Threshold

  “Yaqob –” Boaz began, but Azam broke in.

  “We have not the time for this, Yaqob. Isphet, stay here, and lock up safe until we come for you. If it looks bad, then flee for the Lhyl. You may have a chance of stealing a boat.” He paused, and looked about. “Yaqob, Kiamet, come with me.”

  But Yaqob was staring at me. “Tirzah,” he said. “Do you remember what once I told you?”

  “Yaqob?”

  “I said, Tirzah, that on the day we fought to freedom, you and I, I would leave Boaz dead behind us.”

  And before any of us could react he drew his sword and lunged the distance between himself and Boaz.

  I screamed and lunged myself, but there was nothing I could do. Boaz was surprised and unarmed, and all I saw was a flash of steel as Yaqob sank his blade into Boaz’s belly.

  “That,” Yaqob snarled, his face close to Boaz’s, “is for the pain and the grief you have caused Tirzah and I.”

  Then he stepped back, wrenched his sword free, seized me and gave me a hard kiss. “Soon, Tirzah,” he said, “soon.” And then he was gone.

  I beat Kiamet to Boaz’s side only by an instant.

  “Boaz!” I cried, wrapping my arms about him as he sank to the floor.

  Behind I heard Isphet push Azam out the door. “Go!” she said. “Go! There is nothing you can do here.”

  Kiamet was helpless. He had been trained to inflict such wounds, not aid them, and Isphet laid a hand to his shoulder and literally hauled him away. He sank to the floor some paces away, his mission to aid Azam forgotten.

  Boaz had still not said a word. He wore a stunned look on his face as he stared down at his hands wrapped about his belly. Blood was seeping through his fingers.

  “Boaz!” I wailed again. “Isphet, do something!”

  “Stupid, stupid, stupid,” she muttered, and I think she was referring to the whole of life with that word, not just the tragedy playing out before our eyes. “Stupid! Tirzah, take his hands for me, keep them away. I need to look…”

  She tore at his robes, using a small knife we used for gutting fish to cut them away. “Kiath, tear up some bandages. Now!”

  Isphet exposed Boaz’s belly, and I stifled another cry. Yaqob had struck him slightly to one side of his navel, a neat clean wound that nevertheless bled profusely.

  Boaz moaned, as the first pain nibbled in at his shock.

  “Isphet!” I cried, and she turned and struck me hard across my face.

  “Shut up, girl! I don’t need you moaning as well!”

  She probed quickly, then took the bandage that Kiath handed her. “There’s not much I can do now, Excellency…Boaz…except stop the bleeding. Later I’ll explore it more. See what damage has been done. But a belly wound…”

  She didn’t have to tell any of us how dangerous that was. “It depends on what Yaqob struck on his way through. Tirzah, help him sit up, I need to wrap this about him. Good.”

  Boaz grunted as I leaned him forward, then relaxed back once Isphet was done. “Isphet,” he said, his voice hoarse with deepening pain and shock. “Get Tirzah away from here if –”

  “I’m not leaving you!” I said. “Not!”

  “No-one’s going anywhere yet,” Isphet said. “Tirzah, press here…yes, that’s good. Maintain that pressure. It will help stop the bleeding.”

  She sat back on her heels, her face pale and smudged with blood across the chin where she’d wiped one of her hands. Her eyes drifted between Boaz and myself. “It seems,” she said softly, “that Yaqob has more to be concerned about than whether or not the Magus plans to foil his uprising.”

  “I live for Boaz, Isphet. I have for months now.”

  “Then it is a shame you neglected to tell Yaqob that your affection for him has dimmed, Tirzah! He is too good a man, and has been too good to you, to be thus treated. You have given him the hope and the dream to get through many a dark day. Now…” She looked at Boaz with utter distaste. “Now he will take the news hard.”

  “Then I hope he doesn’t take it out on me again,” Boaz muttered, and his hand fluttered over the red-tinged bandage about his belly, “if this was only the result of a mild distemper.”

  “Rest,” Isphet said abruptly, and she rose, walked to the far side of the room, and sank down to her sleeping pallet. Her eyes never left us.

  “Boaz?” I whispered. “Boaz?”

  “Hmm?” He was drifting in and out of consciousness.

