That seemed to sting Damoc’s pride, but he abruptly laughed it off. “As well, I could have gutted him where he stood, more than once.”
Belina favored Leitos with an imploring look. After brief consideration, he decided no good could come from humiliating Damoc in front of his daughters and his clan.
Leitos fingered the cut in his robes, and put on a humble grin. “This one did come very close.” It was the best he could offer, and that seemed enough. The Yatoans began chuckling, as if they found brushes with death amusing-in that, they reminded him of the Brothers.
While the others were distracted, Damoc’s wry mirth fell away, and he leaned close to Leitos. “This trust you have earned is thin. Betray it, and I will dip your naked shanks in waters brimming with fangfish.”
Now I know where Belina learned her manners, Leitos thought, holding back a weary grin. “Just so.”
After a time, the elder asked, “What did you see beyond the corridor?” His tone spoke of an interest in something other than the Faceless One, and considering what Belina had told him about stealing women to breed changelings, Leitos thought he knew the deeper question.
“I saw nothing of humankind,” he said.
Damoc considered that in brooding silence, then turned to his people. “Mahk’lar do not idly wander these islands, for there is nothing here for them to seek. Let us find where so many went with such haste. In knowing that, we may learn why they have abandoned the Throat.”
Chapter 31
The Fauthian guard returned, his gaze devoid of emotion. Of the captives only Adham, Ba’Sel, and Halan remained kneeling amongst the hall’s central pillars. After looking between the trio, the guard dragged Halan to his feet. Adu’lin seemed to take a perverse pleasure in allowing Adham to watch the Brothers being led to their doom.
The guard walked Halan into the other chamber, from which screams would soon echo for a short time, before a heavy silence fell. The big man did not protest, as some of the others had, nor did he fight, as fewer had. He walked with his blindfolded head hanging, resigned to whatever fate awaited him.
Adu’lin met the guard at the doorway. “We are nearly finished,” he called to Adham, and ushered Halan out of sight.
Like a sheep to the slaughter, Adham thought, his churning insides sour.
As the guard took his place beside the doorway, Adham looked to Ba’Sel, whose eyes were blindfolded, and hands bound behind his back. Sweat coated his skin, and an occasional tremor shook his limbs.
What is he thinking? Why does he not dispute the poor treatment of his men? The temptation to despise the man for his weaknesses fell over Adham, but he resisted.
“Can you guess what they are doing?” Adham asked in a low voice.
“I barely know where I am,” he admitted, sounding tired, out of breath. “The last clear memory I have is the first morning after coming to Armala. After that, all is as dreams seen through smoke.”
“That bloody fruit wine stole your wits,” Adham growled, thankful once more that he had not partaken of the filthy Fauthian drink.
Ba’Sel nodded slowly. “I remember it, a ghastly nectar, like spoiled honey and rotten fruit. But after a few swallows it … it took away cares that had been with me for so many years.” In a whining tone that Adham found unnerving, he said, “I felt free for the first time since that repugnant princeling strode from the crumbling temple in the marshes, his eyes gone white, and his skin hanging like a man suffering from a wasting sickness. Little did we know that many of us had been changed.” He paused again with a shudder, then went on hollowly.
“That boy changed inside the temple, gained dark powers. He laid waste with strange fire, burning my kindred to ash in a blink. He summoned a serpent from the mud, a creature of wood and bark and flesh. Kian ordered us away, and so we fled … even knowing he could never survive alone. But he did survive. Kian was not man to die easily. He was a true leader, a king.”
“My father never chose to wear a crown,” Adham said with fierce pride, “but he did serve his people.”
Ba’Sel did not seem to hear him. “Some days after we regrouped, Kian returned to us. Ishin, our leader then, gave him a bowl of snakefish soup. All but Ishin gagged on the taste. Kian fared no better. Ishin was offended, which was nothing novel.” Ba’Sel went quiet again, then spoke in a fearful hush.
“That night, my cousin Fenahk came from the forest … but he was my kin no more. He had become something else, and the creature inside him-the demon, the Mahk’lar-tore him apart from the inside, like a moth emerging from a cocoon, ripping his flesh and bones to shreds. Kian and my brothers fought the beast, as did Ishin. In fear, I remained apart, using my bow. Kian destroyed the creature, seemingly with his voice alone … but not before it had killed Ishin.
“After that, it fell on me to lead the Asra a’Shah. It was a task I never hoped for, but it was mine to do. Perhaps I was too young, or maybe I was never suited to lead. A madness came over the world in the early days after the Upheaval. It broke some part of me that has yet to heal.”
Uncomfortable with the revelations, Adham set himself to planning a way to escape, or at least a way to kill some few of his captors. Until my last breath and drop of blood, he thought, taking solace in the stark and unbending ways of his ice-blooded kinsmen.
Try as he might to turn his thoughts, a question kept arising in the forefront of his mind. Would I have behaved any differently than Ba’Sel? He wanted to believe that he would have shouldered the task as his father had, but was not sure.
Kian’s entire life, from his time as a displaced orphan scrounging for crumbs on the deadly streets of Marso, to his rise as a coveted mercenary, had shaped him into the man he needed to become in order to defeat a depraved princeling with the stolen powers of a god, and to cast Peropis back into the Thousand Hells. Even his later rise to rule over the fractured kingdom of Izutar, and his unceasing resistance against the Faceless One, seemed preordained.
Adham shook his head, unsure if he could have prevailed, had he stood in place of his father or Ba’Sel.
Halan’s sudden howl destroyed Adham’s brooding counsel. Fresh beads of sweat showed on Ba’Sel’s brow, and he began muttering to himself.
“Unless you want to suffer whatever nightmare Adu’lin has planned for us,” Adham urged, “you better find the strength that made you the leader of the Brothers of the Crimson Shield.”
“To what end?” Ba’Sel pleaded. “We are as good as dead-the same fate that has befallen all my brethren these long years.”
“I should wring your coward’s neck,” Adham snapped.
“What cowardice is it to accept that which we cannot alter? Better to make your peace with the Silent God of All, and pray for a sleep of serenity to fall over you before … before they begin.”
Loathing churned in Adham’s throat, and for a moment he thought he might scream in rage. Somehow, he kept his voice low, and asked, “How can you go willingly to your doom? You were an Asra a’Shah, a man born and bred for battle. Is there none of that man left inside you?”
“So many years,” Ba’Sel sobbed. “Four lifetimes of men have I trod the face of the broken world. I have seen the death of thousands at the hands of Alon’mahk’lar, and those who bent their knees to the Faceless One. Longer than you have been alive, I have fought, when I would have rather raised good, tall sons, and tilled the soil of my homelands in peace.”
“ ‘Tilled the soil?’ ” Adham snarled, losing all patience.
The guard glanced their way.
Adham bowed his head, and said from the corner of his mouth, “You are a man of war, and have been all your life. There are no crops for you, and there never has been. The only soil to till lies in the black hearts of all who would destroy humankind at the behest of a soulless demon. If there is any hope for those who come after us, you must resist the Faceless One.”