by Ginn Hale
"Did he invite you to take steam with him?"
"No, he didn't say anything to me. I was just a child at the time. Is steam one of their mystical potions?"
"I think so. Alizadeh took steam in Yuan. He said that it opened the world of dreams and allowed him to enter them while he was still wide awake."
"I'm not sure I want more chances to enter my dreams." A teasing expression flickered over Javier's face. "I am curious about yours, though."
A guilty flush flooded Kiram's cheeks and Javier leaned close and whispered, "Are they dirty?"
"I don't remember any of them," Kiram lied. "What about yours?"
"Filthy," Javier replied with a salacious smile. "You'd be shocked to see the things you do in my dreams."
"How can you just admit that?" Kiram asked. "Don't you ever get flustered or embarrassed?"
"Why would I be embarrassed? You're the one who can't keep his clothes on in my dreams." Javier's fingers gently curled along the curve of Kiram's neck and he accepted it as easily as he would have accepted one of Musni's caresses. It seemed natural to rest his hand on Javier's hip, hooking his thumb under the supple leather of Javier's belt and leaning in close to him.
The muscles of Javier's body went taut at Kiram's touch. The confident smirk dropped from Javier's mouth; his lips parted just slightly as he caught his breath. He stared at Kiram almost as if he were powerless to look away, a soft pink flush spreading across his cheeks.
Kiram wanted to kiss him. And he almost gave into that desire, but out of the corner of his eyes he caught a movement at the edge of the Irabiim camp. Javier saw it too and pulled back immediately, dropping his hand down to the sword hanging from his belt. Kiram turned just as the approaching figure waved at them.
And then Kiram realized he knew the man.
Alizadeh so perfectly looked the part of an ancient Bahiim that his appearance could have graced a Haldiim scroll from two hundred years past. His honey-blonde hair hung in spiraling curls down to his waist. Flashes of his dark bronze skin showed through the fine white cotton of his flowing prayer clothes.
The orange wrap that he wore over one shoulder and tied at his hip was heavy and in ancient times it would have served as the only shelter a Bahiim could depend upon while crossing the desert. For the same reason, all Bahiim carried water skins, short bows, and hunting knives. Alizadeh's looked like they had been used often.
His leather sandals were past their prime. The strap wrapping around his right ankle looked as if it had been recently mended. Kiram could easily imagine his uncle Rafie doing the careful stitching while commenting that Cadeleonian boots didn't have these kinds of problems.
"Well met, Kiri!" Alizadeh called. Kiram waved back at him.
Javier studied Alizadeh with an expression somewhere between wonder and suspicion. "You know him?"
"That is Alizadeh, my uncle's partner. The one I told you about."
"The Bahiim." Javier nodded.
Kiram made introductions. Javier gave a curt bow and Alizadeh responded by holding up his palms in a sign of formal blessing. A flock of black crows swept out from the Irabiim camp, passed overhead, and then scattered out over the fair. Alizadeh watched the birds then returned his attention to Kiram. "I see Rafie got the lotus medallion to you."
"Yes, it's already brought me lots of luck. I did better in the fencing circles than I expected anyway. And I think some of it rubbed off on Javier. He won the race this morning."
"Congratulations." Alizadeh studied Javier for a moment then glanced back to Kiram. When he spoke again it was softly and in Haldiim. "Do not take the medallion off, Kiri. This place may not be safe. The shadow of an old evil lingers here and it will not be made to rest."
Kiram knew that Javier understood more of the Haldiim language than he admitted to and clearly from the way his body tensed at the mention of an old evil, he understood Alizadeh's words, and doubtless took them to mean the white hell.
"Anything I can do? Perhaps show you and your partner around?" Javier's tone remained polite, but his face revealed his tension.
"No, thank you." Alizadeh gave Javier a cool, priestly smile. "Kiram's uncle and I just want to catch up with him and make sure that he is doing all right. He's never been this far away from home before and he's been missed."
Kiram frowned at hearing something so dismissive coming from Alizadeh, who as a rule was so welcoming.
"Yes, he was saying something like that just a few moments ago." Javier's expression shifted to mild disinterest, a sure sign that he had withdrawn into Cadeleonian reserve. "I imagine that you all have things to catch up on, and I ought to check on Lunaluz."
