And to what end?
He stared back up at the statue. It was unharmed.
A shout rose behind him. “Kral! Beware the statue!”
Through the tears of despair, Kral watched the griffin lean toward him, wings spreading wider, black lips pulling back to further bare its fangs. He knew now what his efforts had succeeded in doing.
He had awoken the Black Beast of Gul’gotha.
Book Six
RUINS OF TULAR
18
JOACH WALKED TO where the sands ended and the desert lake began. He stared across the strange landscape. Though small boats sailed across its smooth surface, it was like no lake he’d ever seen before. Instead of blue waters, an endless sea of black glass spread to all horizons. Joach tapped his toe on the hard surface to make sure it was real. The lake was named Aii’shan by the tribes of the Southern Waste, “the Desert’s Tears” in the common tongue. It stood between them and Tular.
“It’s like a frozen sea,” Sy-wen said behind him. Kast stood at her side. The pair wore desert robes and cloaks, hiding their outlander features.
Nearby, a small skiff loaded with bales and crates glided past with its sails full of the afternoon’s breezes. It ran across the glass sea on a pair of sharpened steel runners, whisking past them with the slithery sound of its blades. In the distance, other ships could be seen plying the lake, crossing from village to village.
Kesla stepped up to Joach at the lake’s edge. “We should continue on, if we are to reach Dallinskree by nightfall. The tithing caravan will leave at sunset.”
He nodded, rubbing the stump of his right wrist against his hip. Phantom pains still plagued him. Though his hand had been bitten off by the foul creature of Greshym, Joach still felt an itching and burning in his lost fingers.
Behind them, Hunt stood beside one of the giant desert malluks. His ward, the child Sheeshon, sat perched on the shaggy beast’s neck, one hand tugging on her mount’s ear. “Klup, klup!” she called out, trying to imitate the drover’s nickering call to get a stubborn malluk to move. The beast simply ignored her, huffing out its blubbery lips in an expression of exasperation.
Hunt patted her leg. “Leave the poor creature be, Sheeshon. It’s tired.”
As were they all, Joach thought. They had traveled the entire night to reach Aii’shan by morning and were still running short of time. The assembled children for this moon’s blood tithing were due to depart from the town of Dallinskree that night, and they still had to cross the lake.
Atop the malluk, Sheeshon gave her mount’s tufted ear a final tug, then settled back to her seat.
On the beast’s other side, Richald hobbled forward, leaning on a wooden crutch. The elv’in’s leg had healed rapidly. The recuperative powers of the elv’in, along with the medicinal magick of the desert healers, had mended the broken femur in less than half a moon. Still, Joach had tried convincing Richald to stay behind at the oasis of Oo’shal to attend his fellow elv’in, injured during the attack at Alcazar. But the prince had insisted on joining Joach on the journey to the Southwall. “I gave my word to see this through,” he had said. “I will not dishonor it. Whatever strength or magick I possess, I will use to aid you in the battle to come.”
Joach crossed to meet the elv’in now.
Richald wore a slightly pained expression. “Innsu returns,” he said, and pointed an arm to the west.
In the distance, a small plume of sandy dust marked the approach of a malluk running at full speed. It was followed by another.
“He’s not alone,” Richald added needlessly.
The group gathered around, waiting to discover what Innsu had learned in the small lakeside village of Cassus. They had been traveling overland for the past half moon and had had little contact with any but a few nomadic tribesmen. They were anxious for news.
Joach stared at the stretch of dunes and endless sand. Kesla moved beside him. He heard her breathing, the rustle of her cloak. Again he found it hard to believe the old shaman’s revelation that Kesla was no more than the Land’s dream given shape and life, brought into being to draw him to the desert sands.
From the corner of his eye, Joach studied Kesla: her hair shining like beaten gold in the bright sunlight, the deep bronze of her smooth skin, the twilight blue of her eyes. Even she did not know her true self. She thought herself as human as any other—and most times, he had the same problem himself.
