“Look.” I pointed to the piles of wet sand.
Brother Merik sifted a handful of it through his fingers. “That’s our man, all right. I’d say he’s a couple hours ahead of us.”
I watered the horses, their sweat-dampened hides steaming in the dawn air, while Brother Merik scoured the area for signs of Brother Yarit’s passage.
“Looks like he’s following the tracks of the king’s guardsmen.” Brother Merik remounted. “The Bright Moon must have been high enough to make them out when he came through. Why do you suppose he’d head straight back to Merabaht where he was caught?”
I clambered into the saddle, my thighs protesting at the effort. “Maybe he thinks to enter in disguise.”
Brother Merik grunted, displeased at the reminder. “Let’s make time before the sun catches us, little brother.”
In the desert we say Make haste slowly. Brother Merik and I resumed our ride at a brisk walking pace as the sun cleared the mountains and began to climb overhead, dispelling the night’s chill. Heat began to mount. I shrugged out of my woolen robe, lashing it to the packs behind me.
There was no outrunning the sun. As the morning wore on toward noon, Brother Merik began casting about for shelter. “There should be … ah!” Standing in the stirrups, he pointed toward a rocky formation shimmering through the rising heat haze in the distance. “There’s an overhang on the leeward side.”
It was large enough to provide shade for at least a half a dozen men and horses, but there was no evidence that it had been used in recent days. On Brother Merik’s orders, I gave the horses each a handful of grain, then a few mouthfuls of water in a leather bucket. While I tended to them, he stretched out in the shade, crossing his feet at the ankles, folding his arms behind his head, and closing his eyes.
Make haste slowly.
My duties done, I sat in the shadow of the overhang with my arms wrapped around my knees and gazed out at the desert. It shimmered in the heat of the midday sun, dun-colored sandstone interspersed with outcroppings of ochre deepening to rust-red in places.
“Do you suppose Brother Yarit is taking shelter?” I asked.
“If he’s got any sense, yes,” Brother Merik said without opening his eyes. “He made the crossing with the king’s guardsmen, he ought to have learned a thing or two. If he didn’t, he’s a fool.”
I tipped a water-skin and took a mouthful, swishing it around before letting it trickle down my throat. “What if he reckons it’s worth the risk to … to make haste swiftly?”
Brother Merik cracked open one eye. “Do you think we’ll lose him? If the Shahalim is pushing his stolen horse in this heat, it will founder; and we will catch up to him sooner rather than later if it does. We’re on his trail. Trust me, we will catch him.” He yawned and closed his eyes. “Let the desert teach you patience, little brother.”
Brother Merik slept, snoring faintly.
The horses cocked their hips and dozed, heads hanging low. I chewed a meditative strip of dried goat.
The desert shimmered with heat.
I rested my head against my knees and dozed, too.
The rising wind woke me. There was something in it that called to me, that tugged at me, saying Now now now.
Brother Merik awoke and caught my sense of urgency. We mounted and began riding westward into the teeth of the wind, moving again at a steady trot. Sand swirled around the horses’ legs, plumes dancing across the floor of the desert.
Pahrkun.
I was at once exhilarated and scared. It was one thing to catch a glimpse of one of the Sacred Twins in the distance from the safety of the fortress; it was quite another to face the prospect of encountering one or both in the open desert. Pahrkun and Anamuht guarded the realm to which they were bound, but that didn’t mean it was safe to be in their presence, no more than it was safe to encounter lightning or a sandstorm or any great force of nature.
The wind toyed with us, rising and falling, changing directions. It rattled pebbles and raised eddies of sand, erasing the signs of the trail we were following. More and more frequently, Brother Merik was forced to dismount to examine the ground at close range, searching for the various signs, the fresh scrapes and gouges and overturned stones, that indicated recent passage; signs that became increasingly scarce. An hour or so after we’d resumed our pursuit, he rose from a futile search and shook his head in a reluctant admission of defeat.
“I’m sorry, little brother,” he said. “Either we’ve lost his trail or it’s gone for good. Maybe we should have ridden through the heat of the day.” He dusted his hands with a grimace. “Or maybe Pahrkun doesn’t want the Shahalim in his service after all.”
