by Kyrja
“But why isn’t anyone here to enjoy this?” Kraas wanted to know.
“This is where Borja lives. She the Goddess of the Waters here, in Nohoyo,” Sakari explained.
“Just in Nohoyo?” Kraas asked.
“We’ll have to catch you up on the local history,” Zaria chuckled. “Apparently, there are many gods and goddesses in the world beyond Nohoyo and Bila.”
“So I’m beginning to learn,” Kraas shook her head. “That’s who we’re here to talk to, isn’t it? This “Borja?””
“There is a faint life force in the caves, just over there,” Zaria pointed. “And, of course, many lives in the water,” she added, following Sakari who had started walking in the direction of the caves.
“You can feel every life force?” Kraas was fascinated.
“Yes,” Zaria responded. Her short, single-word answer was unexpected, so Kraas looked to Sakari for an explanation.
“Zaria was a Fire Tender. They were the ones who took life from all of Sov’s victims.”
“Can you still do that?” Kraas asked, incredulous.
“No,” Zaria’s clipped tone should have warned her to stop her line of questioning, but Kraas had never been known to be delicate.
“She doesn’t want to talk about it,” Sakari told her.
“I murdered hundreds of people in my life time so that Sov would have enough energy to stay alive,” Zaria blurted out, looking straight ahead, her jaw tight.
“I’ve heard … stories,” Kraas stuttered, “but I had no idea.” After a moment of awkward silence where the only sound was the sand swishing from their footfalls, she added, “It’s not like it was your fault.”
“Shut up Kraas,” Sakari told her, meaning it. “When Zaria wants to tell you …”
“I can speak for myself,” Zaria interjected, turning her head to look at Kraas. “You can ask me some other time, when we’re not walking into a dangerous situation, maybe about to get killed.”
“Maybe when we get to Bila,” Kraas chuckled dryly, trying to lighten things up.
“Maybe when we’re all snuggled into a big, comfortable bed together,” Zaria smiled back at her.
“Quiet,” Sakari said, suddenly serious. “Can you still feel it?” she asked Zaria.
“Yes,” she whispered, “but it’s … it’s different than anything I’ve felt before. Like it’s here, but it’s not.”
“Maybe because it’s a god instead of a human?” Kraas suggested.
“I’ve been around other gods, and they feel different than … than … people do,” Zaria explained, “but this isn’t like that. It’s more like … like a lifeforce that doesn’t belong to a body. Like after a Fire Tender has taken the lifeforce, but before it is given to the shields.” She shrugged, unable to clarify.
“Follow me,” Sakari said, leading the way into the caves. To her surprise, the cave was filled with light instead of being dark as she’d expected, and yet there were no torches, candles, or fires. Magic. She realized she shouldn’t have been surprised, but she still was. She wondered what other surprises were waiting for them.
“She’s everywhere,” Zaria whispered loudly, sounding both awed and alarmed. Unwilling to wait to find out what she meant by that, Sakari kept walking. There was no way they were going to be able to sneak up on a goddess. And yet, they hadn’t been challenged. She didn’t like the prickly feeling creeping up the back of her neck.
She heard her own sudden, involuntary intake of breath echoed by the others when they encountered what looked like a partially-decayed corpse.
“What is it?” Kraas was the first to ask out loud. “It doesn’t look human. I mean, look at the bone structure. It looks like it had a tail of some sort, instead of legs. And maybe wings or something?”
“Borja,” Zaria answered with confidence. “She was a goddess of the water, a sea creature. At least partially, from the looks of it.”
“I wonder if she had anything to do with the Bahari,” Kraas mused.
“You know about Bahari?” Zaria was surprised.
“While not common, they aren’t rare either,” Sakari answered. “Not in Bila anyway. There are a lot of stories and first-hand accounts everywhere.” She wasn’t about to mention the fact that Sahil’s son, Afdal, had turned out to be one too – a fact which had deeply surprised and disturbed her for not having known all this time.