Dream or not, he could not ignore or dismiss how his heart ached with the sight of her. Even now, he remembered the brief brush of her lips on his cheek as they fled Alcazar’s keep. How he longed to explore that unspoken promise to its end. But he clenched his fist against such foolishness. She was not real.
At last, the clopping tread of the approaching malluks drew his attention forward. Innsu and the stranger drew their lumbering mounts up the low dune. Both beasts frothed and were damp with sweat. Innsu slid off his perch and landed lightly on his feet. The journeyman assassin shoved aside his cloak’s cowl, his face tight with concern.
Kesla stepped up to him. “What’s wrong?”
“Disaster,” Innsu said, running a hand over his shaved head. “Word in Callus is that winged demons arrived this past night, pale, vicious creatures who scoured Dallinskree for every child. Any who resisted were slain.”
“And the children?”
“They were taken, along with the tithing already gathered from the neighboring tribes.”
“But why?” Kesla asked, her eyes wide with shock. “The pact . . .”
Innsu shook his head. “I don’t know the full story. Only that every child was taken this morning, emptying the city. A caravan set out upon the point of a whip, heeled by demons.”
Joach cleared his throat with a scowl. “For them to take so many young ones, something new must be afoot in Tular.”
“But what?” Kesla asked.
“If only Shaman Parthus were here,” Joach mumbled.
The elder of the desert tribes had remained at the oasis of Oo’shal, insisting that his presence was needed to help heal Alcazar and Guildmaster Belgan from the taint of the darkmage’s occupation. But on the evening the group had set off into the desert, Parthus had pulled Joach aside. “I will watch for you in the dreaming sands. I will do what I can to help.” And he had proved as good as his word.
Every other night, the shaman had met Joach in the dream desert, instructing him in the art of sculpting dreams into reality.
Joach wished he could share the shaman’s wisdom now. They had left the oasis so many days ago with a single plan in mind: to infiltrate this moon’s tithing by posing Sheeshon as one of the sacrifices. Under cover of the tithing caravan, the group could have snuck to the very steps of Tular without raising suspicion. But with the children already under way . . .
“What are we to do now?” Kast asked. Sy-wen hung on his arm.
Innsu waved to the stranger, still seated on his malluk. “This is Fess a’Kalar, pilot of a skateboat in Cassus. He’s willing to take us to the far side of Aii’shan. We might be able to intercept the caravan, overtake them as they travel the sands around the lake.”
“For a price,” the man said from his saddle, his voice dark.
Innsu nodded.
“What’s this price?” Joach asked with suspicion.
The man shook back his hood. His black hair was cropped close to his head except for two locks hanging in front of his ears. His eyes were as black and hard as the lake at his back. “I will take you all to the far side of Aii’shan, but you must swear to bring back my young daughter.”
Innsu explained. “His child was tithed this past moon.”
The pilot turned away, but not before Joach saw the pain in his eyes.
Joach spoke up. “We’ll do our best to free all the children.”
“No,” Fess a’Kalar said, turning back, his eyes sparking. “Innsu has already explained your plan to me: to hide under the cloaks of the children so you might sneak upon the ghouls unseen. I wil
l not have my little Misha be a shield for your foolish attack.”
“We will not risk the children,” Joach said. “Their safety will be our foremost priority. This I swear.”
“Besides,” Innsu added, “the children are already doomed. Our presence will not add to their danger, but offer a chance of salvation. Once we reach the Southwall, we will send them fleeing under the protection of Hunt and the desert warriors.”
The skateboat pilot appeared little swayed.
Kesla stepped forward. “Already a full legion of desert warriors is en route along Aii’shan’s other shore. Once we’ve entered Tular, they’ll lead a feinting attack on the Ruins. The ghouls will be too distracted to be concerned with the fleeing children.”
Fess pulled his hood back up. “Misha is all that is left of my wife. She died three winters ago. I cannot lose Misha, too.” He swung his malluk around. “I cannot.”
Innsu turned to Joach and Kesla. “He was the only pilot willing to travel to Aii’shan’s far side. It lies in the shadow of the Southwall. None will sail their boats so close to Tular.”
