“Roasted owl,” Kesla explained.
Joach brought it to his lips. His eyes closed with satisfaction as his teeth sank through the charred skin to the tender meat. He sighed with appreciation, tasting the sweet juices used in the marinade. He had never experienced anything so wonderful.
Noises of appreciation arose from the others. With the men having sampled the fare, the women began to spear and jab at the feast. As the night wore on and the moon climbed high in the sky, laughter and ale flowed, easing residual tensions and aches. Joach could almost forget that he sat in the middle of the Southern Wastes, one of Alasea’s harshest lands. Finally, his stomach full, he groaned with pleasure and put down his spear.
“More?” Kesla teased.
Joach shook his head. “I couldn’t stand another morsel of your people’s hospitality—Not without bursting like an overripe pumpkin.”
The group shared his views. Sy-wen and Kast were soon retreating to their assigned tent, arms locked around each other. Hunt stirred, too. “I should get Sheeshon to bed.” The child leaned against the Bloodrider’s side, gently snoring. She had fallen asleep long ago. He picked her small form up under one arm and stood. Sheeshon did not even stir. Weaving slightly from the ale, Hunt strode toward the tents.
“Sleep well,” Kesla called after him.
He lifted an arm in acknowledgment, then disappeared into a tent.
Turning, Kesla’s eyes found Joach’s. They were alone now. She glanced shyly away. “I told Shaman Parthus about the nightglass dagger. He’ll join us on the journey to Alcazar tomorrow.”
“That’s good,” Joach mumbled, suddenly awkward. He rolled his feet under him, pushing up. “I guess I should find my tent.”
Cross-legged, Kesla stared at her toes. “Already?”
Joach felt his heart jump. He shuffled his feet. “Well, I . . . I’m actually not that sleepy.”
She slid smoothly to her feet. “It’s good to walk a bit after a large meal. Better for the digestion.”
“So I’ve heard. But walk where?”
She finally lifted her eyes back to his face. “I’ll show you.” Kesla waved him to a trail between a dense grove of trees. “There’s something you should see.”
Kesla led, but Joach quickly stepped beside her. “Where are we going?” he asked.
“You’ll see.”
In silence, they wound through the trees. Small bats roosting in the canopies took flight at their approach. But soon the trees were behind them, and they were climbing a path up the face of a dune. Joach’s feet kept slipping in the sand, but Kesla moved lightly up the slope. She reached back and helped him.
Her hand was an ember in his palm.
“If you walk with the inner edge of your feet, you’ll not need to fight the sand as much.”
Joach did as she instructed and discovered she was right. But though he moved more easily, she never released his hand. He did not object. In fact, he moved closer to her side. He could smell the water of Oo’shal in her hair, and the soft scent of her skin.
All too soon, they reached the crest of the dune.
The desert, etched in silver by the bright moon, stretched forever. “It’s beautiful,” he mumbled.
She leaned closer to him and pointed her free arm. “Do you see that spear of rock near the horizon?”
Joach squinted. He could just make out a lone mountain in the distance, its slopes limned in moonlight. “What is it?”
“It’s Alcazar. My home.”
Joach stared down at her. Her eyes brimmed with tears. He let go of her hand and draped his arm around her shoulders, pulling her to his side, hugging and holding her.
The cold assassin melted into his side, now just a woman.
RICHALD LAY ATOP the thin blanket, the sand beneath sculpted to his contours. The camp had long gone quiet, but sleep escaped him. The tribe’s healer had given him medicines to dull his pain, but the ache in his broken leg still nagged. His remaining crew lay around the wide tent, curled in slumber; a whistling chorus of snores surrounded him.
He closed his eyes. He could still sense his ship, even from leagues away. During his life, he had seldom left its planked decks. To lose the Fury was like losing a part of himself. He felt naked, vulnerable.
He remembered his distraught words to Joach. Foolish, he thought to himself. It was not proper for a prince of the Blood to show weakness, to ask for forgiveness, especially from a half-breed like Joach.
