“Not enough.”
The Messah knelt, bowed his head to the floor, cradling the girl, the ground warm as the blood in his veins. “God, I’m begging you. Please! It’s all I have.”
The old woman glanced at her lamp grumbled, in Tsaazaari at first, then in Messaii, “There is a thing, but it will not save her. Maybe she will last the day. You leave me this,” she pointed to the purse. “I give you medicine. Tomorrow, you come back and pay the rest.”
“And you can save her?”
The hag plucked a necklace from the bosom of her smock. On it were keys and charms and silvered vials—one of these she broke free and traded to Adam. Immediately, he removed the cork and fed the cure to Magdalynn. But the liquid poured murky, caustic, and viscous. The girl gagged and choked more than she swallowed. “Good,” the old woman said. “Now go and get the rest. Thirty-eight drakes, Messah. At most she lasts one more day.”
One more day, he thought, over and over after departing the apothecary, his concentration on nothing but this mantra as he waited for his companions to appear at the southern entry. It was dawn when they arrived, Ba’al and Adnihilo. The half-blood seemed glad to see him. The bishop said nothing, and neither did Adam aside from asking the location of their camp. He wanted somewhere safe to hide Magdalynn while he did what he needed to do. Adnihilo pointed him to a ridge in the sand. The camp laid between there and a range of dunes, out of view from the watchmen on the towers, about half an hour’s march east. It took the Messah twice that long to find it concealed by the shifting hills and sandy winds. Good, he thought, finally coming upon their paltry tents. He laid Magdalynn in under the protection of the canvas shade, pilfered water from a skin his friends had left behind, and pinned the tent flap open. Out of that open flap he gazed into the dawning desert, feeding the girl sips from the skin, staring down his temptations.
He thought of the lockbox that the vendor left defenseless in Hassan’s office. It would be easy enough to rob it. It’s only him and the Mistress up there, and three floors of screaming whores between. The guards outside would never know until we were long gone. Then he remembered the tapestries walling off Hassan’s office—Adam had taken them as a holy omen, one substantiated by the merchant’s constant warmth and kindness. For his own profit. He’s just like that old women, a Godless heathen out for his own interest. They’re gulling you, all of them. To hold faith with them is foolish.
“I don’t believe that,” the Messah prayed. “We forgave the Impii after the first purge of Babylon. We named a holyday after them.” The very day God started me on this journey. “Why should the Tsaazaari be any different?”
To this, his inner demons ceased their intimations, and that he took as a confirmation of his faith. One more day. Adam had no time to waste. Leaving Magdalynn safely hidden in the camp behind the ridge, he raced back into the heart of the maze—into the brothel common room, transformed again, tranquil, deserted, no sign of the mistress. He found Hassan at his desk, peacock quill scribbling swiftly over open ledgers, his free fingers fiddling an abacus to the rhythm of Ashaya’s snores. The merchant glanced up as Adam entered then returned to his ledgers, his head turbanless, balding at the crown of his black cropped hair. Then he looked a second time and jumped up with a smile as his belly bounced exposed in his unfastened robe. He smiled, yet he didn’t say a word. He was scared, Adam saw in the merchant’s tired eyes, of his wife’s waking. So they snuck back down to the common room and took a table. Hassan ordered some mixture of water, pepper sauce, vinegar, crushed peppercorns, and a raw egg yolk. “Traders call it the ‘meadow oyster.’ A good cure for a long night.” He offered one to the pastor’s son who refused on the grounds that he’d rather not die. “A Messah of little faith,” japed Hassan, slurping down the concoction in a single gulp. “I jest. A less steadfast man would not have returned. I received word from Yasmine, you know, and not just from Ashaya. She told me herself that you were quite the fellow, that she is hoping to meet you again tonight before she and her husband are gone to Mephisto. I promised to inform her whether that was possible by the middle hour. And now here you are. I’m glad. I was afraid you’d fled after how my wife treated you.”
“You said there was a second job,” answered Adam. A lump was forming in his throat, a pit forming in his stomach as heavy as stone. “Tell Yasmine I’ll do it.”
Hassan clapped his hand together. “Excellent! I knew you were the one. From when I first saw you, I knew.”
“But,” the Messah added, and for a moment, apprehension molded the merchant’s entire mien. “I want to discuss my pay.”
