City Under the Sand

by Jeff Mariotte

  “The fuel’s s-soaked,” Myrana pointed out. Her teeth, like Aric’s, were starting to click together.

  “Perhaps,” Sellis said. “But if the b-beast sucked enough moisture from them, then p-perhaps …”

  He hurried to the far side of the oasis, away from where the beast had turned to fight them. In what seemed just moments, Aric saw the glow of embers, then flame lick the darkness. “C-come,” he managed, grabbing Myrana’s hand once more. The water had very nearly frozen. Less than a minute to go, he believed, and they would die where they stood, not falling until the next day’s sun melted them.

  But they worked their way into the fire’s circle of heat. Sellis had it roaring in no time. No other creatures would dare approach the oasis tonight, not with a fire like that going, and even if they did they wouldn’t find any water in the pool. Sitting as close as they dared, they let the fire dry them out and warm them, until finally, as morning approached, they slumbered.

  6

  They got a late start the next day. They hadn’t had much sleep, and they had to wait until the sun dried out the rest of their belongings, left behind at their campsite when they had stormed the oasis to kill the rain paraelemental beast. Aric still didn’t understand how Sellis had defeated it, he was only glad the warrior had done so.

  Once their things were dry and they were hiking along once more, the sun had heated the air to the point that Aric almost missed his near-frozen state of the night before. When he said as much, Myrana chided him. “You’re never satisfied, are you?”

  “I just wish there weren’t such extremes,” he said. “Baking hot during the day, icicles at night. Why can’t the world just be temperate for a change. Inside that cavern, when I saw a vision of Athas as it once was, there were vast forests and lush meadows full of grass and flowers. That world couldn’t have been as forbidding as ours.”

  “That world is long gone,” Amoni said. “If your vision was even true.”

  “It was true in other respects,” Aric argued. He was thinking of the battle that had left all those bones under Akrankhot, and the sword he had found. And Tallik, of course. Tallik was real enough.

  “Perhaps it can be restored to that state,” Sellis said. “If we can turn our backs on magic long enough to stop destroying it.”

  “Not all magic is destructive,” Myrana reminded him.

  “That’s what some say, it’s true,” Sellis admitted. “But I believe magic is magic—whether it’s preserving or defiling, when people rely it there’s always the temptation to take it too far. Better to stay away from all of it. Just take our chances with no magic, and see what happens.”

  Aric’s hand went to his medallion, without his conscious participation. “What about the Way?”

  “I don’t think it’s inherently destructive,” Myrana said. They were marching up one of the low, rocky hills crossing their path, trying to carve a straight line toward Nibenay. “I don’t have a problem with those who use the Way. As you said, Aric, I have seen a lot of the world. For the most part it’s a harsh, wasted place, ravaged by forces none of us can comprehend. But there are glimpses of beauty to be had. Enough that I can’t help believing that if it were left alone for some time, it could yet recover and become someplace livable. Like you saw in that vision.”

  “You might be right,” Aric said. “It’s sad that none of us will live to see that day.”

  “You don’t know that!”

  “I do. For the world to change so much, it would take centuries. We’ll not live that long.”

  “I suppose not.”

  Ahead of them, having already reached the top of the rise, Ruhm held out a single huge hand. “Shh!’ he said. He crouched down and waited for the others to join him. “Raiders,” he said, pointing into the valley on the other side. A group of thirty-five to forty cut people across the valley, some on foot but most mounted on kanks or erdlus. This was no trading caravan—they had only three wagons—and they looked like they could move fast when they needed to. Even from here Aric could see that they were comprised of a variety of races: humans, elves, muls and others.

  “Have they seen us?” Sellis asked.

  “Don’t think so,” Ruhm said.

  “We’ll stay low a while,” Sellis suggested. “Until they’ve moved on.”

  Aric couldn’t argue with that. He sat. The others sat around him, Myrana close to his left side. There was no shade, and the sun pounded them with ruthless ferocity, and they were making no progress. Aric, frustrated, hurled pebbles down the hillside into a scraggly brush.