But in his heart, he knew he needed the comfort of the young man’s counsel. As much as he sniped at Joach, Richald had grown to respect the man. He had proven his royal blood, both in the past and even on this journey. It had been Joach who had goaded him into finding that last bit of strength necessary to guide his ship over the vine’s fields. If it hadn’t been for the boy, they all might have died. Joach had given Richald the strength to find his honor, to ply his elemental skills to their fullest.
And as much as the loss of his ship was a wound in his heart, Richald relished that final flight: the rush of wind, the snap of sailcloth, the dance of flames, even the overwhelming pain as the ship broke apart under him. At that moment, he had never felt more alive and vigorous. Lives had depended on him. His skill was all that had stood between life and death.
Tears filled his eyes. He owed the experience to Joach.
Richald shifted his hip, triggering a flash of agony up his leg. The pain helped focus his thoughts. Injured, he was more a burden than an asset to the mission here in the deserts. The plan was for him to recuperate at Alcazar while the others continued in their efforts to destroy the Basilisk Gate. And this rankled him—it was the true reason sleep escaped him this night. He owed Joach a debt, and he meant to honor it.
But how? How could he be of use in his current broken state?
Richald stared at the tent’s roof. If there ever was a way to repay Joach, he would.
“This I swear on the blood of my family,” he muttered softly.
Content with his spoken promise, Richald rolled to his side, guarding his leg, and knew he could finally sleep.
IN THE THICK of the night, Joach woke with a start, as if someone had called his name in the dark. He sat up, his heart pounding harshly. He stared around the small tent. It was empty—some stored rolls and bags, but nothing more. He tossed aside his blanket and rolled from the thin bed, naked except for a pair of cotton breeches. The cool desert night chilled his bare flesh. His ears strained for what had startled him awake.
The only noise outside was the soft whisper of tree fronds wafting in the gentle night breezes. Still, Joach shivered.
Stepping to the tent flap, he pushed a corner open and peeked outside. The night had grown darker than when he had climbed into his bedroll after his walk with Kesla.
Beyond the tent, past a few trees, Joach spotted the central clearing. As his eyes adjusted to the dark, he spotted a shadowy figure standing out there. The stranger waved an arm, indicating Joach should approach.
Glancing right and left, Joach hesitated. Not a single light glowed anywhere around the oasis. But he knew guards had been posted around the valley. No intruder should have been able to enter the area without raising an alarm.
Joach bit his lower lip and slipped through the tent flap. Out of the shelter, the night breeze chilled him to the bone. He wrapped his arms around his bare chest.
Ahead, the dark figure waited, unmoving.
Joach stepped forward, swallowing back his fear. Once closer, the features of the lurker grew clearer: his bald head, his burnt-copper skin, and his piercing eyes that glowed as bright as the moon. Joach recognized the tribe’s shaman.
He strode more confidently forward. “Shaman Parthus.”
“Joach Morin’stal.” The shaman’s voice rasped like flowing sand.
“How may I help you?” Joach asked hesitantly, not fully able to shake his nervousness.
The shaman did not answer. He simply waved Joach to sit with him in the sand. The old man folded to
the ground, cross-legged.
Joach felt uncomfortable looming over the elder, so he settled to the sand, too. Only then did he spot a small bone bowl resting before the shaman’s knees. It was filled with thumb-sized nuts.
Parthus noticed his attention. “Gre’nesh seeds.”
Joach remembered Kesla’s description of the fruit’s seed. Diluted, it made a strong, intoxicating ale, but when taken whole, it supposedly helped the shamans of the tribes in some mysterious ways.
Parthus picked up the bowl and offered its contents to Joach. The young man took one of the offered seeds, as did the shaman.
“I don’t understand,” Joach mumbled.
“You are a shaman. I spotted it in your eyes when you first came to Oo’shal.”
Joach shook his head. “I have the gift of dreamweaving, nothing more. I am no shaman.”
Parthus stared at Joach with those intense bright eyes. “That will be seen.” The shaman popped a gre’nesh seed into his mouth. A loud crack sounded as his teeth bit into the nut. Parthus nodded for Joach to do the same.
He hesitated, then did as instructed. He popped the seed between his molars and crunched down on it. Almost instantly, a bitter taste filled his mouth. He swallowed back a gag.