Joach sighed and stepped forward to block the pilot’s beast. “What would you have of us then?” he called up to the mounted rider.
The man’s eyes almost glowed from inside his hood. “I would travel with you to meet the caravan. Once you’ve commandeered it, I want Misha freed before you continue on. With so many taken from Dallinskree, they will not miss one small child.”
Joach considered the man’s request. He glanced to Kesla. She gave him a barely perceptible nod. Joach returned his attention to Fess a’Kalar. Joach hated to be coerced in this matter when so much was at stake, but at the same time, he saw no harm in granting this man his demands. It was his child. It was his boat.
Joach answered the silent plea in the desert man’s eyes. “So be it. We will free your daughter.”
Fess bowed his head. Words—a prayer of thanks—flowed from the man’s hood. “Reliqai dou aan.”
Joach turned to the lake of black glass. The sun had climbed the sky to turn the lake’s surface into a blinding glare. It was as if the world ended here. But Joach knew it did not. Beyond its far shore, the Basilisk Weirgate awaited them all. Standing on this shore, Joach could almost sense its baleful gaze. Even in the sweltering heat, Joach shivered under his cloak.
“So be it,” he mumbled to himself.
AS THE SUN SANK toward the horizon, Greshym crouched within the shadow of the Southwall. He stared into the small pool of quicksilver and waved his hand over its mirrored surface, erasing the image of Joach and his allies. He used his staff to pull himself up. “So, boy, you still intend to put your head into the beast’s jaws, do you?”
For the past few days, Greshym had been monitoring Joach’s progress, plotting and planning. It was a simple thing to spy on the boy since the bonds between them went deeper than any suspected. The blood spell to open a window on Joach’s doings was a simple thing—no more effort than reaching out and shaking a hand.
“Which is just as well.” Greshym glanced up to the Southwall towering behind him. He cared not to draw the attention of what lurked inside Tular. He had made sure his hiding place was many leagues from the crumbled ruins and that any spells he cast were minor ones.
With the final pieces satisfactorily falling into place, Greshym allowed a small smile to crack his dry lips. Though he had been thwarted in Alcazar, the information he had gained was worth the loss. The boy is a sculptor. The shock of that revelation, more than any magickal assault, had sent him fleeing.
Greshym was well familiar with the magick of the dream. Long ago, he himself had been a member of the Hi’fai sect, a group devoted to studying prophecy and gleaning glimpses of the future through the art of dreaming. But since Ragnar’k, the stone dragon, had awoken and taken flesh, joining the wit’ch’s fight, Greshym had considered the boy’s elemental gift to be no threat. Now all that had changed.
Greshym turned his back on the black sea of glass and stumbled toward the wall of sandstone nearby. The revelation of Joach’s true ability made a certain sense. Without a doubt, there was balance and symmetry in this.
But more than that—it was also a chance like no other.
Greshym approached the wall and heard telltale scrabbling and scraping coming from a narrow hole in the sandstone surface. He tapped his staff against the lip of the cave. The sounds stopped and a bulky shape backed out of the cubby. Its curled tail and hoofed hind feet came first, followed by its squat body and porcine head. Peaked ears swiveled in agitation and fear. “Mmmasster.”
“Out of the way, Rukh.” Greshym leaned down to peer into the hollow the animal had been digging. He frowned. It ended just a short way in.
The stump gnome must have smelled his displeasure. A stream of urine sprinkled into the desert as the creature groveled. “Stone hard,” it pleaded and held up its gnarled hands. Its claws had been ground to nubs from digging at the sandstone. Blood dripped from the fingertips.
Greshym sighed and straightened. Why was he always plagued by beasts of such ill use? Greshym waved Rukh away. “Night comes. I’ll be hungry with the moon’s rise. Fetch something to eat.”
“Yes, mmmaster.” Rukh scurried out of his way.
Greshym bent to the hole, then turned and called back to the gnome. “And no more desert rats! Something with a bit of meat and blood!”
