“Hey,” I called. We were alone, and no one else could see him anyway. He ignored me, not even lifting his head, absorbed in what he was doing. “Malator?”
“Come look at this, Lukien,” he said. I put down my brush and left the paddock, going to stand over his shoulder. He had drawn what looked vaguely like a dragon in the sand.
“Nice,” I commented. “So you’re talking to me again?”
“Look at the dragon, Lukien,” he told me, then passed his ghostly hand over it. The moonlight went through his fingers, striking the image and bringing it to life. The drawing twitched, the mouth and wings suddenly moved. It was a grotesque looking thing, changing quickly as I watched it, sometimes barely resembling a dragon at all. The trick made me smile.
“I didn’t know you could do that,” I said. “What is it?”
“I’m not sure,” said Malator. He leaned over to study it, the moonlight passing through his body. “Something I’ve been seeing lately in my mind.”
Now I was really interested. “What? Like the future?” Minikin had been able to glimpse the future and so could some Akari. But then I said, “There’s no such things as dragons.”
“The dragon could be anything,” said Malator. “A symbol maybe.”
“A symbol for what?”
Malator shook his head and would not answer. He watched the drawing change from a jumbled mass, then to something that looked like bones, and then at last back to a dragon. His unease made me nervous.
“What’s it telling you?” I asked.
Slowly he reached out and wiped the thing away.
“Come on, Malator,” I said. “What was that? What’d you see?”
Malator stood up to face me. Though he’d been kneeling, not a single grain of sand clung to him. “We need to talk about Cricket,” he said, “and the stupid decision you’ve made.”
“Now?” I turned back toward the paddock. “It’s too late. We’re leaving in the morning.”
“You need to listen to me, Lukien. Cricket can’t go with you.”
“Why?” I looked at him again. “What aren’t you telling me, Malator?” I gestured toward the sand where he’d made his picture. “Did you see something about Cricket?”
“No,” he said flatly.
“No. And if you did, would you tell me?”
“You’re letting her come between us, Lukien.” His face was earnest, even sincere. “You’re special. But I can’t teach you what you need to know if you’re distracted.”
“Special,” I scoffed. “Are you ever going to tell me what that means?”
“You’ll know in time,” said Malator. “But not if you take the girl with you.”
None of it made sense to me. I was sick of trying to figure out his riddles. “I’m going, Malator. And Cricket’s going with me.” I returned to Zephyr, picked up my brush, and continued grooming. Malator floated up behind me.
“Go to Akyre, Lukien,” he said. “It’s important that you do. But go alone.”
“Nope.”
Malator growled, “Stop blaming me for keeping you alive! You chose to stay alive, Lukien. You made the promise to Gilwyn and White-Eye. Cassandra’s dead. Cricket can’t replace her.”
I lowered the brush but didn’t turn to face him. “No one can replace her,” I said. “Why would you ever begrudge me something as simple as a friend?”
“I’m your friend, Lukien,” said Malator. “The only friend you need. Cricket can’t help you find peace. Neither can Gilwyn or anyone else. Only I can do that, but you need to listen to me. Learn from me. You have a destiny.”
“Which you won’t tell me about, right?” I threw the brush to the ground. “It’s always riddles with the Akari! If it’s my destiny then it’s mine. Who are you to keep it from me?”
“I’m not a fortune teller,” said Malator. “I can only be a guide.”
“Right,” I sneered. “What was that thing you drew? And why’s it important for me to go to Akyre all of a sudden? That was my idea, Malator. You had nothing to do with it.”
“I see things, Lukien. I don’t always know what they mean.” Malator folded his arms over his chest with an imperious, irritating expression. “But a host needs to trust his Akari.”
“Give me a reason to trust you,” I pleaded. “Tell me what this great destiny is you’ve got planned, and I won’t take Cricket to Akyre. Just once tell me the truth without wrapping it in riddles.”
Malator refused to budge. “The future cannot be revealed. You know that.”
“Then I’m going. I’m going, and I’m taking Cricket with me, and to hell with my destiny!” I pulled the sword halfway from its sheath. “You can keep me alive, Malator, but that’s all I want from you. From now on you serve me-not the other way around.”
“I’m an Akari, not a slave,” he bristled. “Let me be a friend to you. Trust me-and leave the girl here.”
“Why? Is she in danger? Because I can protect her, Malator. You of all people should know that.”
“You’re not immortal, Lukien. How many times must I tell you?”
“I know what I can do.”
“Leave the girl here.”
“No deal.” I determined to meet his stubbornness with my own. “Cricket comes with me. You’ll just have to live with your jealousy, Malator.”
“I could leave you,” he warned.
“No, you can’t, because I have the sword, and you’re bound to it. You leave when I decide it’s time for you to go. That may be in a day or two or a decade or two, but it’ll always be my choosing.”
His impish smile returned. “Your path could be wondrous, Lukien. If you let me help you.”
“Then let it be my path, Malator. That’s all I want from you.”
He said nothing more, simply disappearing, leaving me alone in the moonlight. I sheathed my sword and felt his quiet energy within it. He had frightened me. As accustomed as I was to talking with a ghost, I was rattled. If he had something wondrous in store, why couldn’t he tell me? Why did the Akari always couch their words in puzzles?
Curious, I went back to the spot where he’d drawn in the sand. Most of the picture was gone, except for a bit of the creature’s head. It was inanimate now, no better than something a child might draw. But I swear I saw nothing wondrous in it, and the word that gripped me wasn’t destiny.
It was death.
5
The worst part about crossing a desert isn’t the heat. It’s not the way the flies eat your skin or the fear of running out of water, either. The problem is how small it makes you feel. Anyone who’s done it knows what I mean. Once you’ve traveled for just a few hours, you look back and see nothing. And when you look ahead you see nothing, and you keep looking and looking and there’s nothing. There’s just sand and dunes and the horizon. There’s a fever that sets in when all you see is desert. If a man isn’t careful, it can madden him.
I had made the crossing more than once, and wasn’t afraid for myself. I knew how to guard against the desert’s bewitchments. We had our mounts and our mules loaded with everything we’d need, and I had my map. Still, I worried about Cricket. All that first day I watched her for signs of trouble, careful to measure the look in her eyes. We were just two people, infinitely small with an ocean of sand around us and nowhere to turn if trouble arose.
But Cricket was better than her word. She rode without complaint, quietly studying the dunes on the horizon, glancing up occasionally to marvel at the sun. She drank only sparingly and only when I said so, and she quickly adopted the habit of desert people of not speaking too often, a way of saving both strength and body moisture. I knew as I watched her that I’d made the right choice.
Our journey, though, would be a long one, because I had mapped out a route that looped south beneath Ganjor, avoiding it entirely. Almost everyone who came through the desert did so through Ganjor, especially if they were from the continent. We could have rested there for days, refreshed our animals and gotten new supplies, but only if I wasn’t recognized. King Baralosus might have given me Zephyr as a peace offering, but I doubted he’d be happy to see me.