  “Is something bothering you, Aric?” Myrana asked.

  “I just hate sitting here doing nothing when we should be moving fast. By now Kadya has doubtless got the argosies filled and the caravan on the march toward Nibenay.”

  She stroked the back of his arm. “I’m slowing us down. I’m sorry. If you want to go on ahead … or you, Ruhm and Amoni, then Sellis and I can follow at my speed.”

  He was tempted to accept her offer. At the same time, however, he wanted nothing to do with it. He couldn’t say why, not out loud. How could he tell her what it was like to grow up a half-elf, abandoned by a father he had never known and left too young by a mother who died? Unloved and seldom trusted, making his way in the world with few close friends. Since the moment she had put a hand on his cheek, he had felt that she accepted him. They had a bond, he thought, that had been at once as strong as any others he’d known.

  He didn’t want to leave her behind. Even alone, he didn’t know if he could reach Nibenay in time—or, if he did, whether it would help stop Tallik from doing whatever it was he had in mind. Given that uncertainty, he had no interest in leaving Myrana behind, possibly never to see her again.

  “No,” he said finally. “No, we stay together, the five of us. We’ll have a better chance of survival that way.”

  “Thank you, Aric.” She gave his arm a squeeze, then released it. “I was hoping you felt that way. But I had to offer.”

  “Raiders gone,” Ruhm said. Aric looked. The raiders were nearly out of sight behind the hills. The companions rose and started picking their way down the slope.

  They were out in the middle of the sandy valley floor, where there was no cover larger than the occasional sparse cactus or scrubby tuft of grass when the raiders came back, heading straight for them.

  XIV

  AMBUSH

  1

  They’re coming!” Amoni shouted. She took a battle stance, cahulaks at the ready. Sellis drew both of his swords. Aric’s broadsword filled his hand, and Ruhm prepared to use his club. Myrana had only a dagger, Aric noted, but she looked ready to use it.

  Still, they were only five, against nearly forty. Aric would not have said that it couldn’t be done. Sellis in particular cut a heroic figure, and he might have actually enjoyed the odds. Aric, although strong, was not yet an accomplished warrior, and it didn’t look as if Myrana was either. Sellis, Amoni, and Ruhm would have to do the bulk of the fighting.

  The raiders came on fast. Their insectlike kanks and flightless erdlus tore across the plain, sending up a plume of yellow dust. Aric raised his sword and prepared for battle.

  Then Myrana surprised them all by sheathing her dagger. “Weapons down!” she said.

  “They’ll kill us!” Sellis cried.

  “They’ll kill us if we fight,” Myrana said. “If we don’t, at least we have a chance.”

  “Myrana, there’s always a chance,” Sellis argued.

  “This is our best one,” Myrana said. “Trust me.”

  The raiders came closer, so close Aric could see the honed edges of carrikals and spears, swords and gythkas, and the faces of those wielding them, set in masks of fury. He and his friends had never done anything to those raiders, but people seemed to need to embrace anger against those they would strike down. Anger burned in him, as well—somewhat more justifiably, he believed, since these raiders seemed intent on killing people whose only offense was walking across open de
sert.

  He slowly lowered his sword, then pushed it back into the makeshift scabbard he had crafted. Myrana had a point—the raiders were too many to fight. Even if they won, they would certainly suffer some losses, and they hardly had enough to spare.

  Amoni let her cahulaks dangle from her hand. Ruhm didn’t release his club, but rested the end on the ground. Finally, when the raiders had almost reached them, Sellis scabbarded his pair of swords.

  Puzzled looks replaced rage on the raiders’ faces. “Are you cowards, to face us without weapons?” one asked. He was a full elf, lean, tall and broad-shouldered, his hair long and wild, and he arched an eyebrow at them in wonder. He and three other elves among the raiders were the only ones on foot, but in spite of the hard sprint he did not seem winded in the least. “Or wizards, perhaps, meaning to destroy us through magic rather than fair combat.”

