by Nat Russo
“The harbor is there,” Mester Vincen said. “That means the temple is back that way.”
The soldier glanced around the alley. “Fifty.”
“I need more time,” Mester Vincen said.
“Not my area of expertise, I’m afraid,” the soldier said. He walked several paces away from the crate Nicolas and Kaitlyn hid behind. “Perhaps you should train Gabril a little better?”
Mester Vincen took measured steps across the alley, then wrote something on the parchment.
“Thirty five.” The soldier turned and walked back.
“This will take hours at this rate!”
“Why doesn’t Gabril chimeraport you to one of the mapped locations?”
“And what shall I do then, walk back to the harbor?” Mester Vincen scribbled furiously on the parchment. “I can’t very well chimeraport myself. Focus on soldiering and leave the chimeramancy to us.”
“Fifteen,” the soldier said. “Yes, but he could at least transmigrate us to the same location. Wouldn’t that speed this tedious process up?”
Mester Vincen placed the parchment and pencil in his robes. “Gabril does not have that level of control, and I do not have the time or desire to teach you the principles of chimera—”
The Barathosians vanished with a pop.
“Did you hear any of that?” Nicolas asked.
“The sketches they’re making have something to do with the way they travel,” Kaitlyn said.
“But we were wrong. They have two different ways to do it.”
“How do we get to the harbor from here?”
“What? I’m not walking you into Barathosian central!”
“I came here to do something, and I’m not leaving until I’ve at least tried. You heard that Mester Vincen person. They’re at the harbor. Lamil told us a chimeramancer made the city of Meculor implode. What if I can do something like that to this armada by taking control of one of their chimeramancers?”
Nicolas glanced down and shook his head.
“Two weeks ago—your time, at least—you cried because you accidentally killed a baby lizard in my apartment,” Nicolas said. “Now you’re going to destroy a fleet carrying thousands of people?”
Kaitlyn looked away.
“I’ve killed, Kait. In self-defense. I was justified. But It still changed me. And not for the better. The more you kill the easier it gets. There comes a point you don’t even stop to think about it anymore. You just do it. After a while, you don’t even feel anything. The ones you kill are just obstacles in your way. Not even people anymore. Just problems to be solved on your way to the next problem.”
Kaitlyn stood. “I’m not going to pretend I know what you went through. But you use your skills to help these people. I’m going to use mine.”
“Kait, I—”
“Are you helping me get to the harbor, or am I going by myself?”
Nicolas stood. “This wasn’t what I had planned for us. We were supposed to walk together for graduation. Get married. Start a family. Have a life.”
Kaitlyn took his hand and smiled. “No shit, Nick. If I thought this was your grand plan for our lives, I wouldn’t be looking for the harbor. I’d be looking for the exit.”
Nicolas squeezed her hand and took off down the alley.
They crossed several intersections unhindered, but with each toll of the palace bells, the patrols increased in frequency. If they didn’t get to the harbor quickly, and if Kaitlyn didn’t figure something out once they were there, it will have all been for nothing. Zorian would never let Nicolas go once he learned who the true archmage was.
They waited behind an old wagon as three patrols of six Religarian soldiers passed each other on the cross street.
Nicolas waved Kaitlyn to follow, and he bolted across the street.
“There!” a solder yelled.
Crap!
“Stay close!” Nicolas said. “We’ll try to lose them at the next cross street.”
They ran through the labyrinthine streets and alleys, making as many turns as they could, but always heading toward the harbor.
Nicolas looked over his shoulder to check on Kaitlyn.
Six Religarian soldiers entered the alley behind them at a full run.
He darted into the cross street and turned right, making sure Kaitlyn saw him.
Another alley ahead on the left looked promising, so he crossed the street and entered it. Kaitlyn was close behind, judging by the footsteps.
An open door in the side of a building rocked open and shut on its hinges.
The soldiers hadn’t turned into the alley yet, but the pounding of their boots told Nicolas they were getting closer.
