Yeah, well, I’m working on that last one! my dragon side snapped defensively. And I’m putting up with everyone’s stupid rules about that! But fiends aren’t the same! They don’t take things to make use of the treasure! They just want to make sure that nobody else has anything! That asshole who just woke up doesn’t know the value of a single thing he wants from us! He just wants us to have nothing!
The horse under me moved in a way I hadn’t expected, and I shifted to remain in the saddle.
We’ll talk about this later, I said in an effort to placate the raging side of me. But we already agreed to take this guy down. And if he’s even half as bad as you say, I’m going to let you eat him with absolutely zero complaints.
Damn straight, you will, the New Guy replied, and finally quieted enough for me to concentrate on riding across the desert.
We rode across the desert in silence, Val still riding with Salima, Petalbell still riding with Breyn, and Breena still riding with me—although she had shrunk to about the size of a dollar bill and was very carefully not saying anything at all as she peeked out of the saddle bags.
I decided I wasn’t going to worry about it. We’d figure out new boundaries in time, and until then, we had another planet to save.
We raced across the endless sands as the sun continued to crawl above the horizon, shimmering along whatever invisible route Salima’s people had somehow managed to form through the seemingly endless dunes of golden grains.
Many hours passed. My legs burned, but my Risen body could handle it, and the stamina pool of my vital guard engaged to help me deal with the soreness and fatigue.
And it would have to, because time was of the essence. Every moment that passed was one more moment that the local Malus forces had to organize themselves, one more moment for the Fiend in the desert to finish waking up.
It was also one more moment for my people and I to act with impunity. To get where we needed to go without obstruction, and to devastate our enemies while they were still vulnerable.
Which meant we rode all day to capitalize on it. We stopped only twice, for ten minutes both times, in what were hidden oases that either the Breath or Salima’s memory had led us to. Then, when the horses had enough time to rest, drink, and be reinforced with our magics, we rode out again, as if we were racing against the bright burning orb over our heads.
But if we were, we only managed to tie against the blazing star. Mejem came into view just as the sun touched the horizon and began painting the sky behind it in the golden-pink colors of a beautiful sunset.
Val and I activated our shrouds as soon as the city came into view as a faint speck, which had hopefully prevented Warren’s local goons from seeing us from afar.
It was one more reason that I was glad to have arrived when we did. I had no idea how well-defended this next city would be, but twilight was hopefully the time that the local guard shifts changed, and would presumably be when they were the least alert. It should be our best chance to sneak in unnoticed. At least, I hoped it was.
While I pondered that, I examined the city itself. It was definitely smaller than Nedjena, but unlike the ruined city we had left behind, this one was far more intact. The walls formed a complete circle around the settlement and appeared to be well-maintained, with no obvious cracks along the yellow stone walls. A few pennants flew from the ramparts, probably to mark the entrances that they wanted caravans to use when they visited the city. We steered carefully away from them, because Headmaster Moram had already used his local Testifier contacts to make arrangements for our entry.
Instead, we circled around to the very back of the city walls, making our way to the one side that didn’t have any obvious entryways at all. We all searched for an oddly-shaped rock on top of the ramparts’ crenelations, one of the few in the otherwise well-maintained stonework.
Still invisible, we crept up against the sand-colored walls. Then, making sure he aligned directly under the irregular crenelation, Weylin put his face against the stones and whispered a single phrase of Song magic.
The stones next to him shimmered as if they were liquid, then opened to form a small tunnel.
“Is that you?” a quiet voice asked from somewhere inside. The speaker sounded young, and cautious.
“If it isn’t, you’re already dead,” the blond elf replied with a bitter edge to his voice.
“Weylin?” the invisible figure stammered in disbelief. “It really is you! You’re alive! I can’t believe it!”
“I am,” my elven friend growled, no camaraderie in his voice, “despite being utterly abandoned with my brothers by the very college we had worked so hard to support. But I’d like to stay that way, so unless this is a trap, I’d really prefer that you let me and the rest of the people with me inside these walls.”
“Yes, yes! Of course!” the other Testifier said. “Come inside! Hurry!”
We had no problem obliging.
The tunnel hung low, with a ceiling barely above five feet, which meant everyone that wasn’t a fairy or Val had to duck down low in order to enter it. But it was only as thick as the city walls themselves, so seven feet later, we emerged on the other side.
The invisible figure turned out to be a young Goldfolk man, roughly Breyn’s age, with dark hair and dusk-colored skin. His wide eyes shone under the shadows of the wall.
“You’re…all three of you…” he stammered as he gawked at Karim, Weylin, and Eadric, “you all survived…did you really bring him?”
