Sennar's Mission (26 page)

Nihal forced herself to let it rest. She too, in the past, had held tightly to her secrets. And she knew well how unbearable questions could sometimes seem. But her curiosity remained.

And that was how, after more than a year’s absence, Nihal once again set foot on the steppes of the Land of the Wind. She was afraid to return to the place where she’d lost everything, but at the same time she felt it to be an important step. She knew it was time to conquer her fears, despite her dread that the past would come back to haunt her, or else she’d never be able to close that chapter of her life.

They were stationed in a camp just beyond the border of the Land of Water, near the remains of a destroyed tower. There was an air of resignation about the place. Ganna, the sorcerer serving as stand-in councilor for the camp, was only a teenager. Which wasn’t necessarily a problem, in theory—Sennar was also very young—but Ganna knew little of strategy or war tactics, and was paralyzed by his own insecurity. During meetings he kept his mouth closed, speaking only when spoken to, and he couldn’t come up with a bright idea to save his life. A disaster.

Ido and Nihal were hardly welcomed with open arms—a woman and a dwarf weren’t exactly the sort of reinforcements the knights were expecting. Even the general in charge of the camp regarded them initially with suspicion before simply pretending they weren’t there, not even bothering to consult them before decisions were made.

Nihal didn’t trouble herself over it. She was used to such treatment and had learned that, when it came time to prove herself in battle, her sword would do all the talking.

Ido seemed ill at ease, but Nihal was certain it had nothing to do with the behavior of the other knights. He came out of his tent only rarely, always brooding and reluctant to talk.

The only one of them to gain the knights’ immediate sympathy was Laio. Right away he became the camp mascot. The knights joked with him and took advantage of his services, until essentially he was everyone’s squire. Besides, how was it possible not to like Laio? He was an indispensable helping hand around the camp, always eager and in perpetual good spirits: a ray of sunlight in those dark days of war.

For the first time since she’d begun fighting, Nihal had her own personal tent.

She adjusted quickly to the rhythms of daily life at the encampment—how could she not, with combat now as the central focus of her existence? Back at the base, several weeks might pass without her having to pick up a sword. Here, on the other hand, they hardly had time to breathe between one battle and the next.

The territory was rife with spies, and enemy attacks were frequent. When they weren’t on the offensive, they were sent to bolster defenses at a neighboring base.

Nihal proved her valor immediately in the first battle. They were to attack and seize a tower, one of many. She disregarded the orders of the general, who had commanded her to fight on the second line, and stepped up with the other Dragon Knights, battling alongside Ido. The two of them were used to fighting as a team. They were efficient, operating together like a well-oiled machine, and proved to be a great help to the other warriors. The tower was seized rapidly and with few casualties.

Nihal, however, did not get away without a slap on the wrist. There was a time she’d have fought tooth and nail to defend her actions, but now she suffered the rebuke with patience and indifference.

“You’re right, I shouldn’t have done that. But the tower is ours now, if I’m not mistaken,” she said, looking the general straight in the eye.

Their bravery at the tower earned her and Ido the respect of the other knights at the camp, who little by little began to consider them an essential component to the success of their missions.

Within a month, the rhythm of life at the new camp had become familiar and tiring. Nihal was fighting often and resting little. She felt right at home.

It was a muggy night, lit only by the full moon.

A sweltering heat besieged the encampment. Nihal had forgotten how suffocating the nights could feel in her Land. She was tired, too tired to think. Sleep would have been the perfect antidote to her disquietude. But sleep wouldn’t come. She lay there, practically drinking the humid air as she listened to the crickets chirping incessantly only a short distance from the tent. Nihal despised those nerve-racking insects. In the end, she went out to look at the moon and enjoy the soft breeze as it blew weakly over the steppe. She sat with her sword planted in the dirt between her legs and closed her eyes. Soon enough, she dozed off.

Perhaps it was thanks to her ever-alert senses, or perhaps it was a mere coincidence, but suddenly she awoke and looked up toward the sky. A black shadow swept across the silver disc of the moon. It had happened in an instant, and it took her a moment or two to understand what she’d seen. Her realization came at the precise moment of the guard’s loud cry: “We’re under attack!” His shout distorted into a death rattle.

