Kings of Ruin (Kingdoms of Sand Book 1)

by Daniel Arenson

  "Father!" Atalia cried.

  He plunged down and slammed against the siege engine roof. He slid, snapping arrows, and hit the ground with a thud.

  Legionaries came racing forward from the hills.

  Jerael ran past the siege engine's towering wheels and leaped into the structure.

  Ten legionaries stood within, holding iron rings in the battering ram, tugging the beam backward on its chains. Jerael charged toward them, sword swinging.

  "The lion of Zohar roars!" rose a cry from outside. "Ours is the light!"

  Feet slammed against the roof.

  The legionaries released the ram, letting it slam again into the gates, and drew their swords. They raced across wooden platforms toward Jerael.

  An enemy sword swung.

  In the shadows of the siege engine, Jerael parried and reposted, driving his blade into a man's throat.

  "Leave some for me, Father!" Atalia cried, leaping into the structure with him. A legionary raced toward her, and Atalia ducked under his swinging blade, then thrust her sword up, piercing the man's jaw, driving her blade deep into the skull. She tugged it back with a shower of blood and teeth.

  More feet thumped against the siege engine's roof, and more Zoharites leaped inside, swinging blades. Two men began spraying oil from leather skins across the wooden innards. Outside on the field, thousands of legionaries were racing forward, and flaming arrows came flying their way.

  Jerael swung his blade, severing the leg of the ram's last defender. The legionary crashed down onto the wooden platform, stump spurting, still clinging to the ram with one hand.

  "Out!" Jerael bellowed to his comrades. "Out, back to the city!"

  Atalia leaped out from the siege engine, followed by five more Zoharite soldiers, leaving puddles of oil.

  The flaming arrows flew.

  Still inside the wooden structure, Jerael ran down the platforms alongside the battering ram.

  The flaming arrows entered the siege engine.

  Fire blasted.

  Jerael leaped.

  The flames washed across his feet, and Jerael hit the ground outside. The city's cracked gates loomed above him. When he spun around, he saw the siege engine blazing. The ram's head thrust out from the inferno, seeming almost alive, almost enraged that it should burn. The wounded legionary, the man whose leg Jerael had taken, screamed inside the blaze.

  "Lord Jerael!" cried a voice from above. "My lord, climb!"

  He looked up to see Zoharites lowering ropes from the gatehouse battlements. More arrows flew from the hills, and legionaries came running.

  Jerael grabbed one rope, and Atalia grabbed another. They began scurrying upward, feet against the wall. Arrows flew. One slammed into Atalia's armor, denting the iron but doing her no harm. Another arrow drove into Jerael's leg, and he groaned but kept climbing. Another arrow tore down a Zoharite soldier, and the man fell from the rope. Instantly legionaries leaped onto him with swords, and his blood sprayed.

  Atalia reached the battlements first, then helped Jerael climb back onto the wall. Another Zoharite fell, and only one reached the battlements with them.

  Below the wall, the siege engine still blazed. Its wooden shell cracked and collapsed, and the ram fell, crushing the platform beneath it. The iron head glared from flames.

  All around Jerael, the ships burned and sank, ghosts of memory, and the fire washed across his brother.

  "You eagles will be lion shit!" Atalia was screaming, waving her sword over her head. "See what we did to that wooden cock of yours? You tried to fuck us with it, so we chopped it off. And we're going to chop off your real cocks too, you sheep-fuckers!"

  The young woman was laughing as she shouted, but weeping too, the tears streaming through ash and blood.

  As Jerael stared at Atalia, a new memory filled him. This was not a memory of the war nineteen years ago, not a memory of sinking ships, of a burning brother. It was a memory of his family. Of young Atalia playing with her wooden sword with the boys, of sweet little Maya reading a scroll, of Ofeer chattering to her dolls, of Shiloh lighting candles and praying. A memory of them all at the dining room table beneath the painting of elephants, singing together.

  "We'll kill you all!" Atalia screamed, brandishing her bloody sword, voice torn with grief and fear, blood covering her armor. "Every last one of you!"

  More than ever, Jerael knew that those days were over—that Atalia would never more be that sweet girl, that his family would never more know peace, know joy, that even should they survive this war, they were forever broken. And that memory of home, of a meal with candles, with a painting of elephants, with his family—that memory hurt him more than the memory of a sinking fleet.