“So now what do we do? Aren’t we supposed to be here to talk to her, to find out why she’s poisoning the water?” Kraas asked, taking a few more steps to the other side of the body lying on the sandy ground in front of them.
“I have an idea,” Zaria said, absently, as she got to her knees beside the body.
“What are you going to do?” Sakari asked, feeling like they should be leaving the damned thing alone.
“She was … is … a goddess,” Zaria explained, putting her hands on what was left of the chest. Most of the rib cage was clearly visible, along with most of the other bones. There was very little else left of the body, although there were scales scattered on the ground next to it, as if they had sloughed off.
“How do you know this wasn’t her latest meal, and she’s just out looking for dinner?” Kraas asked with an uneasy laugh that betrayed her nervousness. Zaria looked up at her, giving Kraas a look that made sure she knew her attempt at humor had passed the line of decency.
“This is Borja. Or a god at any rate,” Zaria told her, looking back at the body. “Enough of her is still here to bring her back long enough to tell us why she was poisoned.” She paused. “If she knows.”
“Bring her back?” Sakari practically shouted, she was so surprised.
At the same time, Kraas asked, “Enough of her left?”
“Her essence, her lifeforce is still here. I’ve already told you that. Neither of you have ever been a Fire Tender, and you’re not Magami either. Healers. So you don’t understand what I feel. She is still here, I am telling you. Whether you believe it or not doesn’t matter. And her whole body, or what’s left of it, is poisoned. So make up your mind, do you want to know what happened or not?”
“Will it be painful for her?” Sakari asked, knowing she would not want her own consciousness to be returned to a body that was so ruined and was more bone than flesh and guts. She wouldn’t want to come back to this kind of existence, ever.
Zaria bit her lip then, obviously contemplating her reply. She opened her mouth to speak, took a breath, then closed it again. When she opened it again, she wore a troubled look on her face. “When the body heals, there is often pain. After a bone is broken, when someone has been stabbed, or even after giving birth. As the body is healed, pain is inevitable, regardless if you use herbs or magic. Using magic shortens the healing time, but the body must still do the same things inside as it would do with herbs, salves, and other common remedies.” She paused, looking uncertain.
“And?” Kraas prompted.
“More like “but,”” Zaria corrected. “But Borja is a goddess. Everything about her is different than how we are made. Even though she looks like us, the important part of her is not her body.”
“What does that mean?” Sakari was fascinated. She’d never even thought of these kinds of things before. She’d really never given much thought to the gods at all.
“That means it is her … energy that is important, not her body. Borja could make herself look like anything from … I don’t know, an old man to a fly. And even if you killed her body, she would still exist and would reform into something else. Or someone else.”
“Do you mean her soul?” Kraas wanted to know.
Zaria sighed. “No, not exactly. Gods don’t die and then are reborn, like humans are. Their spirits, or their essence, is … just different. Even when Sov died, Lumas didn’t leave his essence behind. She took it with her. Who knows? By now, he might have reformed into something else or maybe he’s a firebird again. I don’t really know. I’m only guessing.”
“So you don’t think that Borja wi
ll feel pain if you … what? Bring her essence back into these bones?”
“That’s exactly what I plan on doing. And no,” she shook her head, looking at the ruined shell of Borja’s body, “I don’t think she will feel pain.”
“If she does, she won’t thank us when you bring her back,” Kraas murmured.
