With the terrible book in my hands, I retraced my steps through the neglected garden and returned to the palace. A cold wind had come in from the sea as the sun set, and the strange warmth of the book’s leather binding cooled until it felt like the skin of a dead man. I considered throwing it from the ship as soon as I reached open water. I could only guess at its contents, but I was filled with the grim certainty that it was an evil book, and I would find no help in its pages that did not cost me my very soul.
Like most of the people of Salmacha, the priest Chanjask was tall and long-limbed, and his age was difficult to tell. His skin lacked the rough, oaken quality of his superior, Ucasta, so I guessed him to have lived forty or fifty years. He possessed bright, dark eyes that darted quickly from face to face in the crowded throne room. He was a clever man, if not a wise one; he knew which way the winds were turning, and he would set the sails of his life and career accordingly.
He finished his recitation of the law as Mara had asked, and he bent to kneel on the floor, touching his brow to the marble tile and raising his hands in supplication—to the princesses, it would appear, though Mara still held the power to decide his fate. She dismissed him with a wave of her hand, and he stood, more quickly than his apparent age might allow. He backed away, holding his empty hands palms-up as though he were offering a gift. He let the gathered mass of noblemen envelop him, and I was certain he intended to disappear.
In the throne room, the windows were little more than arrow slits; the last line of defense between the king and an invader from the sea. But as the sun filtered through and cast bright lines on the marble floor, the throne stood empty. Salmacha was now without a ruler. Perhaps, I thought, it had been without for a long time before my harpoon finally slew King Sondassan.
The weapon lay quiet across my legs as I sat at the base of the dais, beside Hamilcar and his crew and a good distance from the twin princesses. Having done its duty, it was content, and projected to me a sense of accomplishment. It was pleased with my actions. There would always be more tyrants, more men willing to spend the blood of others on power for themselves, but for the moment, the work was complete.
I’d held an enchanted weapon only once before: the Sword of Heaven, the tool of the god Torr, who had taken my Khalim from me. It, too, had approved of me. I’d used it to slay the great worm as it laid waste to Phyreios, and I had gladly given it up to the custody of Jin and his temple.
I would call my harpoon Storm, I decided, for the thunderclap I had heard as it destroyed King Sondassan. Having spent the early part of my life upon the roof of the world, I had great respect for storms. They could destroy a ship just as easily as they could fill its sails; lay waste to a village as easily as water its crops.
Sondassan fixed his gaze upon me, but it was not I who would first face the half-dead king’s wrath. As Hamilcar and his crew entered the room, they descended upon the priests, knocking them down and silencing their chanting. Soon, only the sound of the heaving earth and the clashing of steel remained in the room. I recognized Halvor and Kelebek, both armed with curved swords and small round shields. With them were Issa and Adama, a pair of brothers from the southlands, Issa with his dark pate shaved bald and Adama’s hair twisted into a mane of tiny braids. Their swords came in matched pairs, one in each hand. Halvor also carried my harpoon on his back. Languishing in the dungeon, I had thought I would never see it, nor any of my companions, again.
I held the unlocked manacles close to my chest and kept my head bowed, being led as I was to the slaughter. For all I knew, I would be sacrificed at the end of the tunnel. I had received no news since Mara Suryan had promised me she would try to contact my companions on the Lady of Osona and prepare a daring escape. I feared she had not been successful. Or, perhaps, she had decided that my death was an acceptable loss for the sake of the lives of her young charges. I would not fault her for that.
Ajan led me through the bowels of Salmacha. Behind me walked two other guards, mailed and armed as he was, to prevent my escape. They were unnecessary—the way back led only to my cell. The only way to go was forward.
Silence fell upon the corridor. The digging had stopped. Beneath my feet, the earth tensed and trembled; not quite a quake, but the warning of one. Whatever slept under the island was close to waking. If it did, all hope was lost.
The young man’s question lingered in the still air of the dungeon like a memory, or the smell of blood. I wanted to shout that I was nothing like King Sondassan, that my quest was selfless and righteous and far from an old king’s desire to live forever, but I held my tongue. The less the king and his high priest knew about me, the better.
What I said was, “I would never sacrifice the lives of others. I risk only my own.”
The man in the glittering black crown smiled at me, a paternal, placating expression that did not hide the devious hunger in his eyes. Whatever his purpose was for me, I was certain I would not like it.
“After months of delays, the gods smile upon our city at last,” he said. “Where do you come from, champion? What thread of fate brought you here?”
I stepped back from the bars and crossed my arms over my chest. “If there is a task you wish me to perform in exchange for my freedom, then give it to me. I have no time to waste lingering here.”
“In due time, my friend.” His smile did not fade, and the flickering light of his torch deepened the shadows on his weathered face. He appeared carved of wood, a sinister spirit of the forest.
The sky was dark, and glittering with stars he did not recognize. A forest of huge trees, older than the earth itself, encircled him with darkness and the smell of green things growing.
He felt neither hunger nor thirst. That was a small mercy. Though he knew it must be an illusion, his feet pressed into the rich soil, and a cold, damp wind tugged at his clothes. He had acquired, in the center of his tunic, a ragged, burnt hole, through which the chill cut at his skin. It was the memory of the conjured lance of Malang, the war god of Phyreios, who had recognized the god inside Khalim and sought to slay him. Khalim remembered how the lance had burned, and the force of it had taken him off his feet. The cold was far preferable.
Voices filled the wood, chattering in languages he did not understand, mingling with the calls of birds and the low, threatening growls of unseen beasts. The undergrowth shifted and moved, and shadowy shapes darted in and out of sight like small, quick animals. Khalim thought he had heard someone call his name, some time ago, but he had not heard it again.
I climbed out from beneath the temple floor. The riches of the pirate Abraxas of Lore lay at my feet, and my companions pored over it, dreams of finery and rich foods and expeditions to distant shores passing between them in whispers. My thoughts were only with the dragon harpoon, and how if I had such a weapon in my possession on the far northern sea, perhaps I would have slain the lind-worm as I had hoped to do.
Even the gods could not change the past. I had it now, and it sang to me, a song of dragon flight and the hands of heroes. I was the last of many to carry this weapon. When the dragon who had given it shape had hatched from its stone egg, the world had been young, covered in water and fire. It was with reverence that I replaced the oil cloth covering the harpoon and fashioned a sling out of rope to carry it on my back.
“I don’t need a share of the treasure,” I told Hamilcar. “I only want this weapon.”
He looked up at me and gave an expansive shrug. “If that’s your choice, then, you can have it. Gods know I wouldn’t be able to find a buyer for months.”
“My friend,” said Halvor, “you need to learn the value of money.”
“Where is everyone?” Hamilcar asked the crew, the island itself, or the gods, giving voice to the unspoken question we had in common.
No one answered.
A high tide had carried our ship to the harbor, but the six thatched-roof houses and solitary central structure stood well clear of the water, raised up on wooden beams against the possibility of a flood. Their doors were shut tight, and their windows covered. A wind from the sea moved across the sand, but the village was otherwise still.
I led Bran by his halter to the deck and down the plank to the dock, keeping my hand below his chin so he could not turn his head and see the terrifying expanse of ocean surrounding him on three sides. Once his hooves touched solid ground, his body relaxed, and so did my grip. I, on the other hand, felt a nervous energy like crackling lightning in my bones. There was a threat here in this silent place.
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