CHAPTER 58
“They’re mostly trail rations, but it’s better than nothing,” Tirud said from the entrance of the palace, and Butu was surprised he hadn’t sensed him sooner. His golems carried armloads of wrapped bundles. “Come eat outside where there’s at least moonlight,” Tirud suggested.
“Can’t you make light like in the city underground?” Lujo asked.
Tirud shook his head.
“Then how did the Urgarun make it?”
“How did they make Pisor do what it does, and why couldn’t any king destroy it?” Tirud countered. “Maybe there are limits to the miramani a king can perform, or maybe there are mysteries in Urgaruna that’ve been hidden for thousands of years that will explain Pisor. That’s the other reason why I’m making it my capital — to solve some of those mysteries.”
They filed out into the open and sat down in the cooling air.
“Like what happened to Mnemon after he hid Pisor?” Butu asked.
The golems brought them the bundles of food and water.
“Exactly. If he’d died in the city, the salt should have preserved his body like the others.”
“And whether the Urgarun refused to unmake Pisor or whether they couldn’t,” Jani said.
“Right.”
“If you could destroy Pisor forever so no more kings could be made, would you?” Blay asked thoughtfully.
Tirud considered this for a long moment as they passed food around the circle. “I’m not sure, yet. It would be interesting to have a chance to make that choice, though. It’s the kind of choice the leaders of my birth clan would meditate on in the orchard.”
Lej, Butu remembered. The fruit that lets you see the situation the way you would see it when you’re older. Can Pisor do that, too?
Silence fell over the top of the rock as they remembered how hungry they were. Butu ate his fill for the first time in days. He felt all the fear and tension of the last few months leaving his body. At once, he realized how exhausted he was. He yawned and stood up.
“I’m going to sleep.”
“Good idea.”
Soon, they were all on their feet, collecting the remnants of the food and joking softly with each other about how tired they were.
“I have a question,” Jani said to Butu as they settled into the basalt palace of the Urgarun children. “How did you know Zhek was going to attack you?”
“I got my Turun sight back when I made Tirud king. Mnemon could still shape stone after making a king, so it makes sense that I’d keep whatever talent I’d’ve kept as an adult,” Butu explained.
“No. I mean before that. I think you knew what he’d do before you suggested resting in the shade.”
“I knew he wanted to be king, but he doesn’t think ahead. It was adult magic.”
“Adult magic?” Amber asked.
“Yes,” Butu said, remembering Tirud’s explanation in the shanjin. He wasn’t talking about blood priests at all. “If you don’t think about what you’re doing and why, you’re like sand. You get blown around by every little gust of wind — every whim and feeling that comes along — and even adults without magic can shape you into whatever they want you to be.”
“If you would be wise, you must keep your eyes open,” Tirud murmured.
“And if you would sleep, you must close them,” Lujo grumbled.
Silence fell over them, then, and Butu drifted into sleep.
He woke to the distant sound of sordenu marching chants. Butu rose and went to look over the edge of the cliff. Tirud, Blay and Jani were already there. Below, the Akdren army marched west, back toward the Riphil, with the Kadrak army several miles ahead of them.
As they watched the withdrawal in silence, the others came out to join them. The sun was hot in the morning sky by the time Tirud broke the silence.
“Let’s go down into the city.”
They gradually turned away from the cliff and followed Tirud to another basalt outcropping, which descended back to the shanjin. From the surface, Tirud lowered them into the earth and back to the nursery of the Urgarun children’s sanctuary. They crossed the marble footbridge into the dim quarter of the city.
Tirud surveyed the fallen city as they walked.
“I’m not yet certain I should keep the name of my adopted clan,” Tirud said.
“Will you go back to being a Kanjea?” Jani asked.
He hesitated. “No. I’m thinking of taking the name Tirud pi’Urgarun. I suppose we are all Urgarun, now.”
Tirud waved a hand vaguely at the ruined building. The eternal tears of the Urgarun children suddenly stopped falling from the ceiling, and as the dull translucence of salt melted away from the crystal buildings, the ever-present light brightened until it rivaled the sun except without the heat.
“It’s so beautiful!” Amber breathed.
“Is that the palace?” Paka asked, pointing at the gleaming crystal building at the top of the enormous dais.
“Yes. And you can have whatever room in it you want,” Tirud promised as they walked toward it.
“Really?”
“I’d prefer you let me have the throne room, but other than that, yes.”
“Of course.”
They walked on a little while until they reached the stairs.
“I’ll go pick one out,” Paka announced as he broke into a run.
He vaulted the stairs in twos and threes. Butu couldn’t help but smile.
“Do you wish you could still do that?” Blay asked as the rest of them ascended.
“Sometimes,” Jani admitted. “It’s not so bad once you’ve learned how to do everything without magic.”
“I’d give anything to go back,” Blay said, touching his goatee.
“Even everything you’ve learned and experienced since your mirjuva?” Tirud asked.
“Maybe not that, but just about anything else,” Blay said at last, taking his hand from his face with a grimace.
“How soon before the other soldiers loyal to Tirud come down here?” Phedam asked. “This city feels so empty.”
“It takes more than soldiers to fill a city,” Amber said. “We need craftsmen and traders and people to provide food.”
“And tailors,” Butu said, pointing to the bottom of his pants, which were now nearly an inch too short for his legs.
Finally!
As they reached the top of the stairs, they heard a clatter and a muffled cry. They exchanged brief looks and then ran to the source of the noise. Paka sat on the floor, looking extremely confused about something. Butu reached him first.
“What’s wrong, shumi? What happened?”
Paka looked up at him, showing him scrapes on his hands that were already healing. Very softly, he said, “I fell.”
Butu held out a hand to Paka. “Then let me help you stand up again.”
Four Moons Press
Invites you to read a sample
of a forthcoming novel
By Eric Zawadzki and Matthew Schick
COMING IN SPRING 2012