“It is time,” Raila said. “Searcher, Engineer and Warrior,” she added the last title without pause, “you are about to undertake a journey that can only be successful if you agree pledge your lives to one another, if you act as one. This you will swear now.”

  “I swear,” Ain said. Ibranu, and Schan, one of Jependa’s Snakes, repeated his words from a pace behind, one to either side. One gruff voice and one flat, as if nothing in the sands could have been of less interest. What a team we will make.

  “Then take our and the People of the Sand’s blessings with you.” She smiled at him as she and the others stepped aside. Ain led the way through the trees, a slow shiver spreading through his body. Beyond the square and the Oasis, the desert opened up before him, his home shrinking behind with each step.

  Townsfolk and visiting Snakes lined the road, kneeling, faces solemn, eyes urging Ain on. Silaj had not come, as they’d agreed. He drew in a shuddering breath. It was better. He passed dozens of familiar faces, mostly mixed in with snake clan and even Peg, the visiting merchant from Holvard. The man winked at him. Further on, Dadel put his fists together in the old gesture for strength. Majid, supported by Jedda, broke tradition to step forward.

  “You can do this, Ain.”

  “If you think so.”

  “Remember, when you reach the Shrine, you must Call the Ocean. That is what Ibranu and I have learnt from the old scrolls. It is the missing piece.”

  “But none of the legends speak of the Shrine that way.”

  “We don’t know what it means yet. Ibranu thinks it will become clear when you find the shrine.”

  Elder Raila cleared her throat.

  Jedda squeezed his shoulder. “Your parents would be proud, Ain.”

  Ain straightened his back.

  Strongest Pathfinder. If Mother and Father could see him, they would believe in him. He could find the Shrine in Sekkati, City of Secrets, despite it being overrun with devils. He could pass the blazing Wards, find every water hole in the wasteland and slip through the stone walls. Where others had failed he would succeed. Why else would the Sands turn his path so far away from the one his feet had wanted to tread?

  Climbing the first dune, he paused at the top. Beyond its smooth ridge waited countless other dunes, stretching into the yellow sun, whose light spread like a warm blanket. At least two weeks to the Wasteland and the Wards at their end. And then the Anaskar foothills and finally the city itself. Perched on the coast where the legends of the sea would come to life.

  Ibranu clomped over. “What are you waiting for, boy?”

  He took a breath. “I am pausing a moment, Engineer. I may be heading to my death and I have much to leave behind.”

  The older man shook his silvery head as he turned away. His squinting eyes and thin face had not been impressed. “By the Sands, they’ve given me a coward.”

  “I am not a coward,” Ain said. He glanced at Schan, who shrugged. Unbelievable. Already alone and he hadn’t even crossed the first dune out of the oasis.

  Ibranu did not turn. “Well you’re not half the man Majid is, Ain. You might be stronger, I’ll admit, but you shouldn’t be here. You’re not ready.”

  Now Ain flushed. Where had that come from? He’d barely shared a dozen words with the man over the years. The Engineer had kept to himself, in his home. Especially of late, when he’d been speaking the cursed language with Majid and discussing ‘machines’ and other strange things. Old books, old stories, myths and legends from Before the Sand.

  Information that couldn’t be kept to himself. Ain would need to learn it all – how else would they find, and then use, the Sea Shrine to take their vengeance?

  Schan watched on without speaking, his eyes drifting around the dunes. Weighed down with a variety of weapons, bow, sword and knife, he was prepared for attack, but barely appeared interested in events directly before him.

  Bickering achieved nothing. He had no seniority in age or experience, but as Pathfinder he was to lead them. So it had been for every Search. Jedda’s voice thundered in his ears. Lead with your body. Actions speak. Ain stepped forward. “But I am here, Ibranu. Either accept that or return to Cloud Oasis. Alone. See who people think is the coward then.”

  Ibranu whirled, hands balled into fists. “I won’t be turning back, boy.”

  “My name is not ‘boy’ as you know, and I am your Pathfinder.” He stood his ground despite a thumping in his chest. “Do you understand?”

  Ibranu said nothing.