Nihal plucked her sword from the ground and made for the stables. What she’d seen, in fact, was a dragon—it was an air strike! She raced past the startled faces of warriors as they exited their tents, past squires already busy harnessing the dragons, past infantrymen whizzing about in all directions. And then she reached the Fammin. They seemed to have sprouted up out of nowhere. They were demolishing the tents of those who hadn’t roused in time. Suddenly, a bright light flared up in the darkness, followed by a gust of unbearable heat. Part of the camp was on fire. Fire-breathing birds circled high above. There was no time to get Oarf, no time to don her armor.

With only her sword, Nihal readied herself for attack, entrusting the dark to cloak her movements. Her heartbeat slowed. Her eyes narrowed. She was prepared to battle. Clear-headed and confident, she advanced on the Fammin.

The camp was completely unprepared. The flames, the smoke, the heat took most of them by surprise. Once again, the Tyrant had proven himself shrewd and efficient in the art of war.

Nihal caught sight of Ido as he approached. Sword in hand, he was completely focused. With his usual calm, he cleared himself a path, hacking down anyone who stepped in his way, until he was at Nihal’s side.

“One of them is on a dragon. He’s the one burning the tents. Go and get Oarf!” Ido shouted.

“There’s no time, Ido!”

“I’ll cover you! You just worry about running,” said the dwarf, and leaped forward to intercept the Fammin surrounding her.

Nihal took off for the stables. Once again, she noticed a shadow pass over the moon, casting a dreadful darkness over the encampment. It was then that she experienced a strange sensation. At first she thought it was a dizzy spell, but then she could tell it was something different. She picked up her pace, demolishing two enemies as they jumped in front of her. When she reached Oarf, he was already clawing at the ground, raring for action. She stuffed her head into a helmet she found lying on the ground, leaped on the dragon’s back, and took to the air just as the stables went up in flames.

From above, she could see the full extent of the damage. One half of the camp was engulfed in flames, and numerous corpses dotted the ground. On the other half, the battle raged on, though the Fammin overwhelmingly had the upper hand. The swords they clutched in their hideous claws were unusual, their blades giving off a strange, reddish glare. Nihal dipped toward the ground and Oarf snatched up a few of the beasts, killing them on the fly. Then they dove again and picked up Laio as he ran for cover.

“Hold on tight and don’t let go, no matter what,” Nihal commanded.

With Oarf’s help, she went on mowing down victims among the enemy ranks, forcing herself to remain calm, to keep her focus. But it wasn’t easy. The scene below was horrendous and disheartening. She could feel Laio tighten his grip. It was high time she dropped him off somewhere safe. Scanning the territory below, she noticed a clearing and sped toward it.

“I’m bringing you back down,” she shouted. “You hold on tight to your sword and if anyone comes, you kill them, got it?” She felt Laio press his head into her back and nod.

Once she’d dropped him off, she reared back and took to the air again, only to plunge down toward another horde of Fammin.

She had no choice but to fight from just inches above the ground, though she could feel how much effort it was for Oarf to hover there. The entire encampment was up in flames. There was nothing left to do but fight with all her might.

She didn’t know how long she had been fighting when all of a sudden she was gripped with agony and a chorus of wailing voices filled her head. The desperate wailing reverberated in her brain. It was the same sensation that had overtaken her the day of Salazar’s destruction. And it was just then, surrounded by the hiss of flames, her temples pulsing, her vision blurred, that she lifted her head and saw him.

He was just above her, glowing in the bleak light of the moon, a colossal dragon, blacker than the night sky. Floating there in mid-air, its enormous, membranous wings stretched wide, the dragon was staring directly at her with a clear, emotionless gaze, and her blood froze in her veins. Its eyes, as red as hot coals, gleamed with a sinister light. A man was sitting on its back, completely immobile. It was impossible to distinguish his features. He seemed giant beyond proportion, and as black as the beast beneath him. Oarf, who feared nothing and no one in the sky, Oarf the fierce and mighty veteran, trembled before his presence.