He didn’t immediately recognize me, on account of the fact that I wore as much covering as possible, something any tall, red-headed man should consider doing if he wishes to disguise himself among a different population group.
And since we weren’t completely sure we could trust this person, I wasn’t about to speak up and reveal my identity.
“We’re not having introductions until we’re in a secure location,” Eadric whispered from under his hood. “Do you have a place for us to go?”
“I…” The young man nodded his head. “Yes. This way. Quietly. We must be careful.”
The Testifier turned and began walking down the street. I realized that we were actually in an alleyway formed by a large number of tall buildings next to the wall, something that both the locals and Warren’s forces had allowed to remain in place, despite how easy it would make infiltrating the city after a successful siege.
But I couldn’t be one to talk, I suddenly realized. I was trying to blend in with a community whose hair and skin tones ranged from Salima’s to Karim’s (I’d have to figure out why, since those were associated with two vastly different ethnic groups back on Earth).
Salima and Karim were literally the only two people that could remotely pass for a native of this world—well, maybe Val, if no one looked that closely. Everyone else in our retinue was either a dwarf, a light-skinned blond elf, a long-haired white-skinned man with glowing tattoos, a freaking aquamarine-skinned member of a previously extinct race, and myself, the red-haired Challenger of Avalon who had probably had his appearance memorized by most of the people on most of the planets.
Also, there were two fairies, although they could shrink down and hide their glow whenever needed. But that didn’t change the fact that my group had eight clearly foreign people trying to carefully sneak their way through enemy territory—and four of us had well-known faces.
That just means we’ll either have to master the art of disguise quickly, or rely on the locals for help, I decided, before realizing that everyone else in the group had probably already thought of that.
We slunk down another alley, this one further away from the city wall. Now that we were deeper inside the city, I could see more decay, more cracks in the buildings, and loose rubble in the streets.
Somehow, I could tell that Mejem’s deterioration was different from Nedjena’s decay, and sadder. Despair weighed down the figures in ragged robes, huddling on the floor wherever there was shade, and crouching hollow-eyed by the empty market stalls
that looked to have once sold food. The state of the city as a whole was highlighted mainly by the absolute absence of traffic in the streets beyond the alleys, where by contrast, Nedjena at least had a few figures rushing out to finish random errands at this time of the evening.
Nedjena’s ruins were caused by the sheer passage of time, of enduring for ages.
Mejem’s ruins came from stress, from being squeezed for everything it had, and tossed aside after it was wrung dry.
But just as we had seen in Nedjena, there were signs of hope amidst the decay. I took comfort in them as our guide led us further and further into the winding alleys of the small city. We made our way past increasing numbers of people in ragged hooded robes. They watched us silently from their positions lining the alley walls, but they trembled less once we’d passed them. I had the impression that they were waiting instead of hiding, standing guard instead of wallowing in poverty. I could feel their eyes track us from under the cowls of their robes, and once or twice, I thought I saw one doodling something in the dirt that covered the cobblestones, or moving their lips silently as they watched our progress.
During our ambushes, I had seen Karim and Weylin do almost exactly the same thing with their Saga magics.
We were either being led into the heart of the local resistance, or straight into a trap.
It probably wasn’t a trap, I decided. So far, the local people groups of Avalon’s worlds had resisted Rhodes’ assholes almost to a man—or woman, or child. I had often wondered why they had taken the route of belligerent conquest, when the population had been so willing to welcome the revered Challengers with open arms and shower them with every manner of honor and gifts. I’d have to ask Chris at some point.
Unfortunately, I also knew that this was the one world where one of the Testifier colleges had cooperated at least on some level with the Malus Members, or Eadric, Karim, and Weylin would never have wound up as captives in the same dungeon that I had broken out of. That supposedly wasn’t the college here, but that didn’t mean every other place was traitor-free.
Or that this group had chosen to believe that I wasn’t just one of the many impostors they had encountered in the past, and that I had managed to fool the former captives into believing I was the real thing.
But it became officially too late to worry about that as we moved into a large building that resembled an abandoned warehouse. Moram had vetted this group, and that would have to do.
Either way, I reflected as I noticed the crowd of hooded, robed figures gathering around us, I was about to find out.
They formed a ring around our party, keeping a careful distance away from us, too far for us to easily strike at them, but close enough to charge us or use any magic they might have.
I didn’t doubt that they had either magic or military training, because the formation they had easily surrounded us with was practically dripping with tactical deliberation.
“Wait right here,” our guide said to us, then went still himself. I expected that an old man similar to Headmaster Moram would walk up to us the next moment, but no one moved from the circle of robed figures. They just kept watching us silently, no doubt measuring us, testing our reactions to their behavior—even though we hadn’t removed our own hoods.