  “Then find your own water.” Ain started down the dune. He did not turn to see who followed.

  ***

  The first night was one of silence. No-one spoke in the freezing autumn wind, huddled around a fitful blaze, eating the orange flesh of the white-bugs Schan had killed and shelled. Nor did anyone speak as they sought their tents, nor when dawn came and they set out. Not even when Ain broke his word days later, at the first well, where they refilled their water skins. Ibranu only nodded at the water and went back into his own shell. An old, grumpy beetle.

  The Engineer travelled with a glower on his face and Schan appeared completely unruffled, still largely absent from proceedings. The only time Ain saw him become animated was at the sight of vultures in the distance, at which he made a rude gesture.

  The sun beat down in the mornings and pounded its way into the tent at noon, while he shivered beneath his blankets and furs of a night. What poison had he been given in the form of Ibranu? The man threatened the Search with his behaviour, but most troubling, he threatened their lives. Perhaps not immediately, but once they passed the wards...

  In the last few days, near to halfway across the desert, the man had begun to mutter. Even Schan took note.

  “He is sun sick?”

  “I will speak with him,” Ain said, slowing to walk beside the older man. “What troubles you?”

  He did not answer at first. Ain waited until Ibranu shook his head. “I ain’t crazy. I’m practising.”

  “The Anaskari tongue?”

  “What else?”

  Ain kept a retort to himself. “Then I must learn some words, as must Schan.”

  “Later.”

  “Why delay?”

  “Because I ain’t ready, that all right, Pathfinder?”

  “For now.” Ain rejoined Schan. “He’s practising the Anaskari tongue.”

  “That’s a relief.”

  “I agree.” His companion walked with dagger in hand, spinning and catching it, blade flashing in the sun. His tans were stitched with a pattern of scales, Ain held back a shiver at the image it presented, of a snake wrapping the man’s legs. “Did you volunteer to come on the Search, Schan?”

  “I did.”

  “Why?”

  “I would see the Anaskari fall with my own eyes.”

  Ain understood. An old dream, of many Medah. One he’d shared. Once. Once he was going to be the greatest Pathfinder and locate the Sea Shrine and single-handedly bring down the Anaskari. Avenge his father, mother and uncle. Avenge his ancestors.

  But did that matter now? It would be enough to return home. Sands willing.

  Schan pointed. “What is that then?”

  The sands were empty and the horizon wavered in bright blue. “I don’t see anything.”

  “A dark shape, faint against the sand. Distant.”

  “Let’s get closer.”

  A wind slithered the sand as he picked up the pace. The passage of feet, something he’d nearly missed during all the tension with Ibranu, grew louder. He angled toward a low point between the dunes, pausing at a yelping cry. Ahead, outlined against the sky atop a dune, were a pair of sand-fangs. Their mangy forms dropped out of sight at once, but Ain marked them. Any food scraps would have to be burnt or buried deep.

  He followed the base of a dune to a wide depression. It stretched the limit of his vision, the sand at its bottom filtered with darker, thicker grains when he bent to touch it. The hum and scrape of feet had not lessened, it was a clamour in his head as the echoes grew. Horses, camels, boots, bare feet, pads, wheels, he heard them all. Each one driving toward the centre of the depression where something shimmered in heat waves.

  “I think I see it.”

  Distant yet, the shapes resolved themselves into spires in rows, rising from the ground. Dark, each shaft had a curve. When he stopped at their feet, Ain whistled. The spires were bones. Taller than a man many times over, the ribs were twice broader than he could stretch his arms. The beast would have been colossal.

  He placed a hand against the surface as Schan and Ibranu circled the rib cage. Hard, like stone, and weathered. He moved to the next one, trailing his fingers across pits and ridges.

  “Come see,” Schan called.

  The warrior was crouched by a smaller rib, still like a tree, Ibranu beside him. Ain joined them, the hum of the path intensifying. Along the base of the bone, words were scratched into the surface, doubtless with knife or even other fragments of bone. “Names.” Each hand had some characteristic, either in neatness, height or positioning of letters. Some were horizontal, in the old script, while most played in vertical sweeps and curves – modern Medah writings.