Nicolas bolted into the building and Kaitlyn followed. When she was inside, he pulled the door closed and latched it shut.
Within moments, the sound of boots striking the ground ran past the door and out into the next cross street.
Natural light spilled in from a window on the front of the building. The sweet smells of yeast and honey had Nicolas’s stomach growling. They’d managed to run into a bakery.
“Don’t touch that!” a corpulent man yelled. He walked out from behind the counter and unlatched the door. “What do you think you’re doing? Farouk! Stop them!”
A burly, sweating, shirtless man in torn trousers ran up a short stair case from a basement and locked eyes with Nicolas. He pulled a spiked club from a shelf on the wall.
“Shit,” Nicolas said.
He grabbed Kaitlyn’s hand and ran toward the front of the building.
As they reached the door, Nicolas released a web of necropotency that wrapped around Farouk and pinned him to the stairs.
Nicolas opened the door and dashed outside. The guard patrol was gone, but another was entering the street a hundred yards to their left.
Nicolas aimed for another alley and kept running.
They crossed three more intersections until the alley opened onto a board walk littered with wooden shipping crates.
No soldiers had followed, but the palace bells were tolling nonstop now.
The sun broke through the clouds over the harbor, and Nicolas shielded his eyes from the light.
When Nicolas got his first glimpse of the Bay of Relig, he understood how the most powerful nation in the Three Kingdoms had been brought to the verge of surrender.
More than a thousand four-masted, multi-deck warships sat off the cost of Dar Rodon. Each of the ships had three rows of portholes above the water, and five ships sat broadside to the city. Subtle motion indicated they were sailing a circular pattern around a tall island in the middle of the bay. A golden beacon shone from the top of the island—a lighthouse of some sort, oddly bright at this time of day.
Nicolas couldn’t help calling to mind Mujahid’s description of the Barathosian Armada. “There were so many ships you could walk the breadth of the Bay of Relig without stepping in water,” Mujahid had told him. At the time, Nicolas thought he’d been exaggerating.
Mujahid wasn’t exaggerating.
As clouds obscured the sun, and the beacon on the island stopped shining, Nicolas brought his hand away from his eyes and took a closer look at the bay.
That was no island with a lighthouse. It was the largest ship Nicolas had ever seen. A gigantic catamaran. And the two supporting hulls—wide at the top and narrowing at the bottom—were several times the length of the massive, four-masted warships sailing around it. Its deck must have been a half mile in length at least, and it was ringed by six towers that rose to a dizzying height and bent inward toward a shorter—but much wider—central tower.
The central tower was open at the top, a platform with four columns holding up a roof. Several men stood on its perimeter carrying multicolor flags—emblazoned with symbols Nicolas didn’t recognize. The tower grew wider as it descended to the main deck, giving the colossal ship the appearance of a floating ziggurat. But where the warships circling it had three rows of portholes, the big ship had horizontally elongate
d doors, which were many times the size of the smaller portholes.
As Nicolas refocused on one of the warships, deckhands rolled cannons into place within the portholes.
My god. We don’t stand a chance.
“Nick,” Kaitlyn said, as she nudged him with her elbow.
Nicolas faced the direction she was looking.
Mester Vincen, no more than twenty feet away, stood before a long table, which was surrounded on three sides by thick white fabric. He was examining rows of parchment on the table, while another chimeramancer—a younger one in a similar gray robe—sat next to a raised sleeping pallet under a canvas tarp.
Nicolas ducked behind the nearest shipping crate with Kaitlyn and peered around the corner.
“At least a third of the city remains incomplete in the guiding dream,” Mester Vincen said.
“Forgive me, Mester, but I don’t understand the urgency,” the other chimeramancer said. “We’ve taken five of their largest cities in a matter of days.”