“Your pay?”
“Yes.”
Every muscle in Hassan’s body relaxed. He laughed, slapped the table. “Solomon, save me. You scared Hassan for a second time. Pay, you said? Well, my friend, I swear in the name of the king, you’ll not find a better price. Yasmine has already agreed to seventy drakes.”
“Seventy!” Adam’s voice cracked.
“The house takes a cut, of course. You will receive fifty-eight drakes and two demidrakes, assuming all goes well. We must live out our standards or suffer the price. Unhappy customers stay for free, eat for free, and sleep for free—at the offender’s expense. Do you follow?”
Adam nodded, nervous.
The merchant winced and said, “Your worry worries me. For all of our sakes, I don’t want to sell an Iisah virgin. You do have experience?”
“Yes,” Adam answered, and he said nothing else while the contract was drafted, recorded and signed. It wasn’t truly a lie, he tried to tell himself, but the weight of exhaustion was pressing against his eyes, pushing toward sleep. Somehow, that frightened him, though he didn’t know why, only that he was to stay and rest while the deal was confirmed on Yasmine’s end. Food and drink, in accordance with Solomon’s law, was provided. A flagon of amber wine, a slab of flat bread, and dried chevon to gnaw on. Eating eased his mind, though only for a while, and after, even thick swigs of wine couldn’t dampen the strain of Magdalynn’s life riding on an hour alone with a woman when he’d never known a woman so intimately in his life. It made him marvel at how brave he had been, lusting after the whores of Babylon, before knowing his ignorance. Not brave, foolish. I should have been terrified.
Thus, the hours ambled on under the self-chastising crop of Adam’s doubts and fears. The time grew near, and the servant women appeared again to wash and scent and dress him in queer clothes—a robe of cotton, red as blood and soft as gentle sin to the touch. They painted pale clay over his burns and blemishes, gave him bindii tea, and massaged him till every strand of sinew in his body loosened, till he was as ready as they could cause him to be. Then they led the Messah where his fate awaited.
It was worse than he imagined. Adam had led himself to believe that he would at least be alone as he blundered his last opportunity. He couldn’t have been more wrong. The fourth floor was an open apartment, a chorus of carnal rhapsody, an aria of libertine screams. There were no corners in which to sequester, no screens to hide behind. All would be seen as he was seeing now: a dozen plush couches and as many fleshy beasts mounting and being mounted. Too late to avert his gaze, he found himself transfixed upon a particular pair, the woman bound with rope around her wrists and ankles. She lay on her knees, her face pressed into a pillow, the man behind her thrusting with wanton abandon like the jaundiced monster in the Hell of Adam’s memory. He staggered as it flashed before him, the animal-grunts, the knocks and thuds like the waves of the ocean beating on the cabin and the hull of the ship. And the touch of those yellow fingers and their spider-fang nails assailing his back—touching him now. He spun around and reached for his sword and grabbed naught but air. It left him impressed with terrible nostalgia, a nausea of nerves; wordless, yet with a certainty that the woman staring across from him saw.
“Adam,” rasped Yasmine. Her dark eyes were inked with wings, her lips black and sultry. Hungry, they spoke in silent suggestion of desire, then curiosity, then pity by the end.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, her face a reflection of his dismay. “Am I not as you imagined? To look at me so…am I too old for you to find beautiful?”
Her questions were not at all what the Messah expected, and it showed in his response, guilty and unsure. “No, it’s not that. It’s just that—what I mean is, I’ve never…I’ve not been with a woman before, and…”
“Oh,” she said, though not unkindly. Her consternation dissolved. “I didn’t realize this was your first time. And in a place like this, no wonder you’re frightened. They’ve thrown you to the wolves, a lamb. But we will make a man of you before the night’s end, Adam.” She spoke it as a command, like a spell cast from a witch’s lips. “Look at me,” was its tenor, and the enthralled Messah obeyed. Now he was the sinner, lingering on her bare legs veined and dimpled, her midriff soft and distended, the wrinkled scars ringing her breasts where they spilled out the top of her gown. She’d chosen a Tsaazaari imitation of a singer’s dress, rose-gold in the scarlet lamp light. “What do you think? Would I pass for a maiden of Babylon?”