  “Boaz, don’t leave me.”

  “Perhaps Isphet was right. Yaqob would be better for you…after all I’ve done…Yaqob would be better…”

  “Boaz,” I whispered, “Don’t leave me!”

  We sat for an hour or more, waiting for we knew not what. Kiamet and Holdat had dropped to one side of Boaz, helpless, but lending me strength through their presence.

  Eventually Isphet rose and came over to us. Boaz was now asleep – or unconscious – and she told me to relax the pressure on his belly.

  “He tore you apart with his power, Tirzah,” she whispered. “And now he suffers likewise. It is not a coincidence, methinks.” And she was gone again.

  I lowered my head and wept, remembering what the Soulenai had said to me.

  Tirzah, if someone visits such pain on another person, then one day that pain will rebound on him. It is the price he will eventually have to pay.

  “No, no, no,” I whispered. But it was too late. I could only hope that the price he would have to pay would not be too great.

  Time passed, and the room grew hot. Boaz sweated and tossed in my arms, and I whispered to him fooleries that I’m sure only deepened his fever. Holdat fetched a damp cloth and wiped Boaz’s brow, and I smiled briefly at him, grateful.

  “Fighting,” Isphet said, breaking into my thoughts.

  I raised my head, listening.

  I did not hear anything immediately, then heard the faint noise of shouts, and the ring of steel against steel. “Zabrze has had to fight his way through to Threshold,” I said listlessly.

  “And we fight with him.” Isphet was standing now, a hand and an ear to the door. “Kiath. Go to the roof and tell me what you see.”

  Kiath slipped out the courtyard door, and I heard her quick steps on the stairs.

  She was gone a long while, and meantime the sound of fighting grew closer. Isphet glanced at me and at Boaz from time to time, her face worried. Where was Yaqob? Azam?

  Would we have to move without them?

  Gods, no! I prayed. How would we move Boaz? He could not be moved.

  Damn you, Yaqob, I thought, that you be so unwilling to accept the help handed you! Damn your jealousy! But then I wondered if the blame for Yaqob’s actions should be laid at my feet, not his. Had I been wrong to keep silent for so long?

  Kiath returned.

  “Well?” Isphet snapped.

  “There is heavy fighting in the streets to the west of us,” Kiath said. “I do not think Prince Zabrze managed to get close to Threshold. His men, and those of us who fight with him, are being forced back.”

  “Where is the sun, Kiath?” I asked. “How high?”

  “It waits but an hour until noon.”

  “Isphet!” I cried, forgetting my earlier concerns about leaving. “We’ve got to go! If we’re still here at noon…!”

  “There’s worse,” Kiath said.

  “Out with it, girl!”

  “Gesholme is afire.”

  We all stared at her, and I realised even Boaz had his eyes open. Afire! Oh, gods!

  “Then we have no choice,” Isphet said, and squatted down by Boaz. She grasped his face in a rough hand.

  “Magus, can you walk?”

  “His name is Boaz,” I said softly, but my eyes were hard.

  Isphet ignored me. “Well?”

  “If I have help, yes,” he replied.

  “Well, you’ll die if you stay here. Kiamet, help him up.” And she rose and bundled several belongings into a blanket, speaking swiftly to Kiath and Saboa.


  Boaz did not make a sound as Kiamet helped him rise, but his face paled, and I grabbed him, thinking he was about to faint. Holdat fussed about us, but I told him to look after the box. “And the goblet, too, if you can manage it.”

  He nodded, wrapping both goblet and box in a blanket Kiath handed him, and then Isphet was at the door.

  “Ready?”

  We all nodded save Boaz, he was concentrating too hard on staying upright.

  “Isphet,” I said urgently as she opened the door.

  “What?”

  “Please, we’ve got to stay out of Threshold’s shadow as much as we can. Keep to overhangs and narrow alleys. If it sees us…”

  She stared at me, but she understood. “Very well. Come on now, the alley is clear…”

  Clear of people, but smoke drifted down over the rooftops, and the sounds of fighting some three or four streets distant clattered about our ears.

  “Hurry!” Isphet hissed.

  “What about the others?” Saboa asked. “The tenements are packed.”

  “I’ve no time to save the world,” Isphet snapped. “This sorry band will take all my effort.”

