all the questions. Zohra had wakened in a strange place from some sort of enchanted sleep, experienced all the same uncomfortable sensations Mathew had experienced—even now she swayed slightly on her feet and he could tell that it was taking every ounce of will she possessed to remain standing. She had, apparently, no idea where she was (This disappointed Mathew. He had hoped she would recognize this place.) and yet she was regarding the formidable Auda ibn Jad with the same scornful gaze she might have fixed upon poor Usti, her djinn, for bungling a command.
Auda’s attention continued to remain focused on the unpacking of the ivory jars. Mathew saw Zohra’s dark eyes above the veil flare with anger, her black brows draw together. He knew he should stop her. In his mind he saw the slave girl falling to the sand, ibn Jad’s knife in her ribs. But the intense heat of the sun radiating up from the salt floor was sapping Mathew’s strength. Clinging to one of the poles supporting the litter where Khardan lay, Mathew could only try to warn Zohra to keep still with a gesture of his hand. Zohra saw him and she saw Khardan, who was groaning, shaking his head muzzily, and making feeble, futile attempts to sit up.
“I asked you a question, swine!” Zohra said, stamping her slippered foot on the cracked ground, her jewelry jingling, her body quivering with anger.
“Dog of a kafir! Swine!” Mathew cringed.
“I am a Princess of my people. You will treat me as such,” Zohra continued, holding the veil tightly over her face, the rising wind whipping the silken folds of her chador around her legs. “You will tell me where I am and you will then return me to my people.”
Seeing the nine ivory jars safely stacked up on the shoreline with four goums posted guard around them, Auda ibn Jad turned his attention to the woman standing before him. A glint of amusement flickered in the hooded eyes. Weakly Mathew sank down onto the hot ground, huddling in a small patch of shade cast by Khardan’s litter. Almost immediately, however, a new fear arose when the young wizard saw Khardan’s eyes open to stare about his surroundings in confused astonishment.
A waterskin lay nearby. Catching it up, Mathew held the mouth out to Khardan to drink, trying as best he could to warn him to keep silent. The Calif thrust the waterskin aside.
Gritting his teeth against the pain, Khardan propped himself up on one elbow and stared intently at Auda ibn Jad.
“You stand, Princess, on the shores of the Kurdin Sea—”
“The Waters of Tarakan?” Zohra cut in scornfully. “Do you take me for a fool?”
“No, my lady.” Respect coated the surface of Auda’s voice.
He was toying with her, amusing himself because he had no other entertainment. The slaves and the goums had completed unloading the camels. The slaves sank, panting, down onto the ground, trying desperately to find some modicum of shade by crouching beside the kneeling camels. The goums stood in disciplined silence, sipping water and keeping watch over the baggage and the slaves. They appeared immune to the heat, though Mathew could see huge patches of sweat darkening their black uniforms. And he noted, as he glanced at them, that more than one turned his gaze out to sea, nodding in relief and satisfaction at the sight of the shadow growing larger upon the water.
“All know the Waters of the Tarakan do not exist,” said Zohra, dismissing the vast sea that stretched before her with decisive finality. So calmly and firmly did she speak that it seemed the sea itself must realize its mistake and take itself out of her presence at once.
“I assure you, madam, that these are the waters of the Kurdin Sea. We have reached them by traveling north from the Tel in the desert of Pagrah to the city of Idrith, then due east across the southernmost border of the Great Steppes.”
Zohra gazed at Auda pityingly. “You are mad. Such a journey would take months!”
“Indeed it has, my lady,” ibn Jad replied softly. “Look at the sun.”
Zohra looked upward at the sun. So did Khardan. Mathew watched the Calif carefully, searching for clues in the expression on the man’s face. The young wizard himself did not bother to study the orb’s position in the sky. In this strange part of the world, he was barely able to judge the passing of day into night much less the passing of weeks into months. It seemed to him to have been only last night that they had escaped the Battle at the Tel. Had it truly been months ago? Were they truly far from their homeland?
Our homeland! Mathew shook his head bleakly. What am I thinking about? My homeland. . . So much farther away than that . . . Farther away than the blazing sun. . .
He saw Khardan’s eyes widen, the man’s face grow pale beneath the growth of heavy black beard, the lips part, the tongue attempt to moisten them. The Calif looked down now upon the strange armor that he wore, noticing it for the first time. His hand ran over it, and Mathew saw the fingers tremble. Wordlessly the young wizard held out the waterskin again. This time Khardan accepted it, drinking a small amount, his brow furrowed, his black eyes fixed upon Auda ibn Jad with a dark expression Mathew could not fathom.
Zohra’s cool demeanor, too, was shaken. She darted a swift, fearful glance at Mathew from above her veil—the glance of one who has ventured blithely onto smooth, hardpacked sand, on
ly to discover herself being sucked beneath the shifting surface.
Mathew quickly averted his eyes. She had thrown herself into this, she must get herself out. He could say or do nothing that would help her, and he dared not attract the attention of the slave trader to himself. By the looks of it, Auda ibn Jad was telling the truth. They had undertaken a long journey, apparently traveling under some sort of spell that feigned death yet kept them very much alive.
The city guards do not search the bodies of the dead.
That statement was beginning to make sense. Mathew’s hand stole surreptitiously to the globe containing the fish. Ibn Jad had given it to him originally to sneak it past the guards in the city of Kich. Now Mathew had been instrumental, apparently, in doing the same thing with the guards of Idrith. That was the reason ibn Jad had taken Mathew captive instead of killing him and retrieving the fish. Mathew recalled the moment of terror when he had awakened in the tall grass near the oasis. Seeing the slave trader standing above him, he had supposed the man meant to murder him. Instead, ibn Jad had cast him into a deep sleep.
But why take Khardan? Why take Zohra? Why bring them here? Why the ships? Where were they being taken? Surely, if he had brought them this far, ibn Jad did not intend to kill them now.
Looking at Auda’s smooth, impassive face, the unblinking eyes; looking at the waters of the sea that were growing rougher by the moment; looking at the shadow covering the water and realizing that it was the darkness of a rapidly approaching storm— a strange storm, a storm that seemed to rage only on a small part of the ocean—Mathew wondered despairingly if death coming to them this minute might not be a blessing.
“I do not like this place,” said Zohra coolly. “I am leaving.” Mathew raised his eyes, staring at her in astonishment.
The Paladin of the Night Page 14