  The catapults below tossed their boulders. The Zoharite arrows flew. Bricks and blood rained. The battle for Gefen continued.

  SHILOH

  Three days after her world had crashed around her, after the eagles had descended with their wrath upon the lions, Shiloh and her daughter beheld the city of Beth Eloh in the distance.

  "The holy city," Maya whispered, tears in her eyes. Sitting on her white horse, the girl lowered her head. "Blessed be the Lord of Light. Praises be upon his dwelling in our earthly world. Ours is the light."

  They had been riding up this road for hours now. It was not a wide, cobbled boulevard like those that stretched across the Aelarian Empire, the stones so smooth carriages barely bounced when rolling across them. Nor was this road pleasant and shaded like the paths that coiled around the hills of Gefen, affording a view of the sea. Here was a rough, steep road that climbed the mountains, a struggle for their horses. Limestone boulders loomed along the path, and scattered olive trees grew across the mountainside, their trunks twisting, their leaves dark green tinged with gray. Some of these trees, the tales said, were thousands of years old, trees that had grown here when the first wild tribes of Zohar had climbed these mountains.

  Ahead of them, the mountains leveled into a plateau that sprawled eastward, tan and dry. Here rose Beth Eloh, capital city of Zohar, like a lion perched atop a tall stone, gazing upon his territory.

  The city was still distant—several parsa'ot away—but so large Shiloh could see it clearly from here. The walls of Beth Eloh soared, formed of ancient sandstone, topped with battlements. Beyond rose the roofs and towers of the city, crowded together, a hive of stone and gold and copper and light. Minarets rose into the sky, pale and thin as bones. Domes topped thousands of homes, the stone bare and white in the poorer neighborhoods, coppered or gilded where rich men dwelled. Palm and cypress trees grew along cobbled streets and framed cemeteries where ancient warriors rested. Towering above all other structures, a vast temple soared into the sky, columns capped with gold.

  Gefen, Shiloh's hometown by the sea, was an old city too; its walls had stood for hundreds of years. Aelar was ancient, sailing the Encircled Sea for centuries. Both those were as babes by the antiquity of Beth Eloh. Every stone here exuded time. Countless ghosts of ancient priests, prophets, and pilgrims haunted this place.

  For three thousand years, the Zoharites had worshipped in this city. Here was the city King Elshalom had named his capital. The place where the Zoharite tribes, lost in the desert, had first built walls, first forged a nation. The city where they said the spirit of God himself dwelled.

  Beth Eloh. City of stone and copper. City of gold and light. City of memories.

  City of lume.

  "It's . . . it's too much," Maya whispered on her horse, tears in her eyes. "It's so old . . ."

  Maya had not been to this city for a decade now. Shiloh had forbidden the girl to come here since discovering her magic. Every harvest, when the rest of the Sela family traveled to Beth Eloh on pilgrimage, Shiloh left her youngest daughter in the care of Master Malaci in Gefen. There was too much lume here, too much of the ancient magic that would see Maya chained and shipped to Aelar.

  And now it's happening, Shiloh thought, looking at her daughter. What I feared, what I fought to pre
vent all these years.

  Eyes dazed, Maya managed to dismount her horse, and she knelt in the dust. She trembled, and tears ran down her cheeks.

  "So much lume," Maya whispered. "I can feel it, Mother! It's flowing here. Everywhere. It's so old. The prophets, Mother! I can hear them. I can see them dancing. Too much. Too many souls, too old." She gasped, and her back arched, and she stared toward the city. "The light. The light. So much light. Praise the Lord of Light."

  Maya's hands began to glow, and her eyes shone like pools of molten gold. The light snaked across her, rising in wisps as she wept, scattering dust and pebbles across the road.

  Shiloh dismounted her horse and marched toward her daughter.

  "I feel him, Mother," Maya whispered, her voice a thousand voices, her tears steaming in the luminescence. "I feel God. He dwells here. Praise him! Praise—"

  Shiloh slapped her.

  Maya gasped and the luminescence petered away. The girl clutched her cheek.

  "Listen to me, girl." Shiloh knelt before her daughter and clutched her shoulders. "You will keep control here. You will not illuminate again. Do you understand?"

  Maya blinked several times as if waking from slumber. "I can't control it."