  But she banged on doors as we passed, shouting to occupants to get down to the river.

  We stumbled along, Kiamet taking much of Boaz’s weight as he concentrated on putting one foot ahead of the other, his arm tight about my own shoulder. Please do not die, Boaz, I prayed. Please. Please.

  We reached the end of our alley and Isphet waved us to a halt. “Down here, I think,” she muttered, indicating a street branching to our left.

  “But,” Kiamet began.

  “I know it’s longer,” she said, “but it’s also clearer, and frankly I prefer an extra quarter of an hour in clear streets than lying dead in crowded ones.”

  I glanced worriedly at the sky, looking for the position of the sun. But smoke was thick overhead now, and all I could see was an indistinct haze.

  And so we stumbled on. Isphet led us well, taking twisting, narrow alleys and passageways that I barely knew existed. Bands of other slaves passed us, some armed, hurrying to the fighting, others like us, fleeing flames and the action behind us.

  I wondered what Threshold thought of all this.

  “Boaz!” I whispered as a thought occurred to me. “With all the smoke drifting overhead, the sun won’t have a chance to break through!”

  Boaz mumbled a reply, his face ashen and sweating, and it was Kiamet who answered.

  “The wind blows from the north-east, Tirzah. Threshold will be clear.”

  Isphet stopped us underneath an overhang. “Tirzah, Kiamet. Strip that blue robe from Boaz.” She looked me in the eye as I was about to protest. “We’re nearing the river. There are undoubtedly hundreds of slaves about. What they will do if they recognise Boaz I cannot say.”

  Appalled that I hadn’t thought of this myself, I pulled the blue robe and sash from Boaz as Kiamet supported him, gathering them into a bundle and further loading down the long-suffering Holdat. Boaz’s white under-robe was stained with blood and dirt, but that was good in as much as it further disguised him.

  “Kiamet, bear with me,” I muttered, reaching for the dagger in his belt. I cut Boaz’s queue off with two quick slashes, and threw it away, mussing his now shortened hair. Then I rubbed dirt about his face.

  “Quick!” hissed Isphet, and we were off again.

  There were burning buildings close to us now, and the smoke was thick and choking. Embers and sparks flew through the air, and tears streamed from my eyes.

  Shouts and screams and the clash of steel echoed from around a corner, and Isphet waved us to yet another uncertain halt.

  “I do not know what to do,” she said. “There is fighting ahead of –”

  Abruptly half a dozen men lurched into our alley. Two were slaves, the others wore the armour and insignia of the imperial army. One wore little more than a blue wrap, rent and bloodied, and a gold band about his sword arm.

  “Zabrze!” I cried. “Oh, Zabrze! Help us! Please!”

  “Tirzah?” He stumbled closer, and I saw that he had sustained a number of nicks in his chest and arms. “Shetzah! Is that Boaz?”

  “I have not had a good day, Zabrze,” Boaz muttered, barely able to raise his head to look at his brother.

  “Damn you, Kiamet!” Zabrze snarled. “What were you doing to so allow this –”

  “There was nothing any one of us could have done,” Isphet said, restraining Zabrze by the arm as if she thought he might strike Kiamet. Zabrze stared at her, then pulled his arm free.

  “It was a rash action fuelled by long-held hatreds,” Isphet continued, utterly calm in the face of Zabrze’s anger, “and, surely, he should have expected something of the like. But what is happening, Zabrze? We know nothing save of the fighting and fire.”

  Zabrze glared at her familiar use of his name, but knew this was not the time to fuss. “Most of the army remain loyal to Chad-Nezzar, who remains totally loyal to the power promised him by the Magi and the power of the One through Threshold.”

  Zabrze threw a simmering glance at Boaz, but was too worried about him to comment further. “I have a few units behind me, no more. We tried an assault on Threshold, aided by Azam and Yaqob and some two thousand slaves, but it was no use. We got no further than the gates to the pyramid’s compound, and have been beaten back street by street.”

  He looked at me. “It’s the river, Tirzah. Escape. There’s nothing more we can do. We’ve got to get Boaz to safety.”

  “It must be close to noon, Zabrze.”