For a brief moment, they held each other’s gaze, though to Nihal it seemed an eternity. She was paralyzed, unable to move a muscle. Then, in the midst of the immense blackness, a bright strip of red appeared as the dragon opened its scarlet mouth and spit fire into the darkness. In the flash of light, Nihal saw the man’s eyes, tiny and gleaming, the eyes of a weasel, unfaltering. The wailing in her mind overtook her, drowning out all sound. After that, she saw only a burst of red sweep over her as she plunged into a bottomless abyss. The voices gave way to a more violent shout, a howl like a roaring laugh of victory, of defiance.

When Nihal came back to her senses, she was lying on the ground, shielded beneath Oarf’s wing. She felt groggy; there was a sharp pain in her arm.

“Nihal, what happened to you? Are you injured?”

She stared vacantly up at Ido, unable to respond.

“Oarf, get her somewhere safe,” the dwarf said, as he heaved her onto the dragon’s back.

Nihal held on with all her strength, struggling to recover her thoughts. Just as Oarf took off, she saw the black dragon descending like death over the encampment, destroying everything in its path. Once again, her head filled with the unbearable clamor of crying voices. And then she remembered. She understood. Salazar at dusk, the plains gleaming orange in the fading sunlight, the Tyrant’s army in the distance. High above there had been an ominous figure, its massive wings beating. The very same dragon she’d just faced.

It took an entire night of ceaseless battle to repel the attack. Retreat was an alien concept to the Fammin, so there was no choice but to slaughter the beasts, one by one. The warrior on the black dragon flew off just before dawn, when it became clear that they would not be able to seize the camp.

The first rays of sun flooded the encampment with merciless light. Not a single structure was left standing. They’d held their ground, but that was all. The camp was lost.

Ido was weaving his way through the ashes, exhausted, when Nihal saw him. He’d been the soul of the army’s resistance, fighting without respite, indifferent to injury, heat, flames, death. And now he was wiped. One more step forward and he’d have collapsed.

Nihal landed her dragon and ran to him. “Ido, are you okay?” she asked with alarm as she took stock of the dwarf’s many wounds.

“Not quite, I’m afraid. But I’m no worse than I look, either,” he answered, his voice hoarse. He gave her a once-over and his eyes stopped on the substantial burn mark on her arm. “You’ve been wounded.”

“It’s nothing,” she replied. “We have to clear out of here now.”

Ido shook his head. “No, there might be someone still alive in there, in the midst of this mess. It’s my duty to find him,” he murmured. “We have to try and—”

Nihal cut him off. “Come, Ido. Come with me.”

The survivors—nearly a hundred of them, just more than half of the camp’s original inhabitants—gathered together in a clearing not far from the ruined encampment. They’d been defeated on every front. The camp was unsalvageable, and the number of wounded staggering.

“Nihal, do you want to explain to me what happened to you up there?” asked Ido, once he’d gained hold of himself.

She cringed as the agonizing sensation she’d suffered in the presence of the black dragon filled her memory.

“Well then?” the dwarf insisted.

“I recognized that warrior.”

An obscure shadow swept across Ido’s eyes. “Which warrior?”

“The one riding the black dragon. I know him, Ido. When the Tyrant’s armies attacked Salazar, I was up in the tower with Sennar, watching from a terrace. I saw the Fammins’ lances glittering in the dark. I saw the army approaching. And that man was leading them.”

Ido remained silent.

“Last night, when I found myself face-to-face with him, I lost all sense of my surroundings. That’s what left me so vulnerable. That’s what allowed his dragon to catch me off guard.”

“Dola,” Ido muttered. “The man from last night, his name is Dola.”

Nihal looked Ido in the eye. “Sennar told me about him. Dola … He’s the one who destroyed my village. He’s the one responsible for my father’s death.”

For a moment, Ido held her gaze, then abruptly turned his head and closed his eyes.

They transferred to an encampment a few miles away, still along the border, but farther west. If one listened carefully, it was possible to hear the waters of the Saar in the distance. Once there, Ido and Nihal took their first moment’s rest since the day of the attack. Each, in different ways, had worked to alleviate the situation. They’d refused to let themselves be discouraged. Rather, they had inspired courage in everyone around them, helping the generals to reestablish order among the ranks.