Yep, Eadric confided, apparently guessing my suspicions through the mindlink, if you think that they’re testing us right now, you’re spot on. Don’t make any sudden moves.
He repeated the message to the rest of the retinue, and I felt everyone else grow still. Breena wiggled in my pack, ready to launch free at a moment’s notice.
I let the silence stretch on with confidence. I needed to show that these people didn’t have anything to fear from me. I had no desire to hurt them.
Unless they really were Malus operatives about to ambush me.
Then they would find out that I had nothing to fear from them.
CHAPTER 9: OF ONE ACCORD
My patience apparently passed whatever test they were performing, because someone finally stepped out of the surrounding ring. They walked slowly toward us, probably giving us all one final measure as they approached.
In the end, the person lowered their cowl and revealed themselves to be a gray-haired woman with caramel-colored skin.
“Hello, Eadric,” the Headmaster said in a warm tone, “and hello, Weylin and Karim. It’s good to see you three again.”
“Headmaster Yama,” the dwarven Shaper said in a carefully neutral tone. Karim and Weylin gave her acknowledging nods, but said nothing.
In that moment, I realized that my own Testifiers had been measuring the group just as much as they had been measuring us.
“I am happy to see that you three are safe, but I am sorry to know that you must have suffered,” the woman said in a sad yet strangely formal tone, one that was at odds with her earlier warm statement. “The Dark Earthborn have wreaked much havoc on every world. It is a… happy surprise to see that you were all able to escape from their power.”
Bitch, Eadric thought, and I didn’t blame him.
I could read the suspicion in the woman’s use of the phrase ‘happy surprise.’
She was voicing the possibility that my three Testifiers might have been turned.
“A ‘happy surprise,’ indeed,” Eadric said in a tone that was almost a growl, “considering how thoroughly we were abandoned upon accepting the College’s request.”
The older woman blinked at his words, surprised at the sudden heat in his tone.
“The decision to send you three was contested,” she began, but Eadric cut her off.
“Headmaster Moram said the same thing,” the surly dwarf continued. “That makes at least two colleges claiming that our little suicide mission was ‘contested.’ And I suspect, if our little band manages to make it to the other cities in the Golden Sands, all the other leaders will claim that they ‘contested’ the idea of sending three supposedly ‘rising stars’ through one of the Dark Earthborn’s portals to Avalon itself. After all, two Headmasters opposing an idea is almost enough for a veto just by themselves. It would have been an easy idea to quash,” the Shaping dwarf continued, his voice growing more heated, “especially since it was so stupid. But it wasn’t quashed, and we three were knowingly sent to a foreign location with a high probability of torturous death. Unless they somehow turned us, like you currently suspect they had, Headmaster Yama.”
The room grew tense as his accusation rang through the air. The still ring of figures finally shuffled, losing the measuring, confident stance they had been maintaining.
The Headmaster blinked again, her head jerking as if she had been slapped.
“I do not—”
“Trust us,” Eadric completed, his voice still heated, and I wondered if I should intervene, because this was on the verge of becoming a fight with the very people we were expected to network with. But something in Eadric’s hurt, angry tone caught my attention. The dwarf was usually one of the most stoic members of my retinue. For all of his bitching and moaning, he kept his cool during tough situations. In fact, he had been the first one to calm me down once or twice, especially during the early times, when I’d had trouble controlling my Battleform.
It wasn’t like him to actually get angry, and it wasn’t like him to admit to being hurt. He had some sort of history with this woman, one he still needed to work out, if he could.
And besides, he wasn’t alone. Weylin and Karim had walked up behind him, as if they were trying to support him with their angry silence.
“You don’t trust us,” the dwarf continued, his teeth occasionally flashing through his beard, “when, if anything, we should be the ones distrusting you. You were the ones who let three of the College’s youngest pupils go on an insane mission without any real support—and without even warning the young Shaper you had known personally for years, one who had assisted you and your research on numerous occasions. And you know what, Headmaster Yama?” Eadric continued, his voice growing louder with each word, “I
understand. Given my history, even with my accomplishments, I know why I can be seen as expendable. But Karim and Weylin weren’t, Headmaster Yama,” the bearded dwarf said heatedly, angrier than I had ever heard him. “They weren’t nobodies. They had families, or friends, or at least people who would miss them when they were gone! They didn’t deserve to be thrown away just for their association with a disgracefully clanless dwarf!”
The volume of the Shaper’s shouts by the end left my mouth hanging open in astonishment.
Evidently, it had surprised even Eadric, I realized in the next moment. His shock over the intensity of his own anger washed out through the mindlink before he abruptly slammed the connection shut.
Yet somehow, all on its own, the Breath had cycled out to him and returned to me.
What was that?
Was that me?
That could not have been me.
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