“Your skills with chimeramancy are growing, Gabril, but you have much to learn about war,” Mester Vincen said. “We may be able to take a city by transmigrating soldiers and cannons at intervals. But we cannot hold the city that way. If we cannot complete the guiding dream, Unega will order the landing boats to take the beach. The Religarians will fight back. Whom do you think the Diamond Throne will hold accountable for the failure when thousands of Barathosian lives are lost?”
The palace bells tolled, and the sound of running boots grew closer. Another patrol would be on them soon.
Kaitlyn glanced over her shoulder. “I have an idea. We should split up.”
“You’re kidding right? Name one horror movie where splitting up was a good idea.”
“Zorian cares a lot more about you than he does me. If you can keep him focused on you, I can deal with these chimeramancers.”
Nicolas shook his head. “I don’t like it.”
The boots grew louder.
“We have to try,” Kaitlyn said.
“This isn’t Texas, Kait. I can’t just text you if I can’t find you again!”
“Us being together isn’t going to help anyone when they arrest us.”
She was right.
Dammit all!
Nicolas took her hands in his and pulled her close until his forehead rested against hers.
“Don’t do anything stupid,” Nicolas said.
Kaitlyn chuckled. “Stupid is all we’re left with at this point.”
Nicolas squeezed her hands.
As he turned away, she pulled him back and kissed him.
When Nicolas pulled away, he gave her hands one last squeeze, then ran back out into the cross street, yelling as loudly as his voice would allow.
Shouts went up behind him. His diversion had worked.
The patrol ran past the entrance of the alley that led to Kaitlyn and followed Nicolas instead.
Nicolas passed a sandwich-board sign with a picture of an Arinian monk hoisting a tankard of ale and turned onto a street leading away from the harbor.
If the patrol was still following, he didn’t see them.
But as he looked up and down the side streets, he did see patrols converging toward him.
When he emerged onto the Sharea Ar-Ra’isi, he wanted to head north. But every time he did, another patrol would converge toward him. He had one option—keep moving south and stay out of sight.
His path led to a hill on the southernmost end of Dar Rodon. Switchbacks crisscrossed their way up the side toward a tower on top of the hill.
If he ran any direction other than forward, the guard patrols would spot him again. The tower might be a good idea. He’d evade the patrols, for starters. But more than that, higher ground was easier to defend. The countless warrior penitents he’d summoned over the past year had taught him that.
Thunder pealed from the clouds overhead, and torrential rain followed.
The dirt switchbacks were wide and covered in old wagon tracks, mostly worn away. Large boulders rested on precarious perches above him, a fact he was grateful for—he could use them for cover as he made his way up the hill.
It wasn’t long before the dirt became mud, making the run even more difficult.
When he reached the top, he doubled over to catch his breath. Rain poured over his head and off onto the rocky ground in narrow rivulets, where it collected in pools between the stones and small boulders.
He straightened and chanced a peek over the cliff into the city below.
No patrols followed him up the hill. But something odd was happening.
The patrols that were once converging on him were scattering back into the city, and they didn’t appear to be in any hurry.
Something tickled at the back of his consciousness.
He wasn’t alone.
He spun toward the tower, but no one was there. It was a fortification of some sort. Three stories tall, with crenelations at its top. Maybe it was part of the city’s defense at one time. Whatever it was, it hadn’t been used for a while. The whitewashing was reduced to white flecks, and the facade was crumbling.
There door at the tower’s base swung open, revealing a familiar figure staring out from a torch-lit room.
“Hello, Archmage,” Zorian said. “A pleasure to finally meet you.”
Realization dawned on Nicolas. He hadn’t been leading the guards anywhere. They’d been herding him here the entire way!
Why didn’t I see it?
“Please,” Zorian said. He gestured into the tower. “Step in from the rain, and we can proceed where I left off with your predecessor.”
Zorian was alone. If he knew Nicolas was the archmage—knew what Nicolas was capable of—why would he come alone?
Nicolas could attack. Maybe even finish this right here.