There were no maiden singers, he might have said—if he was still a boy trying to impress his father—but they were engaged in a game, and the anticipation on her face told Adam it was his turn to play. “More beautifully than any singer I’ve ever seen,” he compelled himself to say.
Yasmine growled, prowling close, breath warm as she nuzzled his chest and sunk her claws into the back of his robe. “Adam,” she rasped, big brown eyes staring up at him making the pastor’s son feel like a giant. Slowly, she opened his robe; and slowly, his fears folded inside of him. A new feeling arose, whelming and primordial. It filled him from head to manhood, made him forget for the moment all his withholdings. Then the sound of slapping skin cut through the room—a bestial grunt, a vulgar moan—the Messah’s focus thrown to his hounding memory. She grabbed him by the hands. “This won’t do, to have you here in front of all these strangers. Yasmine wants you all to herself. Come.” She led him to the second floor and found a private chamber. It was little more than an alcove, in truth; a few cushions and a straw mat consumed most of the room, the only light inside from behind its curtain door.
And so in shadow they advanced by the sense of touch and sound. She guided him with her hands upon his, stripping away clothes, rubbing softly at first less sinful places—palms on thighs, waists, and shoulders, lips on lips—steadily progressing to breasts and buttocks, the mound between her legs, fingertips circling his throbbing manhood. Cautiously, she laid his back onto the mat and stroked with her hands, her mouth—brought him to the cusp then shied away, over and over like a cat teases its prey before finally pouncing. She mounted him, and inside her he felt himself fade as something else took over. It was something not afraid of what might or may be. It did not doubt or pause or stop. It only watched and saw and acted. It missed nothing. It felt every plunge and spasm, every involuntary release of amorous breath. When It directed, Adam listened. What It directed, Adam obeyed—without thought or interruption. By the end, it was Yasmine on her back, praying for one more day, one more night with her intrepid Messah. She pulled her legs to her chest and urged him to penetrate her depths and release there what he held bound.
“Let it go,” she said, but Adam withheld, afraid to take his pleasure for what may be forever released. He retreated as if from a demon knocking on his doorstep, yet he knew he could not escape, that It would not recede. He had to decide what kind of monster he was to be. Then she called out to him, “Adam!” and the pastor’s son threw open the door.
They lay together for a while after in the high of soft skin and pillow talk. Yasmine spoke most, confessing her wish that his seed might quicken, that she would get to keep a piece of him for her lamented return to Mephisto. She told him of the emptiness she experienced in the city, of the chasm between souls of people who believed that man was his body alone. “I learned too late the folly in that thinking, and now all I am left with is hashish and a husband who has forgotten me. If I see you again, I hope it is not in that place. You have a good life ahead of you—you and your Magdalynn.”
Magdalynn! “I have to go,” he said suddenly, though Yasmine understood. She went with him to collect from Hassan, then bid him farewell. “Promise never to forget me, Adam of Babylon.”
It was cold and dark on his way back to camp. He ran the whole distance, barely keeping his bearings, but managing to hold the south watch towers in sight. The tents were harder to find; the ridge and dunes seemed to disappear into the night, and even by the light of the moon, he could not spot the shapes of canvas against the sandy ocean. Yet he did find the silhouette of a man, of Adnihilo. The half-blood had packed one of the tents and left the other a pile on the ground. He was stowing their stolen provisions as Adam approached. Adnihilo froze and spoke without looking at him.
“I’m glad you’re back. We have to leave early—it’s my fault. I was caught stealing a waterskin. They’re probably looking for us now, so Ba’al said we should go while it’s dark. It’ll be harder for them to track us, and he said the Tsaazaari are superstitious. They might be too afraid to come after us during the night.”
“Where’s Magdalynn?” asked Adam.
“We weren’t going to leave you,” the half-blood continued as if he hadn’t heard. “We’d have to come back this direction anyway. He promised we’d sneak inside and find you after we return from Iisah.”
“Adnihilo. Where’s Magdalynn?”
The half-blood glanced toward the listless tent, then toward the ridge. There was a pattering, like the fall of a heavy rain.
“Adnihilo!”
He looked at the pile again. “I’m sorry.”
Adam dropped his purse, and the fifty-eight pieces of Mephistine silver clinked in the dirt, forgotten. He walked, quaking, to where the canvas cloth laid over her—a beggar’s grave—and peeled it back so as to see her face. He looked as long as he could, not long, then staggered aside and retched.