"We could go with you." Kiram wanted Javier to make some effort to stay with him.
But Javier had retreated to the impenetrable guise of a bored Hellion. Kiram wanted to assure him that he didn't need to, that Alizadeh wouldn't see him as a soulless aberration. He'd understand that Javier was a man-a friend. Only Alizadeh wasn't treating Javier with the warmth of a friend.
He regarded Javier with a cold formality that the Haldiim reserved for only their least loved neighbors and Cadeleonians. He said, "We shouldn't impose on your upperclassman any longer, Kiram."
"Master Ignacio will expect us at the city stables by the sixth bell," Javier told Kiram. "I'll see you then." And with that he left them.
Chapter Nineteen
Alizadeh kept one hand clamped on Kiram's shoulder as he hurried him back across the fairgrounds. He glanced to the sky often, watching the crows converge and fly apart.
"What's wrong?" Kiram asked but as he took in Alizadeh's grim countenance and remembered his words, he knew the answer-an old evil lingered here. "Ybu and Rafie didn't just come to see me, did you? You're here because of the curse."
Alizadeh gave Kiram a quick assessing look and then nodded.
"I'm so glad you came," Kiram told him. "They're in real trouble-"
"Not here," Alizadeh cut him off. "This is not a safe place to talk. Come quickly."
Apprehension gnawed at Kiram's sense of the normalcy of the fairgoers and merchants surrounding him. Suddenly they seemed to be staring too long at him and stepping aside too quickly. All around them children gaped at Alizadeh's long yellow hair and his strange clothes. Adults often made signs of the Cadeleonian church against their chests.
In Anacleto, Alizadeh would have grinned at them and returned the signs. He might have struck up a light conversation with one of the merchants and slowly charmed the people around him. But today he strode past them as if their discomfort wasn't worth noticing.
He led Kiram off the fairgrounds and across the harvested sunflower fields to a stooped traveler's inn at the edge of the city. A sign depicting a grinning black dog hung over the door. Two huge crows called down from the thatched roof. An old dog lay curled up near the wooden steps. Like most animals, the dog rushed to Alizadeh, full of excitement.
"Rafie is waiting for us, as are two of our Irabiim friends. You must be polite to them and don't let their appearances bother you. They're both Bahiim like me." Alizadeh stroked the dog's dusty hide.
"Of course," Kiram replied.
The room Alizadeh and Rafie had rented was directly under the ridge of the roof and so the heavy beams of the rafters slanted down on one wall, while the opposite wall abutted the stone of a central chimney. A single window illuminated a narrow bed where Kiram's uncle Rafie sat. Next to him a lanky Irabiim woman hunched, watching the window. Another more muscular Irabiim woman sat cross- legged on the floor toying with a string of brass prayer beads.
Both women wore their blonde hair long and twisted into thick matted locks. Their clothes resembled Alizadeh's, but the material was much brighter and covered with patches of dark red embroidery. The woman on the bed also wore a necklace that looked like it had been made from bird skulls. Both women gazed curiously at Kiram. Their pale green eyes looked almost luminous against the deep circles of kohl surrounding them.
Rafie said, "This is my nephew, Kiram." And
Kiram knew from the women's sudden warm expressions that they had already heard quite a bit about him. "This is Nakiesh," Rafie indicated the woman sitting beside him, and then the woman on the floor, "and Liahn."
"It's an honor to meet you," Kiram said. Reflexively, he lifted his hands in friendly greeting. A slight pang shot through his left forearm as he moved.
"What's happened to your arm, Kiri?" Rafie crossed the tiny space to Kiram's side.
"He was injured in a duel, apparently," Alizadeh provided.
"A duel?" Rafie demanded. "How did you get into a duel?"
"It was just one of the competitions in the tournament. It wasn't anything serious, and a physician took care of it right away."
"A Cadeleonian physician," Rafie commented as he studied the stitches. "They still use black silk."
"I'm fine, honestly." After four months of speaking nothing but Cadeleonian, Kiram felt strange conversing entirely in Haldiim again. He heard a difference in the cadence of his own words, as if he had picked up a slight Cadeleonian accent.