“Yes, mmmaster.”
Greshym ducked and pushed into the sandstone cave. As soon as his head passed the threshold, Greshym could feel the power flowing through the Southwall. He had chosen this spot since it was upriver from Tular. Here, the Land’s vein of power ran clean and untainted. Below Tular, the feeble, corrupted current would do him little good—not if he was to succeed in this first step.
Greshym reached the end of the excavated hole and slowly sat down, crossing his crooked legs in front of him and resting his staff on his knees. So near the heart of the true desert, the air almost glowed with energy, but Greshym knew it was just the sun setting, painting the desert in countless hues.
Settled, Greshym closed his eyes, waiting, patient. He touched the elemental gifts in his own body; they were long unused, almost forgotten, but still there. For any member of the Hi’fai sect, the dreaming was always just a breath away. Greshym sank into his trance, exhaling out the real world and willing himself into the dream desert.
Time drifted forward.
From a distance away, he sensed as stars began to shine and the moon’s full glow climbed the skies. And still he waited.
Finally, Greshym felt a familiar tug and allowed himself to be drawn away from stars and moon. Night had come to the Wastes. The path to the dream desert opened, and Greshym flowed into it, ripe with power. He had tested entering the dream desert over the past several nights. From a long distance, he had spied upon Joach in the glowing sand, watching the boy practice his new talent.
But this night was different. He had no intention of merely spying from a distance. This night he would take his first step on the path to ridding himself of this decrepit husk of a body, returning youth to his bent bones and ravaged flesh. And to take this step, he needed power.
Greshym opened his eyes. The cave had vanished around him. He now sat in the sands beside a bright silver river. He climbed slowly to his feet. The skies overhead were as blank as an empty slate, while around him the desert shone with a soft light. Greshym glanced back to the flat river. In its bright surface, he saw the Southwall reflected. He could even see the small cubby bored into its surface, so close he could reach out and touch it.
Smiling, Greshym leaned a hand over the great expanse of silver. The power here flowed like a raging river, but its surface was as still as a quiet pond. He passed his arm over the Southwall’s reflection, resting his hand over the entrance to the tiny cave.
“Come to me,” he whispered in the old desert tongue. As a member of the Hi’fai, Greshym had long ago studied the dreaming arts of the desert shamans. He knew their a
ncient tongue. He knew secrets lost to the ages. “Return to your master.”
Slowly, a long thin object rose from the silver river. Once it was within reach, Greshym closed his fingers around his familiar staff. As flesh met petrified wood, the silver river turned momentarily black. As if sickened by its foul touch, the river shot the staff out with a blast. Greshym was knocked back by the force of the expulsion, landing hard in the soft sand, but he managed to maintain his grip on his prize. Relieved, Greshym hugged his staff to his chest for a few breaths before moving.
Finally, he rolled around and shoved to his legs. He still had one more chore to complete this night. Turning his back on the river, Greshym set out into the desert. He moved swiftly, casting out his elemental senses, honing in on a single target in this vast desert. So far, there was no sign. But after spying here these many nights, Greshym knew where to go.
With the boy taking sail this evening across the dead glass sea, Joach would be unable to enter the dream desert. Greshym could not pass up this chance. Leagues of sand vanished under him. In the distance, vague shapes arose from the sand as sleepers throughout the Wastes accidentally slipped into this plane. Greshym ignored them all. He knew it would only sap his energy to give them attention. So he continued on toward the rendezvous.
As he neared the location, he sensed a ripple in the ever-present pressure of the desert’s power, like a pebble dropped into a still pond. He hurried forward.
Ahead, a figure took shape in the sand, cross-legged, his head bowed. Greshym pounced upon the unsuspecting arrival. He swung his staff just as the man darted a glance in his direction.
Instincts made the newcomer attempt to block the blow, grabbing at Greshym’s staff.
With a feral grin, Greshym allowed him to hold tight. “Well met, Shaman Parthus.”
The elder’s eyes shone with the glow of the dream desert. “Who are you?”