  Schan gestured. “Not all.”

  Where the bone met sand, a complex concentration of chisel marks, their edges precise and deep, peeked above as if from an ocean. He brushed more sand aside. The writing continued around the base and he took several steps, kicking at the sand to reveal more writing. It circled the entire bone.

  “What is it for? Is it even in our language?”

  Schan shrugged but Ibranu shook his head. “Nothing I recognise.”

  “Why carve it here, in the middle of the desert, where no-one can see it?”

  “Got no idea,” Ibranu said. He opened his mouth to continue, but instead slapped a hand against the bone, mouth moving as if reading silently. Just as quickly, he cursed and strode away.

  “What’s wrong?”

  The Engineer did not answer and Ain bent to look at the bone. One of the names was familiar but he could get nothing but a grunt from Ibranu, and a demand to resume their journey. Ain agreed, fascinating as the markings and the bones were, they contributed nothing to the Search.

  By nightfall the rib cage of the enormous beast was behind them and his first lessons in the Anaskari tongue had progressed as far as he could manage. Schan had given up on Ibranu’s impatient methods, which seemed to be repeating difficult words at the top of his lungs and cursing. Somehow Ain learnt several phrases and words. Still the flat accent troubled him, but faint praise from Ibranu before the fire was doused surprised him.

  “We are closing in on the first of the Wards,” Ain said before the man sought his tent. “But I’ve been told so little of them. I know that after the Glass War they grew stronger, what does that mean?”

  Ibranu squinted up at the stars, tracing a circular constellation, the Great Eye, with his finger. “No, the Wards are older. When our ancestors got forced from Sekkati and the sea they regrouped and sent another attack, very next summer. Too soon, the fools. It was a damned disaster. Those who didn’t die, fled deep into the desert and learned the Ways of the Sand. It was they, their magicians who raised the Wards.”

  “But the Anaskari raised their own, didn’t they?”

  “Yes. But theirs was something foul. They twisted our own Wards somehow. Passing them is like gamblin’ with your life now. Some get struck dead as they pass, others just enter the Wasteland beyond like nothing was even there. Don’t learn much from the few who returned either. Hard to know why.”

  “That doesn’t make sense. How did an entire army pass through, multiple times?”

  “We destroyed one,” he said. “As had our ancestors, but the bloody Wards grow back, don’t they? Something about ‘em, I don’t understand it. But they don’t stay broke. And destroying Wards is costly work.”

  “You fought in the Glass War. Can we pass them?”

  “I reckon so. For you and the Snake, I don’t know.”

  Ain shook his head. Another reminder of how he was underprepared. He should have known all about the Wards and what was beyond. “The Elders did not discuss this with me.”

  “You should know it already. It’s our history.”

  “I’m not a warrior,” he said. “My study was the finding of paths.”

  “No excuse.”

  Ain nodded. “True enough. I’ll need your help tomorrow, when we face the Wards. And beyond, I know little of the Sea Shrine. Majid mentioned Calling the Ocean?”

  He grunted. “You’ll get my help, slight though it may be. An as for the Sea Shrine? If we find it I’ll make it sing – I’ll Call the Sea. Then Sekkati will be free. The Anaskar will perish.” He made to duck into his tent.

  “Wait.”

  Ibranu paused, a frown on his face. “What?”

  “Back there, with the runes. Why did they upset you? Are we in danger?”

  He grinned, showing a gap in his teeth. “No more an before.”

  “So the runes?”

  “Recognised a name is all.” He shrugged. “My father and his Pathfinder. Good night then.”

  Ain looked away. “Good night.”

  Chapter 10

  Bathed and wrapped in new, warm clothing, Notch stood before one of Seto’s delicate paintings of the sea, a mug of ale in hand. The water was scattered with gold light, as if something magic rose from the depths. He’d always suspected there was actual gold mixed in with the paint.

