The Midnight Sea (The Fourth Element Book 1), page 25
“My Queen,” he said, dropping to one knee, for she did expect a certain degree of deference.
Neblis sat on the rim of a circular pool. Unlike the lake, which had the opaque yet lustrous aspect of quicksilver, this was pure blackness. She wore a gown of blue silk, with matching slippers. Her appearance changed with her mood, but today she had white hair and golden eyes. The latter had the same intensely curious, birdlike look they always did, and that he would have recognized no matter the color or shape.
“You come alone, Balthazar,” she said. “Why?”
He didn’t bother with excuses. “The others are dead. Victor escaped. But I brought you this in his stead.” He held out the urn. “From the Barbican itself.”
Her golden eyes widened a fraction. “The fire?”
“Yes, my Queen.”
Neblis took the urn in slim fingers, turning it this way and that.
“He was taking it to…” The Antimagus stopped himself from speaking Delilah’s name just in time. “The King’s whore.”
“To free her?”
Balthazar didn’t dare answer.
“Even after all this time…” Neblis’s tone was light, but there was an edge to it. “Poor thing. I wonder if he will come after it?”
“Someone will,” Balthazar said. “If not Victor, the Macydonian invader.”
She looked at him, her gaze impenetrable. “So you would bring them down on me?”
“I…Of course, that was not my intention.” Balthazar tried to control the quaking in his bowels. “If you wish it, I will take it back over the mountains immediately.”
Neblis smiled and Balthazar felt the world right itself again. “No. You did well.” She tapped a nail against one pearly tooth. “I have no unholy bonds to break, but perhaps new ones could be forged. Do you know how to use it?”
“No, but this one does.” Balthazar gave the chains a heave and his captives stumbled forward. Two teenaged boys and a Purified. “He is one of the magi that guarded the fire. See his hands?”
Neblis wrinkled her nose in distaste. “Savages. Make him speak.”
The Purified stared straight through her. His lips were flecked with drool. Balthazar sent a tentative probe of power through the chains. The mind there was fragile as an old eggshell. His palms began to sweat. Thoughtless!
“You always were too heavy-handed,” Neblis sighed. “Using a cudgel when a gentle slap would suffice. Give him to me. And remove the collar first.”
Balthazar obeyed, letting the Purified sink to the ground at the very rim of the pool. He himself took a step back. The thing that lived in that black hole made the fauna of the lake seem tame and benevolent.
Neblis laid her palms on each side of the Purified’s head. He jerked once, then subsided. But his brown eyes now looked more dreamy than vacant.
“What is your name?” the queen asked, her voice low and musical.
“Mahvar,” he said instantly.
“How are the cuffs forged? What are they made of?”
“Are you the Prophet?”
Neblis shot Balthazar an amused look. “Yes, my son. You can speak to me freely.”
“Praise the Holy Father. How did you break free?”
“What do you mean?” Her hands tightened on his face and he grimaced, but Neblis seemed not to notice.
“I dreamt of your prison. Cold and deep. All I have done was for you, the highest of all mages…”
“Prison?”
“Oh, the wickedness that has been committed in the name of the Holy Father. It shames us all!”
“Where?” Neblis nearly screeched.
Balthazar watched his queen with apprehension. Pinpricks of blood welled in the Purified’s eyes. Balthazar weighed the wrath he would incur by intervening against the loss of their only source of information. He knew she harbored a deep-seated hatred for the so-called Prophet, even greater than Balthazar’s own. But they had both assumed him dead these many years.
“Where is this prison?” Neblis demanded.
“Karnopolis,” the Purified choked out. “Do you not remem—”
His words cut off as she savagely twisted his head to one side.
Balthazar’s queen breathed heavily for a moment, her face flickering among the dozens she could call on at will. It dizzied him to watch it, so he stared at the substance of the pool instead. That too was mesmerizing, in its own way. Layers of darkness, like peering into a tunnel that went down and down and down…
“Balthazar!”
His head snapped up.
“I have a new task for you.” She looked like a pretty dark-eyed girl of Babylon now, a city Neblis had known when it was still a scattering of mud huts on a fertile plain.