“Do not fight it,” the shaman said, but his voice was dreamy, almost as if he were drifting away.
Joach stared across the small space, eye to eye. His mouth filled with saliva as his tongue fought the bitterness, trying to wash away the taste. With his fingers clenched on his knees, Joach swallowed hard. For a moment, he felt nothing, just relief to get the foulness off his tongue.
With a nod, the shaman spit out the empty husk of his seed; Joach did the same.
Joach coughed on the residual bitterness. “What now? Is there some—” Then the world dissolved around him. Trees and tents, water and sky—all washed away. All that remained were two things: the endless sand and the lone figure of Parthus still seated across from him.
Joach craned his neck. Overhead, the night sky was empty—no stars, just an endless blank expanse that spread to all horizons. Yet instead of finding this strange landscape dark, Joach had to squint against the brightness. All the sands around them glowed with the same shine found in the shaman’s eyes.
Joach gawked at the landscape. As strange as this all was, Joach felt a twinge of familiarity. He had been here before. Last night, as he slept, he had dreamed of this place. In the morning, he had thought the sandy dream a mere reflection of the day’s arduous trek. But here he was again.
Parthus rose smoothly to his feet and held out a hand. “Come. It is time you walked the dream desert.”
Joach, his mouth still hanging open, accepted the man’s firm grip and allowed himself to be pulled to his feet. “Where exactly are we? What is this dream desert?”
“The gre’nesh seed freed our spirits from our bodies. Once untethered, those attuned to the elemental energy of sand are drawn into the desert’s endless dream.”
“But I have no skill in sand magick.”
Parthus nodded. “I know this. But you thrum to all things dreaming. You were drawn not by the sand, but by the dream itself.”
Joach frowned and stared around him. Not a creature stirred, not a wind blew. But even though it was quiet, he sensed a great pressure all around him, as if he were submerged deep under the sea and something large were examining him for dinner. He wrapped his arms around his bare chest and wished he had thought to don a shirt. Turning back to the shaman he asked, “But where exactly are we? Why did you bring me here?”
“Follow me.” Parthus swept his cloak around his thin shoulders and struck out across the smooth landscape.
Joach matched his stride. As they walked, Joach sensed great distances were crossed with each step. “Where are you taking me?”
“To the heart of the dreaming . . . To the Southwall itself.”
Joach cringed. “Is it safe?”
“As long as you stay at my side. Don’t wander off.”
Joach studied the landscape of empty glowing sands and emptier skies. Where could he go?
As if reading his thoughts, Parthus spoke. “To walk alone here can threaten your very spirit. Occasionally other dreams will intersect with this plane and bring nightmares to the sands. Here they have the strength of real beasts. They can kill or worse.”
“Worse?”
“Sometimes as you engage another’s night figment, you can become drawn out of this landscape and into the dreamer’s mind. If that happens, you will be lost forever.”
Joach’s belly became queasy. He studied the sands more closely. Was that a flicker of movement at the corner of his eye? His gaze darted all around him.
“Do not search too closely. It gives the figments power, sapping your own spirit through your attention. Instead, focus on your own goal. Do not be distracted.”
Joach nodded, but his eyes spotted a shimmer to his left. He looked. A handsome silvery woman appeared from the sands wrapped in diaphanous silks, barely hiding a lithe body of long legs and inviting curves. Joach stared.
The figure noticed his gaze and smiled. Joach found his own lips curling to match her expression. She raised a slender arm and, with a single red-nailed finger, motioned for him to come nearer.
Joach stepped away from the shaman—but a bony grip clenched his elbow. The shaman held him tight. “Look closer, boy,” Parthus hissed in his ear.
Blinking, Joach opened his mouth to protest, but the shaman’s words cast the glamor from his eyes. The slender woman still stood in the sands, inviting, alluring—but from the waist down, Joach realized her body was that of a monstrous coiled snake, writhing in the sands.
Joach jumped away, bumping into the shaman behind him.
The nightmare hissed, lips parting to reveal silvered fangs.