  Myrana stepped to the group’s front. Reasonable, Aric thought, as this approach had been her idea. “You speak of fair combat? Attacking five with forty or more?”

  The elf chuckled. “Perhaps only five of us at a time would have engaged you. Under those terms, would you fight? Or do you surrender your lives and possessions now?” Other raiders joined in laughter at that, a few of them hurling curses and epithets at the five companions.

  “We would surrender our possessions gladly, to spare our lives,” Myrana told him. Not exactly answering the question the elf had asked, Aric noted. “But we have precious little to take. A handful of weapons, I suppose. The skins we use to keep ourselves warm at night. A little water, though not much, and less meat. We are but poor journeyers, a long way from anywhere. And as you can see, without mounts or wagons. What is it you would take from us?”

  “I suppose we’ll settle for your lives and what little you carry,” the elf said. “Better than naught.”

  “Is it?”

  “You have something better to offer, girl?” Some of the other raiders dismounted, walking around their prey, eyeing their few belongings. “And are the rest of you mute? Or too stupid to speak?”

  “I speak,” Ruhm said. “I’d fight you in a second.”

  “I might have something to offer,” Myrana said quickly, lest Ruhm embroil them all in an unwinnable battle. “We are but five lonely travelers, but I am a daughter of House Ligurto. Surely you’ve heard of it—once of the richest trading houses in the Tablelands.”

  “Oh, I’ve heard of House Ligurto,” the elf said, his interest piqued.

  “I’m away from them for now, but I’ve been on the road with them my whole life. I know their route and schedule as well as I know my own name.”

  “How does that help us?”

  “I said I’m a daughter of the house, I didn’t say that I was a contented one. You spare us, and I’ll direct you to a place where you can wait for the caravan. The riches you could acquire there would be far more than you can take from us.”

  The elf rubbed his chin. Black tattoos snaked up from under his faded red shift, climbing his neck and etching a false black beard on his smooth skin. “An ambush, eh?” He huddled with some of the other raiders.

  “Myrana, this is a dangerous game you play,” Sellis whispered.

  “It’s no game, it’s our lives. I know what I’m doing.”

  “We can still take them,” Sellis insisted. “Myrana, I—”

  Myrana cut him off. “Do not forget that I’m a trader, from a long line of them. I’m doing what we do. I’m bargaining. Now hush.”

  Aric hoped she was right. Ever since that moment he had known Kadya meant to kill him, life seemed composed of one narrow escape after another. As if the burning sun and sands and the infinite cold of night weren’t bad enough, they’d had to stave off one attack after another. He was starting to despair of ever seeing Nibenay again, much less saving it from the demon-possessed templar.

  The raiders seemed to have reached a conclusion. They faced the travelers again, the elf at their center, flanked by three humans, a halfling, and a goliath, doubtless brought up from the ranks in case Ruhm tried anything. They were a hard-looking lot, showing the scars of many a struggle, their faces grim. Aric was glad they weren’t fighting, but suspected that had only been postponed by Myrana’s action. And possibly not for long.

  “Very well,” the elf said. “We’ll take the girl at her word. For now. Girl, you’ll lead us to this place, where we can set an ambush for your family’s caravan.”

  “And you’ll leave me and my friends alone and unharmed, until you get what you can from the caravan,” Myrana insisted. “If even one of us is mistreated in any way, then you’ll have to kill us all, because I will never breathe a word of that location.”

  The elf looked disappointed. Perhaps he’d hoped only to spare Myrana. “You’ll have to give up your weapons, of course.”

  “And be utterly defenseless against whatever horrors the desert springs upon us? Nonsense. You already know we have no illusions that we could beat all of you in combat, else we would be fighting now, not talking. But we give up nothing—no water, no food, no weapons. Then, when you’ve attacked the caravan and stolen your fill, you let us go.”