"Do you have any other injuries?" Rafie's gaze suddenly fixed on the fine scar on his cheek.
"I'm a little bruised but nothing serious." Kiram pulled his arm out of Rafie's grip. "I won the duel." Kiram felt he needed to say as much so that they wouldn't assume he'd just taken a beating.
"Good for you! Come sit here, Kiram." Liahn patted the floorboards beside her. Kiram obeyed and Rafie returned to his seat on the bed. Alizadeh seated himself on the floor and leaned back against Rafie's leg.
Kiram found it amazing that all five of them fit in the room. The smell of strong spices, the sight of familiar faces, and the cadence of the Haldiim tongue spoken so freely made Kiram acutely aware of how genuinely different his own people were from the Cadeleonians. In the past, he could only observe the Cadeleonians as being unusual, but now he could see unique characteristics of his own people. They stood and even sat in a particular loose manner and had an almost sleepy fluidity in their gestures and speech. Kiram wondered if that was how he looked to Javier and Nestor.
Liahn seemed to think he needed cheering up. She held up her right arm so that Kiram could see the long white line running from her elbow to her wrist.
"I took this scar from a Mirogoth shapechanger in the Blue Forest. I took an eye from him in exchange." She grinned at Kiram. Her gums seemed a little too red and her teeth looked a little too long.
"Your uncle stitched her back up," Nakiesh said from the bed. "And if I remember correctly he stitched what was left of the Mirogoth back together as well."
"The reward for bringing him in alive was bigger than the reward for his dead body,"Liahn informed Kiram with a wink.
Kiram stole a wondering glance between his uncle and Alizadeh. They certainly hadn't ever mentioned anything like that in the stories of their travels. Rafie looked a little pained.
"The last thing Kiram needs is to hear more tales of dangerous adventure. His mother is going to be horrified by this entire situation as is."
"He's safe enough now." Liahn shrugged. "At least as safe as anyone can be with the shadow of a curse in the air."
At the mention of a curse Rafie leaned forward just slightly and lightly touched Alizadeh's shoulder. Alizadeh offered him a reassuring smile.
Rafie asked, "Did you find it?"
"No, I hunted the entire city and the fairgrounds but I couldn't pin it down. I know that it's cast from the fortress on the hill, and spills down across this entire valley but its vessel seems unnaturally elusive." Alizadeh scowled in frustration. "Something is hiding it, shielding it from sight."
Kiram frowned, trying to follow the conversation. Were they talking about the Tornesal curse?
"I had no luck with the blood calling, either." Nakiesh held up her palm, which was bandaged. "I sent out our sister crows to look at the fortress more closely."
Kiram asked, "Are you talking about the Sagrada Academy?"
Alizadeh nodded impatiently, as though it was obvious. "Before it became the Sagrada Academy it was a fortress. Did you know that there used to be a Haldiim village just north of here?"
"No, I didn't." He couldn't imagine any Haldiim living this far north.
"The desecrated bodies of murdered Haldiim and Irabiim were hung from the walls of that fortress like banners of loyalty to King Nazario." Nakiesh ran a finger lightly over one of the bones hanging from her necklace. "Thousands of us died in that place. If you dig deep enough in the orchards you can still find bones."
"And ghosts," Liahn added. "Ghosts so wronged that their souls became a desolating curse."
"There's no need to frighten him," Rafie interrupted. He turned to Kiram. "That was all a long time ago. The furious ghosts who became the curse of the Old Rage were all put to rest by the Bahiim. They were locked away in the wood of the Ancients. And they are born into new lives with the passing of those old trees."
Rafie looked to Alizadeh for confirmation but Alizadeh's expression was troubled.
"Until I came here I would have thought so. But something is moving up on that hill."
"It feels like the Old Rage. But all we can see is its shadow," Nakiesh said softly.
"Wait, is this Old Rage curse the same curse that's destroying the Tornesals?" Kiram asked.
All eyes turned abruptly his way.
"What are you talking about?" Rafie asked.
"Well, there's a curse on the Tornesal bloodline. It's been hunting them down and killing them for eighteen years now, but it's been most active in the last three." Kiram looked between their faces for a sign of recognition. Rafie nodded slowly.
"A fellow physician from Rauma once mentioned some affliction that plagued the Tornesal dukes," Rafie said.