“Brother Saan wouldn’t have sent us on a fool’s errand.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw movement. “Look.”
There was a column of carrion beetles making their way in a northwesterly direction. While I watched, a scorpion emerged wriggling from its burrow and began scuttling across the sand in the same direction.
Brother Merik glanced at me, and there was something in his expression that reminded me of the way he’d looked at Brother Saan. There was a measure of respect in it. I was young, but I was Pahrkun’s chosen. I had caught a hawk’s feather in my fist. “We follow them?”
I nodded, feeling sure. “We follow them.”
The wind continued to rise as we followed the desert insects that were creatures of Pahrkun. Now sand filled the air, dimming the sun. The horses became balky, until at last Brother Merik and I had to dismount and lead them on foot.
“We can’t keep this up, Khai!” Brother Merik shouted to me above the roaring wind. “Time to take shelter or—” He halted mid-sentence, craning his neck and staring past me.
I followed his gaze.
A hundred yards from us, Pahrkun the Scouring Wind loomed out of the desert. For the space of a few heartbeats, my wits ceased to function altogether. Cloaked in swirling sand, Pahrkun stood mountain-tall. High in the sky, his great black head, long and inhuman, turned this way and that, glowing green eyes set in deep hollows surveying the landscape. I dropped the reins in my hand and fell to one knee, genuflecting without thinking. Beside me, Brother Merik did the same.
I forced myself to my feet, only to fall and genuflect again as Pahrkun moved with slow, graceful strides to reveal a vast tower of flame behind him: Anamuht the Purging Fire. One skeletal bone-white arm emerged from the flames to lift high, lightning crackling in her fist.
Brother Merik was shouting in my ear and pointing.
Anamuht flung her arm forward and a bolt of blue-white lightning struck the barren earth between us. In its sudden glare, the small figure of a man struggling to keep his seat in the saddle of a terrified horse was illuminated.
Brother Yarit.
“… with the horses!” Brother Merik shouted. “I’ll get him!”
Dumbstruck and nigh frozen, I did as he said, gathering up the fallen reins. The horses tossed their heads in protest, fretful and fearful. Brother Merik ran unerringly toward the Shahalim, unwinding his head-scarf as he ran. He wrapped it around Brother Yarit’s mount’s eyes and began leading them back.
The wind howled.
“Let’s go!” Brother Merik cried. “Go, go, ride!”
I tossed his reins to him. Carrion beetles crunched underfoot as I hopped about in an effort to mount my horse. A strong hand grabbed the back of my tunic and hauled me belly-down across my saddle. From this undignified perch, I managed to scramble upright, my feet fishing for the stirrups.
“Watery hell!” Brother Yarit wheezed. His face was coated with a rime of dried sweat and sand, his eyes bleary and bloodshot. “All right, kid. I guess we’re stuck with each other.”
We rode, the wind dying in our wake.
I glanced over my shoulder once as we fled. The Sacred Twins had vanished into the desert.
FOUR
That night we made camp beneath the overhang where Brother Merik and I had taken shelter at midday.
“D
o we need to stand watch over you tonight?” Brother Merik asked Brother Yarit in a weary voice.
The latter smiled without any humor. “I don’t expect you to take me at my word, but no. The Sacred Twins’ will is clear. I won’t be leaving this desert without their consent.”
“You accept this as a given truth?” Brother Merik pressed him.
“Yes, brother.” Brother Yarit touched his thumbs to his brow, somehow making the gesture a mocking one. “I do not like it, but I accept it.” He paused, then continued in a different tone. “I very likely would have died out there if you hadn’t come for me. Thank you.”
“Thank Brother Saan,” Brother Merik said. “It’s the Seer who divines Pahrkun’s will. I wouldn’t have bothered.”
Brother Yarit shrugged. “Nonetheless.” Warming his hands at our small campfire of gorse and dried dung, he gazed westward. “By all the fallen stars, that was a thing to see, wasn’t it?” He shuddered. “I thought I was done for.”