Closing her eyes, Zaria placed her hands on the exposed ribs of Borja’s body. After all the healing Sakari had seen done by the Kasais and the Magami, she knew better than to expect to see something extraordinary happen. Even when Muuaji had healed her when she’d accidently stabbed herself, there hadn’t been any physical evidence of his healing other than the feel of the burning in her skin and her guts. And even that had dissipated quickly. She lowered herself to one knee to wait, noting that Kraas did the same. They’d spent a lot of time in this position in the past, side by side. She felt her mouth quirk to one side with the pleasure of having her by her side again. Then she gasped as she saw tendrils of something she didn’t even know how to name swirling around Zaria’s hands. If she didn’t know better – and she wasn’t sure she did know better – she would have to say it looked like hundreds of the tiniest of insects swarming together in patterns around the other woman’s hands. And then she saw a glow light up the palms of her hands, a pulsing light. She thought she might throw up when she saw the skin along Borja’s body begin to reform. She glanced over at Kraas to determine if she was seeing the same thing. The look on her lover’s face was all the proof she needed to know she wasn’t hallucinating.
Determined to watch every moment, she saw those “tiny insects” growing in number as they began to make patterns along the length of Borja’s body, and felt her scalp rise nearly off the top of her own head, sending chills down the length of her spine when the body – the very dead body that was still in pieces – took what appeared to be a deep breath. And there was Zaria, her eyes still closed, her hands still steady, pouring her heart into her work, not even breaking a sweat. Sakari knew this was something she would never be able to do. It was giving her the creeps. Kraas sounded like she was trying not to gag.
“Goddess Borja,” Zaria called softly. “Master of the waters of Nohoyo, we call you to return to us.”
It seemed to Sakari that each time the corpse of Borja inhaled, more of her body was restored. It was hard to watch everything happening all at once, and especially difficult to tear her eyes away from the tail that was forming. Because it was so different than her own body, she was curious. And, really, she didn’t have any need to see Borja’s eyeballs as they were reformed. She didn’t even really appreciate the fact that her body was vibrating, now that her heart was, apparently, functioning again.
A sound escaped from the mouth of Borja’s rapidly-regenerating skull, but Sakari couldn’t tell whether it was just a noise or a word. The fact that the lower jaw bone was still exposed probably didn’t help matters, she knew, but hoped they hadn’t missed something important, like “Get out!”
“Goddess Borja,” Zaria said again, “tell us who did this to you. Who poisoned you?”
“ … ssssam,” the word she was trying to speak wasn’t any clearer this time, as far as Sakari was concerned. As amazing as Zaria was, she wished Sahil was here. He knew so much about so many things, he would surely be able to help here.
But Zaria had heard something she had not, as she asked “The Lord of Death, Ozahm?”
“Yessssss …”
“Sakari, Kraas, come here.” Zaria told them, without turning around to look at them. “Put your hands on my shoulders. Don’t argue. Just do it. I need a little help.”
Doing as she was bid, she was surprised to discover how warm Zaria was to the touch. And then she felt her own body beginning to grow cold and suddenly felt weak, as if she was the one being poisoned. Or maybe this was what it felt like when a Fire Tender put their hands on you, she thought. Was Zaria draining her life away? She wanted to pull away. Trust me, she heard coming from somewhere, and so she stopped struggling, and let Zaria do as she must, hoping Kraas was doing the same. She hadn’t felt the other woman move away, so she must be doing the same thing. She was having trouble keeping her eyes open.
“Goddess Borja, help us to avenge you. Tell us why Ozahm did this to you,” Zaria’s voice was clear. She wasn’t feeling weakened. Good. This better work.
“I was there … “ Borja was speaking, Sakari could feel each time she inhaled, and then when she exhaled again.
“When the first Empress of Bila made her pact with Lumas.” Sakari couldn’t imagine what any of this had to do with Borja being poisoned, but she knew that Borja was one of the four Ahadi Lumas had brought to this world to guard Giya from harm. That meant it was possible Borja had been there, hundreds – maybe thousands? – of years ago.
“Yes,” Zaria encouraged her to keep speaking. “Deiserin was the first Empress of Bila. Lumas made her kill her firstborn child, Rajesh. That’s what created the pact. The promise.”