"Yfes, but people are always claiming curses have been placed on certain families," Alizadeh replied. "As a rule it's either plain bad luck or bad choices. Sometimes there's murder involved."
"Or social diseases," Rafie added. Alizadeh, Nakiesh and Liahn all nodded at this.
Alizadeh went on. "But genuine curses don't pursue any single individual or even a blood line. They spread from a physical locus like spilled ink. They destroy people and animals alike."
"Maybe it's not a curse, then, but there is something that's killing the Tornesals," Kiram said.
"I'd bet soft gold that it's a greedy relative with a talent for poisons," Nakiesh replied.
Liahn nodded, looking amused.
"It's not poison," Kiram insisted. "Javier said that it's like some kind of insanity. First you hear screams that become louder and louder. Then you begin to have visions of being impaled that grow worse and worse until you stop eating and drinking. After that you die."
"Javier? The young man you introduced me to?" Alizadeh asked, his expression deeply knowing. "He didn't look like he was in the throes of a curse."
"He isn't now." Kiram felt his cheeks warm. "He was saved from it but his cousin Fedeles is dying."
Nakiesh cocked her head slightly as she gazed at Kiram. The motion struck Kiram as oddly bird-like. "Sounds like poison to me."
"There are poisons which would cause auditory hallucinations." Rafie absently curled a finger through a lock of Alizadeh's hair and then released it. Alizadeh leaned back against him. "Frostvine will do it and cause severe, cramping pain."
"But visions of being impaled?" Alizadeh glanced back to Kiram. "You're sure about that?"
Kiram nodded, remembering Javier's haunted expression as he spoke of iron pikes piercing his flesh.
"He said that he could feel the weight of his own body forcing spikes deeper into him. And it was the same for all of them. All of the Tornesals died believing they were being impaled."
"But no one else around them has died? No friends or lovers?" Liahn asked.
"No," Kiram responded. "No one else."
"Then it can't be a curse. Certainly not the Old Rage. It would take everyone. Everything."
"After Javier described it, I thought that someone might be using some
curse to kill inheritors to the dukedom," Kiram said. "But I didn't know if that could be done. I wrote to you, Alizadeh, to ask about it but you were gone."
Kiram was about to explain about how the white hell had saved Javier when Nakiesh suddenly stood up and shoved the tiny window open. The noise from dozens of screaming crows poured in.
"Jays are driving our sisters back," she hissed.
Nakiesh took a step back and Kiram saw the black mass of a flock of crows veering across the sky, chased by a swath of brilliant blue jays. Mobs of jays clutched at the crows, tearing at their wings and pulling them down. Some plummeted to the ground. Others slammed into the stone wa l ls of nea rby buildings.
Nakiesh made a low hissing noise and then her entire body trembled. Her arms flew out wide, as if she had been struck. Every one of the crows blinked out of the sky. Simply gone. The jays circled and swept across the sky, calling to one another in piercing shrieks.
Nakiesh slammed the window closed then clutched the windowsill, bowing her head and gasping. Kiram thought she was going to be sick. Then he saw deep shadows rippling across her back. Kiram thought one of the shadows looked like a wing, another like a beak and a bird's skull. Then a yellow eye opened, staring at him. He jerked back and hit the edge of the bed.
An instant later dozens of black wings, curved beaks, and glossy bodies burst up. A storm of crows erupted from the shadows of her body as if they were scattering from the shelter of a tree. The beating of their wings filled the room and their black bodies seemed to darken the entire space. Then they settled, in perfect silence.
Some perched on the bed; others alighted on the floor near Nakiesh. Many of them were injured. One with a drooping wing crouched on Liahn's shoulder. Another, with a bloody gash above its eye settled next to Rafie's thigh.
There had to be nearly thirty crows in the room. Kiram stared wide eyed at the birds and then back to Nakiesh.
She sank down against the wall. Her dark skin was beaded with sweat and looked gray. She exhaled a deep relieved breath.
"What just happened?" Kiram asked quietly.
"Nakiesh brought her sisters in," Alizadeh whispered. Kiram realized that he'd asked the wrong question. He had seen what had happened. Thirty crows had flown out of Nakiesh's body. But how had it happened?