  "You will control it." Shiloh glared at her. "Do you know what happens to lumers, Maya?"

  Maya nodded, forced a deep breath, and recited the same words Shiloh had made her recite countless times. "Lumers are slapped in chains. Lumers are shipped off to Aelar. Lumers become slaves. I will never summon lume. I will never weave luminescence." She sighed. "I will hide my magic until the day I die."

  "And if you don't, that day won't be far off, because I'm going to kill you myself." Shiloh narrowed her eyes, scrutinizing her daughter, seeking conceit. Once satisfied, she sighed and embraced Maya. "I tell you this because I love you, my sweet daughter. Because I want to keep you safe."

  She stroked Maya's curly black hair, a mane so wild they could never tame it. Atalia and Ofeer had straight, silky hair, but Maya's had always been a great tangle.

  I love you more than you can imagine, sweet daughter, Shiloh thought. You're my youngest child, my precious princess. I cannot bear the thought of losing you.

  Maya was fifteen, no longer a child, but as Shiloh held her, she felt like a mother nursing her babe. She thought of the babe she had lost, the precious boy she had birthed eleven years ago, a child who had lived for only a day. The memory of sweet Mica never left her mind, but it filled her most powerfully whenever she thought of Maya's Luminosity.

  Please, God, do not let me lose another child, Shiloh prayed silently. I already lost one child. I already lost my brothers in the war. Please, God of Zohar, keep Maya safe. Keep all my children safe.

  Maya sniffed and wrapped her arms around Shiloh. They knelt together on the road, holding each other.

  "But don't you think, Mother," Maya said, "that if I found a Luminosity teacher, I'd learn how to control it? There are Luminosity teachers here in Beth Eloh. There's even a lumer here! She serves Cousin Shefael. Her name is Avinasi, and many scrolls speak of her might. Can I meet her?"

  "Maya!" Shiloh frowned. "I told you. You just promised me!"

  "I know. I know." Maya lowered her eyes. "I'm sorry. No more Luminosity. I'll control it. I promise."

  This was not a new request. Countless times, Maya had begged her parents to send her to Beth Eloh to find a Luminosity teacher, perhaps even to study from Avinasi herself, the fabled lumer who served Prince Shefael, whom Emperor Marcus Octavius allowed to remain in Zohar. Sometimes it seemed like Jerael would almost agree, perhaps would at least allow Maya to read Master Malaci's scrolls on Luminosity—scrolls banned to Maya. Yet Shiloh had always remained firm.

  "Maya is never to approach Beth Eloh again," she had said. "And if I catch Master Malaci giving her a scroll on Luminosity, I'll have the old fool's library torn down."

  That library was far now, and Beth Eloh was close, the fountain that sprouted the world's lume. Shiloh vowed to protect her child from this holy light—the magic that for millennia had blessed their people, that today could doom Maya to chains.

  They continued riding up the mountainside, heading toward the holy city. Beth Eloh had not seemed so far, but it took several more hours of hard riding to finally reach the plateau upon which it spread. They must have been a mil above sea level now, maybe even a full parasa high. Here on the mountains of Eloh lay the gateway to the desert. When Shiloh gazed back west, she could see the mountainsides sloping down, green with olive trees, pines, and cypresses, leading to distant arable lands beyond which—too far to see from here—lay Gefen and the sea.

  But when she looked east, the mountainsides were barren, tan, and rocky, only scattered brambles growing across them. The slopes spread down toward the desert. Distant dunes rolled into a hazy horizon. Beige. Lifeless. Stretching into eternity. Here on the mountain the world ended; beyond was nothing but wastelands, cruel and dead.

  Between forest and desert rose the city of Beth Eloh . . . and thousands of troops.

  Here were no legionaries, marching in perfect precision, eagles on their shields. These troops were darker, their eyes brown and brooding, both bearded men and fierce women with braids in their hair. All wore iron scales and bore sickle swords, and slings hung from their belts. They camped outside the city, some patrolling, many lying under olive and fig trees. Campfires burned across the rocky plateau, and the smells of baking breads and cooking meat tickled the nostrils. The host had many horses, a few camels too, and even a handful of chariots. They seemed to spread for parsa'ot, surrounding the city of Beth Eloh in an iron noose. Their banners thudded in the wind, displaying the lion of Zohar, a crown on his head.