But why was he alone?
If Nicolas attacked now, before he discovered what made Zorian so confident, he likely wouldn’t get another chance.
He left Kaitlyn at the harbor to keep Zorian occupied. Perhaps it was time he started occupying.
“Hello, Zorian,” Nicolas said. “We have a lot to discuss.”
Nicolas stepped around Zorian and entered the tower.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
In the year 661 BCE, Hussein Bata stepped over the threshold, becoming Hussein Lord Mukhtaar Bata. In the first three years of his short twenty-one year reign, Lord Hussein survived fourteen assassination attempts at the hands of Catiatum assassins. He became a recluse, closing the Mukhtaar Estate to all but his own penitents. The circumstances of his death are unknown. His skeletal remains were discovered three years after his last known public appearance.
- The Mukhtaar Chronicles, Second Cycle, 10 CE
The few remaining writings of Lord Hussein implicate Clan Zerubula for the assassination attempts. For what it’s worth, they tried the same with Nuuan some forty years ago. The clan all but disintegrated after the failed attempt. Nuuan claims no knowledge of why this might be the case, though he did seem amused when I asked.
- Mujahid Mukhtaar, Private Commentaries, 45 CE
Nicolas faced Zorian in the close confines of the tower’s base. A torch cast long shadows of the sparse furniture and filled the room with the acrid scent of pitch. Kaitlyn needed time to take control of the Barathosian chimeramancers. He’d have to do whatever he could to delay Zorian.
Tullias, Zorian’s servant, stood at the base of the stone staircase that wound its way up the outer wall of the tower.
“Saleem told you, I take it,” Nicolas said.
“I found it odd when Kagan didn’t bleed during his flogging,” Zorian said.
“I’m sure it was a dead giveaway.”
Another thunderclap, this one louder than the last, thumped Nicolas’s chest and vibrated his teeth.
“This will be over soon,” Zorian said. “The weather, that is. You are a different matter entirely.”
As if following Zorian’s command, the pace of the rain subsided to
a slow drizzle.
“So, what happens now?” Nicolas asked.
“I told Kagan we would have two conversations. As far as I’m concerned, you and I have already had the first.”
“Hardly fair,” Nicolas said. “What if my answers are different?”
“A necromancer who disagrees with his penitent? You don’t take me for that much a fool, do you?
“You don’t know as much about necromancy as you think you do.”
Zorian nodded at Tullias, who ran up the stairs and disappeared through a trap door in the ceiling.
“I’ll concede that,” Zorian said. “I make no claims about my knowledge of the arcane. Come. Let’s take in some fresh air, you and I.”
The rain had stopped by the time Nicolas left the tower, though the rolling black clouds remained. He breathed in the smell of the thirsty desert as it drank in the remains of the downpour.
Dar Rodon gleamed below them where rays of sunlight broke through gaps in the clouds. It looked pristine from up here. On any other day it would have been quite beautiful. But not today. Not when thousands of enemy ships anchored in the bay.
Zorian walked past him, stepping over basketball-sized boulders and mud puddles as he strode toward the cliff overlooking the city. When he stopped in front of a short, foot-high retaining wall, he folded his arms and gazed down at Dar Rodon.
“I spent months on the command ship,” Zorian said. “Every day, I’d step out onto the deck and stare at this city. Just stare and admire it. The palace, with its whitewashed walls. The Temple of Arin, rising into the sky like a spire. Thousands of pilgrims making their way through the city—most of whom are in that very temple as we speak.”
Zorian faced Nicolas, his back to the city below.
“It’s not that different from our capital city Barathos,” Zorian said. “It looks much different, of course. We have no deserts in Barathosia, for one. Our buildings are magnificent. People walk among them on raised walkways of poured stone, illuminated by Builders’ gems. Some say the Builders themselves were Barathosian, given how many of our structures they created.”
“I’m sure it makes a beautiful post card,” Nicolas said.