Borja shook her head back and forth, as if she was disagreeing. Instead, as they soon discovered, she was expressing her anger and disbelief with what Lumas had done. “It made her mad. Deiserin went mad,” Borja told them. “She resented Lumas for the lie. For the deception. Hated her. Rajesh was born a god. Lumas lied.” She coughed then, and Sakari saw Borja try to raise her hand in an automatic reflex to cover her mouth, but her hand fell back to the ground as she continued to cough.
Give me your strength, Zaria’s voice was in Sakari’s mind again. I need more.
Sakari did as she was told, refusing to be afraid. She had been a fighter all her life. A warrior, and a magic maker. This was nothing more than another battle. A battle she would win.
In another moment, Borja stopped coughing and then started breathing easier. All the while, Zaria was cooing to her as if she was a newborn baby. She was petting her hair, touching her face, caressing her arm and torso, using a soothing voice to tell her she was no longer alone.
“Deiserin was an excellent leader,” Borja continued, her voice stronger. “But a terrible mother. She had three more children, two daughters and a son, but none of them were hers.”
Borja opened her eyes then, and looked at Zaria. Her eyes were a startling blue. And then they turned black. She blinked a few times, then continued, “She stole them, the children, from others to raise as her own – and who would challenge her? She had been put in place by Lumas herself. There was no one to tell her no.”
“What happened?” Zaria asked quietly, still stroking Borja’s arm.
“Ha!” Borja replied, a sneer crossing her face. “What could happen with a mother like that? The second daughter, Binti, was jealous of the others, so killed her brother and sister and their children too.”
“But why?” Sakari couldn’t help herself, the question just popped out of her mouth of its own volition. Zaria was no longer taking as much from her as she had been, so she was feeling stronger again. Borja turned her eyes to look at her, then seemed to collapse back in on herself, staring at the ceiling of the cave. But she moved her hand, Sakari noted, to rest on her chest, so she must be feeling stronger. She looked completely restored to herself, including all the shimmering scales on her beautiful tail. Her clothing, though, remained in rags, draped haphazardly across her body.
“So she would be the only one from which the empress’ lineage flowed. Lineage is everything in Bila. Not like here. Not like … anywhere else. She missed a niece though,” she said with a satisfied nod. “Kweli was her name.”
“Her line reclaimed the throne and the right to the official lineage, but by then it was too late to know which child belonged to each line – not that any of them were the Empress’ children to begin with, you understand.” With that, Borja held out her hand, obviously expecting assistance to rise. They helped her to sit up, Kraas fetched her a drink of water in a shell, then they all sat down around her, waiting for her to finish her tale.
“This doesn’t tell us why the Lord of Death poiso
ned you,” Zaria pointed out.
“No, I don’t suppose it does,” Borja sighed. “Lumas was so enraged that Deiserin had stolen the children in the first place that she confronted Deiserin in person, in the Empress’ old age. Lumas turned her into a tortoise who would never die so she would suffer through all of eternity.
“ A tortoise?” Kraas asked. “But why a tortoise?”
Borja just shrugged. “Who knows the mind of Lumas, the manipulator? We are well rid of her. I will tell you, though, that she created the Jikangai just for Deiserin, trapping her so that she would trudge around the same circumference of the same circle until the planet itself came to an end. And, of course, the empire itself has been at war ever since, because the people broke their promise of always working together.”
“What is this Jikangai place?” Sakari was glad Zaria asked, because it seemed to her that Borja became irritated whenever she or Kraas spoke instead of Zaria.
“A place out of time,” Borja told her. “Time moves differently there. That’s where Ozahm is now. He planned to trick your Earth Goddess, Giya, there, in order to kill her.”
“Kill Giya? Is that even possible?” Zaria asked.
“He thinks he has discovered a way, yes,” Borja replied, flipping her tail, causing sand to fly in all directions. “The Empress Deiserin in her tortoise form is neither living nor dead, nor will she ever rest. Nothing can stop her, and no one can leave Jikangai unless they are dead. Ozahm thinks he can trap Giya inside of the Jikangai circle and either make the tortoise stop or kill her.”