Sandstorm (36 page)

Those were his last words before Shahrokh flew into the room on a cyclone that flashed lightning. He gestured and the stranger rose into the air, struggling against unseen attackers.

“The kenku’s last words puzzled me,” the djinni said to the trapped man, ignoring Cephas and Ariella. “But the message they hid is now found out. You will show me
where your pathetic conspiracy has hidden him in the sewers.” With that, the djinni swept the firesouled genasi back through the window.

Unable to intercede, Ariella and Cephas watched Shahrokh and his captive vanish into the distance.

Cephas turned to her. “I believe the ringmaster has just cued the last act.”

Far below, Marod el Arhapan paced back and forth in the luxurious box of the master of games. He was impatient at the slow pace of the crowds filing in, but exultant to be at his rightful place behind the lectern.
This
was his place;
this
was his role. Playing Shahrokh’s political games, parrying with his hopeless son, even warring against the cursed WeavePasha … All of it paled next to the exhilaration of the arena.

An aide approached with a slate covered in chalked figures. After a quick glance, he dashed it onto the ground, the shattered pieces crunching beneath his boots. “No, fool! There will be no other matches on the card. The fight we witness tonight is a fight for the ages! No one will need to be warmed up for this!”

He took his seat, eager for the night to truly begin. He had forced twins to fight one another before, of course.

But never twins who also happened to be Arvoreeni adepts.

Inside the hidden chamber tucked away in Calimport Below, the priest raised his head. “Shahrokh comes,” he said. Then he added, “I fear our friend did not survive the task
we set him.” He looked at the others, then at Corvus. “His name was Ravin. He was an excellent chess player.”

All the Jannisars said, in chorus, “His name was Ravin. We will remember.”

Corvus felt helpless. Things were going badly before they had properly begun. He paused in his furious calculations. “Ravin,” he said, committing the name to memory. “I will remember.”

The others began to file out of the chamber, making use of a hidden way on the wall opposite. The maskmaker waved them through, urging speed. He said to Corvus, “Shahrokh is a skylord of the djinn. There are none here who can stand against him.”

Corvus said, “Go, and continue your work. Live.”

The halfling nodded once, and disappeared into the passageway. Once he closed the secret opening, it was undetectable.

Beside him, Tobin said, “Those Janessar are some pretty stout fellows. Can
we
stand against this Shahrokh?”

“Not even for an instant,” said Corvus. “If you know a way to the Djen Arena, go there and do anything you can to delay the fight between Shan and Cynda. I will deal with the skylord.”

“I know a way to the arena, Corvus, but you should not sacrifice yourself. You just said we cannot stand against him!”

“Good friend,” Corvus said, “there are sacrifices I have not told you of yet. But you must go now. I will not try to stand against Shahrokh. As I said, I will
deal
with him.”

“They’re still out there,” said Ariella. “At least a dozen as far as I can tell.”

Djinn swarmed the el Arhapan manor in numbers allowing no possibility for the windsouled pair to escape by air. Below, the Djen Arena was lit by enormous floating lamps, the stands nearly full. Cephas did not know what to expect, but he feared that the match his father had planned would mean death for some or all of his missing companions.

“If only the firesouled had told us what this foundation stone was!” he said. “And whether I’m meant to set it afire or throw it over the side, or something else.”

“I wish we hadn’t chased all the servants away,” Ariella said. “Perhaps they’d know what he meant by his message.”

“The servants have all fled the manor, windsouled.” The voice came from the far end of the hall. “I do not know what thorn you have thrust in Shahrokh’s side, but he has made this house a prison, and now only we remain on this ridiculous floating hovel.” Other words were murmured below these, in another’s voice.

Ariella did not hesitate. She drew her sword and released it with a whispered word of power. It spun past Cephas, down the long hallway, and into the neck of Lavacre, the tall, fat firesouled ambassador from Akanûl. He was still translating when it struck, and Cephas saw the man’s lips moving even as blood poured from between them.

“At least his last words were in the holy language,” Cephas said to Flamburnt. The short man watched the sword extricate itself and sail into Ariella’s waiting hand.

He ran.

Shan sat, waiting.

She had listened to Cephas talk about arena fighting to Tobin and the others during their journey across the
Tethyrian highlands. She knew that the crowd played some role in the fighting, that their cheers or catcalls affected the morale of the gladiators.

Shan was not a gladiator.

For the twentieth time since the Calimien slaves turned her into this small room, she checked her equipment. The armor was not the equal of that she usually wore, but it was of good quality. Her style of fighting depended more on avoiding blades altogether, anyway, than the hack-and-slash Cephas and Tobin favored.

After she had considered and rejected a hundred or so blades in the outfitting rooms, a djinni had appeared, apparently an unprecedented occurrence to judge by the way the windsouled overseers bowed and scraped. The elemental dropped a package wrapped in oilcloth at her feet, then flew away. When she unrolled it, Shan found her own sword and parrying dagger.

These now hung at their customary places at her hip and over her shoulder. The scabbards were new, so she had rubbed fish oil into them to ensure smooth draws, after she had given up on making the Calishites understand she wanted tallow for the job.

They were afraid of her, although she had offered no resistance. They let her wander from room to room until she came to a kitchen and found the pot of oil.

She wished she had tried harder for the tallow. The fish oil would suffice, but the smell in the small ready room was driving her to distraction.

The fish oil conjured memories of a hill village far away, secreted above a brackish swamp that provided access to the sea. They traded with the halflings of the marshland, mutton and leather for dried fish and nuts and news of the wider world—and fish oil. Until this moment, she would have guessed it was the news she would come to curse the most.

News of the wider world meant glory and adventure, concepts she greeted with suspicion and that her sister greeted with wide-eyed wonder. Eventually, it meant the abbey and the deep training of the Defender’s Way, and then the wandering years the Way required. It meant word from the village of a monster that would come to steal hers and her sister’s voices. It was word of a halfling monastery razed by unknown enemies.

She shook her head. Damn that smell.

She checked again. The straps of the armor were tight. The draw of the weapons was smooth.

Shan did not know what she would face when the doors opened. Nor did she care, because she had no intention of fighting for the entertainment of the people outside, who must number in the thousands from the noise they raised.

Her plan was simple enough. She would scan the crowd for people who looked important. She would go to where they were and kill them until just a few remained. She would hold the last of them hostage and somehow make herself understood. They would bring Cynda. Then the two of them would leave this terrible place and go somewhere else. They would go to the next part of their lives.

The plan would have been even simpler if Mattias were alive. He would have found a way to sneak in and bring Cynda out undetected, or to swoop down from the air with Trill and pluck her out of her prison. If nothing else, he could have destroyed the arena.

If Corvus were there to direct her—and if she still trusted him—her role would have simply been to kill until someone told her to stop. Probably Cynda—it was almost always Cynda who found a way to stay Shan’s hand.

She checked her equipment again. Damn the smell of the oil.

Shahrokh was forced to dissipate the lower part of his body in order to pass through the door, but he in no way appeared diminished. Rage spilled from the djinni, elemental power radiating from him so strongly that Corvus would have been hard-pressed to stay conscious if he had been more sensitive to such emanations.

Even so, he felt buffeted by more than just the wind that blew from the towering djinni. Corvus was glad he had chosen to await Shahrokh from a reclined position, propped up against a pile of pillows and drinking tea.

Shahrokh opened his hand and tossed a familiar object into the room. The
Book of Founding Stories
bounced and spun, its pages rifling. Corvus hoped the carpets protected the book’s covers from any damage.

“You will tell me where you have hidden the Book of Calim!” roared Shahrokh.

Corvus’s reply was calm. “Yes. I will.”