“I’m sorry,” Adnihilo recited. The storm-sounds were on top of them now. Three beasts reigned down from the ridge, led by Ba’al, calling out for them to mount. The guard was coming, and they were on horseback. Adam looked to Magdalynn, then to his friend, and made his decision. The three of them fled into the black horizon.
Eighteenth Verse
“In the names of the Lord who has born the sun, the earth, and the breath of life: Sol, Patrem, Ventus,” began Commander Pyke. Jael followed along with the prayer as best she could, as exhausted as she was. After five days ride through the northern winter woods, the Saint’s Cross had arrived at the pale citadel founded by Bishop Berthold, the western-border ward, the fortress known as the Watcher’s Eye. The clerics at the gatehouse had recognized them on sight, despite their disguises, and no sooner had they passed through the outer wall and into the bailey was a council called. And so, there they stood before the great whitewood round table on the sixth floor of the tower keep, freezing from the rain, still soaked to the bone in the late of the evening to hear the needs of the thirteen senior clerics. “May soon His kingdom come,” Pyke finished, then he looked to Trey. “Thank you for joining us, Captain Gildmane. I’m glad to see that someone in the capital still takes our borders seriously.”
Serious. Jael thought the word suited Rickert Pyke better than his maille and brigandine—an unnecessary formality at such a meeting, yet it conveyed his meaning. “This is life and death,” it said in so few words, as did the commander’s face. He looked every bit Sir Rillion’s brother, the same bulbous nose and jowls and weight, though in Rickert’s case it was all thick muscle and gray-white wisps about his cheeks. And his tongue was different, too—thicker with the west and more reserved. Every word fell with force of a hammer.
“As for why I called this council, do you recall the situation described in our message?”
Trey swallowed a yawn. “Pagan raiders and strange mist, if I remember correctly.”
“If it were just raiders, the Eye could handle it,
” interjected a cleric with a face and frizzy tonsure the same shade as his scarlet tunic. Immediately, he spread a hand over the black thread eye upon his chest, looked to Pyke, and apologized, “Forgive me the outburst, Commander. It’s just that this lad is making a mockery of us.”
“Am I?” the captain shot back.
“Our brothers are being slaughtered, and you send us three men. What else is that but mockery?”
Trey smiled, but Jael could see the enmity coursing through the veins in his forehead. He was tired, getting sloppy, revealing pieces of his demeanor as he said, “Learn to count, cleric. There are four of us, not three, and there would be five if one of our squires wasn’t nearly killed by a brackdragon on our way to aid you.”
“Three was generous, paladin. I said, ‘men,’ not lads and lassies. I have a half a mind to write a missive to Lord Blackheart—don’t think we haven’t heard. Maybe he’ll send you back to take the oath with the next shipment of prisoners.”
Commander Pyke rapped his knuckles on the face of the great table, a single knock. At once, the senior cleric bowed his bald head and began orally flagellating himself for his indignance. The commander ignored this, and—expressionless—explained to Gildmane, “You’ll forgive Elder Frampt his belligerence. He is grateful for every extra sword at our disposal and would have shown you this gratitude if he were not still grieving the loss of our last party.”
“The whole party?”
“Fourteen men,” the senior cleric uttered. “May I tell him, Commander?”
Pyke nodded.
Elder Frampt met each of the Cross’s bloodshot eyes in turn: Brandon’s, Troy’s, Jael’s, then he settled on the Captain’s with his own—salty and brown as the Serpent’s Head. He cleared his throat. “Aye,” he said, taking a flagon from the table center and poured himself a goblet—water, Leonhardt noticed, though the cleric looked as though wine would have served him better. He began, “May the Lord bear witness that all I say is true. We were twenty men including myself that day, no more than an hour’s ride on the high road, just outside Cinnehollow. We suspected there’d been a raid—the lords on the lake were complaining they’d never received their last load of bark—but when we got there…” The cleric’s voice broke. He coughed and sipped from his goblet. “God save their souls. When we got there, we saw the Devil’s work. Men, women…even the little children… It peeled their skins off like they were onions. Pinned them to the trees and the doors.”
Salt, Sand, and Blood Page 27