“I will be waiting,” was all she said, and they stayed that way, the three of them together, as dawn turned the sky to gold.
3.
Sareth left that day, taking only one other–a broad‑shouldered young man named Fahir–with him. Word had been sent to the fastness of Golgoru, in the Mountains of the Shroud, but there were few T’golthese days. Nor was it likely one would reach Al‑Amъn sooner than Sareth; from here it was only a half day’s ride to the port city of Kalos, on the southern tip of Falengarth, at the point where the Summer Sea was narrowest. Sareth hoped to reach the city by nightfall and book passage on a ship tomorrow.
Before he left, his al‑Mama called him into her dragon‑shaped wagon and made him draw a card from her T’hotdeck. His fingertips tingled as they brushed one of the well‑worn cards, and he drew it out. As he turned it over, a hiss escaped her.
“The Void,” she rasped.
There was no picture on the card. It was painted solid black.
“What does it mean? Do I have no fate, then?”
“Only a dead man has no fate.”
He swallowed the lump in his throat. “What of the A’narai, the Fateless Ones who tended the god‑king Orъ long ago?”
She snatched the card from his hand. “As I said, only a dead man has no fate.”
His al‑Mama said no more, but as Sareth left the wagon he glanced over his shoulder. The old woman huddled beneath her blankets, muttering as she turned the card over and over. Whatever it portended, it troubled her. However, he put it out of his mind. Perhaps the dead had no fate, but he was very much alive, and his destiny was to return to Lirith and Taneth as soon as possible.
They reached Kalos that evening as planned and set sail the next morning on the swiftest ship they could find–a small spice trader. Fahir, who had never been at sea before, was violently ill during the entire two‑day passage, and even Sareth found himself getting queasy, for the Summer Sea was rough, tossing the little ship on the waves. The ship’s captain remarked that he had never seen such ill winds this time of year.
Fortunately, the voyage was soon over, and they disembarked in the port city of Qaradas, on the north coast of the continent of Moringarth, in the land of city‑states known as Al‑Amъn. Sareth had traveled to Al‑Amъn several times in his youth; it was a custom among the Mournish of the north that young men and women should visit the southern continent, where most of the Morindai dwelled. Qaradas was just as he remembered it: a city of white‑domed buildings and crowded, dusty streets shaded by date palms.
“I thought the cities of the south were made of gold,” Fahir said, a look of disappointment on his face.
Sareth grinned. “In the light of sunset, the white buildings do look gold. But it is only illusion–as is much in Al‑Amъn. So beware. And if a beautiful woman in red scarves claims she wishes to marry you, don’t follow her! You’ll lose your gold as well as your innocence.”
“Of the first I have little enough,” Fahir said with a laugh. “And the second I would be happy to dispense with. This is my first trip to the south, after all.”
They headed to the traders’ quarter, and Sareth examined the front door of every inn and hostel until he found what he was looking for.
“We will be welcome here.”
In answer to Fahir’s puzzled look, Sareth pointed to a small symbol scratched in the upper corner of the door: a crescent moon inscribed in a triangle. This place was run by Morindai.
Inside, Sareth and Fahir were welcomed as family. After they shared drink and food, the hostel’s proprietor suggested a place where camels and supplies for a journey could be bought at a good price. Sareth went to investigate, leaving Fahir with orders to rest, and to not even think about approaching the innkeeper’s black‑haired daughter.
“By her looks, I think she favors me,” Fahir said. “Why shouldn’t I approach her?”
“Because by her al‑Mama’s looks, if you do, the old woman will put a va’kshaon you that will give you the private parts of a mouse.”
The young man’s face blanched. “I’ll get some rest. Come back soon.”
They set out before dawn the next day, riding on the swaying backs of two camels as the domes of Qaradas faded like a mirage behind them. At first the air was cool, but once the sun rose heat radiated from the ground in dusty waves. All the same, they drank sparingly; it was a journey of six days to the village of Hadassa, where the rumors of the dervish had originated.
During the middle part of each day, when the sun grew too fierce to keep riding, they crouched in whatever shade they could find beneath a rock or cliff. They were always vigilant, and one would keep watch while the other dozed. Thieves were common on the roads of Al‑Amъn.
Nor was it only thieves they kept watch for. While the sorcerers of Scirath had suffered a great blow in the destruction of the Etherion over three years ago, recently the Mournish had heard whispers that their old enemy had been gathering again. Even after three thousand years, the Scirathi still sought the secrets lost when Morindu the Dark was buried beneath the sands of the Morgolthi. Because the dervishes sought those same secrets, where one was found the other could not be far off.
The days wore on, and water became a hardship. The first two springs they came to had offered some to drink, though less than Sareth had been led to believe. However, after that, every spring they reached was dry. They found no water, only white bones and withered trees. Doing their best to swallow the sand in their throats, they continued on.
Fahir and he never spoke of it, but by the fifth day of their journey Sareth knew they were in grave danger. There were but two swallows for each of them left in their flasks. It was said that Hadassa was built around an oasis. However, if its spring had gone dry like the others, they would not make it back to Qaradas alive.
You could cast a spell, Sareth thought that night as he huddled beneath a blanket next to Fahir. Once the sun went down the desert air grew chill, and both men shuddered as with a fever. You could call the spirits and bid them to lead you to water.
Could he really? The working of blood sorcery was forbidden among the Morindai; only the dervishes broke that law. True, the elders of the clan had allowed Sareth to use the gate artifact to communicate with Vani when she journeyed across the Void, to Earth. However, that had been a time of great need, and it was not a true act of blood sorcery. Sareth had spilled his blood to power the artifact, but he had not called the bodiless spirits, the morndari, to him as a true sorcerer would.
Besides, Sareth asked himself, what makes you believe you could control the spirits if they did answer your call? They would likely consume all your blood and unleash havoc.
Yet if he and Fahir did not find water tomorrow, what choice did he have but to try?
The next day dawned hotter than any that came before. The white sun beat down on them, and the wind scoured any bit of exposed flesh with hard sand. They were on the very edge of habitable lands now. To the south stretched the endless wastes of the Morgolthi, the Hungering Land, where no man had dwelled in eons–not since the land was broken and poisoned in the War of the Sorcerers.
The horizon wavered before Sareth. Shapes materialized amid the shimmering air. He fancied he could almost see the high towers of the first great cities of ancient Amъn: Usyr, Scirath, and the onyx spires of Morindu the Dark. . . .