“Keep moving,” the shaman said, shoving Joach forward. “It’s nothing. A figment. But a moment longer, and your attention would have pulled it fully from the sands.”
Joach swallowed the terror down into his belly, suddenly sick.
The shaman steadied him with a hand on his shoulder. “Take deep breaths. The figment drew some of your energy. It’ll take a moment for you to gain it back.”
Joach nodded and kept marching. He drew great gasps into his chest, and after a few moments, the queasiness did indeed fade away. “I’m feeling better,” he mumbled as Parthus drew beside him.
“Good, because we’re almost to the Wall.”
Joach frowned. Ahead the desert stretched just as featureless as usual. “Where?”
The shaman motioned him to silence. “No further words from here.” He reached and took Joach’s hand.
Together, they walked across the desert. Again Joach was struck by the odd sensation of great distances being traveled, but soon this feeling waned. Though they walked at the same pace, Joach felt as if they were slowing, less distance being crossed with each step.
At last, Joach noted a slight ripple in the sand ahead. He squinted, but it was too far away. They continued on in silence. Slowly details emerged as they approached. Movement—the ripple grew into a silver river cutting across their path, with only a slight meander to its course.
As they neared, Joach saw it was not water that flowed along this channel but what looked like molten silver. Parthus drew Joach up to the nearest bank. He could feel the power here, like a pressure in his ears. The sand led at a gentle slope to the silver’s edge. Parthus pointed into its depths.
Leaning over the river, Joach saw his own reflected face, as clear as in any looking glass—but that was not all! He bit back a gasp, covering his mouth with a hand. Reflected in the silver was the night sky filled with stars and a massive wall towering behind Joach. He glanced over his shoulder but saw nothing—just the endless smooth desert. He returned to his study of the reflection. Glancing to the left and right, he saw the wall’s length was reflected along the silver river’s entire course.
“The Southwall,” Parthus whisp
ered. “The desert dreams of it here.”
Joach’s eyes widened in wonder.
Before he could comment, Parthus hushed him and led the way along the bank’s edge, heading to the left. Joach followed. He found it hard for his eyes to leave the river. Along the silver channel, he watched their images striding along the length of the Southwall. Amazing.
But after a bit of time, the reflection in the river began to fade, growing darker. It was a subtle change, but with each step, the silver seemed to lose its luster. Joach also noticed that the constant pressure of power wavered, too. He glanced questioningly to the shaman.
The elder held a finger to his lips. He led the way over a slight slope. The river swept around the sandy hill in a gentle curve. As they crested over the low mound, Joach cringed at what came into view.
A short distance ahead, the river swept around the slope and into a cauldron of blackness, where it was swallowed away. The sick flow churned in on itself, forming a swirling vortex, a whirlpool of disease. Beyond this cauldron, Joach spotted a trace of the silver river continuing deeper into the desert, winding toward the endless horizon. But even from the distance, Joach could tell the flow was feeble, weakened and corrupted by its passage through this black stain.
Joach returned his attention to the vortex of corrupted energy. He saw that the stain was not limited to the river’s course, but tendrils ran under the sandy banks and spread into the desert, shadowy veins that burrowed far, dimming the glow of the dream sand.
Joach shuddered. He remembered Kesla’s description of a spreading poison that tainted the Southern Wastes. He knew he was staring at the cause.
At his side, Parthus raised an arm and pointed to the black cauldron of swirling corruption. A single word formed on his lips, a name. “Tular.”
With this revelation, the shaman drew Joach back down the slope and away from the river, heading back the way they had come. Joach marched in silence, stunned by what he had just been shown. The evil at Tular was feeding off a vein of the Land’s energy, twisting this font of power to its own fetid purposes.
As he walked, Joach recalled the manner by which the ill’guard were forged, how certain elementals’ energies were corrupted and bent to the Black Heart’s cause. The same was going on here—only on a grander scale. Horror ran like ice through Joach’s veins. Could the Dark Lord twist the Land itself into an ill’guard slave? Was such a thing possible? If it came to be, if the Land itself turned against their side, no one would be able to withstand the Gul’gotha—not even Elena.