“How can I serve, my Queen?” he asked, although he already knew.
“You will bring me Zarathustra. Alive. If he is to be a prisoner, he may as well be mine.” She rose, stepping one delicate slipper over the body of the Purified. “And get rid of that.”
“What of Victor?” Balthazar asked.
“I think he will come to me.” She smiled cheekily, and Balthazar felt a pang of jealousy. “He won’t be able to resist my charms.”
“No man could,” Balthazar muttered.
She peered at him, birdlike again. “Do you love me?”
“You know I do.” His heart ached in his chest as she held his eyes. Her beauty was dizzying, exquisitely painful, like a parchment-thin blade between the ribs. Even when he slept, she filled his dreams. The scent of her, a delicate, honeyed poison.
“Then don’t fail me a second time.”
Neblis paused to pluck a crimson flower, then wandered into the grove. Balthazar watched her until she was lost to his sight. He felt outpaced by events. As though he fought a war on too many fronts to keep track of. Alexander would move soon, but in what direction? The empire tipped on a knife’s edge, and it was Balthazar’s duty to ensure that when it did fall, it went straight into his queen’s lap. If only she hadn’t killed the Purified…But Zarathustra would be an even better substitute. He’d made the cursed fire. And Balthazar had his own bone to pick with the old man.
Karnopolis. The last time he had been to the city, he wore the robes of a magi. That had been before the war. Before they cast him out as a heretic. Did any still live who would remember his face? Balthazar very much doubted it. And if he wore the robes again, he would blend in easily with the hundreds of other magi in the city. A jackal among rabbits.
Balthazar lifted the Purified in his arms and contemplated just heaving him over the rim of the pool. In the end, he decided to dispose of the body elsewhere. The lake, perhaps.
Some things were best left undisturbed.
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Blood of the Prophet
The Fourth Element, Book Two
Visionary. Alchemist. Savior. Saint.
The Prophet Zarathustra has been called many things. Now he spends his time drawing pictures of weird-looking goats. That’s what happens when you’ve been stuck in a prison cell for two hundred years. But the man who might be mad, and is definitely supposed to be dead, has suddenly become very valuable again…
It’s only been a few weeks since Nazafareen escaped the King’s dungeons with her daēva, Darius. She hoped never to set foot in the empire again, but the search for the Prophet has led them to the ancient city of Karnopolis. They have to find him before Alexander of Macydon burns Persepolae, and Darius’s mother with it. But they’re not the only ones looking.
The necromancer Balthazar has his own plans for the Prophet, and so does the sinister spymaster of the Numerators. As Nazafareen is drawn into a dangerous game of cat and mouse, her newfound powers take a decidedly dark turn. Only the Prophet understands the secret of her gift, but the price of that knowledge may turn out to be more than Nazafareen is willing to pay…
Letter to the Reader
If you made it this far, I guess you read to the end, so first, I want to say thank you for giving me several hours of your life. But since this book is a mix of totally made-up lies with a few true things thrown in, I thought I’d take two more minutes to explain.
This story began with the daēvas. In the Zoroastrian religion, they’re evil spirits that embody every imaginable sin. But it wasn’t always so. They started out as gods that were later considered false. They were demonized, in other words, which I found fascinating. And I loved the word daēva. It seemed beautiful and mysterious. And I began to imagine how such a downfall might come about.
To be clear, The Midnight Sea is not at all an alternate history, although it is set in a specific time period: the collapse of the Achaemenid Empire, around 330 B.C. Alexander the Great defeated the Persian King, Darius III, in two decisive battles and went on to take the capitals of Persepolis and Susa. I couldn’t resist weaving a (very twisted) version of those events into my story.
But the wicked king in The Midnight Sea bears little resemblance to Darius III, who may have been a mediocre general but didn’t seem like a bad guy. In fact, the empire he ruled was pretty benevolent as empires go. Although Zoroastrianism was the official religion, other practices and customs were respected, gay people weren’t persecuted, and women had property rights and could be economically independent. The Persians had the world’s first charter of human rights (and the first postal system), among many other achievements.