  He nodded distractedly. “Yes. I’ll help you get through, but…but Neuf…”

  “Oh gods, Zabrze!” I cried, “where is she?”

  His face looked haggard. “Still in the compound of the Magi, I think. I’ll have to go back for her.”

  “Zabrze! You can’t…it’s too late…too dangerous!”

  “I can’t leave her here!” Zabrze shouted. “I won’t leave her here!”

  A dozen other armed men joined us, Azam among them. “Great Lord. We must get to the river.”

  Zabrze nodded. “Yes, yes. Take this group, and mind that you cause no further hurt to my brother. I think he is the only one who will ever be able to destroy that abomination!”

  Yet more men joined us, and I felt more hope than I had for a long while. The sound of fighting still reached us, but it had drifted off into another street.

  “The way is clear,” Isphet said.

  “Then hurry!” Zabrze shouted. “I’ll join you as soon as I can.” And he dashed off back the way we’d come.

  Without thinking I handed my share of Boaz’s weight to one of the imperial soldiers. Boaz was safer now than he had been all morning, and though it broke my heart to leave him, I owed Zabrze too much to let him run back to his death for that woman. And I wanted him alive and with us, for I knew he was going to be as important to Boaz’s ultimate survival as Isphet or anyone else.

  “Isphet,” I gasped, “look after Boaz! Promise!”

  She nodded. “What…?”

  “I’ll be back,” I cried, and then I was off, bunching my skirts about my knees as I ran after Zabrze.

  I caught him as he turned the corner into a blind alley.

  “Stupid woman!” he cried. “Get back with –”

  “You’ll be caught by a sword or a falling tenement if I let you wander about Gesholme by yourself! And that won’t save Neuf. Come on! This way!”

  And I grabbed his royal hand and pulled him in the opposite direction.

  It was a nightmare run.

  Smoke lay thick about us, and I tore lengths from the bottom of my dress so Zabrze and I could wrap them about our faces and keep some of the smoke from our lungs. There were people about the streets, but most of them were milling aimlessly, disorientated by the smoke and the heat and the thickening darkness above us.

  Threshold, stretching its shadow.

  “Zabrze!” I cried as I looked back to see him with the sam
e confusion darkening his eyes. “Think of Neuf, or of Boaz. But don’t let Threshold confuse you! Resist it!”

  He shook his head, then nodded. “Which way?”

  “Down here. Fast, Zabrze!”

  The gates to the compound of the Magi were unguarded and we stumbled through unhindered.

  “Where was she, Zabrze? At your residence?”

  I saw him nod – the smoke was not so bad here, and when I glanced north-east I saw that Threshold stood clear and sun-drenched. Soon. Soon.

  The residence, as the gates, was unguarded, and I supposed that all soldiers and guards were in the streets, either protecting Threshold or fighting the rebels.

  “Where?” I gasped.

  Zabrze took the lead, pushing past me and leading me down a central corridor. He checked rooms as we passed, but no sign of Neuf.

  We would never find her if she’d fled to somewhere else.

  But she hadn’t. We eventually discovered her hiding in a pantry off the kitchen. Her eyes were wide and frightened, and her hands trembled as she clasped them before her.

  “Zabrze! What’s going on! I heard rumours that you had led men against the Magi?”

  “No time to talk now,” Zabrze said. “If you stay here you’ll die. We’ve got to get down to the river.”

  Neuf saw me for the first time. “Girl! What are you –”

  “Shetzah, Neuf! Hurry!” And Zabrze dragged her, stiff and resisting, into the kitchen.

  “Zabrze,” Neuf said in a firmer voice. “I don’t want to go with you if you are going to lead me off on some wild insurrection. I won’t do it. I’ll stay here. I’ll be safe here. I’m not going to go with slaves…”

  Zabrze cursed again, far more foully this time, and swung Neuf into his arms. She gave a wail of protest, but he ignored her. “Tirzah. Out. Go.”

  I wasted no more time, thinking that it would have been no great loss if we had left the cursed woman to her fate.

  I raced from the residence, then through the Magi’s compound and into Gesholme, Zabrze panting behind me. Put her down and make her run herself, I thought, but that would only be counterproductive, because I knew that Neuf, placed on her own two feet, would refuse to take any step that might bring her closer to the river.