  Flir sat with Luik, arguing over the right amount of sauce for the slabs of fish. Gone were her street clothes, in their place she wore tunic and pants, both plain in cut and colour. The tunic left most of her arms bare, he’d never seen her express any discomfort from cold, not even with Anaskar’s hard winters – which she called ‘delicate.’ Not that Seto wasn’t a fine host; a generous fire lit his silver hair and warmed his private dining room.

  “Is everyone at ease?” Seto asked. “Then welcome friends, back to my table. Do enjoy its fruits.”

  “Nice to be back, Seto,” Notch replied, his sentiment echoed by Flir.

  Seto sliced into a slab of whitefish with his bone-handled knife, inhaling before he took a bite. “Wonderful, Luik. How did such a fine cook ever survive beneath the mercenary within you?”

  Luik shrugged. “Folk have to eat.”

  “Indeed they do,” Seto agreed. To Notch, he waved his fork, a frown creasing his brow. “Now. Tell me why you’ve surrounded my establishment with pesky Mascare and clumsy Shields?”

  “Weren’t clumsy in my day,” Luik muttered.

  Seto ignored the comment. “For I am not well pleased, Notch. There’s even a mask in the common room, sipping at my finest. Tulio tells me he has nearly finished half a bottle of Fire-lemon.”

  Notch straightened. “I didn’t do anything to you, Seto. And it’s my name out on those posters.”

  “Yes, yes, and don’t you just look lovely in them,” he said. “But your actions, through fault or carelessness, have brought unwanted attention upon me. My affairs are grinding to a halt.”

  Notch placed his fork down. He didn’t want to come between Seto and the man’s quest to one day rival the palace for power. It seemed the only thing he’d sought, for years now, but that was enough theatrics. “You’ll weather the storm, Seto. And I didn’t come here to be interrogated. I came for help, remember?”

  “With the unpleasantness near the harbour. About which you cannot recall any details.”

  “Yes. But I didn’t kill her and I want that known here in Anaskar.”

  His expression softened. “Then you must answer my questions, you silly fool. Tell me your last memory, before waking.”

  “I was drinking at an inn.”

  “Which?”

  “The Iron Pig, by the harbour.” He sighed. He’d been over it before, with the guard, with Flir and within his own mind, dozens of times now. “I was waiting for a job, for a merchant ship sailing to the Far Islands the next day. It was a good contract too. Everything was fine.”

  “Go on.” Seto’s expression hinted that the name of the inn interested him.

  “Everything wasn’t fine,” Flir interjected. “You were supposed to be with me and Silenna.”

  “Next time don’t push so hard,” Notch said. “I nearly punctured a lung on that rock.”

  She snorted. “It wasn’t that bad. And next time I’ll let the archer take out your eye.”

  “Children, please,” Seto said. “Notch, carry on?”

  He took another bite of fish. It really was superb, with a subtle tang to the sauce. Luik had a gift. Despite the cooking, it was hard to keep an unpleasant taste from his mouth. Seto had always lorded it over them. A bad habit left over from his time in the palace no doubt. But putting up with his manner was a tiny price to pay for what the man was capable of. “Afterwards I went and walked the streets, and that’s all. Hours later, I woke covered in blood beside a dead girl. Her head had been... bludgeoned. People were screaming at me and before I could take half a step, the Vigil hauled me away.”

  Seto tapped a finger on the handle of his knife. “You walked the streets while drunk? Why? Why not seek your bed? You remain professional, as far as your lifestyle permits. I find that curious.”

  “My lifestyle?”

  “Yes.” Seto waved a hand. “You make no apology, as is your right, just as I make none for mine. Don’t read things into my musings, Notch. Consider the question. It will help.”

  Notch pushed a piece of fish through the sauce. The fat beggar from the street, was he even real? Or something his drunken mind produced from ale fumes? Leaving the inn too. Seto was right. He’d been offered a big job that paid well enough. Pirates barely bothered with the Far Islands, passage would have been easy. Why risk passing out in a gutter?

  Or being hanged.

  Flir put her knife down. “When did you start drinking?”

  “Early. I meant to have just one, but the innkeeper offered me another, if I helped him move some kegs. He had a limp and couldn’t do it himself.”

 

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