“I think they just wanted you to turn back,” I said. “If the Sacred Twins wanted you dead, you would be.” I was still angry at him. “You said we had a bargain.”
He stared at me. “What?”
“You said we had a bargain,” I repeated. “That you would teach me to throw zims if I taught you to use a heshkrat.”
Brother Yarit let out his breath in a long sigh. “You don’t know much about the world, do you, kid? First of all, no one has a bargain with one of the Shahalim if it’s not sealed in blood.” Pulling out his belt-dagger, he pricked the ball of his right thumb with the point. “Here, give me your hand.” I let him prick my thumb in turn, a bead of blood welling. He clasped my hand, pressing the ball of his thumb against mine, our blood smearing together. “In the name of Shahal the Dark Moon, I pledge to honor our bargain. There you are, then.”
“That is not our way,” Brother Merik said with disapproval.
Brother Yarit gave him a dour look before returning his gaze to the western horizon. “It’s been a long time since the Sacred Twins left the deep desert. Do you suppose they mean to continue on to Merabaht?”
“That’s a question for the Seer.” Brother Merik’s frown deepened. “Why? Is the city threatened?”
“Not by outside enemies, no.” Brother Yarit scratched his chin. “I’m just wondering. Rumor has it that rhamanthus seeds are running in short supply. Anamuht hasn’t quickened the Garden of Sowing Time since…” He counted on his fingers. “It must be going on a dozen years now.”
“What happens if they run out?” I asked.
He gave a short laugh. “Well, then I reckon the House of the Ageless will start aging, won’t they? But that’s no concern of mine anymore.”
I cocked my head. “Was it ever?”
Brother Yarit gave me a shrewd glance. “You are an observant one. Yes, little brother. It became a concern of mine when I accepted a commission to attempt to steal a cache of rhamanthus seeds.”
“Pahrkun has scoured you clean of your sins,” Brother Merik said. “We do not speak of what lies in the past.”
“Is there anything of interest that isn’t more or less forbidden to you lot? Small wonder that I wanted to escape this forsaken place.” Brother Yarit stifled a yawn. “Suffice it to say that if I’m ever able to go back to Merabaht, there’s a member of the House of the Ageless who owes me a very large favor for refusing to divulge her name on pain of death.”
So that was why he’d been planning to return. I wanted to hear more, but the look on Brother Merik’s face dissuaded me from pursuing the matter.
“Enough,” he said firmly. “Today has been a long and arduous one. It is time and more that we slept. Especially you, Khai.”
As much as I longed to protest, he was right; as soon as I wrapped my robe tight around me and pillowed my head on my arm, my eyelids grew heavy. I was stiff and sore from the long day’s ride as well as yesterday’s exertions, and my mind was still reeling from the sheer awe of our encounter with Pahrkun and Anamuht.
Despite Brother Merik’s admonition, the men continued to talk in low voices. I caught bits and snatches of their conversation as I drifted in and out of sleep, interspersed with the faint crackling of the fire and the occasional stamp and snort of the hobbled horses.
“… teach him about the world at some point if he’s bound for the House of the Ageless, brother.”
Sleep, drifting like a hawk’s feather on the wind.
“… purity in the desert.” That was Brother Merik’s voice, deep and adamant. “Let him be forged in it. There’s time enough for the world.”
Drifting.
Drifting.
“… been cut yet? Pity, but he’ll have to be to serve as the princess’s shadow,” Brother Yarit mused. “Though I suppose it makes sense to wait until he’s got his full growth.”
Cut?
There was a long pause, long enough that I drifted back down toward sleep, before Brother Merik said, “Khai is bhazim.”
It was not a word I recognized. Brother Yarit drew in a sharp, surprised breath. “Does he know?”
“No. There is time enough for that, too.” Brother Merik’s voice took on a note of finality. “Go to sleep.”
It was a strange conversation and one I wanted to remember, but exhaustion smoothed the edges of my thoughts, wearing them away like the wind wearing down sandstone.
And, too, there was the memory of Anamuht the Purging Fire and Pahrkun the Scouring Wind towering over everything.