  "Prince Yohanan's host," Shiloh said.

  Maya nodded and pointed at the city walls. "And look, on the battlements! More Zoharite soldiers."

  Indeed, hundreds of warriors lined the walls of the city, holding bows and spears. These men and women had no baking bread, no cooking meat. Their skin was ashen, their faces cadaverous, their eyes sunken and weary. Here were the warriors sworn to Prince Shefael, younger of the late queen's sons. They perhaps had the city, but they looked close to losing the war, at least judging by their gauntness.

  "For now, your cousins seemed to have reached an impasse," Shiloh said to her daughter. "If only we can convince those foolish boys to stop their bickering, to march west with us, and to defeat the true enemy—the eagles of Aelar. After three years of this civil war, perhaps a hungry eagle is just what these lion cubs need."

  Maya stared at her, eyes glazed. The girl was ashen, shivering, blinking too much. She hugged herself. "Perhaps." Her voice was soft, the voice of one suffering from a long illness.

  Shiloh sighed and tried to smooth her daughter's mane of curls. Perhaps she shouldn't have brought Maya here. Yet here they were, atop the mountain, the spring of lume flowing into the world. Shiloh herself could not sense the lume. To her, this was a mountain of antiquity, of beauty, of fear, the heart of her people. Every stone here, every olive tree, every limestone brick in the walls—all bore the weight of history and her nation's future. Yet how insignificant that must all seem to Maya! How did this mountain and city appear to the girl? Like a storm of light, like a great sea of magic, and she herself caught in the maelstrom? Shiloh felt like a deaf woman in a hall of great music, oblivious to a song of eternal beauty all around her—just beyond her senses.

  "Turn back, pilgrims!" rose a voice from ahead. "City gates are closed. Don't you know there's a war?"

  Shiloh turned to see a tall, gaunt soldier approach, his black beard cropped close. Rust clung to his scale armor, and he wore old leather vambraces and sandals. A sword hung from his left side, a sling and stones from the right. An aroma of sweat and oil clung to him, and a scar ran down his cheek. He seemed about thirty years old, perhaps a few years older, but careworn as an elder who'd seen too many battles.

  Shiloh stared at him, eyebrow raised. "And since when do prince
s dress in rusted scales and guard their camps as lowborn soldiers?"

  The haggard man stepped closer, eyes dark, and a scowl twisted his face. His hand trailed toward the hilt of his sword, and such fire burned in his eyes that Maya took a step back.

  "Since this prince became a king," he said. "And since this king saw two splendid horses, far more valuable than any humble pilgrims could own, climbing his mountain."

  Shiloh jabbed his chest. "You, Prince Yohanan, should learn proper hospitality."

  His scowl deepened, his eyes so cruel that Maya drew her dagger . . . but then a great, toothy grin split Yohanan's face, and he pulled Shiloh into his embrace.

  "Aunt Shiloh! You could always make me feel like a child."

  "I knew you as a child," she said, wrapped in his arms. "I changed your soiled swaddling clothes when you were but a babe."

  He laughed—a deep hearty laugh. "By God, how long has it been?"

  "Three years since I visited Beth Eloh," Shiloh said softly. "Not since your mother passed. My sister was a strong woman, wise and brave." She lowered her head. "And longer since you visited us in Gefen."

  Yohanan—eldest son of the late Queen Sifora Elior, descended of King Elshalom himself—sighed. "Too long, Aunt. Do you still have that pomegranate tree in your yard? And the painting of the elephants in the dining room?"

  "Both are still there. And that dining room is always open to you."

  He held her hands in his. "I miss that place. And I miss Uncle Jerael. He's the wisest man I know. I grew up without a father, and I've always thought of Jerael as one. I've always admired him, wanted to be him." He turned his head, and his eyes narrowed. "And is this Maya, this woman who draws a dagger against her king?"

  Maya stared at him, dagger still held in her hand. "I didn't recognize you, cousin. You look horrible."

  Yohanan stared at her for a moment, then burst out laughing. "I do. And you've grown! By the light. You were only a child when I last met you." He bowed his head. "Three years of war seem like an era to those who fight it. And they seem even longer when I see a child who's become a woman. I would welcome you into Beth Eloh, Maya, and have a feast in your honor, had my weasel of a brother not locked us fine folk outside the walls."