They invented polo, which they called chaugan, and the letter from the king to Alexander taunting him with a mallet and ball was real. Other real things: The Hall of a Hundred Columns (where my Darius was sentenced), the general description of the palace complex at Persepolae, and the ass-kicking Pantea, who had command of the Immortals during the reign of Cyrus the Great and was sort of the sheriff of Babylon.
Alexander did hurl a spear into the ground and claim the Persian Empire for his own, although it was after he crossed the Hellespont. One of the best stories I read about the Hellespont involves the Achaemenid King Xerxes, who got so mad when a storm destroyed the bridge he’d made (in an attempt to invade the Greek mainland) that he ordered his soldiers to administer three hundred lashes to the strait and throw manacles in the water. That’ll teach it!
Most of my place names are made up, but correlate roughly to a map of the empire at that time. The Midnight Sea is the Black Sea, the Salenian Sea is the Caspian, and the Middle Sea is, of course, the Mediterranean. The Great Salt Plain is Iran’s central plateau, known today as the Dasht-e Kavir, or Great Salt Desert.
I also want to stress that my version of Zoroastrianism is only superficially related to the real religion, which many people still practice around the world. This is obviously a work of fiction, and the real magi did not oppress any supernatural beings, although they did worship fire and preach good thoughts, good words and good deeds, which I think sounds nice.
Dogs had a special place in Zoroastrianism. Weirdly enough, the holiest of them all, Water Dogs, were actually otters and were believed to hold the reincarnated souls of a thousand former actual dogs. Still with me? Well, killing one was just about the worst thing you could do, and was reportedly a capital offense.
What else? Zarathustra is the Greek name for Zoroaster. He died in 551 BC, at the founding of the Achaemenid Empire. He preached the importance of being good and kind and honest in this life, which I agree with wholeheartedly.
The word Druj comes from the ancient Avestan language, and means the embodiment of evil and sin.
The Char Khala range is the Caucasus. As far I know, Bactria was never infested with Undead demons. But I will be returning to my Bactria, the lair of Queen Neblis, and so will Nazafareen and Darius. I hope you’ll come with us.
Cheers, Kat
Acknowledgements
To Simon and Deirdre, for being my first and last line of defense on typos, grammar and gaping plot holes. And just for…everything.
To Jessica Therrien, for all your invaluable insights and constant encouragement. Your feedback made this book about a hundred times better.
To Holly Kammier, for all your great advice on the publishing process and for inviting me to your wonderful imprint. I’m honored to be part of such a talented group of authors.
To Kat Howard, for asking all the right questions and helping me truly bring these characters to life.
To Damonza, for designing a cover that was everything I hoped for and more.
And most of all, to Nika, for inspiring me to write about fierce girls. You are the original Nazafareen. Thank you for always putting a smile on my face. I definitely see a #1 New York Times bestselling author title in your future.
About the Author
Kat Ross worked as a journalist at the United Nations for ten years before happily falling back into what she likes best: making stuff up. She lives in Westchester with her kid and a few sleepy cats. Kat is also the author of the dystopian thriller Some Fine Day (Skyscape, 2014), about a world where the sea levels have risen sixty meters. She loves magic, monsters and doomsday scenarios. Preferably with mutants.
Find Kat online at katrossbooks.com. Sign up for her newsletter and never miss a new release.
Connect online:
Twitter @katrossauthor
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Also by Kat Ross
Some Fine Day
A generation ago, continent-sized storms called hypercanes caused the Earth to flood. The survivors were forced to retreat deep underground and build a new society.
This is the story that sixteen-year-old Jansin Nordqvist has heard all of her life.
Jansin grew up in a civilization far below the Earth’s surface. She’s spent the last eight years in military intelligence training. So when her parents surprise her with a coveted yet treacherous trip above ground, she’s prepared for anything. She’s especially thrilled to feel the fresh air, see the sun, and view the wide-open skies and the ocean for herself.
But when raiders attack Jansin’s camp and take her prisoner, she is forced to question everything she’s been taught. What do her captors want? How will she get back underground? And if she ever does, will she want to stay after learning the truth?
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Kat Ross, The Midnight Sea (The Fourth Element Book 1)