In the first light of dawn there were chores to do; the last of the grain doled out to our mounts; the second-to-last water-skin to be shared among men and horses alike; hobbles to be untied; tack to be secured. Brother Yarit’s mount had been in rough shape by the time we made camp, but he hadn’t foundered and a night’s rest had done him a world of good. We set out for the fortress at a jogging trot, making the most of our time before the sun cleared the mountains in the east. It was a good hour before that half-remembered conversation flickered through my thoughts. In the light of day, my thumb sweating on the reins and stinging where Brother Yarit had pricked it with his dagger, it seemed to me that any reference to cutting must be some further Shahalim custom of blood-letting, one from which I ought to be exempt.
As for the word “bhazim,” I forgot it entirely. It would be quite some time before I heard it again.
Our return to the Fortress of the Winds was received without fanfare, although Brother Saan met with all three of us separately. I do not know what he said to the others, but Brother Yarit seemed as chastened as I could imagine him. Brother Merik was quietly pleased.
To me, Brother Saan said, “And how did you find your encounter with Pahrkun and Anamuht?”
“Oh!” Words went clean out of my head at the thought of trying to describe it. “It was … They were…”
He chuckled.
“It was awe-inspiring, Elder Brother,” I managed at last. “It was like seeing the very heart and soul of the desert made flesh.”
Brother Saan nodded in approval. “Well said, young Khai. The children of the heavens embody the places to which they are bound.”
A creeping sense of shame nagged at me. “And yet I stood frozen in their presence, Elder Brother,” I confessed. “I dared go no further. It was Brother Merik who led Brother Yarit to safety.”
“Yes, and you who led Brother Merik to find him,” Brother Saan said. “For now it is enough.”
“But one day it will not be?” I asked him.
“You are pledged to Pahrkun the Scouring Wind,” he said. “One day you will undergo a trial to determine if that pledge is worthy of being fulfilled. But that day is far from now.”
“What manner of trial? Am I to attempt the Hall of Proving?” It surprised me a bit, as it was not required of the desert tribesmen, only criminals like Brother Yarit convicted by the royal judiciary. But then, I was different from both of them. I had been born at the height of the lunar eclipse; I had grasped the hawk’s feather.
“No.” Brother Saan shook his head. “No, in the end it is Pahrkun himself who will determine whether or not to accept your pledge, not those of us who serve him. You will venture into the deepest desert and seek to encounter the Scouring Wind face-to-face.”
I could not help but swallow hard at the prospect. “Did you undergo such a trial, Elder Brother?”
“No.” His eyes crinkled with sympathy. “A Seer is born every lifetime. Less is asked of us than of a shadow, whose birth is far more rare. The last man to stand such a trial was Vironesh.”
I took a deep breath. “I see.”
“Khai.” Brother Saan laid his hands over mine. “You did well. Trust. Have patience. Be content to learn.”
I bowed my head to him. “Yes, Elder Brother.”
My training resumed. I squeezed rocks and hopped up and down the staircase, and bit by bit, the muscles of my wrists and forearms and legs acquired new strength. The three-pronged kopar was still too unwieldy for me to use, but I reached the point where Brother Merik deemed me capable of learning the rudiments of the yakhan and began teaching me.
There was a great deal to learn. There was a complicated series of slashing strikes one made with the curved outer edge of the blade and straightforward thrusts with the tip. In close quarters, there were reverse thrusts with the spiked pommel, though one had to be careful to avoid fouling the blade. There were backward blows to be struck with the blunt inner curve of the blade. Brother Merik made me practice each and every one of them over and over, first with my right hand, then with my left. I did so with diligence, working toward the day when I should be allowed to spar like a true warrior-in-training. Brother Hakan, who was the smallest in stature, had promised to give me my first bout as soon as Brother Merik consented.
From Brother Yarit, I learned stealth.
I learned the Shahalim ways of walking: the silent toe-rolling step he had first demonstrated to me, the back-to-the-wall crossing walk, the swift heel-toe glide, the crouching walk, the crouching frog walk with splayed fingers and toes. On Brother Saan’s orders, Brother Hakan and a few of the other young brothers studied with us, so that the skills might be preserved and passed on within the Brotherhood of Pahrkun.
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