  “Let you go? Ha!” the halfling said. Standing fully erect, she might barely reached the elf’s waist. But she stood with back and shoulders hunched, a slender javelin in her hands, so she only seemed as tall as his thighs. She was thin, seemingly young, but as battle-worn as the others. She wore a vest and loincloth of some sort of pale, almost yellow skin, and sandals against the heat of the desert sands. Her brown hair was knotted once at the back of her head, and otherwise untamed—in that sense, it matched her attitude.

  The elf shot her a glare. “Of course we’ll let you go, once we have those riches,” he assured them. Aric had seen five-year-old children who were more proficient liars.

  “Very well,” Myrana said. “Then we have a deal.”

  “A deal,” the elf echoed. He turned to face the rest of the band. “Nobody’s to lay a hand on these,” he called. “To save their own miserable hides, they’re helping us to ambush a wealthy caravan.”

  This news was met with some cheers but much grumbling, several members of the band seemingly more interested in murder today than riches tomorrow. But the elf and those he had consulted ran things, apparently, and general agreement was voiced by all.

  Then they were off again, the travelers still on foot, herded along at a rapid trot by mounted raiders. Aric wasn’t sure this was any improvement over a quick, bloody death in battle—keeping pace with the raiders seemed sure to kill them anyway.

  2

  As night fell, the raiders stopped and made camp. They built fires, over which they cooked erdlu eggs. The aroma made Aric’s mouth water and his stomach growl. He still had a little of Amoni’s lirr, dry and flavorless compared to the erdlu smell, and diminishing stores of water to wash it down. The raiders drank ale and wine, screamed with laughter at jokes they told one another, sang songs.

  The raiders allowed them a fire, in the middle of camp where there were raiders on every side, preventing any escape. When it appeared that none of them were paying close attention to the captives, Aric tore off a chunk of lirr with his teeth. “I hope you know what you’re doing, Myrana,” he said as he chewed. “They’ve no intention of letting us go alive, even after the ambush.”

  “I know that, Aric. Just as I know that if we’d tried to stand and fight, we’d all be food for the carrion-eaters tonight, and they would have what little we own.” She drank from her water skin. “Besides, I would not betray my own house to such as these. The place I’ll take them is well off House Ligurto’s trading route.”

  “Then they’ll kill us for certain!”

  “They’ll kill us either way,” Sellis said. He had accepted Myrana’s plan, but grudgingly.

  “True enough. I know this won’t keep us alive forever,” Myrana admitted. “I just hope it works long enough to find a way to escape.”

  “Looks hard,” Ruhm said.

&nbs
p; “Impossible, or close to it,” Amoni added.

  “For now, yes. Over the next few days, perhaps they’ll relax their guard,” Myrana said. “Every day we live is one more chance for us. Dying today would have meant no chances. I’m sorry I didn’t have time to discuss it with you before I spoke up, but I honestly just thought of it at that moment.”

  “And saved us all,” Aric said. “Thank you, Myrana. Now that I understand what you had in mind, I think you made the right decision.”

  “Let’s hope,” Ruhm said gloomily.

  “Apparently that’s all we’ve got left to us,” Sellis said. “Hope, and empty stomachs. Tomorrow, Myrana, you’ll have to remind them that not mistreating us requires giving us food and water, else we’re not likely to live long enough to reach the ambush spot.”

  “I’ll work on it,” Myrana promised.

  Aric ate the last of his lirr, staring into the fire, turning every now and then to let it warm the side of him facing the night’s cold.

  3

  She found a chance to bring it up the next day, on the trail. She was near the front of the procession, riding a borrowed erdlu. She had been loaned it so that she could keep up with the leaders of the long line of raiders, since she was supposed to be directing them to a spot only she knew. The elf from the day before, whose name was Ceadrin, jogged beside her. He had a certain roguish charm, and he had been true to his word, so far, keeping other raiders who might have been disinclined to honor his deal from laying hands on her or the others.

  “Either my friends and I must be allowed to hunt our own game,” she said, “or you’ll have to feed us.”

  “Was that part of our bargain, girl? Somehow I disremember that.”

  “It’s part and parcel. If you let us starve, that’s mistreating us. The deal was no mistreatment.”